An analysis of social media traffic in downtown Baltimore Monday has unearthed striking connections to the protests in Ferguson, Mo. last year, according to a leading data mining firm that shared its findings exclusively with Fox News.
The firm, which asked to remain anonymous because of its government work, found between 20 and 50 social media accounts in Baltimore that were also tied to the peak period of violence in Ferguson.
While further analysis is being conducted on the data, it suggests the presence of “professional protesters” or anarchists taking advantage of Freddie Gray’s death to incite more violence.
Gray, 25, died April 18, a week after being injured while in police custody. A wave of violence erupted in Baltimore following his funeral Monday.
One account, which also tracked the recent union protests in New York City as well as other disturbances, tweeted photos of Gray’s funeral and used language that seemed to anticipate violence in Baltimore.
United States President Barack Obama has called on the nation to do some soul searching if the underlying tensions between African American communities and the police are to be fundamentally addressed.
Speaking at the White House a day after hundreds rioted on the streets of Baltimore on the East Coast, the President also slammed the ‘thugs’ and ‘criminals’ who infiltrated legitimate protests after the death of a black man while in police custody.
Scenes of chaos, looting and wanton destruction erupted soon after the funeral of a black man who died while in police custody nine days ago. A day later, the National Guard was made to bring order to the streets.
But this is a cycle that the President believes will take more than just sending in the cavalry.
The US has expanded the size of their criminal justice system over four decades to contain ethnic strife.
The American criminal justice system is dominated by racial disparities. Since 2002, the United States has had the highest incarceration rate in the world.
Although prison populations are increasing in some parts of the world, the natural rate of incarceration for countries comparable to the United States tends to stay around 100 prisoners per 100,000 population.
The US incarcerates 716 people for every 100,000 residents, more than any other country. In fact, the rate of incarceration is more than five times higher than most of the countries in the world.
The state of Louisiana is often called out for having the single highest incarceration rate in the world.
African Americans now constitute nearly 1 million of the total 2.3 million incarcerated population, at nearly six times the rate of whites.
Together, African American and Hispanics comprised 58% of all prisoners in 2008, even though African Americans and Hispanics make up approximately one quarter of the US population
One in six black men had been incarcerated as of 2001. If current trends continue, one in three black males born today can expect to spend time in prison during his lifetime.
Nationwide, African-Americans represent 26% of juvenile arrests, 44% of youth who are detained, 46% of the youth who are judicially waived to criminal court, and 58% of the youth admitted to state prisons (Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice).
Obama says, “In those environments, if we just think we’re going to send the police to do the dirty work of containing the problems that arise there, without as a nation and as a society saying what can we do to change those communities, to help lift up those communities and give those kids opportunity, then we’re not going to solve this problem and we’ll go through the same cycles of periodic conflicts between the police and communities and the occasional riots in the streets and everybody will feign concern until it goes away and then we go about our business as usual.”
These are Obama’s first remarks after the death of Freddie Gray 10 days ago and he called for a rethink on education, criminal justice and economic development, particularly in poor communities.
The home of the rich, New York, is tied with Rwanda, which has the third highest national incarceration rate. Rwanda incarcerates so many people (492 per 100,000) because thousands are sentenced or awaiting trial in connection with the 1994 genocide.
Next comes the state of Washington, which claims the same incarceration rate as the Russian Federation.
A white off-duty policeman shot and killed a black teenager in St Louis on Wednesday, officers said, triggering a night of protests just miles from the site of another police shooting of another black youth in the suburb of Ferguson.
Police said the 18-year-old was armed and fired three shots while he was being chased by the officer, and they had recovered a gun at the scene.
The youth was killed almost two months to the day since sometimes violent protests erupted in Ferguson after a white police officer shot dead unarmed black 18-year-old Michael Brown.
In Wednesday’s shooting, the dead man was one of three people who fled after being approached by the officer, a six-year veteran of the department who was working for a private security company, St. Louis Metropolitan Police Chief Sam Dotson said.
The officer, who was wearing his city police uniform, fired 17 shots at the teenager, police added.
A crowd of around 200 gathered at the scene in the south St. Louis neighborhood of Shaw, 11 miles (18 km) south of Ferguson. Many of the protesters marched to a major thoroughfare, partially blocking traffic and chanting “Whose streets? Our streets?” as a police helicopter hovered overhead.
Teyonna Myers, 23, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper that she was the cousin of the suspect and that he was unarmed when he was killed.
