Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 2:06 p.m. No.15814741   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>4857 >>4899 >>5048 >>5058 >>5064 >>5117 >>5311 >>5408 >>5458

Biden Economic Advisor Brian Deese: The Only Viable Path to Energy Independence is to Reduce Fossil Fuel Use to “Zero”

 

Joe Biden’s National Economic Council Director Brian Deese on Tuesday said only way through this oil crisis created by Biden is to reduce our fossil fuel use to zero.

 

Joe Biden on Tuesday announced the US will ban Russian oil imports.

 

Biden blamed Vladimir Putin for soaring gas prices and used this crisis as an opportunity to sell his Marxist green agenda.

 

Russia’s war on Ukraine “should motivate us to accelerate a transition to clean energy,” said Biden

 

It’s all hands on deck now to turn the US into a 3rd world hell hole all while blaming Vladimir Putin.

 

“The only viable path to energy independence for the American economy is to reduce the energy intensity of our economy overall and ultimately to reduce it to zero and get us in a position to where we are no longer reliant on fossil fuels,” Deese said.

 

God help us.

 

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/03/biden-economic-advisor-brian-deese-viable-path-energy-independence-reduce-fossil-fuel-use-zero-video/

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 2:07 p.m. No.15814748   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5064 >>5117 >>5311 >>5357 >>5408

Chinese Hackers Penetrated at Least 6 US State Governments, Cybersecurity Firm Says

 

A hacker group backed by the Chinese regime has exploited vulnerabilities in the online systems of at least six U.S. state governments in order to compromise and gain access to those networks, cybersecurity firm Mandiant said March 8.

 

Mandiant’s lengthy report presents the findings of an investigation that began in the spring of 2021, in response to a breach by a hacker group known as “APT41” of an unnamed state government’s system, and continued through last month.

 

“Our investigation into APT41 activity between May 2021 and February 2022 uncovered evidence of a deliberate campaign targeting U.S. state governments. During this timeframe, APT41 successfully compromised at least six U.S. state government networks through the exploitation of vulnerable Internet facing web applications, often written in ASP.NET,” the report stated.

 

ASP.NET, developed by Microsoft, is an open-source web framework enabling users to construct internet apps and services on the .NET platform. The weaknesses and vulnerabilities of some versions of ASP.NET have been public knowledge for years. The website CVE Details has even published lists of various design flaws, such as the inability to handle an unencrypted view state or the vulnerability to a denial of service transmitted via a SOAP message, that might allow hackers and other bad actors to attack and disrupt apps and services utilizing ASP.NET.

 

Despite these vulnerabilities, some states in the U.S. continue to utilize the platform for web-facing systems. The Mandiant report did not name the six states known to have suffered APT41 breaches during the period under review.

 

The motive for the attacks is financial, and specifically the hackers’ personal gain, according to Mandiant.

 

Cyberespionage on the part of APT41 are not a new phenomenon, the report stated, referencing the organization’s long record of mass scanning and exploitation of vulnerabilities. APT 41 is known to have targeted computer and internet systems and networks in industries and sectors as diverse as banking, defense, education, the legal industry, oil and gas, real estate, telecommunications, and travel.

 

In 2020, five Chinese nationals from the hacker group were indicted in the United States on charges relating to sprawling hacking campaigns to steal trade secrets and sensitive information from more than 100 companies and entities worldwide.

 

What sets apart the breaches detailed in the new report is their deliberate targeting of U.S. state governments.

 

Mandiant’s report detailed how a favorite target of the Chinese hackers has been the USAHerds app, which 18 states utilize to keep track of the health of animals and coordinate responses to any outbreaks. Three investigations carried out in 2021 led to findings that APT41 had seized upon a zero-day vulnerability in the USAHerds app to breach its security.

 

Mandiant also relays the surprising finding that, even after a highly similar vulnerability had come to light in Microsoft Exchange Server, which made use of a decriptionKey and static validationKey, USAHerds installations relied on the same machineKey values.

