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Member of Gambino Organized Crime Family to spend Life in Prison on Racketeering Charges
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com A member of the Gambino organized crime family was sentenced to life without parole for racketeering charges that span more than thee decades. Bartolomeo Vernace was found guilty of all nine racketeering acts, a 1981 double homicide, heroin trafficking, robbery and illegal gambling. “For more than four decades, the defendant dedicated his…
Celebrity Hacker Helped Prevent More Than 300 Cyber Attacks As Informant
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com The FBI has used celebrity hacker “Sabu” to imprison his friends and prevent prevent more than 300 cyber attacks against the U.S. military, NASA and media companies in the past three years, CNN reports. Hector Monsegur, who used the Sabu moniker online, helped crack down on hacking collectives Anonymous and LulzSec. In…
FBI Agent Who Cracked Down on Public Corruption to Join North Carolina Board of Elections
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com FBI Agent Charles W. Stuber Jr. knows a thing or two about public corruption, from going after U.S. Sen. John Edwards to helping secure convictions against a range of state political figures. Now the 54-year-old, who has worked for the FBI since 1985, is retiring this month and will take his investigative…
Border Patrol Shifts Resources Because of Sharp Increase of Immigrant Smugglers in Texas
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com The never-ending battle to crack down on immigrant smugglers has shifted to southernmost Texas where federal agents are seeing an alarming influx of activity, Fox News reports. Border Patrol leaders are shifting resources from western states after a marked increase of arrests from Oct. 1 to May 17, when more than 148,000…
Justice Department Wants to Slow Pace of Deportations by Focusing on Immigrants with Violent Histories
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com City and county jails are increasingly rejecting federal requests to hold immigrants who are in the country illegally. Now the Justice Department plans to do something about it – reduce deportation mainly to immigrants who have committed violent crimes, the Los Angeles Times reports. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson is expected to make…
Discontinued Full-Body Scanners at Airports End Up in Local Jails After Privacy Concerns
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com The full-body scanners that revealed nude images to the TSA at airports now have a new home. Time reports that most of the 171 scanners have ended up in jails nationwide. Privacy advocates blasted the scanners, saying they were too revealing. The federal government let go of the scanners for much less…
Stejskal: Mississippi Burning 50 Years Later
Greg Stejskal served as an FBI agent for 31 years and retired as resident agent in charge of the Ann Arbor office. By Greg Stejskal ticklethewire.com The 60s were a tumultuous decade, and 1964 was emblematic of that decade. Arthur Ashe won the US Open, and Martin Luther King, Jr. was awarded the Nobel…