G4S company and guards on flight carrying Jimmy Mubenga could be charged with manslaughter Scotland Yard is considering bringing a corporate manslaughter charge against the world’s largest private security firm over the death of an Angolan deportee. Detectives investigating the death of Jimmy Mubenga, who collapsed while being deported on a commercial flight from Heathrow, have interviewed whistleblowers from G4S, the company hired by the government to deport foreign nationals. They are considering whether the company could be held responsible for his death under rarely used legislation that came into force three years ago. Passengers on British Airways flight 77 told police they saw three G4S guards heavily restraining Mubenga, who they said had been complaining of breathing difficulties before he collapsed. The guards were later arrested in connection with the death and, following interviews this week, were bailed until 4 May. They could face manslaughter charges. However, sources with knowledge of the case have said police are also considering passing a file to the Crown Prosecution Service recommending a corporate manslaughter charge against G4S. The first and only company to be convicted under the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 was found guilty last month. Cotswold Geotechnical Holdings was fined £385,000 for the death of Alexander Wright, 27, a geologist who suffocated when he became trapped in a collapsed trench. Under the legislation, prosecutors need to prove a person’s death was caused by a gross breach of duty of care by a company. They also need to convince a jury that the actions of a company’s “senior management” were a substantial element in that breach. A prosecution of this kind against G4S, which receives more than £600m from the government for services including the running of four prisons, three immigration removal centres and 675 court and police cells, would be highly damaging to the Home Office. G4S is the second-largest private employer in the world and boasts a £7bn turnover. Police have recently interviewed three G4S whistleblowers , who last month told parliament that the company repeatedly ignored warnings from staff that potentially lethal force was being used against deportees. They said executives were warned about one technique nicknamed “carpet karaoke”, which involved bending deportees over in aircraft seats to silence them. The whistleblowers, who include a G4S charter operations manager who said he warned seniors they risked “playing Russian roulette with detainees’ lives”, are known to be cooperating with police and providing detailed paperwork they say corrobarates their claims. Detectives are also seeking to track down other individuals from G4S known to have concerns about safety standards and training at the company. Heathrow CID opened the inquiry into the death of Mubenga, 46, hours after he collapsed on the aircraft as it prepared for departure to Luanda on 12 October. The flight was delayed for 24 hours and passengers were transferred to a nearby hotel overnight. The following day, the passengers were interviewed by police but, owing to their imminent departure, only spent around 40 minutes each speaking to detectives. Days later, the Metropolitan police’s homicide unit took over the case after the Guardian independently tracked down passengers who said Mubenga had complained he was unable to breathe for several minutes before his collapse. The unit arrested three guards, aged 35, 48 and 49, and questioned them under caution. Police have tried to trace other passengers for more in-depth interviews. Four G4S whistleblowers last month submitted evidence to the Commons home affairs select committee. The evidence, obtained by the Guardian, alleged serious failings by G4S. It also contradicted some of what senior G4S officials told MPs at a hearing after Mubenga’s death. Keith Vaz, who Labour MP who chairs the committee, said the possibility that whistleblower evidence could assist the police investigation represented “progress”. His committee has yet to decide whether to recall the G4S officials or hold further evidence sessions. “I am not surprised that the police have decided to take the matter forward given the circumstances surrounding this case,” he said. “I am sure the members of the home affairs committee will want to look further into this case during their inquiry into the deportation of detainees.” Committee member Julian Huppert, a Lib Dem MP, said police interest in the parliamentary testimony showed “how strong the committee process is”. “I am glad the home affair select committee hearing has led to this outcome,” he said. G4S said in a statement: “As this is the subject of an on-going investigation, we are unable to comment as this time. We can confirm that G4S has received no approach at this time from the authorities in relation to the company’s position and potential liabilities.” Jimmy Mubenga Immigration and asylum Police Crime Angola Paul Lewis Matthew Taylor guardian.co.uk
