Corruption is Everywhere > Tainted rocket fuel; Hunter's ex-partner rips off Sioux band for millions; Jacob Zuma; Strongman eliminates opposition; Ex-President to be extradited

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Firm admits selling potentially tainted rocket fuel to NASA

The Texas company pleaded guilty to fraud and agreed to forfeit more than $250,000

(FILE PHOTO) © Photo Illustration by Rafael Henrique/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Anahuac Transport Inc. has admitted to delivering potentially tainted rocket fuel to NASA and the Department of Defense (DOD) for rocket launches, according to the US Department of Justice. 

The company’s representatives, Gary Monteau and Brant Charpiot, pleaded guilty to fraud on Wednesday and were banned from federal government contracting for two years.

As part of the plea deal, Anahuac Transport agreed to forfeit $251,401. The amount is comparable with the gross profits the company made from its fraudulent dealings. 

Anahuac was contracted by NASA and the DOD to procure and transport fuel for the rocket launches from approximately 2012 through 2020. 

The firm was required to ensure the tanker trailer it used did not previously contain chemicals that may have adverse reactions with the fuel. However, the tankers had in fact previously contained such substances, and the documents were falsified to claim that they had not. 

Elon Musk’s Space Explorations Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) was among the firms receiving the potentially tainted fuel, the DOJ said. The SpaceX contract saw Musk’s firm deliver supplies for the International Space Station and with military payloads. 

A sentencing date has been set for May 12. Anahuac could be hit with a $500,000 fine and serve up to five years of probation.

So, they cannot contract with the government for 2 years, and they may go to jail for 5 years. Does that mean they can contract with the government for 3 years while in prison?

I'm being facetious, of course, but it seems to me the potential for dramatic catastrophe should eliminate people who are willing to risk the deaths of astronauts, from ever being allowed back in such a position.

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Hunter Biden’s partner gets prison sentence

Biden’s Burisma board colleague sentenced to prison for securities fraud

Devon Archer, who sat on the board of Ukrainian gas company Burisma with Hunter Biden (pictured, August 2020), has been sentenced to prison in a fraud case ©  Getty Images/Handout

Devon Archer, a close friend and former business partner of President Joe Biden’s son Hunter, was sentenced on Monday for defrauding a Native American tribe. A federal judge in New York said Archer may go to prison for a year and a day, as well as serve one year of probation and forfeit $14 million in property.

Archer gained notoriety when it emerged he introduced Hunter Biden – his partner at Rosemont Seneca – to the Ukrainian gas company Burisma back in 2014.

Both Archer and Biden sat on Burisma’s board of directors for years, reportedly being paid over $83,000 a month.

Of course, Biden has no expertise in the gas business, however, he does have access to his father.

Monday’s sentence is not related to the Ukrainian gas deals, however, but the June 2018 conviction for conspiracy and securities fraud, over Archer’s role in a bond scheme to defraud an Oglala Sioux tribe to the tune of tens of millions. 

Archer and two other defendants conspired to have the Wakpamni Lake Community Corporation issue a series of tribal bonds and defrauded both the tribe and the buyers of the bonds while pocketing the profits, the court said in 2018. Archer and another defendant had used the bonds to meet capital requirements in broker deals, and used the profits to buy companies “as part of a strategy to build a financial services conglomerate,” according to the Department of Justice.

On Monday, Judge Ronnie Abrams said the crime was too serious to avoid prison time, but cut the sentence down from the 30 months requested by prosecutors, reportedly citing the Covid-19 pandemic as the reason. He also ordered a one-year probation rather than the requested three years. The US government may also seize up to $14 million in assets owned by Archer as restitution to the tribe.

Abrams also gave Archer 60 days to report to prison, but then said he would set a new surrender date pending appeal.

Archer has appealed the sentence all the way to the US Supreme Court, without success. In November 2021, it emerged that Archer had requested – and Judge Abrams had granted – permission to go on over 40 international trips since his indictment and even conviction.

Former president referred for criminal probe

Former South African leader Jacob Zuma and serving minister Gwede Matashe

potentially face graft charges

Former South African President Jacob Zuma at the United Nations General Assembly in 2017.

© Drew Angerer / Getty Images

A South African corruption inquiry investigating allegations of graft during Jacob Zuma’s time in power, has referred the former president and incumbent mineral resources minister Gwede Mantashe for criminal investigation.

