Jack Yantis of Council, Idaho was killed by sheriff's deputies while defending one of his bulls from execution by those same sheriffs. The bull had been mauled earlier by a Subaru station wagon. The injured, disoriented, and likely concussed bull sought the attention of emergency responders who instead focused their efforts on the protected occupants of the Subaru which had attacked him. In Idaho livestock including bulls have the right of way on all roadways inside the state, and the Subaru occupants under the law had liability for the cost of treating the bull's injuries. By the time Yantis arrived to tend to his wounded bull, sheriff's deputies had made the decision to kill it for their convenience. The Associated Press reports that the official story from the Idaho State Police is that Yantis and both deputies all discharged their weapons even though Yantis was the only person struck down by gunfire (archived). No information has yet been made public on the value derived from the bull's use as a stud nor on the market value of the bull. Mr. Yantis was murdered in the defense of his property and his livelihood.
Category Archives: The Law
Ransomware Ring Busted, "Decryptors" Rushed by Adware Vendors
Shortly after an FBI agent publicly encouraged ransomware victims to pay off their attackers, some arrests and leaks have lead to the release of a number of private keys maintained by some ransomware authors. Allegedly all of the keys for Coinvault and Bitcryptor ransomware have been acquired and persons alleged to have connections to the schemes have been arrested. Adware vendors Bitdefender (archived) and Kaspersky Labs (archived) have released free adware1 tools to decrypt files related to these ransomware products, though caution is advised as the decryption tools from these providers and those from others have the potential to be at least as malicious as the original ransomware.
It is important to accurately categorize software according to what it really does instead of what it is marketed as. Their free products advertise their paid products and their paid products advertise still more premium paid products. ↩
Busybox Drops systemd Support
In a commit dated October 22nd, BusyBox maintainer Denys Vlasenko announced the removal of systemd support from the minimalist unix toolkit (archived). Vlasenko offered as a comment on the commit:
systemd people are not willing to play nice with the rest of the world. Therefore there is no reason for the rest of the world to cooperate with them.
US DoD Extracts Guilty Pleas From Mom and Pop Competitors
The US Navy operating under the larger umbrella of the United States Department of Defense managed to extract guilty pleas from a husband and wife accused of marketing heroin on a United States warship (archived). The couple's marketing of heroin of course makes them competitors to the organized heroin operations occurring in the United States Department of Defense whose activity has lead to heroin overtaking many other drugs of abuse over the course of the United State's adventure in Afghanistan (archived).
Judge Grants Local Cop Immunity as Federal Agent
Federal Judge Lee Yeakel has granted immunity to former Austin, Texas police detective Charles Kleinert on manslaughter charges (archived). Yeakel justified his finding of immunity as Kleinert was working on a joint task force with Federal agents, and Yeakel justified the decision to grant immunity rather than investigate the crime thusly: Continue reading
Billion Dollar Blimp Victim of Police Shooting
The Associated Press reports that once its rampage ended in its descent to the ground the Billion Dollar Blimp was fired upon by Pennsylvania State Police officers armed with shotguns until its complete deflation (archived). The Associated Press report also includes a minimum damage estimate of 2,000,000 United States dollars.
Illinois Universities Follow State in Credit Rating Freefall
Six Illinois public universities has their credit rating lowered by Moody’s Investors Service following in the footsteps of the Illinois state government. Southern Illinois Univesity and Northern Illinois University were lowered to Baa1 matching the state government, Northeastern Illinois University was downgraded to Baa2, and three more universities1 were downgraded to Baa3 status (archived). The budget standoff in Illinois continues with lottery winnings continuing to be rationed and labor unrest including the East Saint Louis teacher's strike is ongoing. There are no publicly facing indications that Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner and the legislature are anywhere near resolving the Illinois budget situation.
Western Illinois University, Eastern Illinois University, and Governor's State University ↩
Judge Orders Dotcom Begin Extradition Defense Monday
Judge Nevin Dawson has issued a ruling that he would refuse to hear the full arguments behind Kim Dotcom's application to have his extradition hearing stopped (archived). As a result his defense is compelled to begin presenting Dotcom's defense against the United States Government's extradition desires presented through the Crown Prosecutor on Monday.
Interview with David Francois on Building a Real Bitcoin Business
Operating a Bitcoin business is difficult and, a lot of times is the first step down the road which brings pretty much 9x% to crime within six months to a year (archived). With the excess influx of Venture Capital into companies pretending as to have any involvement with Bitcoin, I sat down with David "davout" Francois CTO of Paymium, formerly known as Bitcoin-Central, to talk about the fundamentals from his personal experience in developing a Bitcoin company that can survive the ruthless climate of the world of Bitcoin. Continue reading
Karpeles Arrested on Still More Embezzlement Charges
Shingetsu News Agency is reporting on their Twitter feed that Mt Gox CEO Mark Karpelès has been rearrested in Japan on still more embezzlement charges. Japanese police are only allowed to hold a suspect in detention for a limited period of time, so re-arrest on further charges is a common tactic used to keep charged suspects detained indefinitely before trial.