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More than 100,000 jobs lost in 2010 as Labour accuses Office for Budget Responsibility of getting its forecasts wrong Public sector workers are being laid off much faster than officials forecast, with more than 100,000 jobs being lost over the past 12 months. Figures from the Office for National Statistics showed a decline of 111,000 in “general government” workers, 1.9% of the total, during 2010; 66,000 of the jobs were in local government. In its forecast with the budget last June, George Osborne’s Office for Budget Responsibility predicted a decline of 0.1%, equivalent to 5,500 jobs, in general government employment between the financial years of 2009-10 and 2010-11. In its revised November estimates, the OBR shifted its estimate of the number of government employees in 2010-11 down by a further 40,000; but yesterday’s 111,000 figure means job losses are running twice as fast as it expected. Liam Byrne, shadow work and pensions secretary, said: “If the OBR has underestimated the rise in public sector unemployment, then that makes the outlook for jobs even worse.” On the ONS’s wider measure of public sector employment, which includes public sector corporations, the government’s austerity drive claimed 132,000 public sector jobs in 2010, with the rate of job losses gathering pace through the year. Some 45,000 public sector jobs were lost in the final three months of 2010 alone, including 32,000 in schools and colleges, despite the promise to protect education. There was also a surprise rise of 9,000 jobs in “public administration”, raising a question about whether the government is finding true efficiencies. The decline in public sector jobs overall is partly attributed to the government’s recruitment freeze, but the pace suggests cuts are already translating into job losses. It is now known that, overall, 170,000 local government workers have got “at risk” notices, which will take some months to translate into redundancies. The ONS figures show the total of unemployed people increased by 27,000 in the three months to January to reach 2.53m, the highest figure since 1994. Ministers said the figures show that the private sector is picking up staff and offsetting some of the public sector redundancies, citing a 77,000 rise in jobs from non-state employers in the final three months of 2010. The figures also show a 45,000 fall in public sector jobs between October and November 2010. In 2010 there was a 132,000 reduction in public sector employment, a decrease of 2.1%. Of those laid off in the last quarter of 2010, 9,000 were in central government, 24,000 in local government, and 12,000 in quangos and other public corporations. Regions with the biggest falls in public sector jobs were: Yorkshire and Humber (22,000); the north-west (19,000); and the south-west (18,000). In Whitehall the largest losses were in the Department for Work and Pensions (1,670), the Home Office (1,190), and Revenue & Customs (640). Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: “These job losses
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More than 100,000 jobs lost in 2010 as Labour accuses Office for Budget Responsibility of getting its forecasts wrong Public sector workers are being laid off much faster than officials forecast, with more than 100,000 jobs being lost over the past 12 months. Figures from the Office for National Statistics showed a decline of 111,000 in “general government” workers, 1.9% of the total, during 2010; 66,000 of the jobs were in local government. In its forecast with the budget last June, George Osborne’s Office for Budget Responsibility predicted a decline of 0.1%, equivalent to 5,500 jobs, in general government employment between the financial years of 2009-10 and 2010-11. In its revised November estimates, the OBR shifted its estimate of the number of government employees in 2010-11 down by a further 40,000; but yesterday’s 111,000 figure means job losses are running twice as fast as it expected. Liam Byrne, shadow work and pensions secretary, said: “If the OBR has underestimated the rise in public sector unemployment, then that makes the outlook for jobs even worse.” On the ONS’s wider measure of public sector employment, which includes public sector corporations, the government’s austerity drive claimed 132,000 public sector jobs in 2010, with the rate of job losses gathering pace through the year. Some 45,000 public sector jobs were lost in the final three months of 2010 alone, including 32,000 in schools and colleges, despite the promise to protect education. There was also a surprise rise of 9,000 jobs in “public administration”, raising a question about whether the government is finding true efficiencies. The decline in public sector jobs overall is partly attributed to the government’s recruitment freeze, but the pace suggests cuts are already translating into job losses. It is now known that, overall, 170,000 local government workers have got “at risk” notices, which will take some months to translate into redundancies. The ONS figures show the total of unemployed people increased by 27,000 in the three months to January to reach 2.53m, the highest figure since 1994. Ministers said the figures show that the private sector is picking up staff and offsetting some of the public sector redundancies, citing a 77,000 rise in jobs from non-state employers in the final three months of 2010. The figures also show a 45,000 fall in public sector jobs between October and November 2010. In 2010 there was a 132,000 reduction in public sector employment, a decrease of 2.1%. Of those laid off in the last quarter of 2010, 9,000 were in central government, 24,000 in local government, and 12,000 in quangos and other public corporations. Regions with the biggest falls in public sector jobs were: Yorkshire and Humber (22,000); the north-west (19,000); and the south-west (18,000). In Whitehall the largest losses were in the Department for Work and Pensions (1,670), the Home Office (1,190), and Revenue & Customs (640). Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: “These job losses
