Wednesday, June 16, 2021

In early May, Wikinews extended an invitation to Vitaly Filipchenko, an independent candidate in the 2021 New York City mayoral election, set to take place November 2nd, alongside other candidates. Filipchenko answered some questions about his policies and campaign during a phone interview.

Filipchenko, registered on the New York City Campaign Finance Board as Vitaly A. Filipchenko, is the first Russian candidate for New York City mayor, being born in Tomsk, Siberia in 1973, according to news agency Sputnik. He has since naturalised as a United States citizen. According to the web site, Filipchenko has been educated in road construction and maintenance and owns a moving services company; he describes himself on his web site as a “small business owner”. On his web site’s platform page, he says that “[m]y English may not be perfect – but my platform is.”

Incumbent Democrat mayor Bill de Blasio, who won re-election in the 2017 New York City mayoral election by 66.5%, cannot run for a third term under term limits. As of April 28, 22 candidates are currently running, the majority of whom are also Democrats. Ahead of the June Democratic primary for New York City mayor, a poll conducted May 23 and 24 by WPIX and Emerson College of 12 Democratic candidates with a margin of error of 3.2 per cent has former commissioner for the New York City Department of Sanitation Kathryn Garcia and Borough President of Brooklyn Eric Adams leading with 21.1% and 20.1%, respectively.

Saturday, July 2, 2005

A city Circuit Court judge in Baltimore, Maryland, John M. Glynn, ordered state corrections officials on Friday to produce in 30 days a written report that will outline plans to reduce over crowding and slow processing times at the city’s Central Booking and Intake Center. The state-run facility is a centralized jail designed to process arrests made by all city police precincts and is the gateway into the criminal justice system of suspects taken into custody in the city of 640,000 people.

In the last 3 months, over 80 arrestees were released from the Central Booking facility without being formally charged. In April this year, a temporary restaining order was issued by Judge Glynn against the facility to enforce the release of those held more than 24 hours after their intake who did not receive a hearing by a court commissioner. The commissioner sets bail, if granted, and formalizes the charges filed by the arresting officer. The charges are then entered into the state’s computer system where the case is tracked. The hearing also marks the date for the suspect’s right to a speedy trial.

The Friday hearing was called after the city mayor’s office of Martin O’Malley filed a motion to join a lawsuit that was brought by public defenders on behalf of those criminally detained at the facility. In Maryland, a hearing with a court commissioner within 24 hours of being arrested is state law. Judge Glynn presided over that lawsuit which led to the temporary restraining order. The order is to remain in effect until November.

Aides to O’Malley are seeking help from his court to implement and then monitor procedural changes at Central Booking, and made sharp criticisms of state public safety officials. One mayor’s aide said, ”We continue to offer management solutions, and they are accepted. But you know what? I don’t have time to run [Central Booking], nor does the police department.”

Judge Glynn expressed concern during the hearing that a purely judicial remedy may not be the answer, and said, “If I find that it is a hopeless disaster… what can I do about that?” He peppered parties to the suit with questions and suggested there is the possibility that political action, not court intervention, may be needed to solve what city and police officials call inefficient management practices by the state.

Glynn also requested parties to the suit to report back on what happened to the 80+ arrestees who were released so far as a result of the restraining order. The suspect could be re-arrested if officers knew the circumstances of the release, but police say that would take time and money to work out. An arrestee released without seeing a court commissioner has as the only record of the offense the hand written charging document by the officer.

The Maryland attorney general’s office representing the corrections officers said at the hearing that city police are part of the problem by not filing charging documents at Central Booking when the arrestee is delivered and processing begins. The state must accept the prisoners, but cannot move forward without the necessary documents. They also say city police sometimes flood the facility, which can create temporary backlogs.

Central Booking was designed to process 60,000 suspects a year, but currently handles nearly 100,000. It was built to accommodate 900 people at any one time, but normally crowds in 1,200. Arrestees describe conditions in holding cells with no room to sit on the floor, and being crammed in with people who suffer with health problems or drug addicts who vomit from withdrawal.

Sunday, April 28, 2019

On Friday Ford Motor Company announced the United States Department of Justice was performing a criminal investigation of Ford’s internal emission testing practices. Ford said in a financial filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that the criminal investigation started on some unspecified date after Ford voluntarily disclosed the matter to the federal government on February 21.

Ford said in their filing the matter “currently focuses on issues relating to road load estimations, including analytical modeling and coastdown testing”, and “does not involve the use of defeat devices” which were an issue with another automaker previously.

“Ford is fully cooperating with the government, and we’ll keep them posted on what we’re finding through our investigation and technical review”, Ford told The Verge. In the filing itself Ford also made this point, writing “In addition, we have notified a number of other state and federal agencies. We are fully cooperating with all government agencies.”

In February, Ford announced investigating itself, following employee concerns that emission testing calculation could be inconsistent. The employees were reportedly concerned about the calculation of “road load”, a measurement of ordinary resistance factors such as tire resistance and aerodynamic drag.

Ford started its investigation by hiring law firm Sidley Austin, according to The Verge.

