Posts by Balaamsass2

25

The biggest sell off of Kingdom Halls in Britain :Update

by raymond frantz in

the biggest sell off of kingdom halls in britain.

hi guys last night i posted this here but only a few notes as it was quite fresh and only announced lasdt night at the meeting.i have now updated article and included a couple of useful links about this matter .

.

Balaamsass2

Good job. Great idea for the UK Witnesses to turn WTBTS and the local elders in ! That is a great law, I wish they had it in the USA.

47

This is Really Getting Scary!!! PLEASE LOOK!!

by NoMoreHustle in

stupid me does not know how to copy paste pics from instagram site.

nmh.

http://instagram.com/p/vbu5_xhiam/.

Balaamsass2

A Gary Larson "Far Side" cutout cartoon would be more accurate. :(

1

Cheaper land, and another good reason to leave Brooklyn

by Balaamsass2 in

brooklyn prosecutors have a long reachbrooklyn u.s. attorneys office well versed in international investigations.

enlarge.

u.s. attorney loretta e. lynch, shown in may in brooklyn, has been mentioned as a possible successor to attorney general eric holder.

Balaamsass2

Brooklyn Prosecutors Have a Long Reach

Brooklyn U.S. Attorney’s Office Well Versed in International Investigations

ENLARGE U.S. Attorney Loretta E. Lynch, shown in May in Brooklyn, has been mentioned as a possible successor to Attorney General Eric Holder. KEVIN HAGEN FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL By CHRISTOPHER M. MATTHEWS Nov. 6, 2014 2:18 p.m. ET 0 COMMENTS

NEW YORK—The money-laundering investigation into one of Vladimir Putin ’s closest allies puts a spotlight on the Brooklyn U.S. attorney’s office, which is spearheading the effort.

The office’s prosecutors might not get as much attention as their counterparts across the East River in Manhattan, but they have a history of handling high-profile, international investigations, and their boss, Loretta E. Lynch, is on the shortlist of possible candidates to succeed departing U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder .

The U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, aided by the Justice Department, are investigating whether billionaire Gennady Timchenko, an associate of the Russian president, laundered funds from allegedly corrupt Russian deals through the U.S. financial system, according to people familiar with the matter.

LORETTA E. LYNCH’S RÉSUMÉ

Age: 55 years old
Education: J.D. from Harvard Law School, A.B. from Harvard College
Current Position: Appointed by President Barack Obama in May 2010 as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn
Previously: Appointed by President Bill Clinton to the same job, serving from 1999 to 2001
Private-Sector Experience:Formerly a partner at law firm Hogan & Hartson LLP
Big Case: Lead prosecutor in the late 1990s Abner Louima police-brutality case

The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that Brooklyn prosecutors are investigating sales of Russian crude oil by the Geneva-based commodities firm Mr. Timchenko co-founded, Gunvor Group.

In a statement published on its website on Thursday, Gunvor said it hadn’t been notified of any investigation by the Justice Department. “Any allegations of wrongdoing with respect to our trading activities are baseless and entirely false,” it said.

Mr. Timchenko said he was unaware of the investigation in a statement released Thursday by his investment vehicle, Volga Group, which added that Mr. Timchenko hasn’t been affiliated with Gunvor since selling his stake in March this year.

Ms. Lynch declined to comment through a spokeswoman.

Many in the legal community think of mob cases when they think of the Eastern District. The office has been at the forefront of dismantling organized crime for decades, a reputation that continues to this day.

In January, Brooklyn prosecutors charged a member of the Bonanno crime family who was allegedly involved in the 1978 heist of a Lufthansa Airlines cargo hold at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, the famous robbery featured in Martin Scorsese ’s “Goodfellas.” The defendant has pleaded not guilty and is scheduled to go to trial next year.

But Brooklyn prosecutors haven’t confined themselves to mob cases. While they haven’t had a role in the high-profile crackdown on insider trading led by their Manhattan counterparts—prosecutors in the Southern District of New York—they have driven other sensitive inquiries.

Those investigations included a probe that led to a nearly $2 billion money-laundering settlement with HSBC Holdings PLC in 2012, as well as a foreign bribery probe into J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.’s hiring practices in China. J.P. Morgan has said that it is cooperating with related investigations, but otherwise declined to comment on the continuing probe.

“There is a deep history of international cases coming out of Brooklyn,” said Jodi L. Avergun, a former prosecutor in the office and now a partner at law firm Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP. Ms. Avergun isn’t involved in the investigation.

The Brooklyn office often gets its hands on money-laundering cases thanks to New York’s deep links with the global financial system. The city’s central role enables its prosecutors, both in Brooklyn and Manhattan, to bring cases in connection with crimes that may have originated overseas.

In many cases, the routing through New York of money connected to a crime is all that prosecutors need to establish jurisdiction, according to Daniel C. Richman, a professor at Columbia Law School. “Districts like the Southern and the Eastern in New York, which find the world’s business transacted within their loosely defined borders, are often free to pursue criminal activity that seems centered abroad,” Mr. Richman said.

Prosecutors in Manhattan’s Southern District, sometimes jokingly referred to as the “sovereign district” for its pre-eminent role in bringing big cases, have charged everyone from Russian arms dealers to France’s largest bank, BNP Paribas , accompanied by prominent news coverage.

The Eastern District, though more understated, has been successfully pursuing international narcotics cases since the 1980s and foreign terrorism prosecutions since the 1990s, Mr. Richman said.

