News article:

Officials ruled that Wood's drowning death while boating off Santa Catalina Island was an accident. But there has been much speculation about the circumstances surrounding her death.

 A law enforcement source added that the department had recently received a letter from an unidentified "third party" who said that the captain had "new recollections" about the case. The source spoke on the condition of anonymity because the case was ongoing.

 L.A. County Sheriff Lee Baca told The Times that homicide detectives want to talk to the captain based on comments he had made recounting the case on its 30 th anniversary. Baca did not detail what the captain said regarding the case

 Detectives decided to reopen the investigation into the death of actress Natalie Wood in part because of statements made by the captain of the boat Wood was on at the time of her death.

 "Recently sheriff’s homicide investigators were contacted by persons who stated they had additional information about the Natalie Wood Wagner drowning. Due to the additional information, Sheriff’s homicide bureau has decided to take another look at the case," the department said in a statement.

 Wood and Robert Wagner first married in 1957 and divorced five years later. Both went on to marry other people -- and have children. They remarried in 1972.

 ARCHIVES: Natalie Wood's death

 On Thanksgiving weekend 1981, Wagner and Wood had invited actor Christopher Walken to be their guest on Catalina aboard their boat, the Splendour. On the evening of Nov. 29, they had dinner and drinks at Doug's Harbor Reef. They returned to the boat and continued to drink until a heated argument erupted between the two men.

 Wagner told The Times in 2008 that the argument concerned how much of one's personal life should be sacrificed in pursuit of one's career; he was upset that Walken was advocating that Wood give her all to her art, even at the expense of her husband and children.

 Wood left to go to the master cabin's bathroom. Wagner says he and Walken eventually calmed down and said good night. When he went to bed, he says, Wood wasn't there. It is believed that the yacht's dinghy had come loose and that Wood came up on deck to tie it up.

 "I have gone over it so many millions of times with people. Nobody heard anything," Wagner told The Times in 2008.

 RELATED:

 ARCHIVES: Natalie Wood's death

 Robert Wagner supports inquiry into Natalie Wood's death

 Natalie Wood investigation prompted by boat captain's comments

 --Andrew Blankstein, Richard Winton and Sam Allen

 Photo: 1981 Los Angeles Times front page. ||||| Natalie Wood Death Book Triggered Homicide Investigation

 Natalie Wood's Death -- Marti Rulli's Book Triggered New Homicide Investigation

 's death has been reopened as a homicide investigation, primarily because of a book written by the captain of the boat where Natalie Wood spent her last minutes ... a book suggesting foul play ... this according to sources close to the investigation.We've learned Marti Rulli -- who co-authored the book -- has been in regular touch with the L.A. County Sheriff's Dept. over the last few months. She has given Sheriff's investigators documents supporting material in her book, and we're told the Sheriff is so impressed he has assigned 2 full-time homicide detectives to the case.In the book -- "Goodbye Natalie, Goodbye Splendour" -- Rulli and Splendour Captain Dennis Davern write about the night Natalie drowned. They say before Natalie disappeared from the boat, she was drinking and taking Quaaludes with her husband,and actorAccording to the book, Wagner became enraged when he saw Wood and Walken speaking, and smashed a wine bottle, yelling at Walken, "What do you want to do, f**k my wife? Is that what you want?"At that point, Walken returned to his cabin and Natalie and Robert went to their state room. According to the Captain, he heard a loud argument between the couple and thumping sounds, and eventually silence.A short time later, the Captain went to the deck and was told by Wagner, "Natalie is missing."The book claims Wagner refused to let the Captain call the Coast Guard.Wagner told the Capt. the dinghy was gone, along with Natalie, but some doubted that because she was deathly afraid of dark water.The death was ruled an accident, but Rulli was like a pit bull since the book was written in 2008.We're told the homicide investigators have already traveled to Catalina, as well as New Jersey to interview Rulli. They've also gone to Augustine, Florida to interview the Captain, and they're going to Hawaii to look at the Splendour.A source familiar with the investigation tells TMZ the Sheriff's Dept. has not called anyone a suspect in Wood's death. It is a general homicide investigation for now, and will take "a long time to complete." The source adds, supporting documentation in several books about Wood's death -- including Marti Rulli's book -- triggered the investigation because the witnesses accounts of circumstances surrounding Wood's death did not square with what they told officials immediately after her death.We're told no one from the Sheriff's Dept. has spoken with Wagner, nor has an interview been requested ... at least so far.-- Robert Wagner's rep released a statement to TMZ ... saying, "Although no one in the Wagner family has heard from the LA County Sheriff’s department about this matter, they fully support the efforts of the LA County Sheriff’s Dept."The statement continues, "[The Wagners] trust they will evaluate whether any new information relating to the death of Natalie Wood Wagner is valid, and that it comes from a credible source or sources other than those simply trying to profit from the 30 year anniversary of her tragic death." |||||
What is a shorter version of the above article?