The inquiry made the recommendation after a three-year investigation into Zuma’s administration, with the latest report focused on allegations of corruption and fraud regarding a privately-owned company, Bosasa.

“The evidence revealed that corruption was Bosasa’s way of doing business,” the inquiry alleged, accusing the company of having “bribed politicians, government officials, President Jacob Zuma and others extensively.”

Zuma is accused by the inquiry of having passed the company confidential information about criminal investigations into Bosasa, helping to hinder criminal prosecutions in return for bribes. If those allegations prove true, it would mean Zuma violated his obligations under the South African constitution.

Mantashe was also referred for criminal investigation, with the inquiry claiming a criminal probe would lead to a corruption case against him. Bosasa reportedly installed security systems at three properties owned by Mantashe at no cost, which, the inquiry claims, was an attempt to build favor with the then-Secretary General of the ruling African National Congress (ANC). Mantashe admitted the security systems had been installed but claimed nothing was inappropriate about the arrangement.

Bosasa is currently in voluntary liquidation, after banks closed its accounts over the graft allegations.

Zuma denies any wrongdoing and has refused to cooperate with the inquiry, resulting in him being sentenced to 15 months in prison for contempt of court. He was released on medical parole in September but was later ordered back to prison by the High Court. Zuma is currently appealing the order to return to jail.

The inquiry further called for an investigation into ANC officials who, free of charge, arranged an election “war room” for Bosasa. The ANC has not immediately responded to the recommended investigation.

Cambodian court convicts opposition leaders in mass trial

By Thomas Maresca

Exiled Cambodia opposition leader Sam Rainsy was among 21 defendants convicted in a Phnom Penh court

in a verdict rights groups have called politically motivated. File Photo by Mast Irham/EPA-EFE

March 17 (UPI) -- A Cambodian court convicted 21 people, including exiled opposition leader Sam Rainsy, on charges including conspiracy to overthrow the government in a decision Thursday that defendants and rights groups blasted as an effort to sideline opponents of strongman Prime Minister Hun Sen.

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court imposed sentences of 10 years to Rainsy and six other senior leaders of the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party, all of whom were tried in absentia, local news site VOD reported.

Thirteen party activists who were present in court received sentences of five years. One other defendant was given a suspended five-year sentence.

Rainsy, who resides in France, left Cambodia in 2016 to avoid charges that included defamation of Hun Sen, who has held onto power since 1985.

Most of the charges in Thursday's decision revolved around Rainsy's plan to return to Cambodia in 2019, which prosecutors argued was part of a plot to topple the government.

Defendants in court shouted that they were innocent as the verdict was read, while a group of supporters clashed with guards outside the courthouse, VOD reported.

Rights groups were quick to slam the decision as another abuse of power by the Hun Sen government, which has intensified its suppression of political opposition in recent years.

"The mass trial and convictions of political opponents on baseless charges is a witch hunt that discredits both the Cambodian government and the country's courts," Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said.

"Cambodia's politicized courts have facilitated Prime Minister Hun Sen's effort to destroy the last remnants of democratic freedoms and civil and political rights in the country," Robertson said.

Cambodian authorities cracked down on opposition politicians, civil society groups and independent media in the run-up to a scheduled 2018 election. The country's high court ultimately dissolved the Rainsy-founded CNRP, allowing the CPP to run virtually unopposed in an election roundly condemned by international observers.

Western nations including the United States responded with targeted sanctions and visa restrictions, while the European Union ultimately revoked Cambodia's duty-free access to its markets over its worsening rights situation.

Thursday's decision was the second in four mass trials of more than 150 individuals connected to the CNRP.

"The justice system has again been used as a blunt political tool in an attempt to quash opposition to Hun Sen's dictatorship," Rainsy wrote on Twitter after the verdict was announced. "Opposing dictators is a duty, not a crime."

Honduran judge grants U.S. request to extradite former president

By Darryl Coote

An Honduras judge late Wednesday accepted the request to extradite former President Juan Orlando Hernandez

to the United States. Photo by Gustavo Amador/EPA-EFE

March 17 (UPI) -- A judge in Honduras late Wednesday approved the extradition of former President Juan Orlando Hernandez to the United States where prosecutors have accused him of being involved in a narco-trafficking conspiracy.

The Central American nation's Supreme Court of Justice said in a statement that an unnamed judge granted the extradition of the former president "after evaluating the means of evidence presented" by the Court of the Southern District of New York.