The office has also taken its hits in high-profile matters. The decision not to indict HSBC for money laundering was widely criticized, and two former Bear Stearns hedge-fund managers the office charged with securities fraud in connection with the subprime mortgage-market meltdown were acquitted in 2009.

Still, the office has developed the skills and resources needed to be successful in complicated extraterritorial cases, Mr. Richman said, including relationships with foreign law enforcement and knowledge of how to gather evidence abroad. The office has a cadre of foreign-language interpreters to handle defendants who don’t speak English, according to Ms. Avergun, who estimated that around half the cases in Brooklyn involve a foreign component.

Ms. Avergun said Brooklyn’s claim on cases involving foreign suspects sometimes stems from a surprising source: JFK Airport. That is because in certain types of cases under U.S. law, jurisdiction is established by the location where a defendant first arrives in the U.S.

She said the office competes with Manhattan for top cases being investigated by the FBI’s New York field office, perhaps the bureau’s top investigative branch in the country. The decision by an agent about which office to work with is often based on relationships, Ms. Avergun said.

Write to Christopher M. Matthews at [email protected]

11

A day at the convention.

by sparrowdown in

jw
friends

excerpts from my old meeting notebook.. i think i identified what my problem was: attitude!.

morning session: symposium, (something about god's will).

pt 1: what is god's will?.

Balaamsass2

zzzzz.....hey how did that bird get in the building..zzzz...what a boring speaker........wow that sister has tight dress........zzzzzz....where we going for dinner?........zzzzzzz.......ya da ya da yada....shorten up that prayer please!

18

NOT on JW.ORG: A.P. and International Press break stories about rampant child abuse by Jehovah's Witnesses MINISTERS and Watchtower Bible and Tract Society Cover-ups.

by Balaamsass2 in

$13.5m award in jehovah's witnesses molest caseby associated press.

published: 21:45 est, 31 october 2014 | updated: 21:45 est, 31 october 2014. .

san diego (ap) the jehovah's witnesses were ordered to pay $13.5 million to a southern california man who said he was molested as a child by a church member.. a san diego judge ruled wednesday that the church's governing body covered up years of sexual abuse by a member who later became an elder.. superior judge joan lewis said actions of the watchtower bible and tract society of new york were "reprehensible and reckless," u-t san diego reported friday (http://bit.ly/1uf519r ).. jose lopez, who was awarded the money, sued the group, alleging that he was molested in 1986 at age 7 by a member of the spanish congregation in the linda vista area of san diego.. lopez said the elders suggested gonzalo campos as his bible teacher even though they knew he had molested at least one other boy, the suit contended.

Balaamsass2

You would think with all the abuse lawsuits a good attorney might suggest a different photo opportunity for WTBTS. Just my 2 cents.....

47

Why don't parents of an abused child go straight to police, why go to an elder first??

by FeelingFree in

i hope i don't come across as judgemental but having read a lot on the current child abuse cases and the different threads on here, i am left wondering why on earth a parent of an abuse victim would go to an elder with the problem first and not straight to police?.

as a parent myself i know that if anything like that happend to my child (this applies to when i was still an active jw as well as now) i would not hesitate in going to the authorities as soon as i found out, it wouldn't of crossed mine or my husbands mind to go to an elder.

maybe after we had reported it but definitely never as the first port of call.

Balaamsass2

A picture is worth a thousand words........

51

What JW's are afraid of~

by kairos in

just putting together a mental list:.

jehovah .

jesus.

Balaamsass2

Afraid of? Letting some of those Bethel "confirmed bachelors" behind me while in this predicament:

8

Sell Sell and Sell off some more, the real reason for all the consolidation?

by Crazyguy in

its becoming clear that the borg has plans to sell off as much property and kingdom halls as possible.

they will even make it a pain in the ass for believers to get to halls but they don't care!!!

they have seen the results of lawsuits against the catholic church in the 100 of millions of dollars.

Balaamsass2

Hey they can put all that $$ in Swiss and Caymen accounts and visit it from their cruise ship that never docks in "hostile" countries.

70

Not on JW.org: SIX Texas victims acuse Jehovah's Witness Elder & Circuit Overseer of sexual abuse, and bring lawsuit against Watchtower for cover-up.

by Balaamsass2 in

sexual exploitation and abuse of six young children leads to lawsuit in dallas county.

dallas, oct. 23, 2014 /news.gnom.es/ six young adults, from north texas, all sexually abused as children, filed suit today in dallas, texas state court against three north texas jehovahs witnesses congregations (dallas, plano, and greenville), the watchtower bible and tract society of new york, and an elder.. sexually abused when they were ages 4 through 14, the plaintiffs were children of members of the dallas, plano, and greenville jehovahs witnesses congregations.

the suit states that they were repeatedly sexually abused and molested by an elder and an unknown regional circuit overseer, and that they and their families were threatened with discipline and harm if they disclosed the abuse to anyone.

Balaamsass2

I wonder how this will play out in JW vs "apostate" custody battles?

47

Why don't parents of an abused child go straight to police, why go to an elder first??

by FeelingFree in

i hope i don't come across as judgemental but having read a lot on the current child abuse cases and the different threads on here, i am left wondering why on earth a parent of an abuse victim would go to an elder with the problem first and not straight to police?.

as a parent myself i know that if anything like that happend to my child (this applies to when i was still an active jw as well as now) i would not hesitate in going to the authorities as soon as i found out, it wouldn't of crossed mine or my husbands mind to go to an elder.

maybe after we had reported it but definitely never as the first port of call.

Balaamsass2

Good for you Gregor!

The question should be why don't ELDERS tell victims to hang up and "Call the police"!