 

The new report comes amid warnings that the Chinese regime is on track to becoming a global cyber superpower. It is also the latest in a string of breaches allegedly attributed to Chinese state-sponsored hackers.

 

Chinese hackers are widely suspected of having orchestrated the long-running cyberattack announced last month which targeted News Corp., publisher of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post.

 

Last year, the United States formally attributed the massive breach of Microsoft’s email server to hackers affiliated with the regime’s top intelligence agency, the Ministry of State Security. The hack compromised tens of thousands of systems globally.

 

https://www.ntd.com/chinese-hackers-penetrated-at-least-6-us-state-governments-cybersecurity-firm-says_749549.html

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 2:09 p.m. No.15814763   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5063 >>5117 >>5311 >>5408

Accused Sarah Lawrence sex cult leader Lawrence Ray to face trial

 

The trial of Lawrence Ray, the accused sex cult leader charged with preying on his daughter’s classmates at Sarah Lawrence College and pimping out one of the victims, gets underway in Manhattan Tuesday.

 

Jury selection in the case is scheduled to begin Tuesday and prosecutors and Ray’s defense team are expected to deliver opening arguments Wednesday, a spokesperson for the US Attorney’s Office in Manhattan said.

 

Ray, a 62-year-old former Wall Street trader and onetime friend of ex-NYPD Commissioner Bernie Kerik, landed on the feds’ radar after a lengthy 2019 New York Magazine story that revealed his alleged abuse and manipulation of a group of Sarah Lawrence students.

 

The accused sicko moved into his daughter’s dorm room on the leafy Yonkers campus in 2010, days after being sprung from prison after serving time for a securities fraud conviction.

 

He soon began to assert control over a number of the students, luring them under his thumb with fantastical tales about his life and providing “therapy” sessions to manipulate them, according to the indictment against him and the New York Magazine story.

 

Soon after, he convinced five of the students to move in with him in a one-bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side, where his abuse of the students allegedly turned physical.

 

For nearly the next 10 years, Ray extorted money out of the students after he accused them of poisoning him and damaging things that he owned.

 

To pull off the scheme, Ray and his co-conspirator, former Sarah Lawrence student Isabella Pollok, video recorded the students making false confessions in which they claimed to have poisoned the accused madman, according to prosecutors.

 

https://nypost.com/2022/03/08/accused-sarah-lawrence-sex-cult-leader-lawrence-ray-to-face-trial/

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 2:12 p.m. No.15814786   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5063 >>5117 >>5311 >>5408

U.S. Election Integrity Lawyers Are Being Targeted By a Group Whose Leader Accepted a Chinese Communist Propaganda Junket.

 

Longtime Clinton ally and George Soros-funded Media Matters for America founder David Brock is also advising the 65 Project.

 

Former Senator Tom Daschle – a board member of a new dark money, left-wing group targeting conservative election integrity lawyers – took a trip to China sponsored by a key communist influence group flagged by the U.S. government for its efforts to infiltrate American politics.

 

The new group – 65 Project – seeks to deter right-wing lawyers from fighting on behalf of election integrity by attempting to disbar and intimidate lawyers who fought for the issue during the 2020 election. In addition to the former Democratic Senate Majority Leader from South Dakota, longtime Clinton ally and George Soros-funded Media Matters for America founder David Brock is also advising the 65 Project.

 

The National Pulse can reveal that Daschle took a trip to China sponsored by the China-United States Exchange Foundation (CUSEF), a state-sponsored propaganda effort that seeks to “influence foreign governments and other actors to take actions or adopt positions supportive of Beijing’s preferred policies,” according to the U.S. government.

 

CUSEF functions as part China’s “United Front,” which the federal government identifies as Beijing’s covert operation “to co-opt and neutralize sources of potential opposition to the policies and authority of its ruling Chinese Communist Party.” The U.S. State Department also compares the United Front to the Chinese regime’s “magic weapon” to advance its preferred policies by infiltrating American politics, media, and academia.

