US inmates got virus relief checks, and IRS wants them back
BOISE, Idaho (AP) — Hundreds of thousands of dollars in coronavirus relief payments have been sent to people behind bars across the United States, and now the IRS is asking state officials to help claw back the cash that the federal tax agency says was mistakenly sent.
The legislation authorizing the payments during the pandemic doesn’t specifically exclude jail or prison inmates, and the IRS has refused to say exactly what legal authority it has to retrieve the money. On its website, it points to the unrelated Social Security Act, which bars incarcerated people from receiving some types of old-age and survivor insurance benefit payments.
“I can’t give you the legal basis. All I can tell you is this is the language the Treasury and ourselves have been using,” IRS spokesman Eric Smith said. “It’s just the same list as in the Social Security Act.”
Tax attorney Kelly Erb, who’s written about the issue on her website, says there’s no legal basis for asking for the checks back.
“I think it’s really disingenuous of the IRS,” Erb said Tuesday. “It’s not a rule just because the IRS puts it on the website. In fact, the IRS actually says that stuff on its website isn’t legal authority. So there’s no actual rule — it’s just guidance — and that guidance can change at any time.”
After Congress passed the $2.2 trillion coronavirus rescue package in March, checks of up to $1,200 were automatically sent in most cases to people who filed income tax returns for 2018 or 2019, including some who are incarcerated. A couple of weeks later, the IRS directed state correction departments to intercept payments to prisoners and return them.
The IRS doesn’t yet have numbers on how many payments went to prisoners, Smith said. But initial data from some states suggest the numbers are huge: The Kansas Department of Correction alone intercepted more than $200,000 in checks by early June. Idaho and Montana combined had seized over $90,000.
Washington state, meanwhile, had only intercepted about $23,000 by early June. Some states, like Nevada, have refused to release the numbers, citing an IRS request for confidentiality.
While the IRS says checks sent to jail inmates also should be returned, the sheer number of jails and detention centers across the U.S. makes it difficult to tell if many are following those instructions.
The IRS seems to have decided by itself to pull back the payments approved by Congress, said Wanda Bertram, a spokeswoman for the Prison Policy Initiative, a think tank focusing on the harm of mass incarceration. She says prison officials are accustomed to intercepting tax documents to screen for potential scams, priming them to follow this request.
“It appears that the IRS is just making this up,” Bertram said.
Inmates and their families need the money, she said, especially as prisons try to reduce the spread of the virus by instituting lockdown conditions or releasing thousands of inmates who are then trying to get back on their feet.’Yellowstone’ Season 3 Premiere Draws Over 4 Million Viewers on Paramount NetworkDon’t miss new episodes of ‘Yellowstone’ Sundays at 9/8c on Paramount Network.Ad By Paramount Network See More
Lockdowns can increase expenses for inmates because they are often given lower-quality food or fewer meals and need to supplement by buying food from prison commissaries. Family and friends on the outside often cover those costs, and many have lost jobs during the economic downturn, Bertram said.
“Loved ones right now are also under a squeeze because of the pandemic and being out of a job, so when you send a stimulus check for someone, the person in prison is not the only one who benefits from that,” Bertram said.
Intercepting relief checks may also have a disproportionate impact on Black and Hispanic inmates, who are incarcerated at a higher rate than white Americans. Black people are imprisoned at roughly twice the rate of Hispanic residents, and more than five times the rate of whites as of last year, according to the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Prison officials nationwide have been trying to intercept the checks, with varying results. Officials in Vermont, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Arizona and California estimated that they each had intercepted fewer than a dozen checks as of early June. Oregon prison officials had seized 25 payments, with 21 returned to the IRS and four others given to relatives or other joint tax filers.
Kaitlin Felsted, a spokeswoman for the Utah prison system, said the state had intercepted 28 checks so far but noted that any relief money sent to an inmate’s home address wouldn’t be touched by prison officials.
Some states, like Alaska and Wyoming, aren’t tracking the number of payments they intercept.
It’s not clear if inmates have any recourse, said Erb, the tax attorney.
Those who are released before year’s end and who didn’t get a relief check can try to claim the missing money as a credit on their 2021 tax returns, but it’s not clear if the IRS will honor such claims, Erb said. Other inmates may be out of luck.
“I think somebody has to sue, and you have to have the resources to be able to do that,” she said. “I don’t know that there’s anything most people can do besides complain and see if they can attract some attention. You have to have somebody who will step up and be an advocate for that segment of the population.”
