Kevin Spacey Faces Felony Charge – accusation of sexual assault, Harvey Weinstein judge declines to dismiss charges in rape case, Paedophile ring “conspire to abuse babies, toddlers and young children”
December 25, 2018 Comments Off on Kevin Spacey Faces Felony Charge – accusation of sexual assault, Harvey Weinstein judge declines to dismiss charges in rape case, Paedophile ring “conspire to abuse babies, toddlers and young children”
describes abuse
Kevin Spacey Faces Felony Charge in Misconduct Case
By Sopan Deb Dec. 24, 2018
Kevin Spacey will be charged with a felony following an accusation of sexual assault made public last year, the authorities in Nantucket said on Monday.
The charge, first reported by The Boston Globe, is in connection with an accusation of misconduct that was made by a former television anchor, Heather Unruh, who said that Mr. Spacey sexually assaulted her 18-year-old son in July 2016 at a bar in Nantucket.
Michael O’Keefe, the Cape and Islands district attorney in Massachusetts, said in a statement that Mr. Spacey would be arraigned on Jan. 7 for one charge of indecent assault and battery, the first criminal charge levied against him as a result of sexual misconduct allegations. The statement also said there was a public show cause hearing in Nantucket District Court last Thursday, after which Clerk Magistrate Brian Kearney issued the criminal complaint.
A representative for Mr. Spacey did not respond to a request for comment. But the actor has apologized for one incident and denied at least one other accusation of wrongdoing….
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/24/movies/kevin-spacey-criminal-charges.html
Kevin Spacey scandal: A complete list of the 15 accusers
Maria Puente, USA TODAY Nov. 7, 2017
The first accusation of sexual misconduct against Oscar-winning actor Kevin Spacey landed on Oct. 29, and a little more than a week later more than a dozen men — including five who said they were teens at the time — have come forward to allege he sexually harassed, assaulted or attempted to rape them.
Here is a list of accusers, some of them named, some of them anonymous….
https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/2017/11/07/kevin-spacey-scandal-complete-list-13-accusers/835739001/
Harvey Weinstein judge declines to dismiss charges in rape case, sets pretrial hearing for March
By Eric Levenson and Elizabeth Joseph, CNN Thu December 20, 2018
New York (CNN)Harvey Weinstein, the disgraced movie mogul whose downfall helped launch the #MeToo movement, is due back in New York court on March 7 after a judge Thursday morning ordered a pretrial hearing in the rape case.
The proceedings lasted just 10 minutes, a remarkably quick resolution to a highly anticipated and pivotal appearance that the defense had hoped would end with the charges against Weinstein getting dropped.
“We are obviously disappointed that the court did not dismiss the indictment, but Judge (James) Burke has ruled, and we intend to continue to vigorously defend this case to the best of our ability,” Weinstein’s attorney, Ben Brafman, said outside the Manhattan courthouse.
Weinstein, 66, has pleaded not guilty to five felony charges, including predatory sexual assault and rape, in connection with two women in separate incidents. Thursday’s hearing came in response to a motion filed by Brafman to dismiss the remaining counts or to hold evidentiary hearings on whether certain witnesses can testify.
The judge denied both requests, saying the defendant can explore witness credibility issues at trial, court documents show….
https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/20/us/harvey-weinstein-court-charges/index.html
Eighth member of paedophile ring – including Hull man David Harsley – jailed for plotting to rape baby
David Harsley and six other members of the gang were jailed in 2015
By Sophie Corcoran 29 NOV 2018
The eighth member of a sickening paedophile ring who plotted to rape a seven-month old baby has been jailed today.
Matthew Law, 50, worked alongside seven others, including Hull man David Harsley, to conspire to abuse babies, toddlers and young children.
The gang used encrypted communication and the dark web to evade detection, and were branded ‘monsters in disguise’ after grooming mothers to gain their trust so they could have access to their children unsupervised.
Harsley, 55, a hospital worker, befriended a “vulnerable” pregnant and single woman at a social club. He was looking after the boy and committed a sex act in front of the child while fellow gang members John Denham and Matthew Lisk watched over Skype….
Hollyson admitted filming himself raping a three-month-old baby in what the judge at the time called one of the most horrific abuse cases on record.
The seven men were jailed for a total of 78 years after Adam Tom’s confession sparked an investigation into the gang, who have now been revealed to have drugged babies and toddlers.
