Abandoned animals found crammed in cages alongside road, North Carolina police say

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 Abandoned animals were found locked in cages on the side of a dark road in Western North Carolina, police said.
The animals were left off Dunsmore Avenue late Tuesday, March 1, or early Wednesday, March 2, the Black Mountain Police Department said in a Facebook post on Friday, March 4. Black Mountain is in Buncombe County, about 115 miles west of Charlotte.

The Facebook post had received more than 220 reactions and more than 70 comments as of Sunday, March 6.
“Thank you for saving them,” one person wrote on the post. “How cruel.”
“That’s so unbelievably mean,” another wrote.
Some Facebook users said they hope the animals find good homes — or that they want to adopt them themselves.
“So cruel. Glad they (were) found and praying for good homes,” one wrote.
Police didn’t provide information on the conditions of the animals or whether they would be available for adoption.

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Column: Spending $800,000 for a single unit of homeless housing is a red flag for L.A.

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 Way back in 2016, when I voted for the $1.2-billion housing bond known as Proposition HHH, I expected a different picture than the one we’re looking at now.
We all knew it would be impossible to erect 10,000 units overnight and bring immediate relief to the city’s homeless multitudes. In fact, a 10-year timeline was laid out.
But HHH, sold as a centerpiece of the strategy to end homelessness, has underdelivered so far.

“It isn’t what Angelenos voted for six years ago,” said former city and county executive Miguel Santana, who cited multiple bureaucratic hurdles and worried that public frustration will make it difficult to win needed support for future investments in housing for homeless people.
More than five years after Mayor Eric Garcetti and other public officials celebrated victory, only 1,142 units have been completed, homelessness is on the rise, only about 8,000 of the promised 10,000 units are on the books, and the cost per unit of new housing keeps soaring, as do developer complaints about beastly permitting and inspection delays.
City Controller Ron Galperin’s latest audit of HHH progress, and lack thereof, reads like an indictment.
“While 54% of projects are currently in construction, nearly a third are still in pre-development,” Galperin found. “Projects in the primary HHH pipeline are taking three to six years to complete, with most set to open between 2023 and 2026.”
The average per-unit cost of projects under construction — originally estimated at $375,000 — went from $531,000 in 2020 to just shy of $600,000 last year.
As Galperin summed it up:
“The costs are too high and the pace is far too slow to address the tragedy on our streets.”
And then there’s this jaw-dropper:
“At least one project in pre-development is estimated to cost nearly $837,000 per unit.”
HHH got 77% approval, but if people knew how slowly the wheels would turn or that there’d come a day when a single unit would go for more than $800,000, it would have gotten buried.
For all of this, HHH was a good idea in theory, even if the execution has been less than sparkling. Los Angeles was and still is way short of the supportive and affordable housing it needs, and the 8,000 HHH units will end up housing 10,000 or more people who might otherwise languish or even die if left on the streets.
When it comes to high prices, L.A. is not alone. A Times report in 2020 put California at the top of the heap in the cost of government-subsidized housing complexes, and the story laid out details of a Solana Beach housing project that topped $1 million per unit.
In a written response to Galperin’s audit, L.A. Housing Department chief Ann Sewill scratched back.
She argued that tweaks suggested by Galperin have already been implemented, that HHH isn’t the only housing initiative, and that HHH progress has been “anything but sluggish." She also said that despite challenges and market forces, HHH “will over-perform on its goals.”
That’s a rosy assessment. Sewill also argued that the financing model involves the leveraging of funds, so that, say, only $140,833 of HHH money is needed to build a $659,600 unit because HHH leverages funding from multiple other government sources.

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Fox News defense reporter challenges war comments on air

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Fox News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin couldn't hold back when following a retired U.S. Army colonel on the air recently, saying she barely had time to correct all of his “distortions.”
She tried, though. And it wasn’t for the first time or the last time.
Griffin, who has reported for Fox News Channel since 1996, has attracted attention over the past two weeks as she has publicly corrected or contradicted several Fox analysts and hosts on the air about the crisis in Ukraine. When Tucker Carlson suggested this week that some reporters are acting as flacks for the Pentagon, some interpreted that as a criticism of his colleague.

Meanwhile, former Fox host Bill O'Reilly singled Griffin out as a gutsy reporter unafraid to challenge others.
Griffin says her efforts are consistent with what she's always tried to do for 25 years, both on the air and behind the scenes at Fox News.
Related video: Tucker Carlson admits being wrong about Ukraine after supporting Russia

“I think you want your experts, in today's media environment, to be passionate about what they know and what they feel about the facts,” said Steve Krakauer, author of The Fourth Watch, a media newsletter with a conservative viewpoint. “I want them to be in the story.”
Griffin knows her beat as much as anyone in journalism and her real-time fact-checks are a valuable public service, as long as she doesn’t get caught in the muck of partisan debating, he said on Thursday.
Griffin has pushed back on comments made by Sean Hannity, Steve Doocy, Harris Faulkner and Greg Gutfeld during appearances on their own shows. After Hannity criticized President Joe Biden on Ukraine policy, Griffin noted that every president since the fall of the Soviet Union has made mistakes there. Doocy argued on “Fox & Friends” that sanctions haven’t worked against Russia; Griffin said it was too soon to say that. When Faulkner similarly questioned whether sanctions were a sufficient step, Griffin said that sending troops to the area would have given Putin an excuse to invade. She said it was “not some wag-the-dog situation” when Gutfeld suggested on “The Five” that the Ukraine crisis had been manufactured.
This past Sunday, she took on a retired U.S. Army brigadier general, Don Bolduc, after he said that it “boggles my mind” that the United States hadn’t already gone “all in” on Ukraine. Griffin said Bolduc was a politician, not a student of history.
“To suggest that the U.S. would put indirect fire or special operations or CIA on the ground to give Putin any sort of excuse to broaden this conflict is extremely dangerous talk at a time like this,” Griffin said.
Earlier that day, she was interviewed by Trey Gowdy after an appearance by retired U.S. Army Col. Doug Macgregor, who urged the United States to stay out of Ukraine and not ship it any weapons. He said the Russians should be allowed to annex the portion of Ukraine they are most interested in.
When Griffin followed him, she said she needed to correct some of what Macgregor had said, “and I'm not sure 10 minutes is enough time because there are so many distortions.” She said that Macgregor sounded like an apologist for Putin. "That kind of projection of withdrawal and weakness is what made Putin think he could move into a sovereign country,” she said.