Hernandez has three days to file an appeal, the court said.

Until he is extradited, Hernandez will remain detained by the Honduran authorities where he has resided since turning himself over to police on Feb. 15. at the request of the United States.

The former president has been accused by U.S. prosecutors of being involved in narco-trafficking scheme, specifically accepting brides from individuals seeking protection from law enforcement to smuggle drugs into the United States.

The Honduras Supreme Court of Justice said he faces a charge of conspiracy to import a controlled substance into the United States and two firearms-related charges.

The announcement of the extradition follows U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken revealing last month that Hernandez had quietly been added to a list of dozens of former Central American officials barred from entering the United States over accusations of committing corruption.

At the time, Blinken said there were credible reports that the former president was involved in "significant corruption" and that he used the proceeds from narco-trafficking to fund his political campaigns.

The U.S. prosecutors also convicted Juan Antonio "Tony" Hernandez" in 2019 on trafficking charges in a case that listed his brother, the former president, as a co-conspirator. He was sentenced in March of last year to life in prison.

Hernandez was president of Honduras from 2014 to January when President Xiomara Castro was inaugurated.

Corruption is Everywhere > German Ministries Investigated; Judge Murdered in Ukraine; Von der Leyen - Pfizer Secret Negotiations; Zuma's Appeal Rejected; Weightlifting Doctor Banned for Life

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German prosecutors search finance & justice ministries

as part of money-laundering probe

9 Sep, 2021 13:15

Germany's finance ministry in Berlin. © Reuters / Annegret Hilse

German prosecutors have searched the offices of the finance and justice ministries in Berlin, seizing documents related to a probe into possible obstruction of justice by a government agency tasked with tackling money laundering.

The Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), which is part of the Finance Customs Administration controlled by the Finance Ministry, has been under investigation since last year. The agency is suspected of not forwarding to law enforcement agents reports by banks of possible money laundering in the millions of euros.

The probe had been initiated after sketchy payments of more than €1 million (around $1.18 million) to Africa in 2018. At that time, the bank warned the FIU that the money could’ve been linked to trafficking of arms and drugs as well as financing of terrorism. The agency took note of the information, but refrained from passing it on to the police and the justice ministry.

The prosecutors were also looking into the reasons for a drastic decrease in the overall number of reports of suspicious activity since the FIU was assigned the job of controlling money laundering in Germany.

The investigators had previously raided the Finance Customs Administration, saying the papers they secured back then revealed “extensive communications” between the FIU and the two ministries.

The search at the Finance and Justice Ministries on Thursday was aimed at “further clarifying the suspected criminal offense” and establishing if the officials in those ministries had been involved in the decision made by the FIU. The analysis of the newly obtained documents is going to take at least several weeks, the prosecutors said.

The two ministries released almost identical statements in response to the raid, saying that they expressed full support of the investigation, but stressing that no suspicion was directed against their staff.

Ukrainian authorities launch probe over death of judge who oversaw

investigation into car-bomb murder of Russian journalist 

13 Sep, 2021 18:15 / Updated 2 hours ago

Journalist Pavel Sheremet. © Reuters / Valentyn Ogirenko

Ukrainian police have launched a probe following the death of Vitaly Pisants, an investigating judge in the as-yet-unsolved case of Pavel Sheremet, a Russian journalist murdered in the center of Kiev by a car bomb in 2016.

According to Ukrainian outlet Novaya Vremya, Pisants' death came as he was considering motions to extend the detention of three people thought to be behind Sheremet's murder.

Sheremet, who was best known for his writings about Belarus, died in the Kiev explosion, which the Ukrainian Prosecutor's Office says was caused by a bomb. In December 2019, three were arrested on suspicion of murdering Sheremet. According to the authorities, the killing was ordered and organized by Andrey Antonenko, a well-known military veteran and musician. Two other defendants, Yana Dugar and Yulia Kuzmenko, were detained as accomplices. They were all put under house arrest awaiting trial.

Now, with Pisants dead, the police are considering whether he may have been murdered to stop him from keeping the three in prison.

According to reports, the judge died on September 11 in the village of Pogreby, where he was visiting the house of Pyotr Onopenko, the brother of the former head of the Supreme Court. Some Ukrainian media sources have claimed that he died in a drunken fight between his friends: a police officer and a lawyer.

