Category: Stand & Deliver
A suspected catalytic converter thief was stabbed to death in a driveway early Friday morning in Los Angeles County, California, CBS News reported.
Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies responded to a house in South El Monte on the 1100 block of Thienes Avenue at 2:37 a.m. and found a man dead at the scene, sheriff’s Lieutenant Michael Gomez said.
“Deputies made contact with the resident of the house, who said he had been sleeping when he heard people outside tampering with his car. He went outside to investigate, where he was confronted by three to four people. An altercation ensued and one man was fatally stabbed,” according to the report.
Investigators said two or three other suspects fled the scene and were last seen driving eastbound on Thienes Avenue. Gomez said tools left at the scene indicate the suspects were attempting to steal catalytic converters.
The deceased suspect, between 35 and 45 years old, was found lying partially underneath a car in the driveway. The weapon used is believed to be a kitchen knife, according to investigators.
Investigators detained and interviewed the resident. Two other people were allegedly inside the house at the time of the incident, officials said.
————————————————————————————— Two things about this comes to my feeble mind. In that Richard Ramirez the serial killer was caught messing with somebodies car. (Don’t ever mess with a car in LA as you WILL inherit the wind of some serious violence)
The other thing is that if the Cops won’t or cannot do their job. Then the neighborhood even here in wimpy LA will!
Superhero movies are some of the most profitable in Hollywood. Here’s the gist of pretty much all of them: Some buff guy is burdened by pervasive crime and the inability of the cops to control it. Determined to clean up the streets, the guy dons a garish costume and visits vigilante justice upon evil-doers. The cops resent this as extrajudicial and dangerous. A frustrated populace is grateful. Fold in a tortured love interest and some sad back story. Repeat as necessary for as long as the sequels, prequels, and sub-character spinoffs will keep dragging folks into theaters.
It really has become a bit of trope. Perhaps Hollywood screenwriters have lost the ability to create original content. No real person in the real world would voluntarily risk his life to fight crime as a masked vigilante. And then there was Phoenix Jones…
Origin Story
Phoenix Jones was born Benjamin John Francis Fodor in 1988. Raised an orphan in Texas until he was adopted by a Seattle couple at age 9, Fodor’s past had just the right amount of pathos for a proper superhero origin story. A criminal once broke the windows out of his car in full view of bystanders, yet no one intervened. His son later fell on the broken glass and injured himself. The thief left a ski mask at the scene.
Fodor subsequently saw a friend assaulted outside a bar. When nobody moved to help, he donned the criminal’s abandoned ski mask, notified 911, and “made a commotion” until police arrived. He later said, “And I thought, why didn’t someone help him? There were seventy people outside that bar and no one did anything.” That experience lit a fire.
Ben Fodor went home and did a little Googling. In short order, he had his own custom-made supersuit consisting of a Dragon Skin armored vest, multi-aspect stab plating and a cowl. Fodor claimed the purpose of the suit was to ensure that responding police officers did not mistake him for a criminal. He added pepper spray, a first-aid kit, a stun batona nd a net gun. Thusly equipped, Fodor went to work cleaning up Seattle as superhero Phoenix Jones.
Occupational Hazards
During the course of his three years of superhero service, Jones was both shot and stabbed. In each case his supersuit prevented serious injury. Once, while attempting to break up a fight, two belligerent men attacked him and broke his nose.
City officials, predictably, had little use for Phoenix Jones’ vigilante justice. Seattle city attorney Peter Holmes publicly described Jones as a “deeply misguided individual.” In October 2011, Jones was arrested for using pepper spray to break up a fight. When he arrived in court he wore a civilian shirt over his supersuit. After the hearing he said, “I will continue to patrol with my team … In addition to being Phoenix Jones, I am also Ben Fodor, father and brother. I am just like everybody else. The only difference is that I try to stop crime in my neighborhood and everywhere else. I think I have to look toward the future and see what I can do to help the city.”
Alas, nobody’s perfect in the real world, not even superheroes. In 2020, Ben Fodor was arrested for selling ecstasy to an undercover police officer. At the time of his arrest, he was also in possession of a significant amount of cocaine. Despite his obvious warts, I still think the guy is cool. Lots of people talk about being a superhero, Phoenix Jones actually did something about it.
A Nevada woman took away a carjacker’s gun in Las Vegas, tried to flee, then ended up shooting the carjacker dead when he tackled her from behind, according to police.
FOX News reports that the incident occurred November 19, 2022, but a police report was just released, providing details.
FOX 5 notes that the woman and a friend pulled up outside a residence where a party was scheduled to occur. The woman and her friend were early, so they sat in the car to wait for the party to start.
While they waited, two men with guns allegedly approached their vehicle, and one of the men grabbed her shirt and pulled her out of the car.
The man then got into her car and put his gun down in his lap. The woman grabbed the gun and took off running.
The police report indicates the suspect chased the woman and tackled her, at which point she shot the suspect in the head, fatally wounding him.
The second carjacking suspect allegedly opened fire on the woman, so she fled into a nearby backyard and hid.
The second carjacking suspect, Jaylin Morrison, was arrested on December 2, 2022.
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio and a Turning Point USA Ambassador. AWR Hawkins holds a PhD in Military History with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range
His appointment was front-page news and he obviously saw the job as chance to clean up New York City while reviving his own political career, which had stalled.
