Former Executive Director of Nonprofit Sentenced for Diverting Charity Funds To U.S. State Senator

A former executive director of South Arkansas Youth Services (SAYS), an Arkansas-based nonprofit, was sentenced today to 30 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release for conspiring to unlawfully divert over $380,000 from the charity to an unnamed Arkansas state senator and the lobbying firm of a convicted lobbyist.

Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and Acting U.S. Attorney David Clay Fowlkes for the Western District of Arkansas made the announcement.

U.S. District Judge Susan O. Hickey sentenced Jerry Walsh, 72, of Magnolia, Arkansas, who previously pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to misapply the nonprofit’s funds without authority from the board of directors. Judge Hickey also ordered Walsh to pay $515,631.56 in restitution.

As part of his plea, Walsh admitted that beginning in 2013, while serving as executive director for SAYS, he agreed to divert SAYS funds to convicted lobbyist Milton “Rusty” Cranford and an unnamed Arkansas state senator in exchange for the state senator’s influence in protecting the nonprofit’s state contracts with the Arkansas Department Health Services (DHS) and DHS’ Division of Youth Services (DYS). As part of that agreement, Walsh was to provide a monthly “legal retainer” to the Arkansas state senator without the expectation that the senator ever provide any legal work. Instead, the purpose of the payments was to obtain the senator’s assistance in preserving the contracts by influencing DHS and DYS officials. According to the plea, Cranford negotiated the amount paid to the senator, which amounted to over $120,000.

Additionally, as part of the conspiracy, Walsh admitted to paying Cranford’s lobbying firms above-market prices and employed a relative of Cranford who had a “no-show” job with SAYS. In total, Walsh illegally diverted approximately $262,000 in charity funds to Cranford’s lobbying firm and relative.

https://breaking911.com/former-executive-director-of-nonprofit-sentenced-for-diverting-charity-funds-to-u-s-state-senator/

1 in 5 Europeans says secret Jewish cabal runs the world, survey finds

In each of the countries polled, a representative sample of 1,000 adults was presented with 45 questions or statements in face-to-face interviews about Jews and Israel.

PARIS – A secret network of Jews influences global political and economic affairs.

That’s the feeling among a fifth of the 16,000 respondents to a survey among Europeans from 16 countries. The same number also agreed with the statement that “Jews exploit Holocaust victimhood for their own needs.”

The survey was presented Monday at a conference about antisemitism organized in Paris by the European Jewish Association. It was conducted in December and January in Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Poland, among other countries.

Other findings:

• A quarter of respondents agreed with the statement that Israel’s policies make them understand why some people hate Jews.

• More than a quarter concurred with the statement that “Israel is engaged in legitimate self defense against its enemies.” A quarter of respondents disagreed and 46% did not express a position.

• More than a third agreed with the assertion that “During World War II, people from our nation suffered as much as Jews.”

Holocaust revisionism and classic antisemitic stereotypes were more common in Eastern Europe, whereas anti-Israel sentiments, including anti-Semitic ones, were more common in the west, according to Rabbi Slomo Koves, chairman of the Action and Protection League. The Budapest-based group is affiliated with the Hungarian Jewish community’s main watchdog on anti-Semitism.

In each of the countries polled, a representative sample of 1,000 adults was presented with 45 questions or statements in face-to-face interviews about Jews and Israel, according to the Action and Protection League. The survey has a margin of error of 0.8%.

Koves said his group is still working on a breakdown of the results in each country, but it’s complicated “by challenges in the collection process,” noting the difficulty of finding pollsters willing to go into the poor neighborhoods and ghettos of Paris and Brussels, for example. That, he said, “is necessary for arriving at a representative sample.”

https://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/Antisemitism/1-in-5-Europeans-says-secret-Jewish-cabal-runs-the-world-survey-finds-618830