Tag Archives: Arrest

Police clash with North Dakota pipeline protesters, arrest one

police surround north dakota pipeline protesters

By Chris Michaud

(Reuters) – Hundreds of protesters opposed to a North Dakota oil pipeline project they say threatens water resources and sacred tribal lands clashed with police who fired tear gas at the scene of a similar confrontation last month, officials said.

An estimated 400 protesters mounted the Backwater Bridge and attempted to force their way past police in what the Morton County Sheriff’s Department described as an “ongoing riot,” the latest in a series of demonstrations against the Dakota Access Pipeline.

A media statement from the agency said one arrest had been made by 8:30 p.m. local time (0230 GMT Monday), about 2 1/2 hours after the incident began some 45 miles (30 miles) south of Bismark, the North Dakota capital.

The Backwater Bridge has been closed since late October, when activists clashed with police in riot gear and set two trucks on fire, prompting authorities to forcibly shut down a protesters encampment nearby.

The Morton County Sheriff’s Department said officers on the scene of the latest confrontation were “describing protesters’ actions as very aggressive.”

Demonstrators tried to start numerous fires as they attempted to outflank and “attack” law enforcement barricades, the sheriff’s statement said.

Police said they responded by firing volleys of tear gas at protesters in a bid to prevent them from crossing the bridge.

Activists at the scene reported on Twitter that police were also spraying protesters with water in sub-freezing temperatures and firing rubber bullets, injuring some in the crowd.

Police did not confirm the use of rubber bullets or water.

The clashes began after protesters removed a truck that had been on the bridge since Oct. 27, police said. The North Dakota Department of Transportation closed the Backwater Bridge due to damage from that incident.

The $3.7 billion Dakota Access project has been drawing steady opposition from Native American and environmental activists since the summer.

Completion of the pipeline, set to run 1,172 miles (1,185 km) from North Dakota to Illinois, was delayed in September so federal authorities could re-examine permits required by the Army Corps of Engineers.

Plans called for the pipeline to pass under Lake Oahe, a federally owned water source, and to skirt the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation by about half a mile. Most of the construction has otherwise been finished.

The Standing Rock tribe and environmental activists say the project would threaten water supplies and sacred Native American sites and ultimately contribute to climate change.

Supporters of the pipeline, owned by Energy Transfer Partners, said the project offers the fast and most direct route for bringing Bakken shale oil from North Dakota to U.S. Gulf Coast refineries and would be safer than transporting the oil by road or rail.

(Reporting by Chris Michaud in New York; Editing by Steve Gorman and Paul Tait)

Dozens of demonstrators arrested at North Dakota pipeline

North Dakota Pipeline protesters

(Reuters) – More than 80 protesters were arrested on Saturday after clashing with police near a pipeline construction site in North Dakota, according to the local sheriff’s department, which said pepper spray was used on some demonstrators.

The 83 protesters were arrested near the site of the Dakota Access pipeline on numerous charges ranging from assault on a peace officer to rioting and criminal trespass, the Morton County Sheriff’s department said in a statement.

Law enforcement was alerted early Saturday morning to an SUV on private property near the pipeline construction site and found that four men had attached themselves to the vehicle, according to the sheriff’s department. Police removed the men from the SUV before arresting them.

Later, around 300 protesters marched toward pipeline construction equipment and tried to breach a police line keeping them from the equipment, the sheriff’s department said.

Some were pepper sprayed by law enforcement. One protester attempted to grab a can of pepper spray from an officer, resulting in the officer being sprayed.

The demonstration closed a section of a local highway, but it was reopened on Saturday afternoon.

“Today’s situation clearly illustrates what we have been saying for weeks, that this protest is not peaceful or lawful,” sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier said in a statement.

“It was obvious to our officers who responded that the protesters engaged in escalated unlawful tactics and behavior during this event. This protest was intentionally coordinated and planned by agitators with the specific intent to engage in illegal activities.”

The Standing Rock Sioux tribe and environmental activists have been protesting construction of the 1,100-mile (1,886-km) pipeline in North Dakota for several months, saying it threatens the water supply and sacred sites. Numerous protesters have been arrested near the pipeline.

It was unclear who organized and led the protest. A spokesman for the Standing Rock Sioux could not immediately be reached for comment.