– Los Angeles County homicide detectives have reopened an investigation into the 30-year-old mystery of actress Natalie Wood's death. The star's 1981 drowning was ruled an accident. But her last evening, which she spent on a yacht with husband Robert Wagner and movie co-star Christopher Walken, has long been the subject of speculation. Law enforcement officials have now decided to take another look at the case after receiving fresh information, and they plan to interview the boat's captain about comments he made about the case recently, the Los Angeles Times reports. In the captain's book Goodbye Natalie, Goodbye Splendour, he recalls that on the night she drowned, Wood was drinking and taking Quaaludes with Wagner and Walken. An argument erupted between the two men, apparently over Wood, followed by shouting between the couple in their room—and thumps, according to the captain. He says he was later told "Natalie is missing" by Wagner, who allegedly refused to let him call the Coast Guard. The captain's co-author, Marti Rulli, has been in touch for months with police, reports TMZ. An investigation at the time determined that Wood apparently fell into the sea after attempting to climb into the yacht's dingy or trying to secure it. Wagner has issued a statement saying he supports the new investigation.


Article:
The 2019 Golden Globes nominations are out. Let’s first hit some surprises, because there were some rather huge ones on the TV side.

 NBC’s fan favorite The Good Place was finally honored for best comedy series. Sacha Baron Cohen unexpectedly crashed the best actor in a comedy category for Showtime’s political prank series Who Is America? The excellent imported BBC/Netflix thriller Bodyguard got a best drama series nod. And Candice Bergen was nominated for CBS’ low-rated (and presumed canceled) Murphy Brown reboot. With the exception of The Good Place honor, top oddsmakers did not see any of those coming.

 We’ll have more of surprises along the way. But here are the biggest snubs in the TV categories.

 The Handmaids Tale (Hulu).The dystopian drama swept the Emmys for its debut season in 2017 and won for best drama series at the Globes last year. Yet season 2 failed to get a nomination in the top category, and it was a title on every prediction list (stars Elisabeth Moss and Yvonne Strahovski were both nominated, as expected). This is a pretty shocking omission, though the latest season was admittedly more divisive among critics and fans than the first.

 Westworld (HBO). Another big drama series snub. The second season cleaned up at the Emmys a few months ago, with four wins, but aside from a supporting nod for Thandi Newton, the Hollywood Foreign Press was apparently less impressed. Actors Ed Harris, Jeffrey Wright and Evan Rachel Wood were all left out. Also absent from the drama category: The second season of Ozark (Netflix) was snubbed, though star Jason Bateman was nominated.

 Atlanta (FX): The second season of the innovative rap-scene comedy, despite being an Emmy favorite, was surprisingly shut out of the top comedy slots (though star Donald Glover was nominated). Also snubbed was another Emmy darling, Netflix’s ’80s wrestling dramedy GLOW (yet actress Alison Brie got a nod). There was an upside: The Good Place (NBC) finally broke into this category with its first Globes comedy series nomination, and star Kristen Bell was nominated for lead actress in a comedy too.

 Sterling K. Brown, John Krasinski, Liev Schreiber, Milo Ventimiglia and Bob Odenkirk. The best actor in a drama category featured some serious upsets. Last year’s winner, Brown, was fully expected to at least get a nomination once again for This Is Us. Three-time nominee Odenkirk was fully expected to get recognized for Better Call Saul. Krasinski was fully expected to get nominated for his work in Amazon’s Jack Ryan. Five-time nominee Schreiber was fully expected to get nominated once again (due to the HFPA’s curious love for Showtime’s Ray Donovan). And Ventimiglia, well, he wasn’t fully expected to get a This Is Us nod, but some thought he might squeeze in. Instead, there were new additions like Stephan James for Amazon’s Homecoming and Billy Porter for FX’s Pose.

 Jodie Comer. The Killing Eve actress was expected to get a nomination for lead actress in a drama series along with her co-star Sandra Oh (who was nominated), yet was shut out. Robin Wright was also snubbed for the final season of Netflix’s House of Cards. Instead, there was a minor surprise on the list: Outlander’s Caitriona Balfe, who was nominated last year, but wasn’t necessarily expected to make the list this time given the intense competition from newcomers like Oh and Homecoming‘s Julia Roberts.

