Inside the Mind of a Romance Fraudster | Scammed | Real Crime

All relationships encounter their share of problems, but when one partner lies and defrauds the other of their savings, it becomes a crime.

The second story is of Jeff Kent, a charming charismatic individual who preyed upon the loneliness of others. Once he had gained his victim's trust, he incorporated them into his business schemes, often leaving the victim with large debts.

MP Warns of Financial Corruption in UK Escaping ‘Toothless’ Enforcers

THE GUARDIAN: Economic crime needs to ‘be taken seriously’ alongside tougher anti-money laundering levy, says Hodge

The Pandora Papers leak shows that the UK is in danger of becoming a corrupt country because it is failing to take economic crime seriously enough, the former chair of the public accounts watchdog told MPs, as she called for more funding for financial crime enforcers.

Dame Margaret Hodge, a senior Labour MP, raised the issue in the Commons as part of a debate on the finance bill, highlighting the central role of London in facilitating economic crime.

She said the Pandora Papers, leaked to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and shared with media around the world including the Guardian, comprised “the largest cache of documents we have ever received” in relation to tax havens.

“The UK lies at the heart of everything revealed there,” she said. “Others have talked about secret property transactions that took place – £4bn identified in the Pandora Papers. There are more UK citizens cited in that tranche of leaks than from any other country. The relationship between the UK and our tax havens is central to the facilitation of economic crime, and again we see the weak and toothless enforcement agencies.” » | Rowena Mason, Deputy political editor | Thursday, December 2, 2021

Tackling Egypt's Rising Crime Wave
Campaigning in Egypt has finished ahead of the country's first presidential election since last year's revolution. There's now a 48-hour political silence before voting begins on Wednesday and the new president will be announced by the end of June. But, as Rawya Rageh reports from the town of Shubra El Kheima just north of Cairo, crime is rising and has become one of the main election issues.

A Civilization on Edge: Amid Debt Crisis, Athens Falls Apart

SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: As Greece struggles to master its devastating debt problem, decades of mismanagement have taken their toll on the country's once-proud capital. Athens has degenerated into a hotbed of chaos and crime, where tensions between Greeks and immigrants have led to attacks on foreigners by the far-right.

Massoud starts walking faster as the shadows lengthen. He glances at the scratched display on his mobile phone. It's 7:15 p.m.

The sun is setting behind the large apartment buildings on Patission Street, disappearing behind the few remaining classical facades where the plaster is beginning to crumble. "For Rent" and "For Sale" signs are posted on boarded-up windows or behind sheets of opaque glass.

Massoud is in a hurry. He wants to get home before dark, because that's when the people who are out to get him come out.

The gangs of right-wing thugs, sometimes up to 20 at a time, approach their victims on foot or on mopeds, carrying clubs and knives. They are masked, faceless and fast. They appear suddenly and silently before striking.

The neo-fascists are hunting down immigrants in the middle of downtown Athens, in the streets north of the central Omonia Square. They call it cleansing.

They hunt people like Massoud, a 25-year-old Afghan from Kabul. He has been living in Athens for five years without a residency permit, even though he speaks fluent Greek. He studied geography in Kabul, but in Athens he works as a day laborer.

The gangs also hunt the dark-skinned man pushing a shopping cart filled with garbage and scrap metal through the streets. Or the woman with Asian features, who now grabs her child and the paper cup with which she has just been begging in the streets. » | Julia Amalia Heyer | Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan | Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Part 2: Violence, Drugs and Disease »

You Can Pick Up a Knife and Stab a Burglar, Says Ken Clarke
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Householders who stab burglars will not face criminal charges, Kenneth Clarke, the Justice Secretary, said yesterday.

He announced that an act of Parliament would be used to "clarify" the existing legal right to use "reasonable force" against intruders.

His remarks come after a householder was arrested on suspicion of murder following the stabbing of a burglar at a house in Salford, Greater Manchester, last week.

David Cameron has promised that the new Justice Bill would "put beyond doubt that home owners and small shopkeepers who use reasonable force to defend themselves or their properties will not be prosecuted".

Yesterday, Mr Clarke spelt out the sort of action that would be permitted under the new regime. He made clear that it would remain illegal to pursue intruders to attack them or to shoot them as they fled.

The Justice Secretary said: "If an old lady finds she has got an 18 year-old burgling her house and she picks up a kitchen knife and sticks it in him, she has not committed a criminal offence and we will make that clear." » | Thursday, June 30, 2011

Medvedev Signs Amendments Introducing Forced Labor into Criminal Code

RUSSIA TODAY: Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has said a set of amendments to the Criminal Code contains new forms of punishment, while reducing charges of slander – once a criminal offense - to a civil offence.

Medvedev personally made the announcement on Tuesday while meeting with Justice Minister Aleksandr Konovalov. In Russia, the Justice Ministry includes the Federal Service for Execution of Punishment – the body that oversees the system of prisons, penal colonies and pre-trial detention centers.

“The draft law includes a number of novelties and deserves attention as it makes the criminal law more up to date, gets rid of obsolete norms that were passing from one code to another but were never observed, eliminates contradictions and introduces a new form of punishment – forced labor,” Medvedev said.