The pipeline, being built by a group of companies led by Energy Transfer Partners LP, would be the first to bring Bakken shale from North Dakota directly to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Supporters say it would provide a safer and more cost-effective way to transport Bakken shale to the U.S. Gulf than by road or rail.

Earlier this week, pipeline equipment in Iowa was intentionally lit on fire causing about $2 million in damage, according to local authorities and company officials.

(Reporting by Timothy Mclaughlin in Chicago; Editing by David Gregorio)

Refugee from Iraq pleads guilty in U.S. to attempting to join Islamic State

By Alex Dobuzinskis

(Reuters) – An Iraqi-born man who entered the United States as a refugee pleaded guilty on Monday in Texas to attempting to volunteer to fight with Islamic State, federal prosecutors said.

Omar Faraj Saeed Al-Hardan, 24, pleaded guilty in a federal court in Houston to one count of attempting to provide material support, specifically himself, to the militant group, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the southern district of Texas said in a statement.

Al-Hardan, who most recently lived in Houston, faces up to 20 years in prison when he is sentenced on Jan. 17, prosecutors said.

The case comes during a U.S. presidential race in which the question of admitting refugees from the Middle East, especially Syria, has become a point of contention between the two leading candidates.

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has called for increasing the number of Syrian refugees admitted and said the United States can adequately screen them. Republican nominee Donald Trump has opposed their entry and called for “extreme vetting” of incoming Muslim immigrants.

In the Texas case, federal agents began investigating Al-Hardan in 2014 after he communicated with a California man who he believed was associated with the Syrian Islamist rebel group Al-Nusrah, prosecutors said in a statement.

Al-Hardan in 2014 and 2015, in discussions with a confidential informant, said he planned to travel overseas to support Islamic State, prosecutors said.

He also said he had taught himself to make remote detonators and showed off a circuit board he built as a transmitter, prosecutors said.

Al-Hardan entered the United States as an Iraqi refugee in late 2009, about two years before the start of a civil war in Syria, after spending time in refugee camps in Jordan and Iraq, prosecutors said. He was later granted legal permanent residence.

The arrest of Al-Hardan gained national media attention in January, with Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, a conservative Republican, citing it as an indication of why Texas was seeking to block the resettlement of Syrian refugees.

Islamic State, which controls tracts of land in Iraq and Syria, has claimed credit for a surge in global attacks this summer, even as it has been hammered by U.S.-led coalition air strikes. On Monday, Iraqi forces launched a U.S.-backed offensive to drive Islamic State from the city of Mosul.

President Barack Obama has said refugees are properly screened and vetted.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Arrested militants planned attack on Paris railway station, France says

French police investigate

By Gérard Bon

PARIS (Reuters) – Three women arrested in connection with a car loaded with gas cylinders found in a side road near Notre Dame cathedral had been planning an attack on a Paris railway station, the French interior ministry said.

“An alert has been issued to all stations but they had planned to attack the Gare de Lyon on Thursday,” a ministry official said on Friday after the arrests overnight.

The Gare de Lyon station is in the southeast of the capital, less than 3 kilometers from the cathedral which marks the center.

The official also said the youngest of the three women, a 19 year-old whose father was the owner of the car and who was already suspected by police of wanting to go and fight for Islamic State in Syria, had written a letter pledging allegiance to the militant Islamist group.

The discovery on Saturday night of the Peugeot 607 laden with seven gas cylinders, six of them full, triggered a terrorism investigation and revived fears about further attacks in a country where Islamist militants have killed more than 230 people since January, 2015.

Scores of religiously radicalize people of French and other nationalities are in Syria and Iraq fighting for Islamic State. Many of those involved in recent attacks in France have either taken part in the fighting or had plans to.

France is among the countries bombing Islamic State strongholds, and the group has urged supporters to launch more attacks on French soil.

One of the women stabbed a police officer during her arrest before being shot and wounded, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said late on Thursday. Other officials said it was the teenager who attacked the officer.

TV footage showed a policeman leaving the scene of the arrests on the outskirst of Paris carrying a large knife.

Police sources said no detonator had been found in the car, though the vehicle also contained three jerry cans of diesel fuel.

When it was found in the early hours of Sunday morning the car had no registration plates and was left with its hazard lights flashing.

“These three women aged 39, 23 and 19 had been radicalize, were fanatics and were in all likelihood preparing an imminent, violent act,” Cazeneuve said in a televised statement. They bring to seven the number of people detained since Tuesday.