Continue reading …Here’s a very bad rhyme: It wasn’t long too ago, When Sarah ditched her igloo. Now she’s free, Getting paid by Fox with glee But why are Conservatives now crying? Is comparing her to Al Sharpton very mean? Conservatives flock to her like Charlie Sheen? Bill Kristol has ditched her Roger Ailes just snitched her Oh, how the times have changed. Al Sharpton is a favorite whipping post for the entire Conservative movement and has been for decades so you know when they start to compare her to him, things are not rosy in Moose Country. Palin ‘becoming Al Sharpton’? Palin’s politics of grievance and group identity, according to these critics, is a betrayal of conservative principles. For decades, it was a standard line of the right that liberals cynically promoted victimhood to achieve their goals and that they practiced the politics of identity — race, sex and class—over ideas. (Related: Republicans learn cost of attacking Palin ) Among those taking aim at Palin in recent interviews with POLITICO are George F. Will, the elder statesman of conservative columnists; Peter Wehner, a top strategist in George W. Bush ’s White House, and Heather Mac Donald, a leading voice with the right-leaning Manhattan Institute. Matt Labash, a longtime writer for the Weekly Standard, said that because of Palin’s frequent appeals to victimhood and group grievance, “She’s becoming Al Sharpton , Alaska edition.”— This year, the conservative intelligentsia doesn’t just tend to dislike Palin — many fear that her rise would represent the triumph of an intellectually empty brand of populism and the death of ideas as an engine of the right. “This is a problem for the movement,” said Will about what Palin represents. “For conservatism, because it is a creedal movement, this is a disease to which it is susceptible.” The line of modern conservatism that can be traced back to National Review founder William F. Buckley would be broken by Palin, Will said. “There’s no Reagan without Goldwater, no Goldwater without National Review and no National Review without Buckley — and the contrast between he and Ms. Palin is obvious.” Asked if the GOP would remain the party of ideas if Palin captures the nomination, Will said: “The answer is emphatically no.” — Columnist Charles Krauthammer, without talking about Palin specifically, noted that “there’s healthy and unhealthy populism,” and there is concern about the rise of the latter. “When populism becomes purely anti-intellectual, it can become unhealthy and destructive,” said Krauthammer. — When former first lady Barbara Bush recently observed tartly that she thought Palin would be happiest staying put in Alaska rather than running for president, the former Alaska governor responded on Laura Ingraham’s radio show that the Bushes are “blue bloods who want to pick and choose their winners instead of allowing competition to pick and choose the winners.” Then there was this morning’s grim polling news : Sarah Palin’s ratings within the Republican Party are slumping, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, a potentially troubling sign for the former Alaska governor as she weighs whether to enter the 2012 presidential race. For the first time in Post-ABC News polling, fewer than six in 10 Republicans and GOP-leaning independents see Palin in a favorable light, down from a stratospheric 88 percent in the days after the 2008 Republican National Convention and 70 percent as recently as October The GOP Grand Poobahs really don’t want her to run for President, because they know the Republican primary will turn into a Tea Party donnybrook. Can it get much worse for her when Roger Ailes lets it be known that he’s unhappy with her too? Before Sarah Palin posted her infamous “Blood Libel” video on Facebook on January 12, she placed a call to Fox News chairman Roger Ailes. In the wake of the Tucson massacre, Palin was fuming that the media was blaming her heated rhetoric for the actions of a madman that left six people dead and thirteen others injured, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Palin told Ailes she wanted to respond, according to a person with knowledge of the call. It wasn’t fair the media was making this about her. Ailes told Palin that she should stay quiet. “Lie low,” he said. “There’s no need to inject yourself into the story.” Palin told Ailes that other people had given her that same advice. Her lawyer Bob Barnett is said to have cautioned her about getting involved. The consensus in some corners of Palin’s camp was that she faced considerable risks if she spoke out. But, this being Sarah Palin, she did it anyway. Ailes was not pleased with her decision, which turned out to be a political debacle for Palin, especially her use of the historically loaded term “blood libel” to describe the actions of the media. “The Tucson thing was horrible,” said a person familiar with Ailes’s thinking. “Before she responded, she was making herself look like a victim. She was winning. She went out and did the blood libel thing, and Roger is thinking, ‘Why did you call me for advice?’” Here’s the post I wrote about her blood libel response to the criticisms she took over the target map ad: Calling it ‘Blood Libel’ just opens Sarah Palin to a whole new realm of well-earned criticism Oh, lookie here….A new Al Palin posting on her Facebook page which is titled: T he $4-Per-Gallon President . For a second I thought she meant Bush. I wonder if she even wrote it?