The case of Sheremet's murder is still unsolved, five years after it happened. According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, counterintelligence officers from the country's Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) could have been involved.

"There is a possibility that certain individuals who were connected to counterintelligence during [Petro Poroshenko's] presidency may be involved [in the killing]," Zelensky said.

"I do not interfere in the activities of law enforcement agencies and the court. But I know in detail what happened," he said.

Born in Soviet Belarus, Sheremet was a naturalized Russian and spent much of his career working on TV. He also wrote for the Ukrainian online publication Ukrayinska Pravda. At the time of his murder, Sheremet was a public critic of Poroshenko, as well as Russian President Vladimir Putin and their Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko.

That's a lot of powerful enemies!

Pohreby, UKR

Inquiry launched into European Commission chief’s refusal

to hand over text messages she exchanged with Pfizer CEO 

17 Sep, 2021 13:41

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen visits a Pfizer vaccine production plant in Puurs, Belgium, April 2021.

© John Thys / Reuters

The European Ombudsman has demanded that Commission President Ursula von der Leyen explain how she lost text messages that she exchanged with the CEO of Pfizer during talks about vaccine procurement.  

European Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly, the EU’s top accountability and governance officer, launched an inquiry into the European Commission’s refusal to hand over the contents of communications between von der Leyen and a CEO of an unnamed pharmaceutical company about a Covid-19 vaccine contract. 

As a first step, O’Reilly asked the Commission to explain its policy on keeping records of von der Leyen’s text messages. “The Commission has an obligation to record instant messages relating to important policy or political matters, such as the procurement of Covid-19 vaccines,” O’Reilly’s office wrote in a statement about the case.

In April, the New York Times reported that von der Leyen had been exchanging texts and calls with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla for a month as part of negotiations about vaccine procurement for the bloc. The paper wrote at the time that personal diplomacy played a big role in securing the vaccine deal. 

O’Reilly requested that the Commission hand over the text messages, but the Commission claimed that “no record had been kept of any such messages,” according to the ombudsman’s office. 

The office has previously warned about the importance of record-keeping within EU institutions amid an increased amount of remote work in the Covid era. “EU administration is required by EU law to draw up and retain documentation pertaining to its activities, as far as possible and in a non-arbitrary and predictable manner,” the watchdog said in June.

Pfizer remains one of the EU’s major vaccine suppliers after sealing several deals with Brussels. The delays in shipments earlier this year frustrated EU leaders, including von der Leyen herself. “Europe invested billions to help develop the world’s first Covid-19 vaccines,” she said in January. “And now, the companies must deliver. They must honor their obligations.”

Did Ursula use her private e-mail account to bargain with Bourla? Is that legal? It is certainly not secure. Did she learn this from Hillary Clinton?

The head of the tech department needs to be fired, at the very least.

South Africa top court rejects ex-president Zuma’s bid

to overturn 15-month jail sentence

17 Sep, 2021 11:25

Former South African President Jacob Zuma speaks to supporters after appearing at the High Court in Pietermaritzburg,

South Africa, May 17, 2021. © Reuters / Rogan Ward

South Africa’s former President Jacob Zuma’s plea to overturn his 15-month prison sentence handed to him after failing to attend a corruption hearing has been rejected by the country’s top court.

South Africa's Constitutional Court ruled in a majority on Friday and rejected Zuma’s request to annul his jail time, which the disgraced former leader had argued was excessive and that Covid-19 could pose serious risks to his health, and even life, in July.

The 79-year-old anti-apartheid veteran was released on medical parole earlier this month after the country’s Department of Correctional Services (DCS) evaluated a report on Zuma’s health. The placement meant that he will instead serve his remaining jail time on a community corrections course, “whereby he must comply with a specific set of conditions and will be subjected to supervision until his sentence expires,” the DCS stated.

In August, Zuma underwent an unspecified surgery away from the Escourt prison he was being kept in. The politician is slated to undergo more surgeries in the future.

Zuma handed himself in to police on July 7 and began serving his 15-month jail term for contempt of court after failing to give evidence at an inquiry concerning high-level corruption during his nine years in office.

His jailing, combined with soaring unemployment and poor economic conditions, spurred some of the worst riots seen in South Africa, especially in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, where the Army was called in to deal with the unrest. More than 300 people died during the turbulent period and some 3,400 people were arrested.

The current president of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, condemned the riots, describing them as “opportunistic acts of criminality, with groups of people instigating chaos merely as a cover for looting and theft.”