“He had a sandwich in his hand, and they thought it was a gun. It’s like Michael Brown all over again,” she told the paper. Police have not named the teenager.
Thousands protested in US cities overnight as President Barack Obama appealed for calm following the acquittal in Florida of a man who gunned down an unarmed black teenager.
The angry protests highlight simmering racial tensions after a jury found volunteer watchman George Zimmerman not guilty of murdering 17 year-old Trayvon Martin.
Demonstrators held noisy rallies in US cities including New York, San Francisco, Boston, Detroit and Chicago.
At least six people were arrested in Los Angeles early Monday when riot police broke up an “unlawful assembly” in Hollywood near the CNN building.
To the chants of “No justice, no peace!” a separate crowd blocked traffic on an important freeway elsewhere in the giant metropolis, local media reported.
Memories are still fresh of the deadly April 1992 riots in Los Angeles, which broke out after a similar racially-tinged trial.
The most numerous rally Sunday was in New York City, where several thousand — including families with children — marched to Times Square under the watchful eye of police.
Zimmerman protest in Washington, DC
Many in the multi-racial crowd brandished signs bearing a portrait of Martin, while some, despite sweltering July heat, wore “hoodie” sweatshirts as the teen did the night he was killed.
“I am appalled,” said Carli VanVoorhis, a 21-year-old hairdresser.
“The man was armed, the kid was not, and the man with the gun got away,” she said. “If we say it was not a racial issue, we would be lying.”
“We have a big problem with race, and another problem is guns,” said protester Rodney Rodriguez. “If Zimmerman didn’t have a gun, he couldn’t have killed Trayvon Martin.”
Fellow protester Derreck Wilson, 46, said the group had come “to say in a peaceful way why we are angry. We are angry, scared and anxious.”
“It’s cathartic,” he said.
“We all have the same desires. I want to be able to have my son to come home,” added Wilson, who came to the protest from the traditionally African-American neighborhood of Harlem.
The case has pitted those who belive that Zimmerman, a 29-year-old Hispanic neighborhood watchman, killed Martin in self-defense, and those who believe it was a murder sparked by racist assumptions.
Obama, the first black US president, urged Americans to step back and accept the trial verdict.
“We are a nation of laws, and a jury has spoken,” the president said in a statement. “I now ask every American to respect the call for calm reflection from two parents who lost their young son.”
Zimmerman was accused of pursuing Martin through a gated community in the town of Sanford and shooting him during an altercation on the rainy night of February 26, 2012.
The defense successfully argued that Zimmerman fired his handgun in self-defense after the teen wrestled him to the ground and was slamming his head against the pavement.
According to Florida’s controversial “Stand Your Ground” law, people who fear for their lives can use deadly force to defend themselves without having to flee a confrontation.
“We should ask ourselves, as individuals and as a society, how we can prevent future tragedies like this,” Obama said. “As citizens, that’s a job for all of us. That’s the way to honor Trayvon Martin.”
Obama last year spoke emotionally about the case, noting that if he had a son he would “look like Trayvon.”
The racial divide was evident in Sanford pastor Valerie Houston’s Sunday sermon.
“Dr (Martin Luther) King (Jr) stated, the daily life of the Negro is still in the basement of the Great Society,” she said. “And today I state, the daily life of my people is still enslaved to a white supremacist society.”
Martin’s parents — father, Tracy, and mother Sybrina Fulton — asked the public before the verdict to respect the trial outcome, and afterwards gave thanks for the outpouring of support they received over the past year.
Martin family attorney Benjamin Crump declined to say whether they would file a civil lawsuit against Zimmerman, but said “they are going to certainly look at that as an option.”
“They deeply want a sense of justice. They deeply don’t want their son’s death to be in vain,” he told ABC News’s “This Week.”
The US Justice Department said Sunday it will resume its probe into whether hate crime charges can be brought against Zimmerman. The probe was put on hold until after the Florida trial.
Federal prosecutors “will determine whether the evidence reveals a prosecutable violation of any of the limited federal criminal civil rights statutes within our jurisdiction,” it said in a statement.
With the acquital, Zimmerman’s lawyers told the Washington Post that they will immediately resume a defamation lawsuit against NBC News for selectively editing a phone call to police which made their client seem like a racist. That case was also put on hold pending the trial results. – AFP
On Monday, the Broward County Sheriff’s Office released a video calling on the public not to riot in the wake of the George Zimmerman verdict, expected this week or next in Florida. The Sheriff’s Office released a statement explaining that it was “working closely with the Sanford Police Department and other local law enforcement agencies” to coordinate “a response plan in anticipation of the verdict.”
