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Tag: feds

  • Teresa Giudice Won’t Get Out Of Prison Early, Still Acting Like A Diva

    It appears that Teresa Giudice will have to serve the entirety of her 15-month sentence for fraud, and it’s all thanks for her husband Joe.

    The Real Housewives of New Jersey star was expecting to be released from Danbury Connecticut correctional facility in time for the holiday season because she and her husband had a deal on the table.

    But a source says that the deal has gone sour and it was all Joe’s fault.

    “He met with the feds and the whole thing fell apart during those meetings because of the things he said,” the source explained. “So now the deal is off the table. [Teresa] is going to be sitting in prison for the rest of her sentence.”

    However, if reports from some inmates are to be believed, Teresa isn’t having such a terrible time in prison anyway.

    A former inmate at the facility has claimed that “Teresa’s a diva” and that the Real Housewife is getting special treatment.

    “Just the way she got her job, that’s definitely diva treatment,” the ex-inmate says. “She wipes tables three days a week and it’s maybe for 15-20 minutes a shift. She had that job before she came in, and that’s hard to get. Why should she get that when people are outside shoveling snow?”

    Good question.

    She is also allegedly getting preferential treatment when it comes to meals and visitors.

    Her own husband Joe also inadvertently alluded to the cushy life that his wife is living while serving time for wire and bank fraud.

    In an Extra interview aired last month, the businessman talked about having been made to wait for an hour while Teresa did her hair.

    He also described the 42-year-old mother as having “a little group she hangs out with and does her thing with every day.”

    The Italian-born Joe will be serving his own 41-month sentence for fraud once Teresa is released.

  • New Bill Aims to Stop Feds from Looking at Porn on the Job

    Federal employees – they’re just like you!

    …In that they like to watch porn. And they get bored at work. And like to cure that boredom with porn.

    North Carolina Republican Mark Meadows is sick of all the porn watching, however, and has introduced a new bill to “prohibit federal employees from accessing pornographic or explicit material on government computers and devices.”

    It’s called the Eliminating Pornography from Agencies Act. Meadows serves on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

    A Washington Times report found that the number one reason that federal employees look at so much porn, besides the fact that you know, it’s porn, is pure boredom:

    “[The guy caught porning at work] stated he is aware it is against government rules and regulations, but he often does not have enough work to do and has free time,” investigators wrote of another federal employee, this one at the Treasury Department, who viewed more than 13,000 pornographic images in a six-week span.

    There have apparently been cases of excessive porn viewing at the FCC, EPA, HUD, the Commerce Department, and the General Services Administration.

    And remember that porn problem at the Pentagon?

    As The Hill points out, most federal agencies already have rules that ban employees from jacking around on the job – but Meadows’ bill would make agencies ban pornographic content.

    “It’s appalling that it requires an act of Congress to ensure that federal agencies block access to these sites,” Congressman Meadows said.

    Meadows says that feds are doing this on your tax dollar, so you should be upset. Also, porning on the job is a cybersecurity threat.

    “While there are rules in place at most agencies to ban this kind of unprofessional and potentially hostile workplace behavior, it continues to take place. There is absolutely no excuse for federal employees to be viewing and downloading pornographic materials on the taxpayers’ dime,” Meadows said.

    “Further, downloading these files, which are often ridden with viruses and malware, poses a cybersecurity threat at our federal agencies. This commonsense legislation ensures that federal workers have a comfortable, safe work environment and protects taxpayer resources from being misused.”

    This is second time Meadows has proposed this bill. It went nowhere the last time.

    Sure, anyone trying to limit your porn consumption is a killjoy. But honestly, boring job or not, can’t we all wait until we get home before we head to Pornhub?

  • Feds Charge Walmart: They Broke Labor Laws

    Feds Charge Walmart: They Broke Labor Laws

    The nation’s largest retailer is no stranger to criticism, it has in the past, been associated with child slave labor issues in countries such as Bangladesh.

    Wal-Mart is infamous for its unfair labor laws and employment practices. Last year alone, the company reported a net income of over $11 billion dollars. An amount of money that should be ample to remedy some of their workplace practices with regard to wage law violations, inadequate health care, exploitation, and their anti-union stance.

    These facts could account for some of the 5,000 lawsuits that are filed against Wal-Mart each year, which calculates to approximately 17 lawsuits per day.

