Blackwater Training US Police : Wayne Madsen Report
by Wayne Madsen Report, bibliotecapleyades.netby
October-15-2007
from TruthNews Website
The mercenary firm Blackwater USA is well known for the controversy involving its "shoot first, ask no questions" policy in Iraq.
It is also known that Louisiana's Department of Homeland Security contracted with Blackwater to provide public law enforcement services in New Orleans following hurricane Katrina. Blackwater is also planning to establish regional training centers in Potrero, California and Mount Carroll, Illinois, billed as Blackwater West and Blackwater North, respectively.
These training centers, in addition to Blackwater's Lodge and Training Center in Moyock, North Carolina - Blackwater East - and a possible fourth rumored to be slated for the Pacific Northwest - Blackwater Northwest - may result in the establishment of a network of Blackwater-trained police, sheriffs, and other police units around the country.
Given Blackwater's dismal record on human rights and brutality, this spells trouble for civilian control of police and paramilitary forces in the United States, from major metropolitan areas to small rural towns.
On October 14, the Washington Post ran a story, which included photographs from Blackwater's Moyock training center. However, what was most intriguing was a photograph of a police and military patch board at Blackwater's headquarters that indicated the police agencies that have sent their officers to Moyock for training.
Blackwater is secretive about its non-federal, as well as its foreign clients, which the Post pointed out includes Jordan, Azerbaijan, and Burkina Faso, but a WMR inspection of the photograph of the police agencies has yielded the following list of agencies that have used Blackwater for training:
|
|
|
A number of the police departments that have been trained by Blackwater have abysmal civil rights and police brutality records, most notably the Chicago Police and Illinois State Police, both cited by former Illinois Governor George Ryan as being guilty of police misconduct in his decision to commute the death sentences of Illinois' death row inmates.
It was a decision that likely had much to do with his indictment by the Bush administration on corruption charges - political misuse of the Department of Justice that has been seen in the indictments and investigations of:
Alabama former Democratic Governor Don Siegelman
HealthSouth former CEO Richard Scrushy
Qwest's former CEO Joseph Nacchio
Democratic campaign contributor Martha Stewart
Coastal Corporation's former Chairman and Democratic contributor Oscar Wyatt
Democratic-leaning trial attorneys around the United States, as well as the firings of several U.S. Attorneys who refused to engage in political prosecutions, and a Justice Department workup on North Carolina presidential candidate John Edwards in 2004
The training and potential political indoctrination of police officers by the extreme right-wing and proto-fascist Blackwater, coupled with the politicization of the Justice Department and U.S. courts, has the potential for the streets of Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Atlanta, New York, and Washington, DC, as well as Chillicothe, Harvey Cedars, and Elmira to turn as bloody as the streets of Baghdad and Fallujah.
Citizens have a distinct opportunity of confronting their local elected city, county, and town officials over Blackwater training of their police officers.
Local officials should be pressured to reveal the numbers and identities of officers trained by Blackwater, the subjects covered by the training, the revenues spent, and a public demand should be made to cease and desist in such training.
Original Page: http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/sociopol_blackwater01.htm
Shared from Read It Later
No comments:
Post a Comment