The video, titled “Raise Your Voice, Not Your Hands,” focuses on attempting to channel reaction into non-violent response. It depicts two youngsters, one black teenage boy, one Hispanic teenage girl. “Raise your voice!” says the girl. “And not your hands!” says the boy. “We need to stand together as one, no cuffs, no guns,” says the girl. “Let’s give violence a rest, because we can easily end up arrested,” says the boy. “I know your patience will be tested,” says the girl, and then both conclude, “but law enforcement has your back!”
“Let’s back up and choose not to act up, and deputies are with us, so no need to act up,” says the boy. “Let it roll off your shoulders,” says the girl, “it’s water off your back, don’t lack composure, because in one instant it could be over.” Both conclude: “So let’s make the choice to raise your voice and not your hands.” Sheriff Scott Israel says, “I’m Sheriff Scott Israel, and law enforcement does have your back.”
“Freedom of expression is a constitutional right,” the Sheriff’s Department states. “While raising your voice is encouraged, using your hands is not. BSO has created a public service announcement with the help of kids from the Jason Taylor Foundation, H.A.N.D.Y. (Helping Abused, Neglected, Disadvantaged Youth) and basketball star James Jones of the championship Miami Heat team urging young people not to let their emotions get the best of them.”
Sheriff Scott Israel said, “We don’t have information about a specific event that might take place at the conclusion of the trial, but we encourage everyone to keep any protests peaceful.”
The Department says that it is keeping its channels of communication open with “community leaders, civic activists, members of the clergy, as well as local, state and federal agencies.” – Breitbart
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Youth gang riots in the Swedish capital Stockholm have entered fifth straight night. Hundreds of mostly immigrant teenagers tore through the suburbs, smashing windows and burning cars in the country’s worst outbreak of violence in years.
At least six vehicles were torched throughout the city late on Thursday while the police called for reinforcements from other Swedish cities bracing for further unrest.
Firefighters were putting out flames that engulfed several cars and a school in immigrant-dominated areas of Stockholm.
The night before, the fire brigades were called to some 90 different blazes. On the fourth night of violence, youths torched over 30 cars in 15 neighborhoods along with a restaurant in Skogas, south of Stockholm. Three law enforcement officers were injured, police spokesperson Kjell Lindgren reported.
Stockholm firefighters were busy throughout the night, saying they had “never before seen so many fires raging at the same time.” Some 90 blazes were reported in total, most of them reportedly caused by the rioters. Still, the fourth night of violence was relatively quiet compared to the previous three, RT’s Peter Oliver reported from Stockholm.
Leaders of immigrant communities were out on the streets in a bid to stop young people from rioting. Despite their efforts, as soon as the night fell, groups of arsonists took to the streets to set cars on fire. RT’s Peter Oliver witnessed rioters throwing stones at police and journalists alike.
Civil disorder in Stockholm started on Sunday, when police shot and killed a 69-old-man in his apartment after he confronted officers with a machete; the unrest has since continued throughout week.
Community leaders insist that a main reason for the violence is the high rate of unemployment in immigrant communities, particularly in the suburb of Husby near central Stockholm, one of the worst affected by the nighttime violence, Peter Oliver reported.
Although Sweden’s unemployment rate is below the EU average, joblessness among those under 25 has reached nearly 25 percent. The RT crew in Stockholm noted that a majority of those taking part in the violence are young.
Parents of the rampaging teenagers and community religious leaders are now spending sleepless nights on the street in an effort to prevent their children from wreaking havoc.
Meanwhile, the Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt blamed the violence on “hooligans” and said they did not represent the majority in the rioting neighborhoods.
“I think it’s dangerous to draw a picture of Sweden with a capital separated from its suburbs. I don’t think that’s true. I think the dividing line runs straight through Husby, with a majority population and then a small group of troublemakers,” Reinfeldt said.
But the Husby youth taking part in riots told Reuters they are indeed divided from the rest of Stockholm, struggling to find a full-time job with their Husby address. Most of the interviewed rioters were reportedly unemployed.
The claims of social exclusion in immigrant-dominated suburbs have been partly conceded by Sweden’s Integration Minister Erik Ullenhag, who said the ministry is aware of “discrimination in these areas.” But the riots “don’t improve the image of these areas, where there is a lot of positive stuff going on,” he added.