 

Despite these ties, Daschle joined a China-bound delegation comprised of scholars from the Washington, D.C.-based Center for American Progress (CAP) sponsored by CUSEF.

 

CAP, a think tank heavily influential under President Barack Obama, noted it was “sending a distinguished group of experts and officials to Beijing on a fact-finding mission to meet with ministers and high-level officials from the Chinese government”:

 

The unearthed linked between the 65 Project Advisory Board member and the Chinese Communist Party, which sought a victory for Joe Biden in 2020, raises questions about the group’s motivations to fight for election integrity.

 

https://thenationalpulse.com/2022/03/08/group-targeting-election-integrity-led-by-ccp-former-senator/

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 2:18 p.m. No.15814836   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>4876 >>5064 >>5117 >>5311 >>5408

U.S. government borrowed $475 billion so far in 2022

 

The national debt has hit a record $30.2 trillion with the U.S. borrowing about $3 billion per day, according to the CRFB

 

https://justthenews.com/government/federal-agencies/us-government-borrowed-475-billion-so-far-2022

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 2:54 p.m. No.15815128   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5166 >>5311 >>5408

Report: Biden’s Iran Deal Gives Regime Access to $90 Billion, $7 Billion for Ransom, Sanctions Relief to Terrorists

 

President Joe Biden’s impending agreement to restore the Iran nuclear deal offers the regime access to $90 billion in foreign currency reserves and sanctions relief to some of the world’s worst terrorists, according to a former State Department official.

 

Gabriel Noronha, writing in Tablet magazine, says the deal does not restore President Barack Obama’s old Iran deal, a weak agreement from which President Donald Trump withdrew, but goes much further in giving Iran money and sanctions relief.

 

“Multiple career officials view these capitulations as so detrimental to U.S. national security that they contacted me requesting that I rapidly share details of these concessions with Congress and the public in an effort to stop them,” Noronha writes.

 

He describes some of the concessions that Biden’s negotiator in Vienna, Rob Malley, has reportedly made:

 

The list of concessions that follows is long, detailed, disturbing, but also somewhat technical. But this much is clear to me: The deal being negotiated in Vienna is dangerous to U.S. national security, to the stability of the Middle East, and to the Iranian people who suffer most under that brutal regime. The lack of evidence to justify a removal of U.S. sanctions is illegal, and the deal that will be foisted upon the world without the support of Congress will be illegitimate. This deal will not serve U.S. interests in either the short or long term.

 

With Robert Malley in the lead, the United States has promised to lift sanctions on some of the regime’s worst terrorists and torturers, on leading officials who have developed Iran’s WMD infrastructure, and has agreed to lift sanctions on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) itself. In exchange, Iran will receive fewer limitations than those imposed under the JCPOA, and the restrictions on its nuclear program will expire six years sooner than under the terms of the old deal. And that’s just the beginning.

 

 

Iran is set to get access to a massive windfall of cash: My latest estimate (derived from figures declassified during my tenure at the State Department) is $90 billion in access to foreign exchange reserves, and then a further $50-$55 billion in extra revenue each year from higher oil and petrochemical exports, with no restrictions on how or where the money can be spent.

 

Personally, the most troubling transfer of funds will be the $7 billion ransom payment the United States is preparing to pay for the release of four Americans from an Iranian jail. Now, let me be clear: I would be extremely glad to bring these Americans back home safely as quickly as possible. They are innocent victims who, along with their families, have suffered unjustly for far too long. But make no mistake: Biden’s payment will only supercharge Iran’s hostage-taking industry.