The gang would groom mothers – some while they were still pregnant – to gain unsupervised access to their children….
One baby was raped and sexually abused by three of the gang members over a period of months. The others watched on live internet feeds….
https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/news/hull-east-yorkshire-news/eighth-member-paedophile-ring-including-2275623
Psychiatric Impact of Organized and Ritual Child Sexual Abuse, Spain police bust ‘Black magic’ prostitution ring, North Korea: Sexual abuse of women ‘common
November 1, 2018 § Leave a comment
– Psychiatric Impact of Organized and Ritual Child Sexual Abuse: Cross-Sectional Findings from Individuals Who Report Being Victimized
– Spain police bust ‘black magic’ prostitution ring in Murcia
– North Korea: Sexual abuse of women ‘common’, report claims
Article
Psychiatric Impact of Organized and Ritual Child Sexual Abuse: Cross-Sectional Findings from Individuals Who Report Being Victimized
Johanna Schröder, Susanne Nick, Hertha Richter-Appelt and Peer Briken
Institute for Sex Research and Forensic Psychiatry, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, 20246 Hamburg, Germany
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2018, 15(11), 2417; doi: 10.3390/ijerph15112417
Abstract: Organized and ritual child sexual abuse (ORA) is often rooted in the child’s own family. Empirical evidence on possible associations between ORA and trauma-related symptoms in those who report this kind of extreme and prolonged violence is rare. The aim of our study was to explore socio-demographic and clinical characteristics of the individuals reporting ORA experiences, and to investigate protective as well as promotive factors in the link between ORA and trauma-related symptom severity. Within the framework of a project of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse in Germany, we recruited 165 adults who identified themselves as ORA victims via abuse- and trauma-specific networks and mailing lists, and they completed an anonymous online survey. We used variance analyses to examine correlations between several variables in the ORA context and PTSD symptoms (PCL-5) as well as somatoform dissociation (SDQ-5). Results revealed a high psychic strain combined with an adverse health care situation in individuals who report experiences with ORA. Ideological strategies used by perpetrators as well as Dissociative Identity Disorders experienced by those affected are associated with more severe symptoms (η2p = 0.11; η2p = 0.15), while an exit out of the ORA structures is associated with milder symptoms (η2p = 0.11). Efforts are needed to improve health care services for individuals who experience severe and complex psychiatric disorders due to ORA in their childhood.
1. Introduction
Child sexual abuse (CSA), once thought to be rare, is nowadays accepted as a frequent reality that occurs across a range of cultures and socioeconomic backgrounds worldwide and encompasses many types of sexually abusive acts towards children, including sexual assault, incest, the production and use of child pornography, as well as commercial sexual exploitation [1]. Sexual child abuse involving a network of perpetrators acting repeatedly and jointly on multiple victims is defined as ‘organized abuse’ [2]. Organized abuse that follows a (pseudo-) ideological strategy (e.g., symbols or group activities with religious, magical, or supernatural connotations) in order to frighten and intimidate the children or to force the victims to participate whilst simultaneously accomplishing the perpetrators’ exculpation is referred to as ‘ritual abuse’ [3,4]. Salter further describes ritual abuse as ideological framing in organized CSA contexts, functioning as strategical practices through which abusive groups indoctrinate the victims into a violently misogynistic worldview in order to control them [4]. In other words, ritual abuse occurs when a religious, political, or spiritual authority uses its position of power and the sovereignty to interpret the respective belief system to manipulate and dominate its followers. Since the 1980s, evidence of organized and ritual abuse (ORA) has been consolidated due to studies documenting psychological harm amongst children and adults disclosing such experiences [5]….
5. Conclusions
ORA, defined as organized child sexual abuse where a (pseudo-)ideological (i.e., ritual) content serves as legitimization for violence, is a complex and polarizing issue in mental health care contexts as well as in research. At present, the uncovering and reprocessing of ORA is a problem that remains to be solved in Germany, as well as internationally. Given the paucity of research in this field, we believe that this study contributes to closing this evidence gap, as it presents empirical data on reported practices of ORA and its impact on trauma-related symptom severity in self-identified victims, in which reported ideological/ritual strategies by the perpetrators and an exit out of the ORA structures play a major role. A key policy priority should therefore be to intensify efforts on the understanding of ORA-related structures, as well as the complex clinical presentation of those affected. Services like information websites and exit programs should be developed by experts in the field in order to contribute to generating appropriate treatment services for this group of clients. Mental health professionals and centers specialized in the treatment of severely traumatized clients with CPTSD and dissociative disorders would contribute to a better support of clients who report such trauma histories. The therapeutic process of detachment from perpetrator networks is intense, and supporters of individuals who experience ORA face special difficulties, like, for example, dissociative personality states. Therefore, it is essential to ensure that constant professional supervision is provided to them by professionals who understand the spectrum of possibilities and pitfalls in the treatment….
