Crime
Part of haul from 2019 German museum jewelry heist recovered
BERLIN (AP) — German authorities said Saturday that they have recovered a significant part of the 18th-century treasures stolen from Dresden’s Green Vault museum in a spectacular break-inmore than three years ago.
Prosecutors and police said in a statement that they secured 31 items in Berlin overnight, including “several pieces that appear to be complete.” They were taken to Dresden, more than 160 kilometers (100 miles) away, where police and then officials from the authority that oversees the city’s art collections plan to check their authenticity and examine whether they are intact.
Some prominent items are still missing, authorities said.
Saturday’s statement gave no details of where exactly the items were found and in what circumstances.
But they said that the find was preceded by exploratory talks between prosecutors and the defense in an ongoing trial over the theft on a possible agreement that would include the return of stolen items. They added that they can give no further information ahead of the next trial session scheduled for Tuesday.
Six men went on trial in Dresden in January, accused of gang robbery and arson over the Nov. 25, 2019, robbery. The German nationals were accused of stealing jewelry with a total insured value of at least 113.8 million euros ($121 million).
Officials said at the time that the items taken included a large diamond brooch and a diamond epaulette. The treasury of Augustus the Strong of Saxony was established in 1723 and contains around 4,000 objects of gold, precious stones and other materials on display in Dresden’s Royal Palace.
Prosecutors have said that the suspects laid a fire just before the break-in to cut the power supply for street lights outside the museum, and also set fire to a car in a nearby garage before fleeing to Berlin.
Saxony’s regional culture minister, Barbara Klepsch, said officials are waiting to see experts’ assessment and discover what condition the recovered pieces are in.
“I remain hopeful that the wound opened in the historic Green Vault in the 2019 robbery will soon be closed,” Klepsch said in a statement. “This shows that, even three years after this painful break-in, it is worth not giving up hope and pursuing all tracks that arise.”
Crime
Soros-Backed DA Poised To Lose To Challenger In Ultra-Liberal County
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
Portland District Attorney Mike Schmidt is likely to be replaced by prosecutor Nathan Vasquez after only serving one term.
Schmidt, the Soros-linked incumbent, won in 2020 in a landslide in which he received over 75% of the vote in heavily-Democratic Portland. Election results show Vasquez leading Schmidt with 56% of the in the nonpartisan primary as of this writing.
As of April 2024, Multnomah County is nearly 50% blue, with 282,152 of 568,681 voters registered Democrat according to the Oregon Secretary of State. Only 56,653, roughly 10% were registered Republicans.
The incumbent received a generous cash influx of $213,000 from Soros linked donors in April 2024. Despite this, Schmidt and many other progressive and Soros backed DAs are on a losing streak.
Former Portland District Attorney Mike Schmidt linked to Soros lost
How unpopular was Mike Schmidt?
Portland just voted for a long-time Republican (now registered Independent), gun-owner to represent them as District Attorney.
Wild times in PDX. https://t.co/cptlbZTu1E
— Michael Pruser (@MichaelPruser) May 22, 2024
Portland faced increasing insecurity and surges of violent crime in recent years, prompting many to flee the county. Portland homicide rates peaked in 2021 with 92 murders and again the following year with a record of 101 murders, according to OregonLiveData. Violent crime rose 17% in Portland following Schmidt’s election, according to a report from the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission.
In 2020, Oregon decriminalized hard drugs via referendum Measure 110, but was promptly re-criminalized by Democratic Gov. Tina Kotek after Oregon declared a state of emergency citing a dramatic increase in overdose cases. Vasquez plans to prioritize enforcement of drug trafficking and open air drug use, according to his campaign website.
Portland @DAMikeSchmidt is asking voters to reelect him on May 21. Soros is pouring big bucks into the campaign to gaslight voters about the record killings, riots & drug ODs under Schmidt's leadership. Read my piece about the man who destroyed Portland: https://t.co/usCZJXfNXx pic.twitter.com/bTsz0YLFY1
— Andy Ngô 🏳️🌈 (@MrAndyNgo) May 17, 2024
Following Schmidt’s 2020 election, Portland became a hotspot for riots following the police killing of George Floyd. Schmidt later announced that they would not be prosecuting low- level riot related crimes. BLM rioters and violent Antifa protestors led destructive demonstrations for over 120 days, billing the Portland Police Department over $12 million by the end of the year.
