It’s not every day that one gets a front-row seat to witness the justice system’s workings in a high-profile case. I was fortunate enough to be at the US District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco earlier today for the sentencing of the man who on October 28, 2023, broke into [...]
Search Results for: California prison
Attacker of ex-US Speaker's husband sentenced to 30 years in prison
The US District Court for the Northern District of California on Friday sentenced the man who attacked former US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband to thirty years imprisonment for assault and attempted kidnapping. On October 31, 2022, David DePape was charged with the attempted kidnapping of Nancy Pelosi and the assault of her husband Paul [...]
Federal judge sentences Florida man for conspiring to firebomb Planned Parenthood clinic
US District Judge Cormac J. Carney sentenced 21-year-old Xavier Batten of Florida to 42 months in prison for conspiring to firebomb a Planned Parenthood clinic, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced in a statement Monday. The events leading to Batten’s sentence transpired in February and March of 2022. According to the DOJ’s statement, Batten [...]
Colorado’s Attorney General announced that former paramedic Jeremy Cooper was sentenced state court on Friday to four years probation, 14 months of work release and 100 hours of community service. A jury convicted him of negligent homicide of Elijah McClain last December. McClain, a 23-year-old Black man, was stopped and placed in a neck hold by [...]
Explainer: US Mass Incarceration and Its Disparate Racial Impacts
The US prides itself on being a nation built on freedom, justice, and individual rights. And yet the evolution of its system of mass incarceration — a system that cannot be defined without reference to shocking racial disparities — seems to directly contradict these founding principles. The US prison population dwarfs those of nearly every other [...]
The Cost of Revenge: A Cantor's Critique of Israel's Response to Hamas
In the wake of the deadly Hamas terrorist attacks of Oct. 7, 2023, many of Israel’s supporters, myself included, have succumbed to the understandable impulse for violent retribution. Israel is a land that I love, both culturally as a Jew — and third-generation Holocaust survivor — and spiritually as an ordained cantor. It follows that [...]
US federal judge orders special master to oversee California women's prison known for sexual abuse
A US federal judge on Friday ordered the appointment of a special master to oversee a federal women’s prison in California that is notorious for widespread sexual abuse against inmates. This move marks the first time the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) has been subject to such oversight. US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers wrote, [...]
DOJ indicts former Google employee for stealing AI for China-owned companies
A federal grand jury indicted former Google employee Linwei Ding on Wednesday for allegedly stealing information from Google while secretly working for two Chinese technology companies. Ding has been charged with four counts of theft of trade secrets in relation to his alleged plan to steal artificial intelligence (AI) information from Google. The Department of [...]
Injustice in Texas: A Call for Fair Trial as Ivan Cantu's Execution Nears
“It a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” — Macbeth When asked to imagine the stereotypes associated with Texas, one might conjure images of barbecue, big trucks, and cowboys. But perhaps a more apt image would be that of injustice undergirding execution. As it all too frequently has in the [...]
On Feb. 11, much of the global community marked the International Day of Women and Girls in Science and Technology. But in Afghanistan, few felt like celebrating. After all, that day was the 874th since girls were banned from attending secondary school studies, and the 415th since universities shut their doors to women. The urgency [...]