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'You cannot believe how many people have told me to call them on 20 January [the date of the next president's inauguration],' he says, with relish. '[They say:] "You wanna know about abuses and violations? Call me then."
McALLEN, Texas – Vice President Dick Cheney and former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales have been indicted on state charges involving federal prisons in a South Texas county that has been a source of bizarre legal and political battles under the outgoing prosecutor.
The indictment returned Monday has not yet been signed by the presiding judge, and no action can be taken until that happens.
The seven indictments made public in Willacy County on Tuesday included one naming state Sen. Eddie Lucio Jr. and some targeting public officials connected to District Attorney Juan Angel Guerra's own legal battles.
Regarding the indictments targeting the public officials, Guerra said, "the grand jury is the one that made those decisions, not me."
Guerra himself was under indictment for more than a year and half until a judge dismissed the indictments last month. Guerra's tenure ends this year after nearly two decades in office. He lost convincingly in a Democratic primary in March.
Guerra said the prison-related charges against Cheney and Gonzales are a national issue and experts from across the country testified to the grand jury.
Cheney is charged with engaging in an organized criminal activity related to the vice president's investment in the Vanguard Group, which holds financial interests in the private prison companies running the federal detention centers. It accuses Cheney of a conflict of interest and "at least misdemeanor assaults" on detainees because of his link to the prison companies.
Megan Mitchell, a spokeswoman for Cheney, declined to comment on Tuesday, saying that the vice president had not yet received a copy of the indictment.
The indictment accuses Gonzales of using his position while in office to stop an investigation in 2006 into abuses at one of the privately-run prisons.
Gonzales' attorney, George Terwilliger III, said in a written statement, "This is obviously a bogus charge on its face, as any good prosecutor can recognize." He said he hoped Texas authorities would take steps to stop "this abuse of the criminal justice system."
Another indictment released Tuesday accuses Lucio of profiting from his public office by accepting honoraria from prison management companies. Guerra announced his intention to investigate Lucio's prison consulting early last year.
Lucio's attorney, Michael Cowen, released a scathing statement accusing Guerra of settling political scores in his final weeks in office.
"Senator Lucio is completely innocent and has done nothing wrong," Cowen said, adding that he would file a motion to quash the indictment this week.
Willacy County has become a prison hub with county, state and federal lockups. Guerra has gone after the prison-politician nexus before, extracting guilty pleas from three former Willacy and Webb county commissioners after investigating bribery related to federal prison contacts.
Last month, a Willacy County grand jury indicted The GEO Group, a Florida private prison company, on a murder charge in the death of a prisoner days before his release. The three-count indictment alleged The GEO Group allowed other inmates to beat Gregorio de la Rosa Jr. to death with padlocks stuffed into socks. The death happened in 2001 at the Raymondville facility.
In 2006, a jury ordered the company to pay de la Rosa's family $47.5 million in a civil judgment. The Cheney-Gonzales indictment makes reference to the de la Rosa case.
None of the indictments released Tuesday had been signed by Presiding Judge Manuel Banales of the Fifth Administrative Judicial Region.
Last month, Banales dismissed indictments that charged Guerra with extorting money from a bail bond company and using his office for personal business. An appeals court had earlier ruled that a special prosecutor was improperly appointed to investigate Guerra.
After Guerra's office was raided as part of the investigation early last year, he camped outside the courthouse in a borrowed camper with a horse, three goats and a rooster. He threatened to dismiss hundreds of cases because he believed local law enforcement had aided the investigation against him.
The indictments were first reported by KRGV-TV.
___
Associated Press writer Deb Riechmann in Washington contributed to this report.
the difference between international and United States isolated ones who seek justice for Cheney, Gonzales, Rumsfeld and the Buhes is that they don't have to wait for the January Inauguration.
who knows. if you learn about the Watergate crisis (as i had to) you will see...
that Obama and his talkative wife could be brought down by trhe rest of the cieberg of which the Texas mess is the tip.
the keyt statement for next year: "But I thought that was JUST a conspiracy theory!"
Many are products of a life that may include pedophilia, drug trafficking and consumption, child pornography, bestiality, mind control, rape, torture, satanic rituals and human sacrifices. They are given many opportunities to indulge their perversities, which ensure continued obedience and solidarity.
Drug trafficking, white slavery, prostitution and pornography finances secret New World Order programs. Elements in the CIA, FBI, Coast Guard, Military, and police are all involved, as is the Mafia.
This information may upset or enrage some people. I could not bring myself to read these books for over two years. The torture and depravity they describe is excruciating. My mental filters would not accept it. Writing about it is difficult.
The public has a child-like trust in its leaders, especially Presidents. The charge that they really belong to a sadistic, criminal, traitorous syndicate is a betrayal on the scale of incest.
We respond with denial and anger. We don't want to admit that we are dupes and our perception of reality is false. Dumbed down, we are incapable of common sense and concerted action. We refuse to contemplate what they may have in store. Better to ridicule the messenger and change the channel.
These women could have remained silent and found some much deserved peace and happiness. Instead they are taking great risks to warn humanity of the danger. Are we going to listen?
PATTERNS of behavior can be observed.
John Kennedy: Speech that may have lead to his assasination
Free and independent.
__________________ Marerophilia:
A depth of love that youth can seldom appreciate or communicate;
A love that never can die for it is a wild seed living inside us, and it is what it is; Love: that which bonds the reality of one's being to the mystery of the unknown; Wildflowers: evidence revealed."
~~carefulcarpenter
They were talking on The Daily Show last night about this. Like, you guys' journalists just seem totally comfortable with this whole "Call me when it no longer matters, then I'll give you the gossip that might've totally changed the way people would have voted" thing.
This thread's probably not going anywhere, so I dunno, does anyone wanna talk about that?
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