The arrests took place in Boussy-Saint-Antoine, some 30 km (20 miles) south-east of Paris.

The car’s owner was taken into custody earlier this week but later released. He had gone to police on Sunday to report that his daughter had disappeared with his car, officials said.

(Additional reporting by Marine Pennetier; Writing by Andrew Callus; Editing by Richard Lough and Toby Chopra)

New York man due in court, charged with slaying of Muslim imam, assistant

man cries as community members take part in a protest to demand stop hate crime after the funeral service of Maulama Akonjee, and Uddin in the Queens borough of New York City

By Gina Cherelus

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A New York City man was due in court on Tuesday to face charges he gunned down and killed a Muslim imam and his assistant on a street in the borough of Queens over the weekend, police said.

Oscar Morel, 35, of the borough of Brooklyn, was charged with second-degree murder just hours after hundreds of mourners gathered for the outdoor funeral of the two men on Monday. The killings shocked the neighborhood’s Bangladeshi community.

Morel has been charged with one count of first-degree murder, two counts of second-degree murder and two counts of second-degree criminal possession of a weapon, Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown said in a statement on Tuesday.

Morel faces the possibility of life in prison without parole if he is convicted of killing Imam Maulama Akonjee, 55, and Thara Uddin, 64.

“The defendant is accused of the murder of a highly respected and beloved religious leader and his friend,” Brown’s statement said. “Their deaths are a devastating loss to their families and the community that they served as men of peace.”

Brown said Morel’s motivation remained unclear and that the possibility it was a hate crime was one theory being explored.

Robert Boyce, the New York Police Department’s chief of detectives, told a news conference on Monday that surveillance video showed the suspect getting into a black GMC sport utility vehicle after the shootings.

That vehicle was then involved in a hit-and-run three miles away in Brooklyn shortly afterward. After officers located the SUV, the suspect rammed a detective’s car several times in an attempt to escape, but was arrested, Boyce said.

He said the suspect is believed to have worked at a warehouse in Brooklyn.

Citing unnamed police sources, the New York Times, the New York Daily News and other outlets reported on Tuesday that detectives who searched Morel’s basement apartment in Brooklyn found an unlicensed revolver hidden in a wall that authorities believe he used in the execution-style killings.

Police also found clothes in his apartment that matched what the gunman had been wearing, according to the media reports.

Akonjee and Uddin were shot in the head at close range after leaving Saturday prayers at the Al-Furqan Jame Mosque in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens.

Police said there was no known connection between the man being questioned and the murder victims.

Mayor Bill de Blasio, addressing the funeral, promised the city would bolster the police presence in the neighborhood even though the motive behind the killings was still unclear.

Police had said there was no evidence the men were targeted because of their faith but nothing was being ruled out.

Akonjee, 55, was a devout and humble preacher beloved by the area’s Bangladeshi Muslim community, according to those who knew him. Many locals wondered what could have prompted his killing.

A father of seven, Akonjee emigrated to the United States from Bangladesh several years ago, said Badrul Khan, the founder of the Al-Furqan Jame Mosque. He described the slain imam as a man who lived and breathed his religious faith.

(Additional reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco and Daniel Wallis in New York; Editing by Dominic Evans and Jeffrey Benkoe)

N.Y. man admits planning Islamic State-inspired New Year’s Eve attack

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A New York man pleaded guilty on Thursday to planning a New Year’s Eve attack last year inspired by Islamic State, the U.S. Department of Justice said, and faces up to 20 years in federal prison when he is sentenced in November.

Emanuel Lutchman, 25, of Rochester, pleaded guilty to conspiring to provide material support to Islamic State.

Lutchman expressed support for Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, on social media, including videos and images distributed by the violent extremist group, according to court documents.

In December 2015, Lutchman contacted Abu Issa Al-Amriki, an Islamic State member in Syria, after reading an online guide on how to carry out attacks on non-believers, prosecutors said.

Al-Amriki, who was killed in a drone strike earlier this year, instructed Lutchman to kill civilians on New Year’s Eve in the name of Islamic State, according to the government.

Lutchman and an informant secretly working with federal agents purchased a machete, knives, ski masks and other materials on Dec. 29, 2015, in preparation for the attack, prosecutors said.

Lutchman was arrested on Dec. 30, shortly after recording a video in which he pledged allegiance to Islamic State and vowed to “spill the blood” of non-believers.

