Showing posts with label Ray Nagin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ray Nagin. Show all posts

Saturday, November 24, 2018

Hurricane Katrina & TARP Are Going To SCOTUS

I was down in New Orleans with Mayor Mitch Landrieu who showed John Conyers, Jr. & me, all the wonderful downtown redevelopment.

We went to the Jazz Conference where I spoke to people from the 9th ward.

I was told military ops came in, set explosives and blew the levy so the 9th ward would flood and save the homes of the wealthy who lived up the hill.

Those who ran up the hill to safety were shot.

I always got a kick out of the masses dehumanizing the people of New Orlean,s through the propaganda campaigns, who ended up living in abject poverty after living a life in poverty, for not having enough money saved to leave town when they were warned.

The first of the month was a week away and it is sorta difficult to catch a bus to leave town in a national crises emergency situation, you know.

But that is okay, because New Orleans established a land bank.

It is called the New Orleans Redevelopment Authority and has federally funded U.S. Treasury programs like NSP2, through Public Private Partnerships, to sell its properties to only those who could afford to have not lived in the 9th ward like those who qualified for special funding because they migrated into the U.S.

Priorities, you know.

Statement of the Honorable John Conyers, Jr. for the Hearing on “New Orleans: How the Crescent City Became a Sanctuary City” Before the Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security


foster-care-katrinaMany of these families relocated to Detroit where the Detroit Land Bank Authority stole their homes a second time.

But hey, what do I know?

I know many foster kids just disappeared and no one to this day had done a thing about it.

I know many families had their children Legally Kidnapped when CPS placed them in foster care and shipped them off to other states because of Katrina, or rather hailing from "The Poors" (always said with clinched teeth).

I also know Elizabeth Warren allowed it all to happen on her watch because she sat on the TARP Congressional Oversight Committee.

Dirty Bitch.

Ray Nagin Sentenced 10 Years For Fraud, Detroit Mentioned





Members of the TARP Congressional Oversight Panel
Final Report: March 16, 2011

 On November 14, 2008, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi appointed Richard H. Neiman, Superintendent of Banks for the State of New York, Damon Silvers, Director of Policy and Special Counsel of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO), and Elizabeth Warren, Leo Gottlieb, Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, to the Panel. With the appointment on November 19, 2008, of Congressman Jeb Hensarling to the Panel by House Minority Leader John Boehner, the Panel had a quorum and met for the first time on November 26, 2008, electing Professor Warren as its chair. On December 16, 2008, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell named Senator John E. Sununu to the Panel. Effective August 10, 2009, Senator Sununu resigned from the Panel, and on August 20, 2009, Senator McConnell announced the appointment of Paul Atkins, former Commissioner of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, to fill the vacant seat. Effective December 9, 2009, Congressman Jeb Hensarling resigned from the Panel, and House Minority Leader John Boehner announced the appointment of J. Mark McWatters to fill the vacant seat. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell appointed Kenneth Troske, William B. Sturgill Professor of Economics at the University of Kentucky, to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Paul Atkins on May 21, 2010. Effective September 17, 2010, Elizabeth Warren resigned from the Panel, and on September 30, 2010, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced the appointment of Senator Ted Kaufman to fill the vacant seat. On October 4, 2010, the Panel elected Senator Kaufman as its chair.

It seems the TARP Congressional Oversight Panel did not do a very good job because we are going to SCOTUS.

NOTE TO SELF: START A PAGE WITH THE TSUNAMI OF SCOTUS CASES OF 2019

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Thursday, August 30, 2018

Ray Nagin Sentenced 10 Years For Fraud, Detroit Mentioned

Oh my, the prosecutors used Detroit as a sentencing gage.

I wonder how Mike Duggan is doing right now.

Ex-New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin sentenced to 10 years


NEW ORLEANS — Former mayor Ray Nagin, the businessman-turned-politician who became the worldwide face of the city after Hurricane Katrina, was sentenced to 10 years in prison Wednesday.

Nagin, 58, was ordered to report to federal prison Sept. 8 and to pay restitution of $82,000. He was found guilty Feb. 12 of fraud, bribery and related charges involving crimes that took place before and after Katrina devastated the city in August 2005.

Prosecutors immediately objected to the sentence, which falls well below typical guidelines that called for 15-20 years.

"What Ray Nagin did was sell his office over and over and over again," Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Coman said outside the courthouse. "The damage that Ray Nagin inflicted upon this community ... is incalculable. We as a community need not and should not accept public corruption."

Coman said a decision on whether to appeal will be made by U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli.
Judge Ginger Berrigan determined that Nagin did not have a leadership role in the criminal conspiracy, saying all defendants are "equally culpable."

"Mr. Nagin's crimes were motivated in part by a deeply misguided desire to provide for those closest to him," she said.

Before announcing the sentence, Berrigan indicated she would "downwardly depart from guidelines" and that "sentencing imposed should reflect Nagin's ability to harm the public again."

Nagin said he would "trust in God that this would all work out."

A jury convicted Nagin of accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes — money, free vacation trips and truckloads of free granite for his family business — from businessmen who wanted work from the city or Nagin's support for various hurricane recovery projects.

Prosecutors asked the court to send Nagin to prison for a long time. They argued that he was found guilty of 20 of 21 counts in the indictment, and that he participated in and orchestrated a years-long conspiracy to enrich himself and his family.

The government also argued that Nagin spent years covering up his crimes and that his testimony during the two-week trial showed an unwillingness to accept responsibility for his actions.

Coman compared Nagin's crimes with those of other public officials who drew stiff sentences, including former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (28 years), former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich (14 years) and former Birmingham, Ala., mayor Larry Langford (15 years).

"Nagin's widespread and corrosive breach of the public trust — lasting through much of his tenure in office — equals even the worst of these state and local corruption cases," Coman wrote.

Nagin's defense attorney, Robert Jenkins, petitioned the court for a lighter sentence. He pointed out that his client is a first-time offender with no criminal record.

Jenkins also argued that the allegations and evidence presented during the trial showed behavior inconsistent with his otherwise outstanding life as a businessman, family member and citizen.

"Mr. Nagin has been a devoted father, husband and supportive child to his parents, and greatly cares for the well-being of his family, and is their caretaker," Jenkins wrote.

According to Jenkins, a 20-year sentence would amount to a "virtual life sentence."

Jenkins noted that former governor Edwin Edwards received a 10-year sentence in a public corruption scheme that netted up to $5 million in ill-gotten gain.

The court previously calculated Nagin's take at more than $500,000.

The court received several letters of support for Nagin, including from members of his family. His wife, Seletha, asked that he remain out of jail until allegations of prosecutorial misconduct could be fully investigated.

"I am asking that you delay these sentencing proceedings until we are allowed to see all the reports that have thus far only been summarized but clearly show a pattern of prosecutorial misconduct," Seletha Nagin wrote.

Her letter detailed the family's financial ruin and personal anguish.

"We are mentally and financially drained," she wrote in the four-page letter dated July 1. "We have exhausted our savings, borrowed from family, gone on public assistance (for the first time ever) and even had to file bankruptcy to avoid being homeless. We have even sold much of our furniture and all of our jewelry with the exception of our wedding rings."

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