Continue reading …Here’s a very bad rhyme: It wasn’t long too ago, When Sarah ditched her igloo. Now she’s free, Getting paid by Fox with glee But why are Conservatives now crying? Is comparing her to Al Sharpton very mean? Conservatives flock to her like Charlie Sheen? Bill Kristol has ditched her Roger Ailes just snitched her Oh, how the times have changed. Al Sharpton is a favorite whipping post for the entire Conservative movement and has been for decades so you know when they start to compare her to him, things are not rosy in Moose Country. Palin ‘becoming Al Sharpton’? Palin’s politics of grievance and group identity, according to these critics, is a betrayal of conservative principles. For decades, it was a standard line of the right that liberals cynically promoted victimhood to achieve their goals and that they practiced the politics of identity — race, sex and class—over ideas. (Related: Republicans learn cost of attacking Palin ) Among those taking aim at Palin in recent interviews with POLITICO are George F. Will, the elder statesman of conservative columnists; Peter Wehner, a top strategist in George W. Bush ’s White House, and Heather Mac Donald, a leading voice with the right-leaning Manhattan Institute. Matt Labash, a longtime writer for the Weekly Standard, said that because of Palin’s frequent appeals to victimhood and group grievance, “She’s becoming Al Sharpton , Alaska edition.”— This year, the conservative intelligentsia doesn’t just tend to dislike Palin — many fear that her rise would represent the triumph of an intellectually empty brand of populism and the death of ideas as an engine of the right. “This is a problem for the movement,” said Will about what Palin represents. “For conservatism, because it is a creedal movement, this is a disease to which it is susceptible.” The line of modern conservatism that can be traced back to National Review founder William F. Buckley would be broken by Palin, Will said. “There’s no Reagan without Goldwater, no Goldwater without National Review and no National Review without Buckley — and the contrast between he and Ms. Palin is obvious.” Asked if the GOP would remain the party of ideas if Palin captures the nomination, Will said: “The answer is emphatically no.” — Columnist Charles Krauthammer, without talking about Palin specifically, noted that “there’s healthy and unhealthy populism,” and there is concern about the rise of the latter. “When populism becomes purely anti-intellectual, it can become unhealthy and destructive,” said Krauthammer. — When former first lady Barbara Bush recently observed tartly that she thought Palin would be happiest staying put in Alaska rather than running for president, the former Alaska governor responded on Laura Ingraham’s radio show that the Bushes are “blue bloods who want to pick and choose their winners instead of allowing competition to pick and choose the winners.” Then there was this morning’s grim polling news : Sarah Palin’s ratings within the Republican Party are slumping, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, a potentially troubling sign for the former Alaska governor as she weighs whether to enter the 2012 presidential race. For the first time in Post-ABC News polling, fewer than six in 10 Republicans and GOP-leaning independents see Palin in a favorable light, down from a stratospheric 88 percent in the days after the 2008 Republican National Convention and 70 percent as recently as October The GOP Grand Poobahs really don’t want her to run for President, because they know the Republican primary will turn into a Tea Party donnybrook. Can it get much worse for her when Roger Ailes lets it be known that he’s unhappy with her too? Before Sarah Palin posted her infamous “Blood Libel” video on Facebook on January 12, she placed a call to Fox News chairman Roger Ailes. In the wake of the Tucson massacre, Palin was fuming that the media was blaming her heated rhetoric for the actions of a madman that left six people dead and thirteen others injured, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Palin told Ailes she wanted to respond, according to a person with knowledge of the call. It wasn’t fair the media was making this about her. Ailes told Palin that she should stay quiet. “Lie low,” he said. “There’s no need to inject yourself