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/15/11/2417/htm
Spain police bust ‘black magic’ prostitution ring in Murcia
Spanish police say they have rescued 15 transgender Brazilians from forced prostitution in the city of Murcia.
The victims were beaten, forced to use and sell drugs, and often kept locked inside a flat, officials say.
They are also said to have been threatened with the use of black magic if they did not comply.
Objects related to the ritual-filled Santería religion were found in the flat. Thirteen suspects were detained for allegedly running the ring.
The authorities say the ring was headed by Brazilian who worked with associates to recruit vulnerable young people in Brazil….
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-46049213
North Korea: Sexual abuse of women ‘common’, report claims
North Korean officials commit sexual abuse against women with near total impunity, a report has claimed.
Human Rights Watch added that it is so common it has become part of ordinary life.
The report is based on interviews with 62 North Koreans who fled the country. They gave detailed accounts of rape and sexual abuse.
HRW said it revealed a culture of open, unaddressed abuse, particularly from men in positions of power.
Oh Jung-hee, a former trader in her 40s told Human Rights Watch (HRW): “They consider us [sex] toys. We are at the mercy of men.”
“Sometimes, out of nowhere, you cry at night and don’t know why.”
Gathering information from inside the secretive state is extremely difficult and reports like this are rare.
‘My life was in his hands’
According to HRW some women expressed that sexual abuse had become so normalised that they did not think it was “unusual” – with some saying it had become accepted as part of everyday life….
The perpetrators include high-ranking party officials, prison facility guards, police and soldiers.
Interviewees told HRW that when an official “picked” a woman, she would have little choice but to comply….
It added that forced abortion, rape and sexual violence had been carried out in prisons or in detention….
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46053342
Nevada’s famous pimp expected to win election despite death – multiple allegations of sexual assault, Casa Isla abuse case
October 18, 2018 § Leave a comment
– Nevada’s famous pimp expected to win election despite death “stunts that included helping several women “auction” their virginity…multiple allegations of sexual assault against him…If Hof wins on Nov. 6, county officials will nominate another Republican to fill the vacancy”
– After delays, trial set for November in Casa Isla abuse case “eight staff members at a Department of Youth Services facility were arrested for allegedly beating adolescent boys who were detained there….where boys were allegedly beaten, sexually assaulted and given alcohol and pornography “
Nevada’s famous pimp expected to win election despite death
The Associated Press MICHELLE L. PRICE Oct 17th 2018
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Nevada’s most famous pimp tried to bring the state’s legal brothel industry into the mainstream by mingling with celebrities, showcasing his business on HBO and staging outlandish publicity stunts.
Dennis Hof’s fame made him an attention-grabbing figure in an otherwise quiet industry. And, despite being found dead on Tuesday, he’s poised to win an election to the state Legislature in less than three weeks.
Hof, who starred in the HBO reality series “Cathouse,” marketed himself as a Donald Trump-style Republican in his race for a heavily GOP Assembly district that includes wide stretches of desert where nuclear bombs were once tested.
His body was found at his Love Ranch brothel outside Las Vegas following a weekend of parties celebrating his 72nd birthday. Guests included porn actor Ron Jeremy, “Hollywood Madam” Heidi Fleiss, former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio and a mix of local politicians and friends….
While waging a no-holds-barred campaign, Hof’s incendiary style drew fans and well-known supporters such as Trump adviser Roger Stone and Arpaio. But it also brought scrutiny to Hof’s businesses and alienated him from the state’s GOP establishment.
Nevada is the only state to allow legal prostitution, which occurs at about 20 licensed brothels in mostly rural areas.
Most brothel owners keep a low profile, offering few interviews and buying only subtle advertising. But Hof had a penchant for splashy billboards and stunts that included helping several women “auction” their virginity….