International weightlifting doctor lands lifetime ban for sending

lookalikes to take drugs tests for athletes charged with doping

18 Sep, 2021 13:14

Doctor Dorin Balmus has been found guilty of sending lookalikes to doping tests

© Action Images / John Marsh via Reuters | © Facebook / Dorin Balmus

A doctor who worked with three weightlifters has been banned for life after being found guilty of sending lookalikes to take drugs tests for the athletes at world championships before they were charged with doping offenses.

Moldovan medic Dorin Balmus was representing Iurie Bulat, Ghenadie Dudoglo and Artiom Pipa when the trio of weightlifters were asked to provide samples shortly before the world championships in Houston in 2015.

Instead, Balmus arranged for three doppelgangers to give samples under the names of the stars because they were "each undergoing a doping cycle at the time", the International Testing Agency (ITA) has revealed.

An investigation by the World Anti-Doping Agency's Intelligence and Investigation Department found that the three stand-ins had been asked to provide clean samples on behalf of the athletes to negate the risk of failed tests.

The athletes subsequently tested positive for a prohibited substance, receiving punishments for that offense and using urine substitution in an attempt to dupe testers.

Balmus admitted the offense when he was covertly filmed in an interview with the makers of a documentary, 'Secret Doping – the Lord of the Lifters', which was aired by a German broadcaster in January 2020.

The experienced orthopedic traumatology specialist unwittingly told the reporters that he would also pay Doping Control Officers (DCOs) to "turn a blind eye" rather than closely scrutinize passports presented by the athletes, according to the ITA's findings.

His statements to the documentary suggested "a co-ordinated program of urine substitution implicating athletes, DCOs and high-ranking officials", their report said.

The agency has taken the rare step of exiling Balmus for life from any activity authorized or organized by any signatory of the World Anti-Doping Code, acting because of the "nature and severity of the rule violations."

Responding to the report, which included the Balmus case as part of a review of numerous Anti-Doping Rule Violations between 2009 and 2019 across a range of countries, Antonio Conflitti, the President of the Moldavian Weightlifting Federation, called it "another blow" to the sport that he "very much hoped" would be the last of its kind.

"I will continue my fight against doping and my work to consolidate and create a new and clean European Weightlifting Federation governance," he added.

Tamas Ajan, the long-standing president of the federation, stood down following the documentary, which reported on other doping cover-ups and financial irregularities at the organization.

The three Moldavian athletes were each handed four-year bans in 2015.

Corruption is Everywhere > Even in the Vatican; Zuma Resists Prison; Avenatti to Prison; Giuliani's Law License; Scientific Research Corruption

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This stunning event is, unfortunately, about 40 years overdue. David Yallop documented these kinds of corruption in his amazing book "In God's Name" in 1984. 

Italian cardinal among 10 people charged by Vatican in landmark case

involving embezzlement, money laundering & extortion

3 Jul, 2021 12:52

FILE PHOTO: St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican. ©  AFP / Andreas Solaro

The Vatican will prosecute 10 individuals, including Italian Cardinal Angelo Becciu, in a case involving embezzlement and extortion. The indictments are seen as a historic crackdown by Pope Francis on Church-linked crime.

The Holy See announced on Saturday that Becciu and nine others have been ordered to stand trial for alleged crimes stemming from the Vatican's purchase of a luxury property in London, as well as speculative investments that resulted in serious financial losses for the Church.

The cardinal was charged with embezzlement, abuse of office, and subordination. An Italian woman who worked for the senior Church official was also charged with embezzlement. 

Among their co-defendants are the former heads of the Vatican's financial intelligence unit, as well as two Italian brokers involved in the shady deal. Charges include extortion, fraud, and money laundering. 

Charges were also brought against four companies associated with individual defendants. Two of the firms are located in Switzerland, one in the United States, and one in Slovenia. 

The trial will begin on July 27, according to a Vatican press release. 

Becciu has now become the highest-ranking Vatican-based Church official to be accused of financial crimes. According to Christopher Lamb, Rome correspondent for the Catholic journal The Tablet, the cardinal’s indictment is without precedent. 

“This is the first time a cardinal has been prosecuted in this way, and the decision to charge marks a new, and potentially decisive, step in Pope Francis’ reforms of Vatican finances,” he wrote. 

Unless, of course, he ends up like John Paul 1.