Schmidt also accepted a $30,000 campaign donation in February from the Drug Policy Alliance, a group that supported hard drug decriminalization through referendum Measure 110.
“Experience matters,” Vasquez said on his campaign website. “Until you’ve held the hand of a child who is about to face her abuser, or a mother who must listen to the details of her son’s murder, or helped someone access rehab for the first time, only then can you know what it takes to rebuild our public safety system.”
Both Vasquez and Schmidt’s campaign did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
Addictions
Liberals shut down motion to disclose pharma payments for Trudeau’s ‘safe supply’ drug program
Liberal MP Majid Jowhari
From LifeSiteNews
The motion comes as RCMP testified in April that Trudeau’s taxpayer funded ‘safer supply’ drugs are being diverted to the black market.
Liberal Members of Parliament (MPs) resisted a motion to disclose payments made to pharmaceutical companies for “safe supply” opioids.
During a May 15 session in the House of Commons, Liberal MPs blocked a vote on a motion by Conservative MP Garnett Genuis to publish the contacts between Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government and pharmaceutical companies for “safe supply” opioids.
“Allow the public to see the contracts,” Genuis told the Commons government operations committee, questioning, “What do you have to be afraid of?”
“There are contracts involving this government and big pharmaceutical companies involved in producing and selling dangerous hard drugs which then end up on our streets,” he argued.
“Big pharmaceutical companies are involved in supplying hard drugs that are used as part of the government’s so-called ‘safe supply’ program,” Genuis continued. “These programs are a failure. We oppose them. In any event, we believe the public has a right to see the contracts.”
However, a committee vote on his motion was quickly blocked by Liberal MPs.
“I don’t think this is a motion we should move forward with,” Liberal MP Majid Jowhari said.
“I think we should go back and look at it and say our objective is to get an understanding of the source of safe supply and how it is being procured, which is different than going and saying, ‘Give us all the contracts,’” he continued.
Similarly, Liberal MP Irek Kusmierczyk claimed the request was a political tactic, saying, “They are against safe supply and safe consumption sites. That is clearly spelled out by my Conservative colleagues.”
Genuis’ request comes as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) testified in April that Trudeau’s taxpayer funded “safer supply” drugs are being diverted to the black market.
“Organized crime groups are trafficking not only illicit substances but any prescription drugs they can get their hands on,” Deputy Commissioner Dwayne McDonald, commander of the RCMP in British Columbia, testified.
Genuis put forward a motion asking that the committee “order the production of all contracts, agreements or memoranda of understanding to which the Government of Canada is a party signed since January 1, 2016” concerning the purchase of opioids.
Liberals’ refusal to release the contracts comes as the Trudeau government recently rejected a proposal from the Alberta government to add a “unique chemical identifier” to drugs offered to users under “safe-supply” programs so that authorities could track its street sales.
Indeed, the Trudeau government seems determined to pretend their “safe-supply” programs are a success despite the rising deaths and crime in cities that have adopted their policy.
However, the program proved such a disaster in British Columbia that the province recently requested Trudeau recriminalize drugs in public spaces. Nearly two weeks later, the Trudeau government announced it would “immediately” end the province’s drug program.
Beginning in early 2023, Trudeau’s federal policy, in effect, decriminalized hard drugs on a trial-run basis in British Columbia.
Under the policy, the federal government began allowing people within the province to possess up to 2.5 grams of hard drugs without criminal penalty, but selling drugs remained a crime.
Since being implemented, the province’s drug policy has been widely criticized, especially after it was found that the province broke three different drug-related overdose records in the first month the new law was in effect.
The effects of decriminalizing hard drugs in various parts of Canada has been exposed in Aaron Gunn’s recent documentary, Canada is Dying, and in U.K. Telegraph journalist Steven Edginton’s mini-documentary, Canada’s Woke Nightmare: A Warning to the West.
Gunn says he documents the “general societal chaos and explosion of drug use in every major Canadian city.”
“Overdose deaths are up 1,000 percent in the last 10 years,” he said in his film, adding that “(e)very day in Vancouver four people are randomly attacked.”
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