Rise in people fascinated by violence, police warn

The threat from international and domestic terror presents a “breadth of challenge greater than it has ever been”, according to senior US and UK police officers who oversaw the successful prosecution of Anjem Choudary.

The Islamist preacher from east London is starting a life sentence for directing a group banned under UK terror law, and encouraging support for it online.

The officers say his case highlights the continuing danger posed by radicalisers – and the violent groups they support.

“People fascinated by violence” should probably be read as criminalizing dissent.

Share

Jury in Coutts murder-conspiracy trial expected to begin deliberations this week

LETHBRIDGE, Alta. – A story of femmes fatales, government conspiracies, the devil, and an armed invasion leading to a dystopian future has been playing out for seven weeks in a Lethbridge courtroom.

This week, jurors in Lethbridge, Alta., are slated to begin deliberating the fate of Anthony Olienick and Chris Carbert.

The two are on trial in Court of King’s Bench, charged with conspiracy to commit murder at the Coutts, Alta., blockade in early 2022.

Share

Thought Police: Protecting the People from Prayer

In their zeal to defend abortion at all costs, governments are beginning to criminalise silent thought. Their efforts must be resisted.

Since its earliest versions surfaced sometime in the Middle Ages, the venerable German folk song “Die Gedanken sind frei” (Thoughts are free) has been an anthem to a keystone of human dignity: freedom of thought. This song gives voice to the fact that, while oppressive authorities can forbid speech, assembly, worship, or anything else that happens outside the realm of a person’s consciousness, what goes on inside the brain cannot be stopped by anyone. In Germany, the song’s contemporary version took shape in the first half of the 19th century, expressing popular opposition to censorship and authoritarianism. Forbidden after the failed German revolution of 1848, it resurfaced in 1898 when the composer Gustav Mahler included it in his song collection Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy’s Magic Horn). In the 1930s and ’40s, the song played a role in the resistance against Nazism. In 1989, demonstrators sang it to express their demand for a peaceful transition to democracy in the German Democratic Republic.

Share

Alleged ‘pipe bombs’ turn out to be sandstone firecrackers for work, Coutts trial hears

What undercover officers deemed to be “pipe bombs” during the Coutts protest in 2022 have been verified as firecrackers for the purpose of unearthing sandstone for construction work.

The trial continues for the remaining two of the “Coutts Four,” a group accused of conspiracy to commit murder against a police officer at the border blockage in Coutts, AB. Anthony Olienick and Chris Carbert are currently on trial in Lethbridge to address charges stemming from the pandemic-era blockade at the Canada-US border crossing.

Share

Biden DHS Panel Focused on Perceived Terror Threat from Pro-Trump, Religious Americans, Meeting Notes Show

A now-shuttered intelligence expert panel convened by the Department of Homeland Security focused its domestic-terrorism prevention discussions on supporters of former president Donald Trump, religious Americans, and members of the military community, according to a tranche of newly released internal documents.

Share

Creating Online harms regulators expected to cost Canada $200 million: PBO

OTTAWA – The parliamentary budget officer estimates that staffing up the new regulators in the Liberals’ Online Harms Act will cost around $200 million over five years.

The federal government wants to establish a Digital Safety Commission to regulate social-media companies and force them to limit harmful content online.

Share

Report: DHS Group Called Being ‘Religious’ An ‘Indicator’ Of Domestic Terrorism

President Joe Biden’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) brainstormed about infiltrating local communities to spy on Americans, and suggested being “religious” or “in the military” was an “indicator of extremists and terrorism,” excerpts of documents obtained by America First Legal (AFL) purportedly show.

Share

Murder-Conspiracy Trial Hears Edmonton Officers Showed up to Support Coutts Blockade

An undercover RCMP officer has told court that two Edmonton police officers showed up to support the 2022 border blockade at Coutts, Alta.

The Mountie says one Edmonton officer was there with his wife, who was a nurse, and there was a lineup of people wanting to shake their hands.

The undercover officer, who cannot be identified, is testifying in the trial of Anthony Olienick and Chris Carbert.

Share

Something is rotten … in Coutts

Share

A tale of two convoy trials – Pat King’s courtroom drama differs from Tamara Lich and Chris Barber’s

The three of them once stood side-by-side as road captains of a historic protest.

Now, more than two years after thousands of honking vehicles rolled through Ottawa in what became known as the Freedom Convoy, two narratives are emerging in court — potentially splitting the fates of Pat King, Tamara Lich and Chris Barber.

Factually, they are separate cases. King is being tried alone, whereas Lich and Barber are co-accused in their trial.

Share

Hunter’s laptop, Wuhan and more: ‘Disinformation’ and ‘conspiracies’ turn out to be true — again and again

These days it seems like a conspiracy theorist is just someone who was right, but at an inconveniently early time.

Shortly before the 2020 presidential election, a laptop formerly belonging to Joe Biden’s son Hunter came to light.

Hunter, not the most reliable of individuals, had left it for repair in a Delaware computer store and never picked it up.

Share

Ottawa Detective Tells Hearing Probe of COVID Vaccines, Infant Deaths Was ‘Duty as a Police Officer’

OTTAWA—An Ottawa Police Service detective accused of discreditable conduct after probing into the COVID-19 vaccination status of the mothers of deceased infants testified at her hearing that she was upholding her oath as an officer when conducting the investigations.

“My duty as a police officer is to preserve life and property, to preserve the peace. And if I see any one of those situations arising where I need to step in and preserve life, I will do something. And that’s what I did, in good faith, as a police officer,” Constable Helen Grus testified at the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) building in Stittsville on May 27.

Share