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Judge delivers blow to undercover FBI agents in Whitmer kidnap case

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To this day, the defendants in the alleged plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer don't know who "Mark" and "Red" really are.
The two undercover FBI agents infiltrated their group, pretending to be one of them, but their real names have been kept secret.
Not for long.
Over the objections of the government, a judge ruled on Thursday that the two FBI agents will have to use their real names when they testify in the upcoming Whitmer kidnap trial.

While the case was largely built in secrecy, with undercover informants and agents spying on the accused, the judge stressed that the trial will be open and transparent.
"Making it crystal clear to the jury and the public that inside the courtroom, nothing is undercover and everything is out in the open will best ensure fairness during trial and eventual acceptance and respect for whatever the jury ultimately decides," Chief U.S. District Judge Robert Jonker wrote.
Under Jonker's ruling, the government will have to provide the names of the FBI witnesses to the defense one day before they testify.
According to court records, “Mark” posed as a resident of the Upper Peninsula, and was tasked by the defendants with — among other things — scouting out the governor’s summer home. The other undercover agent, “Red,” was introduced as a demolitions expert a few weeks before the suspects' 2020 arrests.
According to the government, the defendants had made several efforts to recruit independent bomb makers, and “Red” was offered to the group in that capacity to mitigate the likelihood of an actual bomb attack.
The judge's ruling is a blow to the government, whose case has come under fire over the alleged misbehavior of multiple FBI informants and agents, including two who have been kicked off the case.
More: Wife beater, liar, schemer: 3 FBI agents crucial in Whitmer kidnap case, defense lawyers say
More: Bad acts of 3 FBI agents will not be mentioned in Whitmer kidnap trial
In the case of "Mark" and "Red," the prosecution had asked permission for the two agents to use their pseudonyms during trial and to keep their real names from the defense. The agents are involved in other antiterrorism investigations, prosecutors argued, and disclosing their identities could hinder those investigations and jeopardize their safety.
But the defense argued the defendants have a right to confront their accusers and know who they are. Additionally, they argued, concealing their identities unfairly prevents the defense from performing thorough cross examinations.
The judge agreed.
"At this point in the case, the court believes the balance of interests tips decidedly in favor of openness," Jonker wrote. "It is time for all guise and pretense to end and for the prosecution to present the evidence in an open forum with witnesses testifying using their true identity."
Jonker noted he understood the government's concern over the safety of its agents, but it didn't warrant hiding their real names.
"With respect to risk to witness safety, the court is sympathetic," Jonker wrote, "but also cognizant that such risk is inherent in an investigation model that relies on undercover agents."

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Former Deputy Accused Of Raping 14-Year-Old Avoids Jail Time And Sex Offender Registry

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 A former sheriff’s deputy in Tennessee who was accused of raping a 14-year-old girl over a period of nearly two years will avoid jail time after pleading guilty to a lesser charge.
Brian Beck, 47, was sentenced to three years probation after pleading guilty to a charge of aggravated assault, according to Memphis Fox 13. Beck, who had worked on the force with the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office since 2004, was initially charged with two counts of rape by force or coercion and two counts of sexual battery by an authority figure back in 2018.

According to court documents obtained by Law&Crime, the judge in the case suspended a four-year prison term in favor of probation. The State ordered Beck to have no contact with the victim or her family, be subject to random drug screenings, and serve 150 hours of community service. If Beck violates his probation, he faces the original sentence.
Beck also isn’t required to be part of the sex offender registry.

Brian Beck Photo: Shelby County Sheriff’s Office
“Considering all the facts, evidence, and circumstances, as well as all possible defenses that could be raised in trial, this settlement was made in the best interests of obtaining justice for the victim,” a spokesperson with the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office told Oxygen.com over email. “The defendant will have a felony on his record, and can no longer carry a gun or be in law enforcement.”
Beck was relieved from his duties without pay following the grand jury’s indictment in 2018.
Beck’s case faced delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic and a growing backlog of court cases, as previously reported by NBC affiliate Action 5 News.
“It’s five years,” the victim’s father told the Memphis outlet. “I mean, she needs closure.”
District Attorney Amy Weirich responded to claims that the parties involvedwere not granted their right to a fair and speedy trial, as afforded by the Sixth Amendment of the constitution.
“There’s a whole bunch of factors that go into getting any case ready for trial and in a posture of getting that trial off the ground,” Weirich generalized.
Still, families and advocates continued to voice their frustration, including the father of Beck’s victim, who wished to remain anonymous.
“I mean, there are damages, you know, major damages and unhappiness,” he said. “She just needs some closure. She just needs to see movement of the ball, that’s what she needs to see.”
The District Attorney’s Office said the recent plea deal would spare the victim from having to testify during the trial, according to CBS affiliate WREG 3.
For the original charges, Beck faced 30 years in prison for each of the two rape charges and 15 years for each sexual battery charge, per Tennessee law, for a total of 90 years behind bars. The legal age of consent in the state is 18 years old.
The Shelby County Sheriff’s Office and Beck’s legal representative did not immediately respond to requests from Oxygen.com.

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