 

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/03/08/report-bidens-iran-deal-gives-regime-access-to-90-billion-7-billion-for-ransom-sanctions-relief-to-terrorists/

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 2:58 p.m. No.15815161   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5217 >>5269 >>5353 >>5399 >>5408

J&J helped fund 1971 study where ASBESTOS was injected into mostly black inmates paid up to $300 to determine if deadly substance was safe to use in talcum powder

 

Controversial studies performed at a Philadelphia prison that left participants maimed and injured have been tied to Johnson & Johnson

The company funded some of Dr Albert Kingman's, a disgraced dermatologist, studies ay Holmesburg prison where he injected prisoners with asbestos

Studies were previously known about, but tied only to the U.S. government and Dow chemical

Participants were paid anywhere from $10 to $300 to take part in dangerous experiments

J&J already owes $3.5 billion in settlements for issues regarding its baby powder products causing cancer and filed for bankruptcy this year

 

Pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson helped fund a 1960s prison experiment when a group of majority-black Pennsylvania prisoners were injected with asbestos to determine whether the substance was safe to use in talcum powder.

 

Documents confirming the company's involvement were obtained by Bloomberg, tying the New Jersey-based company to controversial experiments led by Dr Albert Kligman, a University of Pennsylvania dermatologist whose human experiments have widely condemned as brutal and unethical. He died in 2010 aged 93.

 

Inmates at Holmesburg Prison in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, were offered $10 to $300 - equivalent to between $100 to $2,500 in today's money when adjusted for inflation - to take part in the study - though they were likely unaware of the significant risk they were undertaking.

 

Participants were injected with asbestos and talc - a powder that forms the base of J&J's iconic baby powder product. Asbestos is an extremely dangerous chemical that is tied to lung cancers, among other conditions.

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-10590781/Pharma-giant-J-J-accused-testing-cancer-causing-asbestos-imprisoned-black-men.html

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3 p.m. No.15815180   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5273 >>5311 >>5408

Prime Minister to declare national emergency, as 40,000 evacuated in Sydney

 

Amid ongoing criticism that the government has been too slow to act, Scott Morrison is set to declare a national emergency in relation to the NSW floods.

 

Prime Minister Scott Morrison will officially declare a national emergency in relation to the floods today during a visit to Lismore amid ongoing criticism that the SES has been too slow to ask for help from Defence.

 

The declaration is designed to streamline the deployment of Australian Defence Force support and other resources to communities battling rising flood waters and the clean up.

 

Questions have been raised in recent days over why NSW has not yet declared a state of emergency.

 

Under the new legislation which was passed after the black summer bushfires, the states recommend the declaration of a national emergency to the Prime Minister and the Commonwealth.

 

But that hasn’t occurred in this instance. The Prime Minister has the power to declare a national emergency without a request from NSW and that is what has occurred in this instance.

 

The declaration of a national emergency is largely administrative, it allows the Commonwealth to move faster on deployments and logistical matters with less red tape.

 

Underlining that red tape, the head of ADF Recovery Mission in Lismore, Brigadier Robert Lording revealed this morning they were still waiting to be asked to help people in Sydney after flooding overnight.

 

There are around 250 ADF troops on standby and ready to help.

 

“I know it’s been pretty severe. We haven’t received a direct request from NSW SES to step those people out the door yet but they are ready to go when we get that call,’’ he told 2GB radio.

 

“We’ve had a request to have them on standby. They are there ready to go out the door.

 

“SES have the lead. They come to us and ask for an assistance process and we ready those troops.”

 

https://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/nsw-weather-50000-evacuated-as-new-threat-hits-sydney/news-story/a2b124a73c46f7c6cba301e7a1cf1538

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3:15 p.m. No.15815290   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5297 >>5325 >>5396

Aide to Democrat Dianne Feinstein fired after saying senator 'cares more about her dog than black people.' So he tapes himself smoking pot in her Capitol Hill office.

 

The short version of the story Jamarcus Purley told to Latino Rebels is that after working as an aide in California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein's office on Capitol Hill for five years — and determining that she and the rest of the staff weren't doing enough for black people — he let them know about it no uncertain terms.