    That is a lot of unfairness – but they do employ 1.4 million people in the U.S. alone, about 1 percent of the population, so bad things are bound to happen.

    And they did happen, and the Feds are all over them. Federal officials have filed a formal complaint charging that Wal-Mart violated the rights of protesting and striking workers last year.

    The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), says Wal-Mart illegally fired, disciplined or threatened more than 60 employees for striking, or as the NLRB put it, for participating in legally protected activities to complain about wages and working conditions.

    Striking is an American right that goes as far back as the early 1800’s. The Feds see it that way too.

    The NLRB found that Wal-Mart in more than a dozen states had seen this labor malfunction.

    In the complaint filed by the NLRB, they included an inner-office memorandum that Wal-Mart sent to its striking employees, it read:

    “[I]t is very important for you to understand that the company does not agree that these hit-and-run work stoppages are protected, and now that it has done the legal thinking on the subject, it will not excuse them in the future…Should you participate in further union-orchestrated intermittent work stoppages that are part of a common plan or design to disrupt and confuse the company’s business operations, you should expect that the Company will treat any such absence as it would any other unexcused absence….”

    Wal-Mart obviously just wants their employees to take their unfair practices, or go elsewhere. Knowing full well the country is in a recession and there really isn’t anywhere else to go.

    The complaint will go before an administrative law judge. If the judge rules for the employees, Wal-Mart could be liable to the workers for back pay, reinstatement of their jobs and removal of any disciplinary action the company enforced.

    In November last year, workers and labor activists staged hundreds of protests at Wal-Mart stores in many major cities across the U.S., including the Bay Area, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis and Washington, demanding pay increases and better working conditions. Employees also have accused the company of punishing workers who participate in these type of actions.

    “Wal-Mart thinks it can scare us with attacks to keep us from having a real conversation about the poverty wages we’re paid,” said Barbara Collins, a former Wal-Mart worker from Placerville, Calif., who is one of the 70 workers named in the NLRB complaint. “But too much is at stake, the strength of our economy and the security of our families, to stay silent about why Wal-Mart needs to improve jobs.

    Image via YouTube

  • Cincinnati Bus Crash Leads to Federal Investigation

    Federal officials have stepped in to do a thorough investigation on the Greyhound bus that veered off Interstate 75, flipping over into an Ohio cornfield over the weekend. WDTN-Dayton, Ohio reported that an extensive investigation will be conducted by the U.S. Department of Transportation and Federal Motor Carrier Administration in conjunction with the Butler County Sheriff’s office.

    The local and federal entities have intervened to assist the Ohio State Highway Patrol in an effort to expeditiously determine the cause of the accident. Today, the Greyhound bus’ brakes where the main focal point of the investigation. Other mechanical parts where also inspected, but no mechanical specifications have been released as of yet. The tapes from the bus’ surveillance system have also been sent off for further review. The tapes will be observed to determine if any unusual activity took place minutes before the crash.

    “We’re still putting together pieces of the puzzle. We haven’t determined the cause,” admitted Highway Patrol Lt. Edward Meija. Meija also informed the media that Dwayne Garrett, the 64 year old bus driver, who was also injured, voluntarily gave an investigative statement, and allowed for blood to be drawn for testing.

    Greyhound Lines Inc. representative Alexandra Pedrini stated that the driver has 15 years experience, in addition to a ‘clean driving record.’ She went to say that the bus had also passed its  annual inspection recently.

    The bus crashed at around 4:00am Saturday morning on Interstate 75, about 25 miles north of the Cincinnati city limits. The bus, transporting 51 passengers, was in route from Cincinnati to Detroit, MI. Approximately 35 passengers were injured, and six remain hospitalized.

     

    Image Via Cincinnati Enquirer

  • Oaksterdam: Marijuana University Raided By Feds

    Richard Lee, who founded and runs a school–Oaksterdam–to train people in the marijuana industry, saw his university and private residence raided yesterday after D.E.A. agents served him a search warrant.

    The agents took stacks of paperwork and files along with several bags of marijuana plants, but did not give a reason as to why they had obtained a search warrant. Supporters of Lee and his work say it’s more than likely a political move to keep him from moving any further with his plan to legalize pot, which he bankrolled in 2010 with Prop 19 and which saw a record amount of voters in favor.