Local media in Rochester quoted his grandmother as saying Lutchman converted to Islam while previously imprisoned, and he suffered from mental issues in the past, according to his family.

The Justice Department has brought more than 90 Islamic State-related cases since 2014.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Dan Grebler)

Black Lives Matter activist sues Baton Rouge police over arrest

Black Lives Matter Protest

(Reuters) – A prominent activist in the Black Lives Matter movement, DeRay McKesson, on Thursday sued the chief of the Baton Rouge police department and other officials over the arrests of nearly 200 demonstrators during peaceful protests about police killings.

In the federal civil rights lawsuit, which seeks class action status, McKesson and fellow protesters Kira Marrero and Gloria La Riva complained that police were unnecessarily aggressive in arresting them on July 9. The lawsuit covers arrests in the Louisiana capital between July 6 and July 11.

The East Baton Rouge Parish Attorney’s Office said they had no immediate comment on the lawsuit.

The activists were protesting the July 5 shooting of a black man, Alton Sterling, outside a convenience store, one of a string of high-profile police killings of black people by white officers over the past two years that were caught on video and reopened debate about race and discrimination in the United States.

McKesson, known for his activism on social media and who ran in the 2016 Democratic Party primary for mayor of his hometown of Baltimore, Maryland, said in the lawsuit that demonstrators sought to have all arrest records expunged as well as unspecified damages.

The allegations in the lawsuit include 16 violations of law by Baton Rouge police, excessive use of force, conspiracy to deprive protesters of their civil rights, negligence and arrests without probable cause.

The 23-page complaint said charges of simple obstruction of a highway against nearly 200 protesters who were arrested were ultimately dropped by the local prosecutors office, though they still had to pay administrative and court fees.

“Throughout the protests, the Defendants responded in a militarized and aggressive manner,” the complaint said. “All class members now have criminal arrest records, which in this digital age could adversely affect their future employment, education, reputations, and professional licensing.”

A day after Sterling’s death, another black man, Philando Castile, was shot to death by a policeman during a traffic stop near St. Paul, Minnesota.

The back-to-back killings brought out protesters nationwide but after a rally in Dallas, Texas, a gunman shot dead five police officers in an ambush. Days later, three Baton Rouge police officers were also killed in an ambush.

Authorities said the shootings of officers by black gunmen were apparently in anger over the deaths of black people at the hands of police, but they were not connected to the peaceful protest movement.

(Reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; editing by Grant McCool)

U.S. counterterrorism agents arrest Michigan man with explosives

By Laila Kearney

(Reuters) – Federal counter terrorism agents have arrested a 29-year-old Michigan man accused of illegally purchasing an arsenal of explosives and other devices capable of mass casualties, according to a criminal complaint filed this week.

Sebastian Gregerson, a Detroit resident who also goes by the name Abdurrahman Bin Mikaayl, was arrested on Monday by officials with the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s counter terrorism squad, according to the complaint.

Gregerson is accused of unregistered possession of a destructive device and the unlicensed receipt of explosive materials, the complaint said.

His court-appointed attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.

The FBI began its investigation in April 2015, when an anonymous informant alerted the agency that Gregerson said he was in possession of grenades and bazookas, the complaint said.

Over the past 16 months, Gregerson bought weapons, ammunition and tactical gear including a car pistol holster, hundreds of rounds of ammunition for an AK-47 rifle and commercial-grade road spikes to disable vehicles, the complaint said.

He also bought several training manuals and subscriptions to publications about how to evade capture and “survive dangerous situations,” it said.

In recorded phone conversations with an undercover FBI agent, Gregerson discussed making homemade grenades and ways to attack buildings and law enforcement by using the explosive devices, the complaint said.

It was not clear from the complaint whether Gregerson said he planned to carry out such an attack.

Gregerson was arrested on Sunday, when he met with undercover agents at a gas station and traded a Beretta M9 handgun as payment for several grenades, the complaint said. He was not licensed to receive explosive materials, it said.

Gregerson is scheduled for a detention hearing on Thursday at the Theodore Levin U.S. Courthouse in Detroit, court documents said.

(Reporting by Laila Kearney; Editing by David Gregorio)

Afghan teenager met Munich gunman before attack

Police stand in a small street following a shooting rampage at the Olympia shopping mall in Munich, Germany

MUNICH (Reuters) – A 16-year-old Afghan youth who was arrested on Sunday had been in contact via WhatsApp with an 18-year-old gunman who killed nine people in Munich two days earlier and also met him just before the attack, Bavarian officials said.