If Hof wins on Nov. 6, county officials will nominate another Republican to fill the vacancy….
Billing himself as “the Trump of Pahrump,” Hof wrote a memoir in 2015 titled “The Art of the Pimp,” akin to Trump’s book “The Art of the Deal.” After winning the primary, he credited the president with paving the way by proving a candidate could upend establishment politics and win.
Trump “was the Christopher Columbus for me,” Hof told The Associated Press. “He found the way and I jumped on it.”
Hof, who was born in Phoenix in 1946, owned several gas stations and other small businesses before moving to Nevada in the 1970s.
He had two daughters, who are both adults and were estranged from him for years, Muth said. Hof also had an ex-wife, but Muth did not know her whereabouts or details about her.
In 1992, Hof bought his first brothel and eventually grew his empire to six, including an Area 51-themed brothel. He began selling some of the properties this year as he faced regulatory problems in southern Nevada and a push to outlaw licensed bordellos in the two counties where he operated.
Hof said he was downsizing to focus on politics, which he called “a dirty business.” He said the anti-brothel push, the regulatory problems and multiple allegations of sexual assault against him were politically motivated.
Three of the allegations from prostitutes never resulted in charges. Few details have been released about a fourth allegation that the Nevada Department of Public Safety was investigating. It was made in September by a woman who reported at a hospital that Hof had raped her.
Hof denied all of the accusations….
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2018/10/17/nevadas-famous-pimp-expected-to-win-election-despite-death/23564404/
After delays, trial set for November in Casa Isla abuse case
By Shira Schoenberg
BOSTON — More than three years ago, eight staff members at a Department of Youth Services facility were arrested for allegedly beating adolescent boys who were detained there.
The criminal case is expected to go to trial in Suffolk Superior Court in November.
Attorneys involved in the case say the delays were mostly a matter of logistics, a huge amount of evidence and dealing with motions. The trial is expected to shed light on the environment at the Casa Isla detention facility in Boston, where boys were allegedly beaten, sexually assaulted and given alcohol and pornography, according to court documents.
“The defendants, staff members who were responsible for taking care of and protecting the residents in their care, instilled a culture of fear at the Casa Isla program in order to make the residents comply with the program’s rules and not cause more work for the defendants,” wrote Assistant District Attorney Sarah Stancato McEvoy in a filing asking for permission to introduce evidence not tied directly to specific assault allegations.
Victims of the abuse and their family members have separately filed three lawsuits against the state; Volunteers of America of Massachusetts, which had a state contract to run Casa Isla; and individual staff members.
Casa Isla was a youth detention facility for boys committed by the courts to the custody of the state Department of Youth Services. It housed approximately 100 adolescent boys each year until it was closed in 2014 amid an investigation into the alleged abuse…. https://www.masslive.com/politics/index.ssf/2018/10/after_delays_trial_set_for_nov.html
Yale roommate says Kavanaugh lied under oath about drinking and yearbook, How Trauma Affects Memory, More Believe Ford Than Kavanaugh, A Cultural Shift From 1991
October 4, 2018 Comments Off on Yale roommate says Kavanaugh lied under oath about drinking and yearbook, How Trauma Affects Memory, More Believe Ford Than Kavanaugh, A Cultural Shift From 1991
– Yale roommate says Kavanaugh lied under oath about drinking and yearbook
– Kavanaugh’s college roommate: He was lying (interview)
– How Trauma Affects Memory: Scientists Weigh In On The Kavanaugh Hearing
– Poll: More Believe Ford Than Kavanaugh, A Cultural Shift From 1991
Yale roommate says Kavanaugh lied under oath about drinking and yearbook
By Kate Sullivan, CNN Wed October 3, 2018
Washington (CNN)James Roche, one of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s freshman year roommates at Yale, said Wednesday that Kavanaugh lied under oath about his drinking and about the meaning of his yearbook entries.
In an op-ed for Slate, Roche writes, “Brett Kavanaugh stood up under oath and lied about his drinking and about the meaning of words in his yearbook. He did so baldly, without hesitation or reservation.”
“In his words and his behavior, Judge Kavanaugh has shown contempt for the truth, for the process, for the rule of law, and for accountability,” Roche added. “His willingness to lie to avoid embarrassment throws doubt on his denials about the larger questions of sexual assault.”