 

On Jan. 24, Purley told the staff during a meeting — among other things — that Feinstein “cares more about her dog than black people," the outlet reported.

What happened next?

 

Purley noted to the outlet that a number of fellow staffers offered him quiet support for his words, but on Feb. 8, Feinstein fired him for performance issues.

 

With that, Purley posted his termination letter to Instagram and paid to promote it, the outlet said, adding that Instagram pulled the promotion after it reached 7,000 users since it was about "social issues, elections, or politics."

 

Then he made one last stand.

 

Purley told the outlet he "ate some shrooms" then hatched a plan: He told Latino Rebels he ironed his suit and "walked to the Hill. I was standing in front of the Capitol. My heart is racing. I had a joint in my pocket. I’m talking to cops. It made no sense to anyone but me, on shrooms. I put on some trap music. I thought of my family. I looked at my sister — she’s my screensaver on my phone. She puts up with so much st as a black woman. I knew no one would ever know the st Feinstein does to black people if I didn’t make it impossible to ignore.”

 

And then, after making it past security and into the Capitol complex, Purley did his best to make sure folks couldn't look away.

 

“I get to the Senate, the building where I worked for five years. I still had the keys to my office," he told the outlet. "I get in there. I get into the office, and I can’t breathe. I’m on shrooms in an office where white people touch my hair and do racist s**t."

 

Purley added that he walked into Feinstein's office, which "triggered a screaming white noise sound. I had only been in her actual office like twice in five years, and I couldn’t figure out how to turn off the white noise sound. It was giving me so much anxiety because it sounded like when the cops show up. So then I was like, f*** it. I just gotta do something for 10 minutes, and I can finally leave. So I’d brought my Bose speaker. I used her bathroom, then I go sit at her desk. I turn on my speaker and start the music. I start smoking that joint, an afghani, a heavy indica, because I knew I needed to be calm. I thought about how special my mom and black women would feel seeing me dance to [DeBarge’s 1982 hit “I Like It"] in particular, in a space where they aren’t welcome at all. Then I started the video.”

 

https://www.theblaze.com/news/feinstein-aide-fired-smokes-pot-in-capitol-hill-office

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3:21 p.m. No.15815321   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>5379 >>5387

Don’t believe the media’s fake post-mortem, the “pandemic” was NOT a mistake

 

The story will be that Covid hysteria was the result of “flawed data” or “panic”…it was neither.

 

As the mainstream media power down the pandemic narrative and engage war mode, there’s still time for one last autopsy – the media’s post mortem of the pandemic itself.

 

And, in a beautifully fitting piece of poetic irony, Covid’s autopsy will be inaccurate and fitted to a foregone conclusion.

 

This week has seen the UK’s SAGE group discontinuing their regular monthly meetings, whilst admitting their predictions were “at variance with reality”.

 

The media are discussing the “bad data” which was used to build the Imperial College models that called for a lockdown.

 

A Telegraph article quotes Prof Mark Woolhouse, who claims in his recent book that “lockdowns had surprisingly little effect”, and that “Anyone who supported lockdown on the basis of the half-million figure was misled” but still lays the blame at the feet of incompetence, never malice.

 

This is all still part of the story. The post-event navel-gazing. We’ve seen it before.

 

They said 9/11 was the result of a “failure of imagination”.

 

The Iraq War was supposedly the result of “bad intelligence”.

 

Both outright, provable lies. A protective rear-guard for the establishment narrative.

 

The agonising over “mistakes” and promising to “do better next time” are all still part of the theatre, buttressing the fake story against a more brutal reality – “Covid”, as it was sold to us, never really existed.

 

The pandemic was not organic. Lockdowns were not the result of panic.

 

We have all read the facts. The data was fudged, the tests were useless, the statistics artificially inflated, and many deaths were intentionally caused through institutionalized medical negligence. Hospitals received funding bonuses as payoffs.

