Covert Paul

Wednesday, 12 May 2021

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Former neo-Nazi group leader sentenced for swatting

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A former leader of a violent neo-Nazi group was sentenced Tuesday to 41 months in prison for swatting calls aimed at a historically Black church, an Islamic center, a Virginia university, a former U.S. Cabinet member and journalists around the country.

John Cameron Denton, 27, was the Texas leader of the Atomwaffen Division when the group made at least 134 swatting calls between October 2018 and February 2019, according to the Department of Justice. The false calls, claiming that someone was in imminent danger, directed first responders to respond to the location of the third party.

“The reprehensible conduct in this case terrorized communities across our nation, as innocent Americans simply tried to attend school, practice their faith, and exercise their First Amendment rights,” Raj Parekh, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, said in a statement.

“The defendants caused irreversible trauma to the victims of these hate-based crimes. This case sends an unmistakable message that those who target individuals because of their race, religion, or any other form of bias, will be identified, apprehended, and brought to justice.”

John Cameron Denton was sentenced Tuesday.

Among the group’s targets were then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen on Jan. 27, 2019, Old Dominion University on Nov. 29 and Dec. 4, 2018, and the Alfred Street Baptist Church in Old Town Alexandria on Nov. 3, 2018, according to the DOJ.

Denton himself “personally chose” to swat the newsroom of ProPublica and an investigative journalist who worked with them after the outlet reported on his ties to Atomwaffen Division, prosecutors said.

“Denton’s swatting activities were not harmless pranks; he carefully chose his targets to antagonize and harass religious and racial communities, journalists, and others against whom he held a bias or grievance,” Timothy Thibault, acting Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office Criminal Division, said in a statement.

“Today’s sentence demonstrates the FBI’s commitment to holding accountable anyone who terrorizes communities and threatens public safety by diverting emergency resources, which puts innocent people and first responders at risk.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/former-neo-nazi-group-leader-sentenced-for-swatting/ar-BB1gnMWE

Exxon Mobil begins lockout of workers from Texas plant - USW official

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/exxon-mobil-begins-escorting-workers-103834244.html

Erwin Seba

May 1, 2021·2 min read

FILE PHOTO: Logo of the Exxon Mobil Corp is seen at the Rio Oil and Gas Expo and Conference in Rio de Janeiro

By Erwin Seba

BEAUMONT, Texas (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp began escorting United Steelworkers (USW) union members from its Beaumont, Texas, complex, a Reuters witness said, as a deadline passed without a new labor contract.

The oil company had set a 10 a.m. (1500 GMT) May 1 deadline to lock out and replace union-represented workers with managers and temporary staff if there were no vote on a company proposal. No vote was taken.

Plant manager Rozena Dendy said in a Facebook post Exxon initiated the lockout because of the "real risk of a strike." Union workers will remain off the job until a contract is reached, she said.

Union officials submitted a last-ditch contract proposal Friday evening that was rejected by the company. The union proposal "would significantly increase costs and limit the company's ability to safely and efficiently operate," the company said on its website.

About 30 workers were ushered off the premises by their replacements late Friday. Another 100 began exiting the refinery on Saturday, according to a USW official.

"After they gave us a lockout date and time, they could not give up control of the timeline. They had to go early," Hoot Landry, a USW staff representative, said of the overnight departures. The two sides had given each other a 75-day notice of a strike or lockout, a period ending May 1.

Exxon said on its website it had offered to negotiate through the night to reach an agreement, but the union wanted to resume talks on Monday.

"We are disappointed negotiations broke down," Exxon said. "The lockout will continue until the union accepts the company’s current offer or the parties otherwise reach agreement."

The company's April 20 offer "remains on the table," Exxon said on its website.

(Reporting by Erwin Seba in Beaumont, Texas; Editing by Richard Pullin and Steve Orlofsky)

Tuesday, 11 May 2021

Man who boasted about burning police station during Floyd riot hit with $12 million fine and four years in prison

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A Minnesota man has been hit with a $12 million fine for lighting a police station on fire during a riot in the aftermath of the George Floyd killing.