As per Church law, the pontiff had to personally approve the decision to indict Becciu. The Italian cardinal has always maintained his innocence during the investigation into the affair, which began in 2019. However, he left a top post in the Vatican’s Secretariat of State last September after allegations of embezzlement surfaced. 

The move comes less than a month after the Council of Europe’s top financial watchdog called on the Vatican to ensure transparency in procedures to prosecute senior officials accused of money laundering and other crimes. The Committee of Experts on the Evaluation of Anti-Money Laundering Measures and the Financing of Terrorism noted that the procedure for obtaining papal consent in order to bring legal action against senior clerics is “not fully transparent.”

In April, Pope Francis issued a decree allowing bishops and cardinals working in the Vatican to be judged by a lay tribunal. Before this reform, senior clerics were answerable only to a body of high-ranking Church officials, known as the Court of Cassation.

Former South African President Jacob Zuma resists prison sentence

By Clyde Hughes

Zuma, South Africa's president between 2009 and 2018, says the court's sentence is essentially a death sentence

because of his age, 79, and the coronavirus danger in South Africa.  File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI

July 6 (UPI) -- Former South African President Jacob Zuma found himself in a legal standoff with the country's Constitutional Court Tuesday after he refused to turn himself over to authorities for failing to appear at a previous corruption hearing.

The court sentenced Zuma to prison (4th story on link) last month when he declined to participate in an inquiry focused on his time in power from 2009 to 2018. He was given 15 months in prison on contempt charges for failing to appear at a required hearing.

Zuma said the court's decision was essentially "sentencing [him] to death" because of his age, 79, and the coronavirus danger in South Africa, according to CNBC.

He filed court challenges to the sentence with the Constitutional Court itself and the Pietermaritzburg High Court.

The high court case will be heard on July 12, but the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture said that court does not have jurisdiction to hear it.

"A high court in this country has inherent jurisdiction and national jurisdiction to enforce court orders, even of other courts, of other provinces, even of other tribunals, such as arbitration and even something that is to be done in a foreign jurisdiction," Zuma's attorney Dali Mpofu told The South African, arguing for the high court's intervention.

The Constitutional Court has ordered the minister of police and justice minister to take "legal steps" to arrest Zuma if he does not turn himself in.

UPDATE: 8 July 2021

South Africa's former president Jacob Zuma, who has been in police detention since Wednesday night as he starts a 15-month prison sentence for contempt, will be eligible for parole after around four months, the justice minister said.

Zuma turned himself in to police to begin his jail term for defying a court order to attend an inquiry into corruption while he was in power from 2009 to 2018.

‘Drunk on the power of his platform’: Former CNN regular

Michael Avenatti sentenced to 2.5 years in prison for extortion

8 Jul, 2021 21:35

Michael Avenatti following his sentencing for an extortion scheme against Nike at the United States Courthouse

in New York City ©  REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

Michael Avenatti, a lawyer best known for representing Stormy Daniels and appearing frequently on CNN, has been sentenced to two and a half years in prison after being found guilty of trying to extort Nike.

Avenatti was convicted last year of trying to extort more than $20 million from the sportswear company, but his new sentence presents only the beginning of his legal troubles. Avenatti is also facing a trial in Los Angeles later this year on charges of fraud – and he’s been charged in New York City with cheating his once-star client, Daniels, out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. 

At his sentencing on Thursday, Avenatti reportedly wept and said, “I and I alone have destroyed my career, my relationships, my life, and there is no doubt that I deserve to pay, have paid, and will pay a further price for what I have done.” 

His misfortune represents quite a fall from grace, as the celebrity lawyer was once a regular on left-leaning networks including CNN in 2018 and 2019, where he would often talk about Daniels’ suit against Trump – she claimed the ex-president once paid her hush money to cover up an affair, which he denies. Hosts would at times talk up the amateur pundit’s potential chances in 2020 running against Trump for Democrats. He appeared on CNN and MSNBC no less than 229 times across a two-year period, according to a Media Research Center analysis. 

CNN’s Brian Stelter even called him a “serious” contender against Trump in 2020, long before the lawyer faced his current legal troubles. 

Critics were all too happy to celebrate Avenatti’s downfall, and many used the news of his sentencing as an excuse to remind the world just how glowing and fawning Avenatti’s media appearances really were at the height of his anti-Trump fame. 