Roosevelt’s Patrician Background
The Corruption of the New York Police
Roosevelt Made His Presence Known
Political Problems
Impact of Roosevelt on New York’s Police
EXCLUSIVE — U.S. air marshals are planning to stage an open rebellion against the Biden administration over a plan that would strip 99% of commercial flights from federal protection as people take to the skies during the busiest time of the year for air travel .
Dozens of federal air marshals have agreed to refuse a Biden administration order that they leave their assignments and go to the southern border , where they will drive, feed, and care for illegal immigrants due to a shortage of Border Patrol agents.
“The rank and file air marshals are going to refuse to deploy and risk termination,” said David Londo, president of the Air Marshal National Council, in a phone call with the Washington Examiner on Tuesday. “You’re almost going to have a mutiny of a federal agency, which is unheard of.”
The overseeing agency, the Transportation Security Administration, said in a statement provided after deadline that claims that air marshals are doing menial tasks were “entirely inaccurate and does not reflect the critical and professional law enforcement role these officers perform.”
The administration’s order would leave just 1-in-100 U.S. flights with federal agents on board, one-eighth of its normal coverage.
NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS: BORDER PATROL AGENTS FEAR COLLAPSE OF TITLE 42
It is the first time amid the 20-month-long unresolved border crisis that federal employees have formally turned against President Joe Biden and his Senate-confirmed officials at the Department of Homeland Security . The air marshals are willing to risk everything for how the government is risking national security, Londo explained.
“Morale is so destroyed from this,” said Londo, whose organization serves as an association, not a union. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”
Air marshals would be risking their jobs as inflation rages and the United States potentially heads into a recession.
The air marshals, who are federal law enforcement agents within the Transportation Security Administration’s Federal Air Marshal Service, have been tasked with menial jobs at the border.
Just this week, air marshals pulled from planes and sent to the border were “heating up sandwiches,” driving immigrants in custody to the hospital and waiting inside for hours on hospital watch, and effectively babysitting adults who are already in confined spaces, Londo said.
“These highly skilled [air marshals] are being made to perform mainly non-law enforcement civilian humanitarian duties,” Londo wrote in the letter obtained first by the Washington Examiner.
In mid-2021, the Federal Air Marshal Service asked for volunteers willing to go to the southern border for 30 days and help process the growing number of illegal immigrants in custody. Earlier this month, the government changed course and announced that the deployments would become mandatory.
The air marshals fought the order but only got the length of the deployment dropped from 30 days to 21 days. DHS ordered a minimum of 150 more air marshals to the border on Dec. 7. At present, dozens plan to refuse and are preparing to be fired for taking the stand.
“Air marshals are deployed two to three nights a week. Now they’re taking them away, and their marriages are already on the rocks,” Londo said.
On Monday, the Federal Air Marshal Service’s Miami Field Office announced the deployments would now last indefinitely. Air marshals have already been sent to El Paso, Laredo, and McAllen, Texas; San Diego; and Tucson and Yuma, Arizona.
The council sent a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas as well as the TSA and Federal Air Marshal Service on Monday, warning them that the order is self-defeating because it makes the skies less safe for people traveling during the busiest time of the year.
“According to the Federal Aviation Administration year to date there have been 2,178 reports of unruly passengers, 767 investigations initiated, and 517 enforcement actions taken. Not to mention the fact there has been two attempted attacks on our homeland since 9-11 during the holiday season,” the letter states. “Your policy has resulted in a complete loss of confidence in Secretary Mayorkas, FAM Director Stevenson, and Administrator Pekoske’s ability to lead DHS/TSA/FAMS.”
Londo pointed in his letter to recent violent passenger attacks midflight that involved weapons smuggled aboard the plane, as well as a cockpit breach on a Southwest Airlines flight last week.
The National Association of Police Organizations issued a statement in support of the air marshals and warned that they were already in a bad place before the deployments became mandatory.
“The Federal Air Marshal Service is understaffed and covering the fewest number of flights since before September 11, 2001,” said NAPO, a coalition of more than 1,000 police departments across the country. “We strongly question the decision by the Department of Homeland Security to divert much-needed aviation security to the southern border especially as we enter the busiest travel season of the year, particularly as a Federal emergency has not been declared at the border.”
Behind the scenes, the council is working with the DHS Office of Inspector General to launch a federal investigation into the Biden administration’s repurposing of air marshals.
Hondo accused TSA Administrator David Pekoske and Federal Air Marshal Service Director Tirrell Stevenson of “fraud, waste, and abuse of authority and violations of federal law” in a letter sent to DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari exclusively obtained by the Washington Examiner.
In the Nov. 18 letter, Hondo called on the inspector general to investigate the legality of the air marshal deployments. He wrote that the only exception to pulling air marshals from their jobs would be in the case of a declared national emergency, which has not been declared. Even if an emergency were declared, air marshals would only be permitted to assist other agencies with transportation-related matters.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The Biden administration has refused to call the record-high number of noncitizens being encountered at the border over the past 20 months a crisis. Border agents have encountered approximately 4 million people attempting to illegally enter the U.S. since Biden took office — more than the Obama administration’s eight years in office.
The TSA defended the operation in a statement provided to the Washington Examiner early Wednesday.
“Federal Air Marshals are performing law enforcement support to the mission at the southwest border,” according to a TSA spokesman. “The TSA Federal Air Marshal Service is a highly valued member of the DHS law enforcement team and has an ever-expanding role within DHS, working closely with other U.S. and international law enforcement agencies to safeguard the nation’s transportation systems.”