 

None of that had anything to do with bad data, or pessimistic models. They did it all on purpose, all of it.

 

Every life lost, every business destroyed, every penny wasted, every child traumatised. Every moment of anxiety and fear – every single one – entirely intentional.

 

They ruined lives and countries and the global economy as a deliberate policy on the back of a vast web of lies, and last act of the deception will be to claim it was a “mistake”.

 

Meanwhile, the same agenda that masked itself behind this “mistake” – mass poverty, food and energy shortages, censorship and social control – is creeping ever closer in a new guise: War.

 

It’s all the same, no matter what they’re saying, no matter what they’re pretending to care about, what they actually want never changes.

 

“Covid” cost every single one of us something – safety, money, trust, health, friends, family – but it gave us something too – A peek behind the curtain. In their ambition, the establishment exposed their true face.

 

They think if they stop talking about the “great reset”, the “new normal” or “building back better” for a few months we’ll forget. But we won’t.

 

They told us, clearly, who they were and what they intended, and now they’re going to pretend they didn’t mean it.

 

Don’t believe it. Not for a second.

 

https://off-guardian.org/2022/03/07/dont-believe-the-medias-fake-post-mortem-the-pandemic-was-not-a-mistake/

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3:26 p.m. No.15815395   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Former Illinois State Senator Pleads Guilty to Fraudulently Receiving Salary and Benefits From Labor Union

 

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndil/pr/former-illinois-state-senator-pleads-guilty-fraudulently-receiving-salary-and-benefits

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3:28 p.m. No.15815397   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Former Illinois State Senator Pleads Guilty to Fraudulently Receiving Salary and Benefits From Labor Union

 

CHICAGO — Former Illinois State Sen. THOMAS E. CULLERTON pleaded guilty today to a federal embezzlement charge and admitted fraudulently receiving salary and benefits from a labor union for which he did little to no work.

 

The guilty plea was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; Emmerson Buie, Jr., Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago Field Office of the FBI; and Irene Lindow, Special Agent-in-Charge of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General in Chicago. The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Amarjeet S. Bhachu and Erika Csicsila.

 

Cullerton, 52, of Villa Park, Ill., was hired in 2013 by Teamsters Joint Council 25 as a purported union organizer and remained on the payroll until February 2016. In addition to receiving a salary, monthly car and telephone allowances, and bonuses, Teamsters Joint Council 25 also funded Cullerton’s participation in Teamsters Local Union 734’s health and pension funds, which enabled Cullerton to receive health and welfare benefits.

 

Cullerton admitted in a plea agreement that he did little to no work as an organizer for the three years he was on the union payroll. When his supervisors requested that he perform his job duties, Cullerton routinely ignored them, the plea agreement states. For the last year he remained on the payroll, Cullerton admitted that he performed no work at all of value for Teamsters Joint Council 25. From March 2013 to February 2016, Cullerton fraudulently obtained from Joint Council 25 and its members approximately $169,488 in salary, bonuses, and other benefits, approximately $57,662 in health and pension contributions, and approximately $21,678 in reimbursed medical claims. Cullerton admitted that he used the money to pay personal expenses, such as his mortgage, utilities, and groceries.

 

The embezzlement charge is punishable by up to five years in federal prison. U.S. District Judge Robert W. Gettleman set sentencing for June 21, 2022, at 10:30 a.m.

 

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndil/pr/former-illinois-state-senator-pleads-guilty-fraudulently-receiving-salary-and-benefits

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3:28 p.m. No.15815403   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Santa Paula Doctor and Lancaster Patient Recruiter Arrested in Hospice Fraud Scheme that Received Over $30 Million from Medicare

 

LOS ANGELES – Authorities today arrested a physician and a marketer on federal charges stemming from a scheme that bilked Medicare out of more than $30 million for medically unnecessary hospice services provided to patients who were obtained through illegal kickbacks.