Photo Credit: kmov.com
Photos of people killed in encounters with law enforcement found hanging from nooses in Riverside Park
MILWAUKEE — The Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office is investigating after six laminated cards were found attached to a tree with nooses in Riverside Park Saturday, June 20.
MCSO officials said in a news release Monday, June 22 “the cards depicted the photographs of Black men and women who have been killed in encounters with law enforcement or private citizens, as well as information describing each incident.”
An investigation was opened “immediately,” and is ongoing, MCSO officials said, noting the investigation “has identified pertinent information.”
The Original Black Panthers of Milwaukee posted about the incident on social media Saturday
Anyone with information was asked to please contact MCSO at 414-278-4788.
Photo Credit: fox6now.com
Two New Jersey high schools remove Indians, Cowboys mascots
The sports teams at two New Jersey high schools in Bergen County will no longer be named the Indians and Cowboys.
At their two-hour virtual meeting on Monday night, the Pascack Valley Regional High School District Board of Education voted unanimously to remove the nickname of Pascack Hills, the Cowboy, and the mascot of Pascack Valley, the Indian, reported Pascack Hills Trailblazer.
“Indian mascots are dehumanizing and cause psychological damage to natives,” a former Pascack Valley teacher said during the meeting.
“Personal feelings of nostalgia do not absolve us from our responsibility to stand up for a marginalized group.”
Charleen Schwartzman, a Pascack Hills assistant principal said, “The cowboy is in no way free of bias as it excludes women and people of color.”
“Let’s choose a mascot that we can all be proud of,” she continued.
Immediately after the announcement was made, a counter-petition to keep the Cowboys and Indians names earned more than 700 signatures.
On Tuesday afternoon a protest erupted in the parking lot at Pascack Hills, where students and community members voiced their opposition of the removal of the Cowboy mascot.
In a video, protesters confronted the incoming principle and assistant principle over their dismay that “Cowboys” will be removed from the athletic field, a man yelled, “Who is going to pay to rip up the endzone?”
Others shouted, “This is what the majority looks like!” and “It makes no sense what you’re doing.”
A photo was tweeted of group of students —without face masks — holding signs that read “Defund the BOE” and “Trump Make Hills Great Again.”
The district plans to assign new names at a later date in a “thoughtful and expeditious manner.”
via: https://nypost.com/2020/06/24/two-new-jersey-high-schools-remove-indians-and-cowboys-mascots/
Photo Credit: Stephen Schmidt/Pascack Hills Trailblazer
NJ family drowned trying to save young girl — because none of them could swim
The New Jersey family members who drowned in their backyard pool were trying to rescue an 8-year-old from deep water — but none of them could swim, according to a new report.
The tragic ordeal began when the child — identified by neighbors as Sacchi Patel — jumped into a 6- or 7-foot-deep section of the above-ground pool at the family’s newly-purchased house in East Brunswick on Monday afternoon, NBC New York reported.
An aunt who was watching the girl called for help, and the child’s 62-year-old grandfather, Bharat Patel, jumped in to try to save her, the outlet reported, citing a source familiar with the circumstances.
But Bharat struggled in the water because he didn’t know how to swim, according to the report.
So the girl’s mother, 33-year old Nisha Patel, then jumped in. But Nisha also didn’t know how to swim and struggled to save both her daughter and father-in-law before drowning, according to the report.
The aunt who witnessed the ordeal was able to reach the young girl in the water, but not soon enough to save her life, according to NBC.
The three lived in the house on Clearview Road, which the family bought in April for $451,000, according to public records.
A neighbor who spoke with Bharat before the incident told NBC the family recently had the pool fixed up — and Monday may have been the first time they had used it.
On Tuesday, Mayor Brad Cohen told NJ.com that the “entire East Brunswick community is shocked and saddened.”
“Our condolences go out to the family and may they find strength from the community that shares in their grief,” he said.
Authorities had originally been investigating whether the trio had been electrocuted in the pool, but ruled that out Tuesday afternoon.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/06/24/nj-family-not-knowing-how-to-swim-drowned-trying-to-save-girl/
Photo Credit: Gregory P. Mango
CAUGHT ON CAM: Bay Area police say woman removed mask and coughed on baby in stroller
Police said Monday they’re looking for a woman who coughed on a baby at a Yogurtland.
San Jose police said the incident happened Friday evening and involved a 1-year-old child in a stroller and a woman in her 60s who was standing in line inside.
The woman who coughed on the child was upset another woman was not maintaining proper physical distancing, according to police. So she removed her mask, got close to the baby’s face and coughed two to three times, based on a preliminary investigation, police said.
