The actions of a throng of police officers shown on a videotape kicking and punching three shooting suspects during a traffic stop were inappropriate, Mayor Michael Nutter said Thursday.

A sergeant and five officers have been removed from street duty as authorities investigated the footage. More than a dozen officers were involved, and Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey said investigators were having the videotape enhanced to try to identify how many were actually striking the suspects. Information will be sent to prosecutors, who will determine whether to press charges.

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Police stopped the suspects' car while investigating a triple shooting Monday night. No weapons were found in the car or on the suspects, Ramsey said, but officers said they had seen them shoot three people on a drug corner moments earlier.

The video, shot by WTXF-TV from a helicopter, showed three police cars stopping a car on the side of a road.

Officers gathered around the vehicle and pulled three men out. About a half-dozen officers held two men on the ground on the driver's side. Both were kicked repeatedly, while one was punched; one also appeared to be struck with a baton.

On the other side of the car, the video showed, more officers kicking a third man who ends up on the ground.

The three suspects — Dwayne Dyches, Brian Hall and Pete Hopkins — were each charged with attempted murder in the shooting, police said.

Source: the associated press

A US man stabbed his relative after an argument over the presidential credentials of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Brothers-in-law Jose Ortiz and Sean Shurelds were arguing about the fiery contest for the Democratic nomination for president at their Pennsylvania home when the dispute escalated into violence, US broadcaster CBS said.

US authorities said Ortiz, a registered Republican and Clinton supporter, allegedly stabbed Mr Shurelds, an Obama supporter, in the stomach, CBS said.

Source: theage.com.au

A California meatpacker caught torturing cattle and processing the unfit animals for human consumption is provoking calls for reform that could prove hard to ignore.

The Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing Co announced on Sunday it wanted back nearly 143 million pounds (65 million kilograms) of meat -- enough to feed more than 2.2 million Americans for a year -- that it had shipped out since February 2006.

But the wrongdoings at the plant were not exposed under the watchful eye of inspectors from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Instead, the Humane Society of the United States captured employees in a gruesome, undercover videotape that was made after an apparent random decision to investigate the plant located in Chino, California.

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The Humane Society of the United States sparked an uproar over the meatpacking plant when it released the lurid videotape showing plant workers were gouging, kicking and forcing water into the noses of cattle in order to get the animals upright.

Only cattle that can stand are considered fit to be inspected, a rule considered especially critical in preventing processing of cows infected with mad cow disease.

Source: reuters.com

A Russian environmentalist was beaten to death and seven others wounded on Saturday when a group armed with iron bars and baseball bats attacked their camp near a nuclear waste processing plant in Siberia.

Russian media reported up to 15 people shouting fascist slogans attacked the environmentalists, who were living in the camp to protest against nuclear processing in the city of Angarsk near Lake Baikal, 5,000 km east of Moscow.

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"From that we can conclude they were Nazis or skinheads",(esident of the camp, Marina Popova),told the Vesti-24 television channel, blood seeping through a bandage wrapped around her head.

From theage.com.au - Full story

From The Age:

The lead singer of Right Said Fred, Richard Fairbrass, and an Australian activist were among marchers bashed at a gay rights rally in Moscow yesterday during which several foreign Gay Pride supporters were arrested.

...complete story

In "Shooting Back: The Right and Duty of Self-Defense," van Wyk makes a biblically supported case for Christians arming themselves with guns... Link.