    Police blocked the doors to the school yesterday as protesters looked on. Supporters of Lee’s efforts to legalize pot were surprised at the seizure of Lee’s effects yesterday, since Oakland has long been considered to be a safe haven for marijuana dispensaries. While the university trains students in areas such as horticulture and the business side of running a dispensary, marijuana is not dispensed there. However, one of the targets of the raid was Coffeeshop Blue Sky, a dispensary owned by Lee.

    (image)@Oaksterdam
    OaksterdamUniversity    Oaksterdam is being raided at the moment. Please head down to 1600 Broadway in Downtown Oakland or RT. Thank you for your support!(image) 22 hours ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto

    Ryan Hooper, a former student of Oaksterdam, said, “”This is not in the best interest of the city. If they close the dispensaries, all of this stuff is going to go back underground.”


    (image)@Oaksterdam
    OaksterdamUniversity    #SaveOaksterdam “He was changing the culture. And that is why the federal government is trying to silence him today.” http://t.co/0IsAt3Fq(image) 19 hours ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto

  • Employer Facebook Password Requests To Get DOJ Investigation?

    Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), who announced last week that he was drafting legislation to prohibit employers from demanding Facebook login information of prospective employees, has now teamed up with Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to asked the Department of Justice to look into the possible illegality of the practice.

    According to a release from Blumenthal’s office, the two Senators are requesting that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the DOJ “launch a federal investigation into a new disturbing trend of employers demanding job applicants turn over their user names and passwords for social networking and email websites to gain access to personal information like private photos, email messages, and biographical data that is otherwise deemed private.”

    In the last few weeks, numerous reports have popped up on the disturbing trend of employers demanding Facebook passwords as part of the interview or pre-hiring process. Apparently, this is happening in both governmental and private organizations, and sometimes even at colleges.

    “Employers have no right to ask job applicants for their house keys or to read their diaries – why should they be able to ask them for their Facebook passwords and gain unwarranted access to a trove of private information about what we like, what messages we send to people, or who we are friends with,” said Schumer.

    “I am alarmed and outraged by rapidly and widely spreading employer practices seeking access to Facebook passwords or confidential information on other social networks,” said Blumenthal, echoing comments he made about the practice last week.

    The two hope that a federal investigation will help with any problems that are currently going on across the country, as the EEOC and the DOJ can determine if the practice currently violates federal law. In the meantime, Blumenthal and Schumer are working on their own bill – “new statutory protections to clarify and strengthen the law,” says Blumenthal.

    Here’s the letter that they sent to Attorney General Eric Holder. It comments on previous court cases that limit the employer’s access to login information for current employees, and they suggest that this protection could be extended to job applicants:

    Dear Attorney General Holder,

    We write concerning reports in the media that some employers are requiring job applicants to provide their usernames and passwords to social networking sites like Facebook as part of the hiring process.

    We urge the DOJ to investigate whether this practice violates the Stored Communication Act or the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. The SCA prohibits intentional access to electronic information without authorization or intentionally exceeding that authorization, 18 U.S.C. § 2701, and the CFAA prohibits intentional access to a computer without authorization to obtain information, 18 U.S.C. § 1030(a)(2)(C). Requiring applicants to provide login credentials to secure social media websites and then using those credentials to access private information stored on those sites may be unduly coercive and therefore constitute unauthorized access under both SCA and the CFAA.

    Two courts have found that when supervisors request employee login credentials, and access otherwise private information with those credentials, that those supervisors may be subject to civil liability under the SCA. See Pietrylo v. Hillstone Restaurant Group, 2009 WL 3128420 (D.N.J. 2009); Konop v. Hawaiian Airlines, Inc., 302 F.3d 868 (9th Cir. 2002). Although these cases involved current employees, the courts’ reasoning does not clearly distinguish between employees and applicants. Given Facebook terms of service and the civil case law, we strongly urge the Department to investigate and issue a legal opinion as to whether requesting and using prospective employees’ social network passwords violates current federal law.

    There’s some debate as to whether or not this practice is even a big issue. Is it widespread enough to warrant a federal investigation? Blumenthal and Schumer think so.

    For their part, Facebook issued a statement on the topic, saying that Facebook users “should never have to share your password, let anyone access your account, or do anything that might jeopardize the security of your account or violate the privacy of your friends.”