Tag Archives: new york

Man On The Lamb Turns Himself In

A lamb on the lamb

A career criminal John Thomas, turned himself in after being on the lamb for a month. He first caught the attention of Detective Nick Romano and Sergeant Craig Brier for suspicious activity in the parking lot of an auto-supply store in Jamaica Queens.  When the law enforcers approached Thomas in an attempt to question him he made a run for it.  As Romano and Brier chased Thomas he let off four shots, hitting Brier once in both legs.  After the massive manhunt spanning an entire month, the wounded 15-year veteran was relieved when John Thomas decided to turn himself in.  This uncharacteristic surrender comes as a welcome surprise to everyone, especially Brier’s mother who said she got goose bumps when she heard the news.  Now, Thomas faces charges of attempted murder, criminal possession of a weapon, and assault.

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Middle Finger to the Law

Justice

“Cops keep firing in my environment / middle finger to the law.”  These immortal words from New York rapper Nas were most likely running through Robert Bell’s head on August 6, 2011, except there were no guns involved and Nas was nowhere to be seen.  Mr. Bell left the Slaughtered Lamb Pub in Greenwich Village, NY and decided to give three policemen a little piece of his mind.  He flipped them the bird and seconds later was arrested for disorderly conduct, obscene gesture, public alarm, and annoyance.  His stated reason for throwing the universal gesture was not only to insult the three personally, but also because he just does not like cops in general.  Robert Bell has filed a lawsuit against the city for violating his constitutional rights on what he believes is protected speech.  On top of that, he is suing for assault, false arrest, and, my favorite, emotional distress.

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Rabbi Takes A Sabbatical To Jail

Hung out to dry

Rabbi Mordchai Fish, of Brooklyn, New York, has been sentenced to 46 months in prison for laundering nearly a million dollars.  In early 2008, Fish accepted checks to charities in New York and New Jersey from admitted Ponzi schemer and FBI informant Solomon Dwek.  The charities, including Boyoner Gemilas Chesed, Beth Pinchas, and Levovous, are called “gemachs”, groups intended to give money to people in need.  Instead, the cash went straight back to Dwek, freshly laundered, with Fish keeping a nice 10% commission for himself in the process.  Too bad Dwek was wired up and handing Fish bait money provided by the FBI.  Over two years, Fish and Dwek, with the latter informing all the while, laundered more than $900,000, a crime punishable by a maximum 20 years in prison and fines up to $200,000.  Fish swam by the recommended 57-month sentence from Judge Joel Pisano, receiving a lower sentence because of his work in the Orthodox community.

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An Eye for an Eye, but $20 Million Is Fine, Too

Off the court

There is a big difference between popping bottles and throwing bottles.  Just ask frenemies Chris Brown and Drake.  During the early morning hours of June 14, 2012, a fight broke out between the two music moguls at the über-trendy SoHo nightclub W.i.P (Work in Progress).  Theories abound about the impetus of the scuffle, with many news outlets sourcing it to Drake’s boasts about the affections of Rihanna, but one thing’s for certain: it got out of hand and some innocent celebrity bystanders were injured in the fallout.  San Antonio Spurs superstar Tony Parker found himself in the crossfire when the singers started lobbing bottles at each other.  A piece of glass lodged itself in Parker’s eye, an injury which brings his upcoming Olympic showing into question. Parker has brought a lawsuit against the owners of the club seeking damages to the tune of $20 million on the theory that the owners “should have known better” than to give Drake and Brown alcohol and sit them near each other.  Kind of like tossing a steak between two hungry dogs.

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NYC Transit Workers Allowed to Wear Religious Head Coverings

En route to better days

Fear is a powerful motivator, and as such the government sometimes responds poorly to the irrational fear of its citizens.  In 1942, due to a fear of all things Japanese during WWII, the federal government rounded up all the Japanese people they could, including native-born citizens, and placed them in destitute internment camps.  Before rounding up Jews and other minorities in concentration camps, the Nazis forced them to identify with yellow badges in the shape of a star, claiming that they were responsible for their country’s problems.  Through these events, we learned the hard way that fear and blame, however unfounded, can lead to atrocity.

Comparisons to such human rights abuses are a stretch in today’s case, of course, and perhaps somewhat unfair, and yet the parallels are striking.  After 9/11, the Metropolitan Transit Authority of New York City started enforcing a rule known as “brand or segregate”, in which Sikh and Muslim workers were forced to either mark their turbans with an MTA logo or work out of the sight of the general public.  See the similarities?  Fueled by xenophobic sentiment after the 9/11 tragedy, the MTA responded to American fear by taking steps to appease it: hide all the scary foreigners, or at least mark them so the good red-blooded Americans know to stay away.

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