The youth, who was questioned after he contacted police following the shooting, is under investigation for possibly having failed to report the plans of the gunman.

Thomas Steinkraus-Koch, senior public prosecutor in Munich, told a news conference on Monday the Afghan had been in contact with the gunman via WhatApp until shortly before the attack. He wiped the conversation, but officials were able to retrieve it.

“This (WhatsApp) chat and questioning of a suspect has shown that the Afghan met the gunman directly before the gun attack at what was later the scene of the crime,” Steinkraus-Koch told a news conference in Munich.

The shooting was one of four attacks in Germany – three of them by migrants – since July 18 that have left 10 people dead and 34 injured, a toll that may heighten public disquiet over Chancellor Angela Merkel’s open-door refugee policy.

More than a million migrants have entered Germany over the past year, many fleeing war in Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.

The WhatsApp chat showed the Afghan knew the German-Iranian gunman was in possession of a Glock 17 firearm, Steinkraus-Koch said. “They got to know each other last summer, in 2015, in a psychiatric clinic where they underwent treatment,” he said.

“There, it also became apparent to the (Afghan) suspect that the attacker was interested in Breivik,” Steinkraus-Koch added, referring to Anders Breivik, who killed 77 people in back-to-back attacks in Norway in 2011.

The Afghan’s decision to delete his WhatsApp chat with the gunman and their meeting just before the Munich attack led investigators to suspect he knew of the planned shooting in advance.

“We will now pursue this suspicion,” Steinkraus-Koch said.

(Writing by Paul Carrel; editing by Joseph Nasr/Mark Heinrich)

Zimbabwe Pastor charged with attempting to overthrow government

Pastor Evan Mawarire, who launched the movement #ThisFlag, is seen at a press conference in Harare

By MacDonald Dzirutwe

HARARE (Reuters) – Zimbabwean pastor Evan Mawarire was charged on Wednesday with attempting to overthrow the government through an Internet campaign that inspired rare protests this month against President Robert Mugabe.

Mawarire appeared in a packed Harare courtroom draped in the Zimbabwean flag after spending the night in police cells as officers searched his house, church and office.

Mawarire’s lawyer Harrison Nkomo said his client faced up to 20 years in jail and accused the state of ambushing the defense by changing charges without informing them.

Hundreds of Mawarire’s supporters gathered outside the court, waving the national flag and singing protest songs, as anti-riot police kept a watchful eye.

“We are here in solidarity with a man of the cloth who is standing against a system that has impoverished the citizens of this nation,” Harare resident Pastor Ellard said.

Though Mawarire had called for further “stay at home” protests on Wednesday, queues built up as normal at bus and taxi ranks to ferry people to work, while most businesses were open.

Teachers reported for duty at most public schools, which are conducting mid-year examinations, while nurses and doctors were at work at state-run hospitals.

Mawarire last month posted a video online, that has since gone viral under the moniker #ThisFlag, venting his anger about deteriorating social and economic conditions in Zimbabwe and urging citizens to hold government to account.

“I am angered by the poverty and day to day struggles. The economy is not working and there are no jobs,” Zimbabwean activist Maureen Kademaunga told Reuters.

The preacher’s social media movement has rattled 92-year-old Mugabe’s administration, leading to accusations by the state against Mawarire of inciting public violence.

Anger is rising in Zimbabwe over high unemployment, corruption in government and shortages of money, which has seen people spending hours in bank queues to withdraw their money.

Zimbabwe’s government warned protesters on Tuesday they would face the “full wrath of the law” if they heeded Mawarire’s call, after his #ThisFlag movement organized the biggest anti-government demonstrations in a decade last week.

After his arrest, Mawarire supporters released a pre-recorded video urging Zimbabweans to stage another stay-away protest on Wednesday, although the early signs were that most people had not heeded the call.

Amnesty International said Mawarire’s arrest was a calculated plan by Zimbabwean authorities to intimidate activists ahead of Wednesday’s protests.

“Instead of suppressing dissenting voices, Zimbabwean authorities should be listening to protesters like Evan Mawarire,” said Muleya Mwananyanda, Amnesty International’s deputy director for southern Africa.

(Additional reporting by Mfuneko Toyana; Editing by Joe Brock and Ralph Boulton)