 Ted Danson. While The Good Place received nominations for best comedy series and an actress nod for Kristen Bell, Danson, who was considered the most likely nom of the three, was left out. Blame Sacha Baron Cohen?

 Maniac (Netflix): Many thought the psychological dark comedy-drama was brilliant and unlike anything else on TV this year, so it was expected to get a nom in the movie-limited series category. Nope. Star Emma Stone was also left out for Maniac — the Globes snub which seemed to elicit the most Twitter upset this morning among the TV categories. Stone did receive a supporting nod for her work in the movie The Favourite, however.

 Patrick Melrose (Showtime) was also skipped in the series limited series category, despite predictions, though that’s more understandable given the project’s somewhat lackluster reaction — all the praise was around the boozy performance of star Benedict Cumberbatch (who was of course nominated). Another Showtime snub in the movies-mini category: Benicio Del Toro, who was given strong odds to land a mention for his work in Escape at Dannemora.

 Movie nominations snubs and surprises here.

 Full list of Golden Globes nominations. ||||| From left, Ethan Hawke stars in First Reformed, KiKi Layne and Stephan James in If Beale Street Could Talk, Sam Elliott in A Star is Born.

 Each year, the roughly 90 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association both confirm and upend various awards-season narratives with their Golden Globe nominations. This year was no different. Let’s take a look at some of the biggest snubs and surprises from this morning’s nominations.

 Movies

 Sam Elliott’s Momentum Slows?

 The supporting-actor category looks much as we expected it to this morning, except for one glaring omission: where is Sam Elliott for his rich, tearful work in the otherwise generously nominated A Star Is Born? Elliott has long been thought of—in some circles, anyway—as the supporting-actor front-runner. But just a week after winning the prize from the National Board of Review, Elliott finds himself without a nomination at the pre-prom. No disrespect to the fellow who likely snatched his nod, BlacKkKlansman’s Adam Driver—but this is a pretty big upset for a campaign that had been looking a lot sturdier than many other hopefuls.’ Ah, well; we’ll just chalk it up to the Hollywood Foreign Press being weird, as we do with everything Golden Globes-related every year.

 Mary Poppins’s Magic Burns Out

 Mary Poppins Returns was richly rewarded Thursday: for Emily Blunt’s and (surprisingly?) Lin-Manuel Miranda’s lead performances, for best musical or comedy, and for Marc Shaiman’s score. But curiously, especially given that last nomination, the sequel could not secure a spot in the best-original-song category. Perhaps all the film’s songs bled together into one pleasant blur, or maybe it was just up against competition that proved too tough: who do you say no to in that category to make room for Mary? Annie Lennox? Lady Gaga? Dolly Parton?? Maybe Poppins could have taken Boy Erased’s spot, but “Revelation” is a gorgeous song, one that closes out an Important Issue movie. Whatever the reason for the snub, Disney’s London skies are looking a little dimmer this morning.

 The Ethan Hawke-aissance May Not Be Televised

 He’s won some critics’ awards, yet First Reformed star Ethan Hawke couldn’t land a nomination for best actor in a drama—even though he didn’t even have to compete with Viggo Mortensen or Christian Bale, who are in the comedy/musical category. That may mark a serious impediment to the rest of his awards-season campaign, despite his film being easily one of the best-reviewed of the year. Maybe the movie is too small, too alienating for the H.F.P.A. Or maybe they loved Lucas Hedges in Boy Erased too much. Or maybe if Rami Malek and Bradley Cooper had been run in musical/comedy, where they belong, Hawke would have gotten what’s owed to him. In any case, the First Reformed folks better start praying to keep Hawke in the hunt.

 Peter Farrelly and Adam McKay Spoil Everything

 Well, they’re not spoiling everything. But the respective directors of Green Book and Vice are taking up spots that could have been occupied by The Favourite’s Yorgos Lanthimos, If Beale Street Could Talk’s Barry Jenkins, or Can You Ever Forgive Me?’s Marielle Heller. Farrelly and McKay, two older comedy guys working more serious than usual, are pretty dull, mainstream choices in a year that offered exciting and different options. Heller’s nomination would have been particularly heartening, given that the Globes have only had a handful of female-director nominees in the last few decades, and Can You Ever Forgive Me?—nominated for two major acting prizes—is one of the strongest titles of the year. But, no. Instead, the H.F.P.A. opted for Farrelly’s incredibly straightforward direction and McKay’s messy collage of a reviled vice president. We’ll forgive them someday, but not today.

