George Soros America > No Prison for Most NY Criminals

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Soros-backed DA orders fewer prison sentences

Manhattan’s newly elected chief prosecutor has ordered staff to quit

seeking prison sentences for all but a few of the most heinous crimes

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is shown campaigning last November.

© Getty Images / Michael M. Santiago

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has used his first memo since taking office to direct prosecutors to quit sending criminals to prison in many cases and downgrade charges for such crimes as armed robbery and drug dealing.

Prosecutors in New York City’s most densely populated borough must no longer seek a “carceral sentence” except in a handful of cases, such as homicide, rape and major economic crimes, Bragg said on Monday in the memo. He added that assistant district attorneys also must weigh the impact of their sentencing recommendations on public safety, barriers to housing and racial disparities in incarceration.

Bragg joins a long list of district attorneys in major US cities who were elected with the backing of Hungarian-born billionaire George Soros, who reportedly gave up to $1 million to his successful campaign. And like other Soros-backed prosecutors, he’s trying to reform the criminal justice system by sending fewer people to jail and decriminalizing some lesser offenses.

But violent crime has surged under those policies in such cities as Chicago, which just suffered its deadliest year in a quarter century, and Philadelphia, where homicides hit an all-time in 2021. New York also has been plagued by rising violent crime, including murders and hate crimes targeting Asians.

Bragg demanded leniency for the most egregious violent crimes, banning prosecutors from seeking prison sentences exceeding 20 years. “The office shall not seek a sentence of life without parole,” the DA said, barring a punishment that’s typically reserved for such heinous offenders as terrorists, serial killers and people who rape and murder children.

And in many cases, Bragg’s office won’t even seek felony convictions, let alone prison terms. He ordered that charges be reduced to misdemeanors in such cases as armed robberies where a victim isn’t seriously injured and drug dealing. He added that prosecutors also must consider the suspect’s circumstances, such as mental illness, homelessness and poverty.

“These policy changes not only will, in and of themselves, make us safer; they also will free up prosecutorial resources to focus on violent crime,” Bragg said.

Police are already pushing back against Bragg’s reforms. “In Bragg’s Manhattan, you can resist arrest, deal drugs, obstruct arrests and even carry a gun and get away with it,” said Paul DiGiacomo, president of the New York Detectives Endowment Association. He added that by taking prosecution of many crimes off the table, the new DA “has made himself the police, the judge and the jury.”

So, now, I wonder where child pornography fits in all this. Will pedophiles get their wrists slapped and sent on their way to repeat their crimes? If so, there will certainly be a dramatic increase in child sexual abuse images in Manhattan in the next few years.

George Soros' America > Philadelphia Sets All-Time Murder Record

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Philadelphia sets all-time murder record under Soros funded DA

© AFP / Gabriella Audi

The city of Philadelphia has set a record in 2021 with 559 murders committed, the most in its history since records began. It has outstripped more populous cities that have also seen rates spike, like New York and Los Angeles.

The rate surged from last year’s 499 murders and represented a major increase from 2019’s 356 killings. Children have been among the worst impacted, with some 206 kids and teens hit by gunfire over the past year, 36 of them fatally. All told, about 2,200 Philadelphians were shot over the course of 2021.

“Council and the Mayor clearly must do more in 2022,” City Council President Darell Clarke said in a statement on Friday. Philadelphia earmarked $155 million for public safety in its last budget, with $16 million of that designated for neighborhood-based groups countering violence; Clarke insisted those budgetary decisions must “target actual solutions.”

While some have called for Mayor Jim Kenney to declare gun violence an emergency, Kenney countered that declaring such an emergency would have “no discernible impact on strengthening what is already a highly collaborative and innovative approach to addressing this public health crisis.” Declaring such ‘emergencies’ gives local governments more funding and power to act unilaterally, but there is little evidence to suggest they have any direct effect on curbing violence. The City Council has also called for Philadelphia to be able to set its own gun laws, a measure that has had varying degrees of success in cities like New York and Chicago. The latter had more murders in 2021 than anywhere else in the US.

Many blame the city’s District Attorney Larry Krasner, one of several so-called ‘progressive prosecutors’ who won their positions thanks in large part to campaigns sponsored by billionaire George Soros. Like fellow DAs Chesa Boudin (San Francisco), Kim Foxx (Chicago), and George Gascon (Los Angeles), Krasner has quickly developed a reputation for being soft on crime, one that has grown alongside his city’s body count.

Soros-funded DAs tend to invite strong ‘Defund the Police’ movements, and Philadelphia’s Black Lives Matter chapter made its voice heard in 2020 loud enough to convince 14 of the city’s 17 City Council members not to support a proposed $14 million increase to the police budget. Last year, the city decreased the police budget by $33 million, a figure it has kept for 2022. 

Philadelphia only began keeping homicide records in the 1960s. However, last year’s murders far surpassed what is considered to be the city’s most violent period during the crack epidemic of the 1990s.

Another Day, Another President Charged for Corruption

Corruption is Everywhere - President of South Korea

Warrant issued for former South Korean President Lee Myung-bak

By Elizabeth Shim 

Former South Korean President Lee Myung-bak has been charged with accepting more than $10 million in bribes.

EPA-EFE/YONHAP

UPI -- Former South Korean President Lee Myung-bak has been issued an arrest warrant after being charged with multiple counts of corruption.

The arrest warrant is the fourth of its kind to be issued to a former South Korean leader, local news service CBS No Cut News reported Thursday.

Lee, 76, faces a dozen charges, including accepting more than $10 million in bribes from Seoul's national intelligence service and powerful corporations, according to Yonhap.

The decision came late Thursday at 11:06 p.m. from Park Beom-seok, a judge with Seoul Central District Court.

Park said the arrest warrant is justified on account of the "seriousness of the crime" and "in the context in which it was investigated."

Lee has also been charged with embezzling more than $32 million that was then allocated to the "DAS" slush fund, according to No Cut News.

South Korean prosecutors submitted a 80,000-page document of evidence and argued in favor of detaining Lee in a 1,000-page statement.

Prosecutors say Lee is the ultimate proprietor of the DAS fund.

For the bribes he received he should receive at least a 11-year prison sentence, prosecutors argued.

Lee defended his legacy as president and former mayor of Seoul on Thursday in a Facebook post, local newspaper Kyunghyang Shinmun reported Thursday.

"I tried to pursue clean politics by isolating the wrong practices of the past," Lee said, adding his administration, which came to power the same year as the 2008 global financial crisis, implemented policies that prevented economic recession in South Korea.

Lee said he has "had a hard time" in the past 10 months, and added his family is "suffering" in the wake of the investigations into his case.

The former South Korean leader said "everything is my fault" in the handwritten social media post published on Thursday.