People are asked to contact police, which can be done anonymously, if they have information.
Article via KCCI
Man dies after relatives unplug ventilator for air conditioner unit
The relatives of a suspected COVID-19 patient in India allegedly unplugged his ventilator to use an air conditioner at a sweltering hospital, killing him, according to reports.
The unidentified patient, a 40-year-old man at Maharao Bhimsingh Hospital in Kota in northern India, was admitted into an ICU unit on June 13 as doctors believed he had contracted the bug, the Indian Express reports.
Two days later, the man was transferred to an isolation ward as a safety precaution since another ICU patient had tested positive for coronavirus, the newspaper reports.
The man’s relatives then took an air conditioner to the hospital – as daytime temps reportedly topped out at 106 degrees — and allegedly unplugged the ventilator after not finding an open socket to cool down the room, according to the report.
Hospital staffers had deactivated air conditioners in the unit in an effort to curb the spread of COVID-19, Vice News reports.
The ventilator had a backup battery, but the man’s relatives didn’t tell doctors or nurses that they unplugged it, the medical superintendent at the government-run hospital told the outlet.
An investigation into the incident is now underway, Dr. Navin Saxena said.
“We have set up a committee with the deputy superintendent of the hospital, nursing superintendent, isolation ward staff and chief medical officer to file a report that details what happened,” Saxena told Vice News.
The ventilator’s battery reportedly ran out of power almost 30 minutes after being unplugged, sending the man’s family scurrying for help from staffers who gave him CPR but could not revive him.
The man’s cause of death will also be included in the hospital’s report. He tested negative for COVID-19 following his death, Saxena said.
The temperature in Kota on June 15 reached 106 degrees. No formal complaint had been filed with local police in connection with the incident, Vice News reports.
Photo Credit: nypost.com
Oregon county issues face mask order that exempts non-white people
Lincoln County, Oregon, has exempted non-white people from a new order requiring that face coverings be worn in public — to prevent racial profiling.
Health officials announced last week residents must wear face coverings in public settings where they may come within six feet of another individual who is not from the same household.
But people of color do not have to follow the new rule if they have “heightened concerns about racial profiling and harassment” over wearing the masks, officials said.
“No person shall intimidate or harass people who do not comply,” health officials said.
With mask requirements becoming more common, activists have raised concerns that the directives could put non-white people in danger.
“For many black people, deciding whether or not to wear a bandanna in public to protect themselves and others from contracting coronavirus is a lose-lose situation that can result in life-threatening consequences either way,” ReNika Moore, director of the ACLU’s Racial Justice Program, told CNN.
Trevon Logan, who is black, said orders to wear face coverings are “basically telling people to look dangerous given racial stereotypes that are out there.”
“This is in the larger context of black men fitting the description of a suspect who has a hood on, who has a face covering on,” Logan, an economics professor at Ohio State University, told the outlet.
“It looks like almost every criminal sketch of any garden-variety black suspect.”
via: https://nypost.com/2020/06/23/oregon-county-issues-face-mask-order-exempting-non-white-people/
Photo Credit: nypost.com
Ron Jeremy charged with multiple counts of rape, sexual assault
Porn star Ron Jeremy has been criminally charged in a series of sex attacks, which he allegedly committed on women he met in the Hollywood area over the past six years, the Los Angeles County district attorney announced Tuesday.
The 63-year-old smut film legend was scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday afternoon in Los Angeles County Superior Court on three counts each of forcible rape and forcible penetration by a foreign object, and one count each of forcible oral copulation and sexual battery, officials said.
The counts against Jeremy, whose real name is Ronald Jeremy Hyatt, include the alleged rape of a 30-year-old woman at a West Hollywood bar in July 2019, according to the Los Angeles DA’s Office.
Two years earlier, Jeremy allegedly sexually assaulted two women, ages 33 and 46, at the same bar, court papers charge.
In May 2014, he allegedly raped a 25-year-old woman at a home in West Hollywood, officials said.
Jeremy has been dogged by sexual misconduct allegations, with more than a dozen women having publicly accused him of sexual assault. The Los Angeles DA previously said the office was investigating the allegations.
In 2018, Kristin Brodie, then 22, sued Jeremy in Washington state for allegedly sexually assaulting her during an event at a Tacoma sex shop the previous year, People magazine reported.
Brodie, who was working at the event as a promotional model for a Seattle radio station, said in the lawsuit that Jeremy groped her breast and buttocks then “forcefully” digitally penetrated her, according to the magazine.