Apart from the introduction of forced labor, the bill establishes new penalties for petty economic crimes and crimes related to drug trafficking. Meanwhile, charges of libel and slander have been decriminalized and will fall under the civil code.

“The deeds that are listed as crimes in the current version of the Criminal Code are being decriminalized and after the law comes into force these acts will be persecuted as administrative offence,” the president noted.

The list of such actions pertain to libel, including cases of libeling judges involved in court cases, as well as non-qualified actions that do not cause grave consequences. » | Tuesday, June 07, 2011

High Taxes and Crime Blamed for Britons Leaving the Country
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: More than a third of wealthy British residents are considering leaving the country because of high taxes, the weather and crime.

A study by of 1,000 people with more than £250,000 in savings and investments found 35pc may move abroad because of high tax rates, while 44pc blamed the weather and 43pc want to avoid antisocial behaviour.

Recent changes in tax rules have proved controversial for many Britons, including a combination of the 50pc income tax rate on those earning more than £150,000, increases in national insurance and a reduction in personal allowances. » | Myra Butterworth, Personal Finance Correspondent | Saturday, April 23, 2011

Once Again, the French Are Leading the Way*! French Billionaire Antoine Zacharias Faces Criminal Trial Over Pay Deal
THE TELEGRAPH: A French millionaire [billionaire?] has become the first person in the country to go on trial for being paid too much, in a ground-breaking move against "corporate greed".

Antoine Zacharias is facing criminal charges. Photo: The Telegraph
Antoine Zacharias is facing criminal charges despite the £90 million pay and pension deal being approved by his company’s directors.

He is accused of misusing funds by accepting the money to run Vinci, the world’s biggest construction company.

The sum was set by a remuneration committee chaired by Quentin Davies, Britain’s junior Defence Minister.

Mr Zacharias, 71, is the first French industry captain to face criminal charges over earnings and faces up to five years in prison and a fine of £336,000.

French bosses are anxiously awaiting the outcome of the two-day trial at the court in Nanterre outside Paris, as a guilty verdict could lead to a wave of prosecutions in France over executive pay.

France is notoriously mistrustful of its patrons, and the country was hit by a wave of “boss-nappings” last year in the wake of the financial crisis.

Under French law, company bosses can be prosecuted for misusing funds. However, this is the first time a case has been brought against someone who appeared to have acted within company rules on pay.

Hailed as France’s boss of the decade by the Harvard Business Review, Mr Zacharias transformed Vinci into a construction powerhouse, raising profits by more than 300 per cent and turnover by 81 per cent in six years.

But in 2006 he was ousted by his number two, and successor, who accused him of corporate greed. >>> Henry Samuel in Paris | Thursday, March 25, 2010

*We, the British, should follow suit, as should the Americans. In fact, this should happen wherever corporate greed is a problem. What about jailing and punishing severely those fat cat, greedy bankers? Five to ten years in the slammer would do them a world of good. It would sober them up. They would become examples for all the others just waiting to milk (shouldn’t that be cream?) the system. You’d soon find that corporate greed would become a thing of the past if these ‘can’t-get-enough-types’ were put through their paces in clink. Let the show begin! – © Mark

Savage Attack on Pensioner in Birmingham by "Asian" Youths


Click here for the full article in French:
BIVOUAC-ID: Grande-Bretagne : Un retraité handicapé sauvagement battu par un « oriental » >>> Par Yann | June 25, 2008

Hat tip to Pierre of Québec for drawing my attention to this dreadful, shameful, despicable crime.

”Kill the Bastards”, Says Susan Shabangu, South Africa’s Security Minister
Aiming her [Susan Shabangu’s] words at police chiefs, she said of criminals: "You must kill the bastards if they threaten you or the community. You must not worry about the regulations - that is my responsibility. Your responsibility is to serve and protect.

I want no warning shots. You have one shot and it must be a kill shot.

Criminals are hell-bent on undermining the law and they must now be dealt with. End of story. There are to be no negotiations with criminals."

DAILY MAIL: Police in South Africa were ordered yesterday to deal with criminals by "killing the bastards".

Susan Shabangu, the country's security minister, told officers not to worry about regulations, negotiations or warning shots.

Instead, police should use the guns given to them and go for the kill.

South Africa has become the murder capital of the world with more than 22,000 deaths a year.

Rape, pistol-whipping and torture are commonplace. Shoot the Bastards... and Shoot to Kill: South African Minister Tells Police to Show Criminals No Mercy >>> By Ian Evans

The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback - UK)
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardback - UK)

Somebody, at Last, Speaks Some Sense on the (British) Family!
DAILY MAIL: Family breakdown is a "cancer" behind almost every evil affecting the country, a senior judge will declare today.

Mr Justice Coleridge blames youth crime, child abuse, drug addiction and binge-drinking on the "meltdown" of relations between parents and children.

He warns that the collapse of the family unit is a threat to the nation as bad as terrorism, crime, drugs or global warming.

The speech to family lawyers contains a fierce attack on the "neglect" of successive governments.

The 58-year-old judge, who is married with three grown-up children, will say family breakdown is an epidemic affecting all levels of society from the Royal Family down.