 

Dr. Victor Contreras, 66, of Santa Paula, and Callie Jean Black, 63, of Lancaster, are scheduled to be arraigned this afternoon in United States District Court.

 

A 14-count indictment unsealed today also names the former Pasadena resident who controlled the hospices, Juanita Antenor, 59, who remains at large and is believed to be in the Philippines.

 

According to court documents, Antenor owned a Pasadena hospice company called Arcadia Hospice Provider, Inc., and she controlled a second, Saint Mariam Hospice, Inc., that billed Medicare and Medi-Cal for hospice services for patients who were not terminally ill. In some case, the companies submitted bills for services that were never provided.

 

Contreras, who was on probation imposed by the California Medical Board while he was part of the scheme, provided fraudulent certifications for some of these patients, including patients he claimed to have examined, but never actually saw, according to the indictment.

 

Antenor allegedly paid marketers, including Black, illegal kickbacks for the patients referred to Arcadia and Saint Mariam.

 

From approximately September 2014 until April 2019, Arcadia submitted to Medicare nearly $23 million in claims for hospice services provided to beneficiaries and was paid approximately $18,853,757 for those claims, according to the indictment. Between February 2015 and April 2019, St. Mariam submitted to Medicare approximately $13,742,116 in claims for hospice services and was paid approximately $11,395,849 for those claims. Contreras is linked to about $5.1 million of the total claims paid by Medicare.

 

Additionally, Arcadia and St. Mariam submitted more than $5.5 million in claims to Medi-Cal, which paid the companies a total of just over $1.35 million.

 

Antenor and Contreras are charged in the indictment with health care fraud – six counts name Antenor, and Contreras is charged with five counts. Additionally, Antenor is charged with four counts of paying illegal kickbacks for health care referrals, and Black is charged with four counts of receiving illegal kickbacks.

 

An indictment contains allegations that a defendant has committed a crime. Every defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proved guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

 

If convicted of the charges in the indictment, Contreras would face a statutory maximum sentence of 50 years in prison, while Black would face up to 40 years. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

 

The United States Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Inspector General; the FBI; and California Department of Justice investigated this matter.

 

Assistant United States Attorney Kristen A. Williams of the Major Frauds Section is prosecuting this case.

 

https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-paula-doctor-and-lancaster-patient-recruiter-arrested-hospice-fraud-scheme

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3:29 p.m. No.15815411   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Two Former Senior Venezuelan Prosecutors Charged for Receiving Over $1 Million in Bribes

 

Miami, Florida – Two former senior Venezuelan prosecutors have been charged with money laundering for their receipt of bribes in exchange for agreeing not to pursue criminal charges against certain individuals in Venezuela.

 

According to the indictment, Daniel D’Andrea Golindano (D’Andrea), 43, and Luis Javier Sanchez Rangel (Sanchez), 35, both of Venezuela, are each charged with one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and two counts of engaging in monetary transactions in criminally derived property.

 

The indictment alleges that, in or around 2017, D’Andrea and Sanchez, in their official roles as prosecutors within the Venezuelan Attorney General’s Office, were investigating an individual, identified as Contractor 1 in the indictment, for alleged corruption relating to contracts obtained with subsidiaries of Venezuela’s state-owned oil company (PDVSA). D’Andrea and Sanchez discussed and agreed to receive bribes of more than $1 million in exchange for not pursuing criminal charges against Contractor 1 and others.

 

According to the indictment, D’Andrea caused a co-conspirator to create false invoices seeking payment, purportedly for medical diagnostic equipment, from Contractor 1. In or around 2017, Contractor 1 caused the payment of over $1 million dollars to an account in the Southern District of Florida for the benefit of D’Andrea and Sanchez. As a result of this payment, D’Andrea and Sanchez caused the Venezuelan Attorney General’s Office not to seek criminal charges against Contractor 1 and others. D’Andrea and Sanchez used the proceeds from these bribes for their personal benefit.