One mashup clip of Avenatti media appearances especially made the rounds following his sentencing. Among the bits in the footage, former ‘The View’ co-star and liberal activist Ava Navarro compares Avenatti to “the Holy Spirit.”

“It was around this time 3 years ago there were serious think-pieces arguing that Avenatti should run for president, on top of the glowing profiles and glossy magazine spreads,” Business Insider’s Grace Panetta tweeted. 

Though he reportedly acknowledged through tears that he would never practice law again, Avenatti did leave his future fairly open.

“I still feel positive. I know I can do better. I can be the person I dreamed of being,” he said. 

Avenatti was originally charged last year for the attempted Nike extortion. He was retained by a youth basketball league organizer who claimed the company was corruptly paying players. Avenatti took his client’s complaints and accusations and tried threatening Nike with bad publicity in exchange for a massive payout. 

US District Judge Paul G. Gardephe called Avenatti’s behavior “outrageous” at the Thursday sentencing, telling Avenatti he had become “drunk on the power of his own platform.”

Rudy Giuliani's DC law license suspended pending outcome

of New York case over his election-fraud claims

8 Jul, 2021 01:44

©  Reuters / Jonathan Ernst

Fresh from his New York law license being suspended for allegedly false election-fraud claims in support of former President Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani has also lost his rights, at least temporarily, to practice in Washington.

A District of Columbia court on Wednesday suspended Giuliani's law license in the nation's capital, pending the outcome of disciplinary proceedings against him in New York. Such suspensions are required in DC when a lawyer faces disciplinary sanctions by another jurisdiction. 

A New York court last month suspended the former mayor's license there on accusations that he made “demonstrably false and misleading” claims to “courts, lawmakers and the public at large” while he helped Trump challenge Joe Biden's victory in last November's presidential election.

Giuliani was among the lead lawyers who represented Trump in trying to prove that Biden won the election through massive fraud. The legal challenges were thrown out in federal and state courts, in many cases based on technicalities.

Democrat politicians, such as US Representative Ted Lieu (D-California), were among the lawyers who lobbied for Giuliani to be disbarred and celebrated his New York suspension. The court rebuked him for allegedly inflaming “tensions that bubbled over into the events of January 6, 2021, in this nation's Capitol.”

Giuliani reportedly wasn't permitted to present a case in his defense in the New York proceedings, but he may appeal the ruling. He has said that there was no reason for disciplinary action because the election battle has ended and “he has and will continue to exercise personal discipline to forbear from discussing these matters in public anymore.” 

Giuliani also faces defamation lawsuits by voting-system firms Smartmatic and Dominion, which claimed they were damaged by his false claims.

More than half of scientists admit to research misconduct,

landmark survey with 6,800+ participants reveals

8 Jul, 2021 11:11

FILE PHOTO: © Pixabay

A major survey conducted across academia in the Netherlands has found that more than a half of scientists admitted to engaging in some type of questionable research practice in their work. 

The landmark study was conducted through the Dutch National Survey on Research Integrity, funded by the Dutch government.

The scientists sent out anonymized questionnaires to nearly 63,780 academics working in 22 universities and research centers across the Netherlands. The survey asked about various questionable research practices, ranging from insufficient attention to equipment and the use of unsuitable measurement instruments to improper citations and unfair reviews of manuscripts. 

A total of 6,813 respondents fully completed the survey, the results of which were published as a preprint on MetaArXiv this week. The study, which is yet to be peer-reviewed, has found that 51.3% of participants admitted to having often engaged in at least one questionable research practice.

“We find that, across disciplinary fields, one in two researchers engaged frequently in at least one [questionable research practice] over the last three years,” the authors wrote. They added that one in 12 had reported having falsified or fabricated their research at least once during that time.

“Being a PhD candidate or junior researcher increases the odds of any frequent [questionable research practice], as does identifying as male and doing empirical research,” the authors wrote.

Gowri Gopalakrishna, the survey’s leader and an epidemiologist at the Amsterdam University Medical Center, told Science magazine that the guarantee of anonymity to respondents had helped to receive more truthful data.

“That method increases the honesty of the answers,” she said. “So, we have good reason to believe that our outcome is closer to reality than that of previous studies.”

It is, unfortunately, only about 11% of the total number of scientists queried. We can speculate as to the reasons why the remaining 89% did not. 

The question I would really like to see answered is whether or not a scientist had the luxury of finding a result that was not in keeping with those who funded the research.