Son of Boston police captain charged in terror bomb plot

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BOSTON (AP) — Prosecutors have arrested the son of a Boston police captain in a plot to commit terrorist acts on behalf of the Islamic State group.

Alexander Ciccolo (chih-KOH’-loh) is accused in a criminal complaint unsealed Monday of receiving four guns July 4 from a person cooperating with the Western Massachusetts Joint Terrorism Task Force.

An FBI affidavit says the 23-year-old Adams resident had talked with the cooperating witness in recorded conversations about his plans to commit acts inspired by the Islamic State group, including setting off pressure-cooker bombs at an unidentified university. According to the affidavit, he said the attack would include executions of students broadcast live online.

Before his arrest, agents had observed Ciccolo buying a pressure cooker similar to those used in the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings.

Via: Salon

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Documents show execessive use of Massachusetts SWAT teams

I reported last year that many of Massachusetts’s SWAT teams were claiming to be private corporations that were immune from public records requests. Last month, the Northeastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council (NEMLEC), the corporation that overseas that region’s SWAT teams, settled with the Massachusetts ACLU and released records related to how SWAT teams are used. A number of publications have since been sifting through the documents.

The results are similar to what we found in other situations in which these records have been made public — the widespread use of the kind of militarized tactics, weapons, and gear that was once reserved only for emergency situations, when lives were at immediate risk. Most notable: Of the 21 times a NEMLEC SWAT team was deployed to serve a search warrant for drugs, the SWAT team reported finding drugs just five times.

From The Intercept:

Just one of the 79 SWAT deployments in 2012-14 — assistance with the search for the perpetrators of the Boston Marathon bombing — involved terrorism. Other SWAT actions during that period show no hostage situations, no active shooters and only 10 non-suicidal barricaded subjects.

About half of the remaining cases involved everyday and often mundane police activity, including executing warrants, dealing with expected rioting after a 2013 Red Sox World Series game, and providing security for a Dalai Lama lecture. In one mission, 15 SWAT team members roved through Salem’s Halloween celebrations looking out for unspecified “gang-related activity,” but were warned by their commanders to maintain a “professional demeanor” given that “everyone has a camera phone and you don’t want to be on YouTube or the news later.”

The remaining 37 SWAT actions were either proactive drug operations, initiated by local police, or suicide response operations . . .

More than half of the SWAT teams’ drug operations were initiated at 3:30 or 4:00 a.m. Furthermore, of the 22 narcotics operations detailed in the documents over the two years, 14 included warrants authorizing SWAT teams to conduct “no knock” raids and four authorizing “knock and announce” raids — both of which are forceful entry options that have made national headlines for the accidental killings, injuries, and trauma they can produce.

Via: Washington Post

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[VIDEO] Boston Mosque Obama Hails As “Model” For His Plan To “Countering Violent Extremism” Has Ties To Least 12 Islamic Terrorists…

Via: Weasel Zippers

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ObamaCare To Slam Boston Marathon Charity Hospital?

The nonprofit hospital that treated the final victim of the Boston Marathon bombing attack will have its tax-exempt status reviewed under Obamacare and could face hefty fines and other penalties.

 

Boston’s Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, which treated amputee Marc Fucarile as he recovered from the loss of his leg in the April 15 terrorist attack, is run by a nonprofit 501(c)3 hospital network that will be subject to new scrutiny of its tax-exempt status and potentially massive fines under Obamacare.

A new provision in Section 501 of the Internal Revenue Code, which takes effect under Obamacare, sets new standards of review and installs new financial penalties for tax-exempt charitable hospitals. To be tax-exempt, hospitals have to devote a certain minimum amount of their expenses to treat uninsured poor people.

Via: Daily Caller

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