After Ahmaud Arbery’s killing, Georgia Governor signs hate crimes legislation

Legal Black Gavel

source: NPR News
published: 26 June 2020

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp on Friday signed a hate crimes bill into law. The killing of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man shot dead while jogging in February, drew nationwide attention and energized efforts to pass this law.

Ahead of the signing on Friday, Kemp called House Bill 426 a “silver lining” amid difficult and stormy times.

“There are plenty of disagreements and division, but today we stand together as Republicans and Democrats, Black and white, male and female … to affirm a simple but powerful motto, Georgia is a state too great to hate,” Kemp said.

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Kingsley Burrell custody death: Police probe ‘secret’ Facebook site

Kingsley Burrell Campaignsource: Birmingham Mail
published: 6 January 2019

Police are investigating a secret Facebook site which has called on police officers to stage a counter protest to a demonstration that was planned to demand justice for Kingsley Burrell, who died in custody.

The call was made on Facebook page “Support for PC Adey” – which describes itself as a “secret group with 1.2k members” – and contains messages from supporters, some of whom appear to be serving officers.

That is a reference to PC Paul Adey, sacked by West Midlands Police last month for breaching standards over the restraint used on Mr Burrell after he was arrested and sectioned in 2011.

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The Guardian view on police and child spies: ends don’t always justify the means

Undercover Spy Hidingsource: The Guardian
published: 20 July 2018

Downing Street tells us that child spies are used very rarely by British police and intelligence agencies, and only when it is judged really vital. How reassuring. We would not know they were being used at all were it not for government plans to relax the controls on their use.

The House of Lords committee on secondary legislation has revealed that children are being used in covert operations against terrorists, gangs and drug dealers, and child sexual exploitation (and in doing so, incidentally, demonstrated parliament at its best and most useful, in a week where it has often looked at its worst).

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