According to the filing, Ford voluntarily disclosed this matter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on February 18, and also to the California Air Resources Board on February 21.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

A man who was trying to protect the driver of a vehicle that had hit a child pedestrian was killed by an angry crowd the evening of Wednesday, June 20, in Austin, Texas.

The man was identified today by Austin police as David Rivas Morales, age 40. The driver had just dropped Morales off at his sister’s townhouse moments before. Then while still in the parking lot, he allegedly bumped the toddler with the vehicle. The child was not injured and was not taken to the hospital. A group of 3 or 4 men confronted the driver and Morales came back to assist him. The assailants then turned on Morales. Police indicated the driver, who had escaped the scene of the crime, was cooperating with the investigation. Morales died at the hospital from injuries that included a cracked skull and brain hemorrhaging.

The neighborhood was crowded at the time with some 2,000 to 3,000 people who were participating in the annual Juneteenth celebration, which commemorates the day the emancipation of slaves was announced in Texas. It was not immediately known whether any of the attackers had been part of the celebration.

In a news conference on Wednesday, members of League of United Latin American Citizens called on the community not to assume the killing was racially motivated solely because Juneteenth celebrants are predominately African-American and the victim was Latino. Police officers stated that early reports were incorrect in implying thousands of potential witnesses, as investigations suggested only 10 to 15 people had been in the parking lot when the incident occurred and most of these were residents of apartments nearby.

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Businessman Rocky De La Fuente took some time to speak with Wikinews about his campaign for the U.S. Democratic Party’s 2016 presidential nomination.

The 61-year-old De La Fuente resides in San Diego, California, grew up in Tijuana, and owns multiple businesses and properties throughout the world. Since getting his start in the automobile industry, De La Fuente has branched out into the banking and real estate markets. Despite not having held or sought political office previously, he has been involved in politics, serving as the first-ever Hispanic superdelegate to the 1992 Democratic National Convention.

De La Fuente entered the 2016 presidential race last October largely due to his dissatisfaction with Republican front-runner Donald Trump. He argues he is a more accomplished businessman than Trump, and attacks Trump as “a clown,” “a joke,” “dangerous,” and “in the same category as Hitler.” Nevertheless, De La Fuente’s business background begets comparisons with Trump. The Alaskan Midnight Sun blog described him as the Democrats’ “own Donald Trump.”

While receiving only minimal media coverage, he has campaigned actively, and according to the latest Federal Election Commission filing, loaned almost US$ 4 million of his own money to the campaign. He has qualified for 48 primary and caucus ballots, but has not yet obtained any delegates to the 2016 Democratic National Convention. Thus far, according to the count at The Green Papers, De La Fuente has received 35,406 votes, or 0.23% of the total votes cast. He leads among the many lesser-known candidates but trails both Senator Bernie Sanders who has received nearly 6.5 million votes and front-runner Hillary Clinton who has just shy of 9 million votes.

With Wikinews reporter William S. Saturn?, De La Fuente discusses his personal background, his positions on political issues, his current campaign for president, and his political future.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

U.S. Democratic Party presidential candidate John Wolfe, Jr. of Tennessee took some time to answer a few questions from Wikinews reporter William S. Saturn.

Wolfe, an attorney based out of Chattanooga, announced his intentions last year to challenge President Barack Obama in the Democratic Party presidential primaries. So far, he has appeared on the primary ballots in New Hampshire, Missouri, and Louisiana. In Louisiana, he had his strongest showing, winning 12 percent overall with over 15 percent in some congressional districts, qualifying him for Democratic National Convention delegates. However, because certain paperwork had not been filed, the party stripped Wolfe of the delegates. Wolfe says he will sue the party to receive them.

Wolfe will compete for additional delegates at the May 22 Arkansas primary and the May 29 Texas primary. He is the only challenger to Obama in Arkansas, where a May 10 Hendrix College poll of Democrats shows him with 38 percent support, just short of the 45 percent for Obama. Such an outing would top the margin of Texas prison inmate Keith Russell Judd, who finished 18 percent behind Obama with 41 percent in the West Virginia Democratic primary; the strongest showing yet against the incumbent president. Despite these prospects, the Democratic Party of Arkansas has already announced that if Wolfe wins any delegates in their primary, again, due to paperwork, the delegates will not be awarded. Wolfe will appear on the Texas ballot alongside Obama, activist Bob Ely, and historian Darcy Richardson, who ended his campaign last month.

Wolfe has previously run for U.S. Congress as the Democratic Party’s nominee. On his campaign website, he cites the influence “of the Pentagon, Wall Street, and corporations” on the Obama administration as a reason for his challenge, believing these negatively affect “loyal Americans, taxpayers and small businesses.” Wolfe calls for the usage of anti-trust laws to break up large banks, higher taxes on Wall Street, the creation of an “alternative federal reserve” to assist community banks, and the implementation of a single-payer health care system.

With Wikinews, Wolfe discusses his campaign, the presidency of Barack Obama, corporations, energy, the federal budget, immigration, and the nuclear situation in Iran among other issues.