For years, Sweden – one of Europe’s most tranquil countries, famous for its attractive immigration policies and generous welfare system – has been accepting an influx of immigrants, which now make up about 15 per cent of its population. These migrants have failed to integrate into Swedish society, and are only in the country to enjoy the country’s social benefits system, Swedish journalist Ingrid Carlqvist told RT.
“The problem is not from the Swedish government or from the Swedish people,” the editor in chief of Dispatch International said. “The last 20 years or so, we have seen so many immigrants coming to Sweden that really don’t like Sweden. They do not want to integrate, they do not want to live in [Swedish] society: Working, paying taxes and so on.”
“The people come here now because they know that Sweden will give them money for nothing. They don’t have to work, they don’t have to pay taxes – they can just stay here and get a lot of money. That is really a problem,” Carlqvist added.
“The police could do so much, [instead] they have told the public that they mean to do as little as possible. But they could go there and use water cannons, they could not let people out onto the streets at night. There are so many things they could do within the law – but they don’t do it,” she said.
Young Muslims who enjoy tolerance, social institutions and welfare while living in Sweden nevertheless refuse to integrate into the West, Gerolf Annemans told RT. Annemans is the parliamentary leader of Vlaams Belang (‘Flemish Interest’), a Belgian far-right nationalist political party.
“They [Muslim youths] have always sought excuse to show that they are not agreeing with the basic values of Western society,” Annemans said, pointing to the recent cases of the Boston Marathon bombing in the US and yesterday’s beheading of a British soldier in the UK.
“It’s always the same problem. There is a massive refusal by Muslim youngsters of the basics of Western society… and they take any excuse whatsoever to show that with violence – that is where the problem is,” he said. – RT
Firemen extinguish a burning car parked in an indoor garage in the Stockholm suburb of Tureberg after youths rioted in several different suburbs for a fourth consecutive night on May 24, 2013 (AFP Photo / Jonathan Nackstrand)The night before, the fire brigades were called to some 90 different blazes. On the fourth night of violence, youths torched over 30 cars in 15 neighborhoods along with a restaurant in Skogas, south of Stockholm. Three law enforcement officers were injured, police spokesperson Kjell Lindgren reportedStockholm firefighters were busy throughout the night, saying they had “never before seen so many fires raging at the same time.” Some 90 blazes were reported in total, most of them reportedly caused by the rioters. Still, the fourth night of violence was relatively quiet compared to the previous three, RT’s Peter Oliver reported from Stockholm.
Gangs of youth angered by the police shooting death of an elderly man in a mainly immigrant neighborhood hurled rocks at police and set cars and buildings on fire in a Stockholm suburb early Monday, forcing the evacuation of an apartment block.
Around 50 youths were involved in the riots in the suburb of Husby, police spokesman Lars Bystrom said.
The youths set light to a parking garage, compelling police to evacuate residents from an adjacent apartment block, Bystrom said. Residents were allowed to return home after a couple of hours.
Around 80 percent of the roughly 11,000 people living in Husby – a drab, low-income neighborhood of apartment blocks west of Stockholm – are first or second generation immigrants.
“Youth” in European news stories is a euphemism for black hooligans. The euphemism “Asian” wasn’t used and is an indication that they are black Africans, probably Somalis. The area where this occurred is 80% non-Swedish.
Bystrom said police responded to calls of burning cars and were met by masked youths hurling rocks at them.
One policeman was attacked by youths kicking him and two others were injured by rocks, local police officer Jorgen Karlsson said. He added around 10 cars were set ablaze, and windows were smashed at two schools and several local businesses.
Karlsson said the dead man was “European,” but couldn’t specify his nationality.
Residents said they had gathered to protest against the shooting death and that police responded by sending in SWAT teams that cordoned off the area.
“I understand that people react like this,” said Rami Al-Khamisi from the organization Megafonen, which represents citizens in Stockholm’s suburbs.
The organization said police had used excessive violence against the youths and also attacked passers-by with batons and dogs.
Police have launched an internal probe to investigate the shooting death on May 13 of a 69-year-old man in Husby. They say they shot the man in self-defense because he had attacked police with a knife when they broke down the door to an apartment, where he had locked himself up with a woman.
However, Megafonen has criticized police for initially releasing a faulty report saying the man was taken to a hospital. The group said residents had seen his dead body being transported from the scene hours after the shooting in a hearse, which police later admitted was correct. SAPA/AP
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