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Posts Tagged ‘Crime’

NewsCorp shareholders revolt against Murdoch family

25 Oct

Following up on the contentious NewsCorp shareholder meeting where the independent shareholders were to express their displeasure with the crimes committed on the Murdoch family's watch: the majority of the independent shareholders voted against continuing James and Lachlan Murdoch (Rupert's sons) continuing employment as senior execs in the company. Due to NewsCorp's odd structure the Murdochs get to overrule their shareholders, but if the upcoming shareholder meeting for BSkyB goes the same way, it will see some serious Murdoch tail-kickage.

Michael Wolff, Murdoch biographer and author of The Man Who Owns the News, said it was now inevitable that James Murdoch would leave.

"James will probably go by himself, that's what everybody will be waiting for. I wonder too if Lachlan will step off the board. But could this drag on for another year? Yes."

Wolff said the size of the vote against Murdoch's son had created "a very difficult family moment..."

Tanner said the votes against the Murdoch sons and Bancroft showed shareholders were serious about wanting more independence at News Corp. "The overwhelming influence of the Murdoch family is not acceptable anymore," she said.

James Murdoch's future under threat [guardian.co.uk]

 
 

NewsCorp shareholders revolt against Murdoch family

25 Oct

Following up on the contentious NewsCorp shareholder meeting where the independent shareholders were to express their displeasure with the crimes committed on the Murdoch family's watch: the majority of the independent shareholders voted against continuing James and Lachlan Murdoch (Rupert's sons) continuing employment as senior execs in the company. Due to NewsCorp's odd structure the Murdochs get to overrule their shareholders, but if the upcoming shareholder meeting for BSkyB goes the same way, it will see some serious Murdoch tail-kickage.

Michael Wolff, Murdoch biographer and author of The Man Who Owns the News, said it was now inevitable that James Murdoch would leave.

"James will probably go by himself, that's what everybody will be waiting for. I wonder too if Lachlan will step off the board. But could this drag on for another year? Yes."

Wolff said the size of the vote against Murdoch's son had created "a very difficult family moment..."

Tanner said the votes against the Murdoch sons and Bancroft showed shareholders were serious about wanting more independence at News Corp. "The overwhelming influence of the Murdoch family is not acceptable anymore," she said.

James Murdoch's future under threat [guardian.co.uk]

 
 

Brazilian Police to Wear Glasses That Can Scan Faces to Find Criminals [The Future]

14 Apr
In technology that is lifted straight from Robocop, Brazilian cops will be outfitted with glasses that can scan faces in a crowd and automatically pick out criminals. The glasses use advanced facial recognition technology that can scan 400 faces a second at 50 yards away. More »


 
 

This is meant as an art piece

30 Jun

Sf_drugs_500Indeed, this set of maps produced by Doug Mccune (more here) using publicly available data released by the San Francisco government on its DataSF website is breathtakingly beautiful. Thanks to Rudy R for bringing this to our attention.

***

Hate to spoil the fun but it has to be said that if we apply the Trifecta checkup, these maps fail at the first question: what is the practical issue being addressed?

As Doug noticed, there is a ridge along Mission Street that appears on pretty much every map regardless of the type of crime. The features on various maps are rather consistent as well -- and I can assure you that those features are consistent with population density.

Alas, if you live in San Francisco and care about crime there, Mission Street is not news. We don't need a sophisticated map to tell us that insight. Same with where prostitution is.

What if you are interested in crime in your local neighborhood? Not these maps either because in creating the relief, Doug must make approximations; the higher the peak, the more collateral activity is created around the peak to avoid discontinuities in the surface. This destroys the local details.

***

Still, they are gorgeous to look at, and as Doug alluded to in his disclaimer, we just need to remove our junkcharts glasses to appreciate them.

 
 

Verizon Tech Made 5,000 Sex Chat Calls On Customer Accounts [Verizon]

11 Sep

The next time you're disputing a 900 number call to a sex hotline and the CSR tells you nobody else could have made that call, remind them of this story. Over the past 10 months, a Verizon technician made 5,000 calls to sex chat hotlines, totaling 45,000 minutes of dirty talk at a cost of $220,000. He placed the calls from over 950 tapped residential and commercial accounts throughout Bergen county in New Jersey. He has since resigned, and been charged with theft by deception and theft of services.

Joseph R. Vaccarelli worked for Verion for 10 years but only started making the calls within the last 10 months, which makes us wonder what exactly happened last November or December to make him launch his non-stop telephone orgy of fraud—and how he got any work done during that time.

Verizon would like everyone to know that not all of its employees regularly call phone sex hotlines and charge the fees to customer accounts:

"We believe this was a highly isolated incident by an errant individual," Young said. "It should not reflect on the overwhelming majority of our workforce, who bring pride and respect to their jobs every day."

"Verizon Worker Charged in 5,000 Illicit Sex Calls" [redOrbit] (Thanks to skokieguy!)
(Photo: ernop)


 
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Who’s Smiling Now? Enzyte Scammer Gets 25 Years In Prison [Enzyte]

28 Aug

Steve Warshak, founder of the company responsible for "Enzyte," has been sentenced to 25 years in prison and ordered to pay a fine of $93,000, says the AP. U.S. District Judge S. Arthur Spiegel also ordered the company, along with other defendants, to forfeit more than $500 million that it bilked from consumers.

According to federal prosecutors the scam involved preying on customer's reluctance to admit that they had ordered the "male enhancement" pills. Customers ordered the pills, but were unable to cancel or get a refund. A former VP of the company testified that Warshak required customers to provide notarized documents from a doctor proving that they had small genitals in order to get a refund.

If customers complained, he said, employees were instructed to "make it as difficult as possible" for them to get their money back. In some cases, Teegarden said, Warshak required customers to produce a notarized statement from a doctor certifying Enzyte did not work.

"He said it was extremely unlikely someone would get anything notarized saying they had a small penis," Teegarden said.

The judge had strong words for Warshak:

"This is a case about greed," Spiegel said as he reviewed the case. "Steven Warshak preyed on perceived sexual inadequacies of customers."

Warshak's 75-year-old mother was also sentenced to jail time, but it's unlikely that she will serve it because she's 75 and has cancer. Meanwhile, Warshak has 30 days to report to prison.

Ohio company owner gets 25 years in fraud case [Associated Press]


 
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