 _If Beale Street Could Sing

 Craft categories don’t frequently lend themselves to surprises—partially because they aren’t as closely watched; partially because the right answers are often predictable—but it was admittedly strange not to see Nicholas Britell, who wrote the lush, jazzy score for If Beale Street Could Talk, missing among the nominees this morning. In addition to having some of the best music, that movie had some of the most music—it seems impossible that voters didn’t notice it. Other great scores that are missing, if not quite snubbed, include Nate Heller’s marvelous work for Can You Ever Forgive Me? and David Lang for Paul Dano’s directorial debut, Wildlife.

 Cold War Gets Iced Out

 In the foreign-language-film category, it was a slight shock not to see Pawel Pawlikowski’s beloved Cold War in the running. Pawlikowski’s last film, Ida, was a nominee for this award in 2015, eventually going on to win the trophy in this category at the Academy Awards. Cold War is the better movie, but it likely lost its slot to Roma, which, by the H.F.P.A.’s rules, was ineligible to compete in the best-drama category—where it might otherwise have practically been guaranteed a nomination.

 Television

 Stars Are Blindsided

 The Globes are typically the awards most likely to present a nomination to anyone who sounds famous doing something on TV—or are they? Because in a strange new trend, stars Al Pacino and Kevin Costner weren’t nominated for their roles slumming it on the boob tube—even though Costner’s Yellowstone has been a ratings success on the newly rebranded Paramount Network. EGOT king John Legend also failed to sway the H.F.P.A. for his much-lauded turn as Jesus in Jesus Christ Superstar Live, and even Robin Wright’s complex tightrope act behind the scenes of a House of Cards in upheaval didn't impress Globes voters.

 An Actor Shake-Up

 Julia Roberts, for her part, earned a nomination for Homecoming. But so did her 24-year-old breakout co-star, Stephan James—beating out Costner to enter a bizarre, but fascinating category for best actor in a drama series. Edging out worthies like Bob Odenkirk, Sterling K. Brown, Jeffrey Wright, and Globes perennial favorite Liev Schreiber are James, Jason Bateman, Emmy winner Matthew Rhys, and two more big surprises: Billy Porter from FX's queer ballroom drama Pose, and Richard Madden from Netflix's word-of-mouth hit Bodyguard.

 The H.F.P.A. Doesn’t Like Shows That Age

 Several veteran series in contention at the Emmys—and on critics’ best-of lists—failed to draw the H.F.P.A.’s attention. Atlanta, which won outstanding comedy series in 2017, wasn't even nominated in the category for its second season. Neither were the later seasons of This Is Us, Westworld, and The Handmaid’s Tale, reflecting the Globes’ interest in what’s up and coming.

 Broadcast Isn’t Dead

 Apparently, the H.F.P.A. also has a thing for network comedies. In the category for best actress in a comedy, three out of the five actresses nominated come from sitcoms—Debra Messing, Candice Bergen, and Kristen Bell. Who says we have to let the old ways die?

 More Great Stories from Vanity Fair

 — The supercalifragilistic Lin-Manuel Miranda

 — The Golden Globes are quirky—and that’s a good thing

 — How The Sopranos gave us Trump training wheels

 — Rocko’s Modern Life was even loonier than you thought

 — The year’s best movies, according to our critic

 Looking for more? Sign up for our daily Hollywood newsletter and never miss a story. ||||| CLOSE It was a tough year to be named Ryan when it came to Golden Globe nominations. Here are some of the most notable Globes snubs for 2019. USA TODAY

 Ryan Gosling missed out on an acting nomination for "First Man,' which wasn't nominated for best drama. (Photo: Daniel McFadden/Universal Studios)

 The Hollywood Foreign Press Association showered awards praise on "Vice," which received six Golden Globe nominations on Thursday. But it was a bad morning for everyone named Ryan (Gosling, Coogler and Reynolds) at the 76th annual awards show, which reveals its winners on Jan. 6 (NBC, 8 p.m. EST/5 PST).

 These were the most notable snubs:

 Ryan Gosling, Ryan Coogler and Ryan Reynolds. It was a tough year for everyone's favorite Ryan. Gosling lost out on a nomination as astronaut Neil Armstrong in "First Man" (also overlooked for best drama). Coogler was passed over as director of "Black Panther" (nominated for best drama). And Reynolds, who earned nominations for best actor and best movie for 2016's "Deadpool," was overlooked for "Deadpool 2."