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A Minnesota man has been hit with a $12 million fine for lighting a police station on fire during a riot in the aftermath of the George Floyd killing.

Dylan Shakespeare Robinson, 23, pleaded guilty in December to one count of conspiracy to commit arson after he was accused of lighting a Molotov cocktail that another person threw at a police headquarters in Minneapolis, according to Fox News.

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In addition to a $12 million fine, Robinson was also sentenced to four years in prison.

Robinson reportedly boasted about the crime as he was committing it on his Snapchat account, saying at one point, “These guys have never made a Molotov. ... Rookies.”

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

“Mr. Robinson chose to depart from lawful protest and instead engaged in violence and destruction,” acting U.S. Attorney Anders Folk said about the case. “The arson at the Minneapolis Police Department’s 3rd Precinct put lives at risk and contributed to widespread lawlessness in Minneapolis.”

Robinson was one of hundreds of rioters who descended upon the police station following Floyd's death after being arrested in Minneapolis, and two other defendants who accompanied the 23-year-old also pleaded guilty and will be sentenced at a later date.

Police take down one of the world's biggest child abuse platforms in global operation

https://news.yahoo.com/dark-child-abuse-image-400-140816085.html

Patrick Smith and Carlo Angerer

May 3, 2021·3 min read

LONDON — German police have arrested four members of a gang suspected to be behind one of the world's biggest child abuse image websites with more than 400,000 members worldwide, police and prosecutors said Monday.

A police operation involving regional and federal German officers raided seven addresses across Germany and arrested three men accused of operating Boystown, a platform for distributing indecent images and video of children, the BKA, Germany's federal police agency, said in a statement.

Police also arrested one man in Paraguay, who is due to be extradited to Frankfurt. The arrests took place in mid-April but were announced on Monday.

The site is no longer in operation, the BKA's statement said, adding that an unspecified number of related chat sites were also shut down.

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The arrested suspects, who in accordance with German law have not been named, were 40 to 64 years old.

The three suspects arrested in Germany are accused of founding and maintaining the site, as well as giving members advice on how to avoid arrest. One of them, a 64-year-old from Hamburg, is alleged to have personally uploaded more than 3,500 images.

"Furthermore, members of the platform received safety instructions from them for secure surfing on 'Boystown' in order to minimize the risk of discovery by law enforcement authorities," the BKA said.

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The pan-European police agency Europol assisted in the monthslong investigation alongside authorities in the United States, the Netherlands, Sweden, Australia and Canada.

The site was on the dark web, an encrypted series of web pages inaccessible through normal web browsers or search engines.

Police said the site had existed since at least June 2019 and "served the worldwide exchange of child pornography by platform members, whereby mainly recordings of abuse of boys were exchanged."

The site was structured so to allow easy retrieval of images and video of "the most serious sexual abuse of young children," police said.

Two chat areas on the site allowed members to exchange images of abuse in multiple languages.

Europol said in a statement: "Online child offender communities on the dark web exhibit considerable resilience in response to law enforcement actions targeting them.

"Their reactions include resurrecting old communities, establishing new communities, and making strong efforts to organize and administer them."

The case is latest in a long string of global attempts to clamp down on distribution of child abuse images through the dark web. And other raids and arrests could follow in an attempt to shut down other, similar sites.

"There were and there are still several sites similar to Boystown in the darknet. For this reason investigations will go on to identify the responsible persons behind theses dark net sites," said Julia Bussweiler, a public prosecutor, responding to a question from NBC News.

In 2019 federal prosecutors in the U.S. filed multiple charges against a 23-year-old South Korean man accused of running what they call the world's "largest dark web child porn marketplace," with more than 200,000 unique videos.

The dark web has long been associated with a range of criminality, including the sale of drugs and hacked private information.

Several high-profile successful police operations have curbed the activities of illegal marketplaces. In January this year Europol said it had successfully shut down DarkMarket, thought to be among the largest in the world with half a million members and more than 140 million euros ($168 million) in sales to date.

Patrick Smith reported from London, and Carlo Angerer from Munich.