Kavanaugh testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee that he has never been blackout drunk. He was appearing before senators to answer an accusation from California professor Christine Blasey Ford that he sexually assaulted her when they were both in high school in the early 1980s. Kavanaugh denies the allegation and says he has no memory of the party where Ford says the incident happened.
Roche says he believes his friend Deborah Ramirez, who has accused Kavanaugh of exposing himself to her at a college dorm party.
He told CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Wednesday night that “there is zero chance that she is making up this story.”
Kavanaugh has denied Ramirez’s allegation. CNN has reached out to the White House for reaction to Roche’s comments.
Roche told CNN, “I saw him both what I would consider blackout drunk and also dealing with the repercussions of that in the morning.”
“I didn’t socialize with Brett,” Roche said. “He would come home and he was incoherent, stumbling, he would sometimes be singing, he occasionally would wear this — I think it was an old leather football helmet — and he would throw up, and then in the morning would have a lot of trouble getting out of bed.”….
Roche writes he does not know if Kavanaugh attacked Ford in high school or exposed himself to Ramirez in college, “But I can say that he lied under oath.”
In Roche’s appearance on “Anderson Cooper 360,” he said he was “shocked” when he heard Kavanaugh say “boofing” meant flatulence and “Devil’s Triangle” was a drinking game, “because those words were commonly used and they were references to sexual activities. … I heard them talking about it regularly. I think that contributed to some of my feelings about the fact that these guys treated women in a way that I didn’t like.”
“We were in a room together — our beds were 10 feet apart for a couple of months,” Roche told Cooper. “And what struck me and made me more interested in speaking out about it is not only did I know that he wasn’t telling, you know, the truth, I knew that he knew that he wasn’t telling the truth.”
Roche told CNN his memory of Kavanaugh is that “he was on the far edge of this — he was notably heavier in his drinking than other people.”….
https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/03/politics/yale-roommate-kavanaugh-cnntv/index.html
Kavanaugh’s college roommate: He was lying
CNN Published on Oct 3, 2018
James Roche, the college roommate of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, speaks to CNN’s Anderson Cooper about his experience with Kavanaugh at Yale.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQGrTMLYTCI
How Trauma Affects Memory: Scientists Weigh In On The Kavanaugh Hearing
September 28, 2018 Rhitu Chatterjee
In Thursday’s testimony at Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings, Christine Blasey Ford alleged Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her at a party in 1982, when she was 15 years old and he was 17.
Kavanaugh staunchly denied these allegations.
But memory is fallible. A question on many people’s minds is, how well can anyone recall something that happened over 35 years ago?
Pretty well, say scientists, if the memory is of a traumatic event. That’s because of the key role emotions play in making and storing memories.
On any given day, our brains store or “encode” only some of the things we experience. “What we pay attention to is what’s more likely to get encoded,” says Jim Hopper, a teaching associate in psychology at Harvard University and a consultant on sexual assault and trauma.
A region of the brain called the hippocampus plays an important role in this process. Ford referred to the hippocampus when questioned by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., about how she was so sure that Kavanaugh was the perpetrator of the alleged assault.
“The hippocampus certainly plays a role in taking things into short-term memory and then transferring them and consolidating them into long-term memories,” says Hopper.
If an event elicits an emotional reaction in us, then it’s more likely to make it into our memory. “Things that have more emotional significance tend to get more encoded,” he says.
And when something elicits an intense negative emotion, like a trauma, it’s even more likely to be encoded in the brain….
That’s because a high-stress state “alters the function of the hippocampus and puts it into a super-encoding mode,” says Hopper, especially early on during an event. And “the central details [of the event] get burned into their memory and they may never forget them.”….
However, this doesn’t mean that these memories include every detail of the event. The brain holds on to the most important stuff at the expense of the peripheral details….
Another factor that affects how memories are stored is alcohol use.
“Generally alcohol can make people forget things,” says Mary Beth Miller, a clinical psychologist at the University of Missouri, Columbia who has studied the impact of alcohol consumption on making and retrieving memories.
Earlier this month, Ford told The Washington Post that she remembers Kavanaugh being “stumbling drunk” whereas she recalls having one beer that night.
Other accusers who did not testify Thursday have also suggested Kavanaugh was part of a group of friends who indulged in heavy drinking in the 1980s….