It is "on a scale, depth and breadth which few of us could have imagined even "a decade ago. It is a never-ending carnival of human misery. A ceaseless river of human distress.

"I am not saying every broken family produces dysfunctional children but I am saying that almost every dysfunctional child is the product of a broken family."

The judge, who is in charge of family courts across South-West England, will say he has a duty to speak out.

He will call on the Government to put the family at the top of its agenda, alongside the economy and the war on terror - and make it "rather more important than taking oaths of allegianc" [sic].

His speech will say: "Families are the cells which make up the body of society. If the cells are unhealthy and undernourished, or at worse cancerous and growing haphazard and out of control, in the end the body succumbs.

"In some of the more heavily populated urban areas, family life is quite frankly in meltdown or completely unrecognisable . . . it is on an epidemic scale. In some areas of the country family life in the old sense no longer exists." Family Life Is in 'Meltdown': Judge Launches Devastating Attack on Our Fractured Society >>> By Steve Doughty

Mark Alexander

Is it Any Wonder People are Fleeing London?
THE TELEGRAPH: In a north London suburb last week, a schoolgirl was beaten, gang-raped and then had drain-cleaning fluid poured on her body apparently to destroy DNA evidence. In the eternal cesspit of senseless urban crime, I feel that a dreadful nadir of sorts has been reached, a benchmark of slaked lust and casual, sadistic cruelty.

Police sources say the 16-year-old will never fully recover from the injuries caused by the caustic soda and, at the time of writing, she remains under heavy sedation in a burns unit, fighting for her life.

One could weep an ocean for this young woman, her life ruined by these savages, who hunted in a pack like animals and dragged her to an empty house, caring nothing for her wellbeing or future.

Drain cleaner? The callous premeditation is shocking, and underlines the fact that some of the rootless delinquents who roam the London streets are now scraping the bottom of the barrel of humanity.

I'm almost embarrassed to say that the attackers have been described as "five black youths", in case you think I'm being racist in highlighting this crime.

Yes, these are the peculiar times we live in, particularly in a week when Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, has pointed out that "white flight is accelerating" as Britain becomes increasingly polarised along ethnic lines.

Following the controversy started by the Bishop of Rochester, who said that some Muslim enclaves were "no-go areas" for Christians, it all seems to suggest a country that is becoming increasingly fragmented; a patchwork of rigidly delineated little pockets of race and religion, knots of unyielding humanity who just can't rub along with each other.

This is not a Britain many of us would care to recognise, or even want to live in, although it is true that certain sectors of the middle class are fleeing from inner London like pashmina-wrapped lemmings, desperate to escape the creeping spread of urban decay.

Last year, nearly a quarter of a million decent, law-abiding citizens packed their bags and left the capital for good, seeking what they hope will be a better life elsewhere. They moved to outer boroughs, other city suburbs, rural areas, abroad, the back end of beyond, anywhere but here.

While their fairytale, roses-around-the-door belief in the safety of the countryside and the romantic ideal of a thatched cottage for two is touching, it does point to an underlying urban unease.

I would rather take my chances in the city than the country, but one can hardly blame them for wanting to move.

Elsewhere in London this week, a medical student was stabbed to death in a row over an orange in a Brixton fruit shop. A pupil who was expelled for allegedly having a knife took his school to the High Court. And about the time most of us were sitting down to dinner, watching The Bill on television or putting the children to bed, a teenage girl underwent an unimaginable ordeal in an ordinary suburban street.

What is going to happen to those of us left to live here if youths across the city continue to feel quite comfortable and confident in running amok? That's before you even factor in the older, more professional criminal gangs from more than 25 countries, who operate prosperous drug trafficking, people smuggling, prostitution, money laundering and fraud rackets on the capital's streets.

London is a welcoming city, where home-grown and particularly international criminal networks are flourishing nicely. Somewhere in the city, a great termite nest of law-breaking and corruption grows by the day, nourished by immigrants, some of them illegal, from Algeria, Nigeria, Jamaica and Pakistan, among others.

Is it racist to point that out, too? I don't know any more. All I know is that London has room to absorb them all, particularly as so many of its citizens have recently left in a hurry. And while cosy family evenings by the fire remain one of the few benefits of a wet British winter, how alarming that fewer and fewer people feel safe doing this inside their own homes. [Source: Is it any wonder people are fleeing London?] By Jan Moir

Mark Alexander (Paperback)
Mark Alexander (Hardback)

Incitement to Racial Hatred to Become EU-Wide Crime, But Holocaust-Denial Is Spared
Photo courtesy of Google Images
BBC: European interior ministers have agreed to make incitement to racism an EU-wide crime, but have stopped short of a blanket ban on Holocaust denial.

The agreement makes it an offence to condone or grossly trivialise crimes of genocide - but only if the effect is incitement to violence or hatred.

The deal follows six years of talks, and will disappoint Germany, which pushed hard for a Holocaust-denial law.

Berlin has also had to drop a proposal for an EU-wide ban on Nazi symbols. EU Agrees New Racial Hatred Law >>>

French Muslim Graves Desecrated >>>

Mark Alexander