The young woman sued Jeremy after local authorities declined to file criminal charges against him for the alleged assaults, the report said.
At the time, Jeremy’s lawyer said his client denied the allegations.
Prosecutors are expected to recommend bail of $6.6 million. If convicted, Jeremy, who stands 5 feet 6 and whose net worth is reportedly about $6 million, faces a possible maximum sentence of 90 years to life in prison.
via: https://pagesix.com/2020/06/23/porn-star-ron-jeremy-charged-with-raping-three-women-in-la/?_ga=2.226783901.1412085215.1592869191-2078301105.1521480554
Photo Credit: Rachpoot/MEGA
Cornell football commit kicked off team after using N-word on Snapchat
A star running back from Morristown, N.J., has been booted from the Cornell football team after he was recorded using a racial slur, The Post confirmed.
Nate Panza, who was slated to attend Cornell in the fall after rushing for more than 1,200 yards and 17 touchdowns during his senior year at Morristown-Beard, was heard saying “f–k that n—-r” in a Snapchat video recorded early Sunday morning and subsequently shared to other social media outlets.
A shirtless Panza was off-screen when he was heard uttering the slur. He could then be seen on video asking his classmate behind the camera, Adam Giaquinto, not to post the video.
Giaquinto then used the N-word in reference to George Floyd, the black man killed by a white police officer in Minneapolis, which set off nationwide protests of racial injustice and police brutality.
Panza then tells Giaquinto, “you can’t say that.”
Panza deleted his social media accounts, but others shared the video.
“Cornell football was made aware of the video early Sunday afternoon,” Andy Noel, director of Athletics and Physical Education at Cornell University, said in a statement to The Post. “After viewing it, head football coach, David Archer, made the decision to rescind the individual’s offer to join the team in the fall. There is no room for this behavior in Cornell Athletics.”
The Cornell Daily Sun student newspaper was the first to report that Panza was removed from the football team.
“A video was taken of me using a word that is offensive and hurtful,” Panza wrote in a statement to the Daily Sun. “The word has a long history of cruelty for the black community and is simply wrong. I am heartbroken I have hurt people; those I know and those I do not. I take full responsibility for my actions… I do not believe that my language that night aligns with who I have tried to be as a person, the values I live by or the manner in which I have conducted myself as an athlete. My immediate reaction to the video was to reach out to my entire high school community to offer my sincerest apologies.”
The @blackatcornell twitter account, as well as a student organization named Cornell Students for Black Lives, helped bring the video to light and asked people to notify Cornell’s administration.
It is unclear at this time whether Panza’s admission status to the Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management will remain intact.
Giaquinto is headed to the University of Richmond, which tweeted that it would be investigating the video.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/06/23/nate-panza-cornell-football-commit-booted-after-using-n-word/
Photo Credit: twitter
Mannequin dressed in police uniform with pig mask found hanging from overpass in Florida
(WJXT/CNN/Meredith) — Investigators are looking for the person who hung a mannequin dressed like a police officer from an overpass in Jacksonville, Florida.
The sheriff said it’s disturbing, and the head of the City’s Fraternal order of police said it’s an act of hate that does not reflect the values of the community.
Witnesses who saw the dummy hanging by its neck also said it was disturbing.
Lamont Ross, a Jacksonville resident, said he when first saw the mannequin, he thought it was a real body and his “heart completely dropped.”
Ross captured video of the hanging mannequin, dressed in a police uniform with a pig’s head.
Ross’ wife Kiva Ross was with her husband when they saw the mannequin.
“I was in tears. I was like trembling. It was sad just to see something like that in person, it was just terrifying,” Kiva Ross said. “I was praying to God it wasn’t really a body, which it wasn’t, so that was a great thing. It was a big relief.”
Jacksonville Sheriff Mike Williams called the incident extremely disturbing and released the following statement:
“The incident that occurred this morning depicting the mock lynching of a mannequin dressed in what appeared to be the uniform of a law enforcement officer is extremely disturbing. Both the tactics and props used were a deliberate attempt to exasperate an anti-police sentiment and drive a divide in our community. This incident was carried out by people wanting to undermine our dedicated efforts to keep our city safe. Too many good citizens are working with us to keep our community safe through active partnerships, and frank conversations about the challenges we all face. This type of act will not be tolerated by our agency or our community, and we will work together to hold those responsible accountable.”
Police are still searching for the person who hung the dummy. Detectives said the mannequin will be processed for DNA.
Photo Credit: kmov.com/Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office