into the story.” Palin told Ailes that other people had given her that same advice. Her lawyer Bob Barnett is said to have cautioned her about getting involved. The consensus in some corners of Palin’s camp was that she faced considerable risks if she spoke out. But, this being Sarah Palin, she did it anyway. Ailes was not pleased with her decision, which turned out to be a political debacle for Palin, especially her use of the historically loaded term “blood libel” to describe the actions of the media. “The Tucson thing was horrible,” said a person familiar with Ailes’s thinking. “Before she responded, she was making herself look like a victim. She was winning. She went out and did the blood libel thing, and Roger is thinking, ‘Why did you call me for advice?’” Here’s the post I wrote about her blood libel response to the criticisms she took over the target map ad: Calling it ‘Blood Libel’ just opens Sarah Palin to a whole new realm of well-earned criticism Oh, lookie here….A new Al Palin posting on her Facebook page which is titled: T he $4-Per-Gallon President . For a second I thought she meant Bush. I wonder if she even wrote it?
Continue reading …In America, a 19-year-old can be arrested for killing a hamster —yet we are allowed to inflict great cruelty on animals kept, not as pets, but for food. That’s because of state laws called “Common Farming Exemptions” that allow the industry, instead of lawmakers, to basically define cruelty by making…
Continue reading …The news out of Bahrain is bad— six reported dead in an assault on anti-government protesters today—but this video is worse. The extremely graphic and disturbing footage shows an altercation between a protester and a handful of police, who shoot the man from just a few feet away. New…
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Want some more Droid 3 eye candy? If you just recently bought a Droid 2 , the answer is probably “no, please, no” — but nonetheless, we’ve got some for you. A couple more shots of the rumored refresh have popped up on HowardForums once again, showing off a QWERTY keyboard that looks largely similar to the one it’s replacing with one very, very notable exception: it’s a 5-row deal this time around with what appear to be half-height keys for the numeric row. People love 5-row keyboards, so if this is legit — and we really have no reason to doubt that it is — that feature alone could move a lot of phones. More on this soon, we hope. Motorola Droid 3 for Verizon breaks cover once again originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 16 Mar 2011 15:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Want some more Droid 3 eye candy? If you just recently bought a Droid 2 , the answer is probably “no, please, no” — but nonetheless, we’ve got some for you. A couple more shots of the rumored refresh have popped up on HowardForums once again, showing off a QWERTY keyboard that looks largely similar to the one it’s replacing with one very, very notable exception: it’s a 5-row deal this time around with what appear to be half-height keys for the numeric row. People love 5-row keyboards, so if this is legit — and we really have no reason to doubt that it is — that feature alone could move a lot of phones. More on this soon, we hope. Motorola Droid 3 for Verizon breaks cover once again originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 16 Mar 2011 15:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Want some more Droid 3 eye candy? If you just recently bought a Droid 2 , the answer is probably “no, please, no” — but nonetheless, we’ve got some for you. A couple more shots of the rumored refresh have popped up on HowardForums once again, showing off a QWERTY keyboard that looks largely similar to the one it’s replacing with one very, very notable exception: it’s a 5-row deal this time around with what appear to be half-height keys for the numeric row. People love 5-row keyboards, so if this is legit — and we really have no reason to doubt that it is — that feature alone could move a lot of phones. More on this soon, we hope. Motorola Droid 3 for Verizon breaks cover once again originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 16 Mar 2011 15:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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