By Allan Lengel

The crime isn’t kosher, but the prison meals certainly are for Times Square bomb suspect Faisal Shahzad. One night the menu calls for vegetarian stuffed cabbage; the next, kosher beef meatloaf or turkey cutlet.

New York U.S. Magistrate Judge James C. Francis last week granted a request by Shahzad, charged with five felony counts including trying to explode a weapon of mass destruction, to eat “halal” food at the federal-run Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan. Halal food is defined as meeting the dietary laws of Islam.

In federal prison, that means kosher food, which meets the same standards as halal food, James Davis, executive assistant at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, told AOL News.

“No pork, no shellfish,” he said. The animals are also slaughtered in similar ways for both kosher and halal meat.

To read full story click here.

Saddam Hussein

WASHINGTON — The CIA had a bag of dirty tricks ready for Saddam Hussein in preparation of the 2003 American invasion of Iraq that included making him look like a pedophile. It also had something similar planned for Osama bin Laden.

The Washington Post blog Spy Talk, citing former CIA officials, said one devious tactic involved creating a video showing the Iraqi strongman purportedly having sex with a teenage boy.

“It would look like it was taken by a hidden camera,” one ex-CIA official told Spy Talk’s Jeff Stein. “Very grainy, like it was a secret videotaping of a sex session.”

The ex-CIA officials said the idea was then to “flood Iraq with the videos.”

To read full story click here.

Ex-Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who is still the focus of an FBI probe into public corruption, was sentenced to serve 18 months to 5 years in prison for violating his probation in connection with his conviction for lying under oath in a police whistle blower case in state court.

The Detroit Free Press reported that Wayne County Circuit Judge David Groner, in sentencing Kilpatrick, found he lied while on probation and hid money that was supposed to go toward repaying the city $1 million in restitution.

Kilpatrick asked for leniency, but the judge appeared to give his statements any weight, the Free Press reported.

“Probation is no longer an option,” Groner said. “That ship has sailed.”

Kilpatrick could be in far more trouble if he gets indicted for public charges stemming from his time as mayor.

To read full Detroit Free Press story click here.

Sen. Debbie Stabenow/ sen. photo

A surge of threats have been pouring into our nation’s lawmakers, and the FBI provided details to Politico.

One threat involved a voice mail message in February 2009 to Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mi.) , according to Politico:

“We’re gonna [expletive] get you,” the man said. “We’re gonna get you with a lot of [expletive] bolt action. Like we did RFK; like we did MLK. We know who you are. We’ll get you.”

Politico reported that Senate Sergeant at Arms Terrance Gainer said threats against Capitol Hill lawmakers were up 300 percent in the first few months of 2010.

Politico received details of threats through a Freedom of Information Act Request to the FBI.

To read more click here.

By Allan Lengel

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration, which vowed to have more transparency in government, is working very hard to keep some secrets.

At issue: The names of more than 9,200 people President George W. Bush denied pardons and commutations, the National Law Journal reports.

Last year, a D.C. federal judge ruled against the Obama Justice Department and said the names should be made public. The Justice Department has appealed that ruling, insisting the privacy interest of the applicants outweigh the public’s right to know.

“The case is a politically sensitive one for the Justice Department, given Attorney General Eric Holder Jr.’s involvement in the decision to pardon fugitive Marc Rich at the end of the Clinton administration,” the Journal wrote. “The Rich pardon turned into a Washington scandal that compelled Holder to apologize for mistakes when it came up during his confirmation hearing last year.

The Journal wrote that the case applies only to the Bush years, but could open up the door for the public to see applicants from other administrations.

Under the current policy, the Justice Department can confirm a specific pardon, but won’t comment on a list of denials, the Journal reported.

Since October 2009, Obama has received 382 pardon petitions and 2,275 applications for commutation, but none have been acted upon at this time, the Journal reported.

The Journal said the case was initiated by retired Washington Post reporter George Lardner, who is writing a book on the history of clemency.

To read more click here.

black tar heroin

WASHINGTON — A super-potent heroin being sold by Mexican traffickers is contributing to a spike in overdoses across America, an Associated Press study shows.

AP reports that the heroin, known as “black tar” heroin because of its dark gooey texture — and other forms are causing problems and selling for as little as $10 a bag.

“We found people who snorted it lying face-down with the straw lying next to them,” Patrick O’Neil, coroner in suburban Chicago’s Will County, where annual heroin deaths have nearly tripled – from 10 to 29 – since 2006, told the Associated Press. “It’s so potent that we occasionally find the needle in the arm at the death scene.”

The potency has also enabled people to snort or smoke it and avoid the needle, AP reported.

“That has opened up heroin to a whole different group of users,” Harry Sommers, who heads the DEA in St. Louis told AP.

To read more click here.

By Allan Lengel

One of the last three people executed in a federal case in this country was Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, who died by lethal injection on June 11, 2001.

To say the least, putting convicted criminals to death in federal cases is not all that common, particularly when compared with state cases. Just this month, three inmates from Texas were executed, as well as two from Mississippi and one from Virginia. Fifty-two were executed last year in state court, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Now in federal court comes Mark Issac Snarr, 34, and Edgar Balthazar Garcia, 30, who were sentenced to death by a federal jury in Beaumont, Texas, today for brutally murdering a fellow inmate at the U.S. Penitentiary in Beaumont. They also stabbed and wounded two corrections officers.

The federal jury, which had convicted the two on May 7, deliberated on the death penalty for about three hours today before returning their verdict, the U.S. attorney’s office said.

For Full story click here.

OTHER STORIES OF INTEREST

• Ex-Detroit Mayor Faces Jail Time (AP)
• Arizona Sheriff Urges Boycott of Mexico After Ad (AP)
• Man Acquitted in 1966 Philly Cop Shooting (AP)
• 8 Charged With Accessing Obama Records Plead Not Guilty (Quad City Times)
• CIA Wacky Idea: Depict Saddam Hussein as Gay (Spy Talk)