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/09/28/652524372/how-trauma-affects-memory-scientists-weigh-in-on-the-kavanaugh-hearing
Poll: More Believe Ford Than Kavanaugh, A Cultural Shift From 1991
October 3, 2018 Domenico Montanaro
After a day of wrenching testimony from Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford — who has accused him of sexual assault in high school — more Americans say they believe Ford’s account over Kavanaugh’s denials, according to an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll released Wednesday.
In choosing who is telling the truth, 45 percent said Ford is, up from 32 percent ahead of her Sept. 27 testimony. A third (33 percent) said Kavanaugh is the one telling the truth, up slightly from 26 percent before he testified but not as much of a rise as for Ford.
The daylong hearing appears to have been influential in helping people decide who was telling the truth. Before the hearing, 42 percent said they were unsure whom to believe. Now, just 22 percent are unsure.
The results represent a shift from 1991, when more people said they believed then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas over Anita Hill. Hill accused Thomas of sexual harassment in the workplace. A 1991 CBS/New York Times poll, also conducted days after their dramatic, televised Capitol Hill testimonies, found that 58 percent believed Thomas more, as opposed to just 24 percent who said Hill.
“If it remains ‘he said, she said,’ the benefit of the doubt is very different than 1991, and it goes to Ford not Kavanaugh,” said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion, which conducted the poll. “It shows the reaction to the testimony and does show an underlying change in attitude than 27 years ago.”….
https://www.npr.org/2018/10/03/654054108/poll-more-believe-ford-than-kavanaugh-a-cultural-shift-from-1991
Cosby sentenced to 3 to 10 years for sexual assault, Deborah Ramirez has accused Judge Brett Kavanaugh of exposing himself to her
September 26, 2018 § Leave a comment
Bill Cosby sentenced to 3 to 10 years in prison for sexual assault
By Eric Levenson and Aaron Cooper, CNN Tue September 25, 2018
(CNN) Bill Cosby, once known as “America’s Dad,” was sentenced Tuesday to three to 10 years in a state prison for drugging and sexually assaulting Andrea Constand at his home 14 years ago.
Cosby’s bail was revoked and he was escorted from the courthouse in handcuffs.
“This was a serious crime,” Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Judge Steven O’Neill said. “Mr. Cosby, this has all circled back to you. The day has come, the time has come.”
Cosby, convicted in April of aggravated indecent assault, declined to speak to the court prior to the sentence. His attorneys have filed an appeal….
He also was ordered to pay a fine of $25,000 plus the costs of prosecution as part of the sentence. In addition, O’Neill ruled that Cosby will be classified as a “sexually violent predator,” a determination that requires lifetime registration, lifetime mandatory sex offender counseling with a treatment provider and notification to the community that a “sexually violent predator” lives in the area….
The lengthy path to this moment began in 2004 when Cosby, the groundbreaking actor, gave Constand pills to incapacitate her and then sexually assaulted her. She told police in 2005 about the incident but prosecutors declined to press charges, and they settled the case in civil court a year later.
A decade later, dozens of women came forward to say Cosby drugged and sexually assaulted them over his decades as a powerful media figure.
Constand’s was the only one of those cases that occurred within the statute of limitations. A new team of prosecutors took up the case and, relying on Constand’s and Cosby’s statements in a civil deposition, arrested him in December 2015.
A first criminal trial against Cosby ended in a hung jury. But in April, Cosby was convicted of three counts of aggravated indecent assault for drugging and assaulting Constand in the first high-profile celebrity criminal trial of the #MeToo era.
“No one is above the law, and no one should be treated differently or disproportionally,” O’Neill said….
https://www.cnn.com/2018/09/25/us/bill-cosby-sentence-assault/index.html
In a Culture of Privilege and Alcohol at Yale, Her World Converged With Kavanaugh’s
Deborah Ramirez has accused Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh of exposing himself to her during a drinking game at a dorm party when they were freshmen at Yale.
By Stephanie Saul, Robin Pogrebin, Mike McIntire and Ben Protess
Sept. 25, 2018
Last week, more than 30 years after they graduated from Yale, Deborah Ramirez contacted her old friend James Roche.
Something bad had happened to her during a night of drinking in the residence hall their freshmen year, she said, and she wondered if he recalled her mentioning it at the time.
Mr. Roche, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, said he had no knowledge of the episode that Ms. Ramirez was trying to piece together, with her memory faded by the years and clouded by that night’s alcohol use.