 "This Is Us." The NBC drama was completely shut out, including from the best-drama category. Previous acting nominees Mandy Moore, Chrissy Metz and Sterling K. Brown (who made history last year as the first African-American to win best actor in a TV drama series) all went missing.

 Chadwick Boseman and Michael B. Jordan. "Black Panther" cruised into a best-drama nomination without lead actor Boseman, T'Challa himself, earning a best-actor spot. Jordan, as villainous Erik Killmonger, was also denied a nomination for best supporting actor.

 More: Who got nominated for Golden Globes? Here's the list

 Clint Eastwood. The 88-year-old film legend's latest drama, "The Mule" – his first lead role since 2012's "Trouble With the Curve" – was stubbornly denied in all categories, including best actor.

 "The Grinch." The animated film version of the Dr. Seuss classic, with Benedict Cumberbatch voicing the Christmas-hating creep, has been a moviegoing favorite this holiday season. But it missed out on an animated-movie nomination.

 "The Grinch" was denied an animated movie nomination by the Golden Globes. (Photo: Universal Pictures)

 "Atlanta." The FX series, created and starring Donald Glover, took best comedy at the Golden Globes last year, but it failed to earn that nomination in 2018. Glover was nominated for best actor in a comedy, an award he won last year.

 More: Dick Cheney biopic ‘Vice’ leads Golden Globes field with six nominations

 Also: Sandra Oh, Andy Samberg to co-host 2019 Golden Globes

 "A Quiet Place." Director and star John Krasinski's box-office hit ($330 million worldwide), his first starring collaboration with wife Emily Blunt, has received rare critical raves for a horror film (an impressive 95% positive critical rating on Rotten Tomatoes), the kind that often warrant awards recognition. The film was nominated for movie of the year at the People's Choice Awards, but it scratched out only a nomination for best original score for the Globes.

 Meryl Streep gives a little heartbreak in "Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again." (Photo: UNIVERSAL)

 "Widows." With an all-star cast (including Viola Davis and Liam Neeson), Oscar-winning director Steve McQueen's heist drama seems poised for awards glory. But it received nothing at the Golden Globes, not even a best-actress nomination for Davis.

 The songs of "Mary Poppins Returns." Blunt (as Mary Poppins) and Lin-Manuel Miranda scored in the major acting categories, and the movie was nominated for best comedy or musical. Though Marc Shaiman's score earned a nomination, none of the songs in the musical, including "The Place Where Lost Things Go," were recognized.

 “Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again.” With both "A Star As Born" and Queen biopic "Bohemian Rhapsody" moved to the drama section, there was room for another actual musical to move into the best comedy or musical category. Ten years ago, the original "Mamma Mia!" took two nominations, for best comedy or musical, and best actress for Meryl Streep. The sequel was shut out in 2018.

 Amandla Stenberg. Stenberg has earned raves for her performance in timely drama “The Hate U Give” as student Starr Carter, who witnesses the fatal police shooting of her childhood best friend. But the drama was overlooked.

 Hugh Jackman. Given that Jackman nabbed a best-actor nomination last year for "The Greatest Showman," it would have seemed that the beloved Aussie could ride into this year's awards with a nomination for his serious political drama "The Front Runner," playing Democratic presidential candidate Gary Hart. But he did not.

 Meryl Streep. Sure, Streep has a smaller role as Donna in "Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again!" than she did in 2008's first film, which earned her a best-actress nomination. And Streep has one memorable scene in "Mary Poppins Returns." But this is three-time Oscar winner Meryl Streep, who has won eight Golden Globes. Any time she's overlooked, it's a snub.

 Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2018/12/06/golden-globes-biggest-snubs/2221430002/ |||||Summary:

– Golden Globe nominations were announced Thursday, and along with a surprise frontrunner, there were a number of snubs. USA Today, Entertainment Weekly, and Vanity Fair are among the outlets running them down: Ryan Gosling was not nominated as best actor for his role as Neil Armstrong in First Man—which was also not nominated as best drama. Black Panther was nominated for best drama, but stars Chadwick Boseman and Michael B. Jordan were denied best actor and best supporting actor nods. Atlanta, Donald Glover's FX series, won best comedy series at last year's Golden Globes, but wasn't even nominated this year.