 

If convicted, the defendants face up to 20 years in prison for conspiracy to commit money laundering and up to 10 years in prison for each count of engaging in transactions in criminally derived property. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. The defendants are in Venezuela and remain at large.

 

U.S. Attorney Juan Antonio Gonzalez for the Southern District of Florida, Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Polite Jr. of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, and Special Agent in Charge Anthony Salisbury of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Miami office made the announcement.

 

Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael N. Berger of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida and Trial Attorney Alexander Kramer of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section are prosecuting the case.

 

An indictment is merely an allegation, and all defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

 

Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at www.flsd.uscourts.gov or at http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov.

 

https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdfl/pr/two-former-senior-venezuelan-prosecutors-charged-receiving-over-1-million-bribes

Anonymous ID: 014624 March 8, 2022, 3:33 p.m. No.15815445   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Dual U.S.-Russian National Charged with Acting Illegally as a Russian Agent in United States

 

Defendant Allegedly Willfully Evaded FARA Registration for Nearly a Decade, Working to Advance Interests of Russian Government While Receiving Tasking and Funding from High-Level Russian Officials

 

WASHINGTON – A federal court in New York unsealed a complaint today charging a dual Russian and U.S. citizen with acting and conspiring to act in the United States illegally as an agent of the Russian government, willfully failing to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), as well as conspiring to commit visa fraud and making false statements to the FBI.

 

According to court documents, Elena Branson, 61, beginning in at least 2011, worked on behalf of the Russian government and Russian officials to advance Russian interests in the United States, including by coordinating meetings for Russian officials to lobby U.S. political officials and businesspersons, and by operating organizations in the United States for the purpose of publicly promoting Russian government policies. Branson never notified the Attorney General as she was required to, including by registering under FARA.

 

“As alleged, Branson engaged in a wide-ranging influence and lobbying scheme with funding and direction from the Russian government – all while deliberately leaving the American people in the dark,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “The department will continue to expose these serious crimes and shine a light on foreign malign influence.”

 

“As alleged, Elena Branson, a dual U.S. - Russian national, actively subverted foreign agent registration laws in the United States in order to promote Russian policies and ideology,” said U.S. Attorney Damian Williams for the Southern District of New York. “The Russian government at its highest levels, up to and including President Vladimir Putin, have made known that aggressive propaganda and recruitment of the Russian diaspora around the world is a Russian priority. In connection with this pursuit, Branson is alleged to have corresponded with Putin himself and met with a high-ranking Russia minister before founding a Russian propaganda center here in New York City, the Russian Center New York. Branson’s promotional outreach, including an ‘I Love Russia’ campaign aimed at American youths, exemplifies her attempts to act at the behest of the Russian government to illegally promote its interests in the United States. All the while, Branson knew she was supposed to register as an agent of the Russian government but chose not to do so and, instead, instructed others regarding how to illegally avoid the same. Particularly given current global events, the need to detect and hinder attempts at foreign influence is of critical importance, and the Southern District of New York is proud to do its part in the fight against tyranny.”

 

“The evidence gathered in the Branson case shows she is a serial offender in violating the Foreign Agents Registration Action in order to promote Russian interests,” said Assistant Director Alan E. Kohler Jr. of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division. “While living in the United States for nearly a decade, she allegedly took money and direction from Russian government officials – including some at the Russian Embassy in Washington, D.C. – as she arranged meetings for Russian officials to lobby U.S. officials. The FBI and our partners will continue to investigate and stop individuals who hide their work for foreign governments, like the one in Moscow.”

 

According to court documents, the Russian government has sought to spread Russian propaganda and to use Russian citizens in the United States and elsewhere to make connections with U.S. community leaders, politicians and businesspersons, in order to advance Russian government objectives. Russian leaders, including President Vladimir Putin, have made public statements acknowledging this foreign policy strategy of the Russian government.

 

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/dual-us-russian-national-charged-acting-illegally-russian-agent-united-states