Days later, in a New Yorker story, Ms. Ramirez alleged that Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh, President Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, exposed himself to her at a dorm party. Mr. Roche, a former roommate of the judge, believes her account, he said, and supports her decision to speak out.
“I think she feels a duty to come forward,” Mr. Roche said. “And I think she’s scared to death of it.”
Ms. Ramirez’s allegation — she is the second woman to level claims of sexual misconduct against Judge Kavanaugh — has roiled an already tumultuous confirmation process and riven the Yale community….
Chief Justice John Roberts Accused of ‘Cover Up’ for Sitting on Kavanaugh Misconduct Complaints, FBI’s Kavanaugh review was limited from the start, The New York Times reports
October 7, 2018 Comments Off on Chief Justice John Roberts Accused of ‘Cover Up’ for Sitting on Kavanaugh Misconduct Complaints, FBI’s Kavanaugh review was limited from the start, The New York Times reports
– Chief Justice John Roberts Accused of ‘Cover Up’ for Sitting on Kavanaugh Misconduct Complaints
– FBI’s Kavanaugh review was limited from the start, The New York Times reports
– D.C. Circuit sent complaints about Kavanaugh’s testimony to Chief Justice Roberts
– Anti-Kavanaugh protesters keep up the fight, even after he’s confirmed
Chief Justice John Roberts Accused of ‘Cover Up’ for Sitting on Kavanaugh Misconduct Complaints
by Colin Kalmbacher October 6th, 2018
U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts has received over a dozen official judicial misconduct complaints leveled against U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Court Judge and Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
So far he has not forwarded the complaints to a proper judicial panel. Now, some critics are calling foul and accusing Roberts of mounting a cover-up in favor of the controversial Supreme Court nominee.
Those official misconduct complaints were forwarded to Roberts by a fellow member of Kavanaugh’s court. While U.S. Circuit Judge Merrick Garland would traditionally have overseen those complaints, Garland chose to recuse himself on the matter, according to Buzzfeed News.
In his stead, U.S. Circuit Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson fielded the multiple complaints against Kavanaugh. Judge Henderson dismissed many complaints filed against the Supreme Court nominee as “frivolous,” but found substantial merit in over a dozen of the complaints she reviewed.
According to the Washington Post, Henderson began forwarding the complaints she deemed valid onto Roberts. Henderson sent them to Roberts so that Kavanaugh’s fellow judges on the D.C. Circuit would not have to assess the serious and substantive issues raised against a colleague.
In a statement released early on Saturday afternoon, Judge Henderson noted, “Under the Judicial Conduct and Disability Act (28 U.S.C. §§351-364) any person may file a misconduct complaint against a federal judge in the circuit in which the federal judge sits. After the start of Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings, members of the general public began filing complaints in the D.C. Circuit about statements made during those hearings.”
Henderson’s statement continued, clarifying the conduct at issue. She wrote, “The complaints do not pertain to any conduct in which Judge Kavanaugh engaged as a judge. The complaints seek investigations only of the public statements he has made as a nominee to the Supreme Court of the United States.”….
https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/chief-justice-john-roberts-accused-of-cover-up-for-sitting-on-kavanaugh-misconduct-complaints/
FBI’s Kavanaugh review was limited from the start, The New York Times reports
The FBI’s review of Brett Kavanaugh’s background check was limited from the start, The New York Times reports. Joy Reid and her panel discuss the impact reportedly restricting the investigation’s scope may have had on its findings.
https://www.msnbc.com/am-joy/watch/fbi-s-kavanaugh-review-was-limited-from-the-start-the-new-york-times-reports-1338382915520
D.C. Circuit sent complaints about Kavanaugh’s testimony to Chief Justice Roberts
By Carol D. Leonnig , Ann E. Marimow and Tom Hamburger October 6
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. has received more than a dozen judicial misconduct complaints in recent weeks against Brett M. Kavanaugh, who was confirmed as a Supreme Court justice Saturday, but has chosen for the time being not to refer them to a judicial panel for investigation.
A judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit — the court on which Kavanaugh serves — passed on to Roberts a string of complaints the court received starting three weeks ago, said four people familiar with the matter.
That judge, Karen LeCraft Henderson, had dismissed other complaints against Kavanaugh as frivolous, but she concluded that some were substantive enough that they should not be handled by Kavanaugh’s fellow judges in the D.C. Circuit.
In a statement Saturday, Henderson said the complaints centered on statements Kavanaugh made during his Senate confirmation hearings.
Under the law, “any person may file a misconduct complaint in the circuit in which the federal judge sits,” she said in the statement. “The complaints do not pertain to any conduct in which Judge Kavanaugh engaged as a judge. The complaints seek investigations only of the public statements he has made as a nominee to the Supreme Court of the United States.”….
People familiar with the matter say the allegations made in the complaints — that Kavanaugh was dishonest and lacked judicial temperament during his Senate testimony — had already been widely discussed in the Senate and in the public realm. Roberts did not see an urgent need for them to be resolved by the judicial branch while he continued to review the incoming complaints, they said.
The situation is highly unusual, said legal experts and several people familiar with the matter. Never before has a Supreme Court nominee been poised to join the court while a fellow judge recommends that misconduct claims against that nominee warrant review.
Roberts’s decision not to immediately refer the cases to another appeals court has caused some concern in the legal community. Now that he has been confirmed, the details of the complaints may not become public and instead may be dismissed, legal experts say. Supreme Court justices are not subject to the misconduct rules governing these claims.
“If Justice Roberts sits on the complaints, then they will reside in a kind of purgatory and will never be adjudicated,” said Stephen Gillers, a professor at New York University Law School and an expert on Supreme Court ethics. “This is not how the rules anticipated the process would work.”….
Roberts, an appointee of President George W. Bush, has for many years hired Kavanaugh clerks to work for him at the Supreme Court. Bush credits Kavanaugh in his book with helping him choose Roberts for the high court when Kavanaugh was a White House lawyer.
Normally, misconduct complaints are confidential and do not become public until they are fully investigated and concluded.
Most of these complaints center on Kavanaugh’s answers about his work in the Bush administration, according to people familiar with them. They also accuse Kavanaugh of lacking judicial temperament in his partisan comments about Democrats, the people said.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/dc-circuit-sent-complaints-about-kavanaughs-testimony-to-chief-justice-roberts/2018/10/06/c7e7b526-c8d0-11e8-b1ed-1d2d65b86d0c_story.html
Anti-Kavanaugh protesters keep up the fight, even after he’s confirmed
By Ralph Ellis, CNN Sat October 6, 2018
(CNN)Protesters opposed to Brett Kavanaugh’s appointment to the US Supreme Court swarmed over Washington on Saturday — massing at the Capitol, disrupting the confirmation vote in the Senate and banging on the Supreme Court building doors when Kavanaugh arrived to be sworn in.
About 5:45 p.m. ET Saturday, a large crowd of protesters surged onto the front steps of the Supreme Court, chanting, “Hey hey, ho ho, Kavanaugh has got to go.”
After police pushed them back from the doors, the demonstrators held signs and chanted, “No justice, no peace,” and “We believe Anita Hill,” a reference to the woman who accused Justice Clarence Thomas of misconduct.
It’s not known if Kavanaugh heard the protesters. Police cleared the steps of the court about 6:15 p.m. and set up barriers.
Protesters stood one by one in different sections of the gallery, most with their fists raised, and yelled “I will not consent.”
“The sergeant-at-arms will restore order in the gallery,” the presiding officer, Vice President Mike Pence, said several times.
Police forcibly removed the protesters, with one person dragged out by their arms and legs. They kept screaming as they were pulled into the hallway.
Crowds started forming around 9 a.m. ET outside the Capitol building and the Supreme Court building and grew through the morning.
Protesters occupied the Rotunda Steps on the East Front of the US Capitol early Saturday afternoon, with about 150 of them being arrested, Capitol Police said in a news release. Video showed them lined up, with wrists cuffed behind their backs on the Capitol lawn. Police cleared the steps and the Capitol Plaza, and the protesters headed back to the Supreme Court….
A demonstration scheduled for Saturday outside Collins’ office in Portland, Maine, was canceled.
A group gathered there Friday and fell silent when she announced her decision, CNN affiliate WGME reported.
“It’s just this feeling of being utterly ignored,” Jenny O’Connell of Portland told WGME on Friday. “Susan Collins just made a huge choice to ignore her constituents and survivors (of sexual assault).” https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/06/politics/kavanaugh-protests/index.html