Here is a news article: WASHINGTON –- In an interview with The Huffington Post, Sen. Rand Paul stoutly defended an aide who, as a radio shock jock in South Carolina, praised John Wilkes Booth, heaped scorn on Abraham Lincoln and wore a ski mask emblazoned with the stars and bars of the Confederate Battle Flag.

 Paul (R-Ky.) stressed that he opposed such views, many of which have been recanted by the Senate aide, Jack Hunter, who co-wrote Paul's first book in 2010 and who is now his social media adviser in Washington.

 “I'm not a fan of secession,” Paul said. “I think the things he said about John Wilkes Booth are absolutely stupid. I think Lincoln was one of our greatest presidents. Do I think Lincoln was wrong is taking away the freedom of the press and the right of habeas corpus? Yeah.

 “There were great people who were for emancipation. Lincoln came to his greatness. One Republican congressman described it as ‘on borrowed plumage.’ I love the description, because there were some great fighters [for emancipation] and Lincoln had to be pushed. But I'm not an enemy of Lincoln, like some who think he was an awful person.”

 Paul said that Hunter had never acted in a discriminatory way, and that his earlier work in South Carolina was a form of youthful political showmanship.

 “People are calling him a white supremacist,” Paul told me in his Senate office. “If I thought he was a white supremacist, he would be fired immediately. If I thought he would treat anybody on the color of their skin different than others, I’d fire him immediately.

 “All I can say is, we have a zero tolerance policy for anybody who displays discriminatory behavior or belief in discriminating against people based on the color of their skin, their religion, their sexual orientation, anything like that,” Paul told me. “We won't tolerate any of that, and I've seen no evidence of that.

 “Are we at a point where nobody can have had a youth or said anything untoward?” the senator asked rhetorically.

 Hunter is 39 years old. He was a well-known figure in South Carolina for years before he caught Paul’s eye with some well-circulated YouTube videos.

 Say this about Paul: He doesn’t run from a fight, especially if it means defying a Washington Beltway consensus.

 The 50-year-old freshman senator, a tea party libertarian hungering to climb his way through the GOP to the White House, wins passionate fans for questioning the rise of the Security State at home and the drone wars abroad.

 But he wins equally passionate critics for some of his statements on race and civil rights, which foes see as a throwback to the days when resistance to federal power was tantamount to defending the Old South.

 The consistent thread is his irritation at other people -– especially those in the federal government or media –- telling him what he should do, say or think.

 And he is not about to distance himself from a writer who long called himself the “Southern Avenger.”

 Paul insisted that he had only known “vaguely” about Hunter’s work. But even if he had known all of the details, Paul said, he would not have shied away from hiring Hunter because he is a talented conservative writer.

 “Let me put it this way,” Paul said. ”I’m aware of some of your columns, but not all of them. And some of them I find very unfair, calling me a conspiracy nut, things like that. But I chose to talk to you today. So that means we have a relationship now. But it doesn't mean that I agree with all of your past writings.

 “It's the same way any time you meet somebody who's got a large body of work,” Paul continued. "So if I hired you to work in my campaign, there would be some things I agreed with, and some things I disagreed with.

 “I think it's hard. The thing is, I grapple with this. What am I supposed to do? I'm going to have a lot of people working for me. They've all got writings and opinions."

 Hunter, he said, "is incredibly talented."

 Behind the flashy and provocative rhetoric, Paul said, Hunter often made thought-provoking arguments. “Look and listen to the actual words and not to the headlines, people,” Paul told me.

 What about the ski mask? I asked.

 “It was a shock radio job. He was doing wet T-shirt contests. But can a guy not have a youth and stuff? People try to say I smoked pot one time, and I wasn't fit for office.”

 Paul clearly thinks that he is.

 And, by the way, he told me, he was headed to Nevada this weekend -- Nevada being a key early-nominating state in what would be a 2016 GOP nominating race.

 Before he gets there, Paul will have to deal with myriad nettlesome issues that come from his family’s political roots in the libertarian, states’ rights and nativist soil deep in some reaches of American politics.

 A major theme of Paul’s short career has been the tension between the grassroots tea party enthusiasm and libertarian online donors he inherits from his father -– perennial presidential candidate and former Texas Rep. Ron Paul -– and Rand’s own strategic plan to be seen as a mainstream-able GOP figure.

 The two imperatives seemed to have collided in the person of Jack Hunter this week, and Paul stood by his friend. He could hardly do otherwise. Hunter is too close to him, for one, to be easily jettisoned. But more important for Paul, firing him would have been allowing other people to tell him what to do. ||||| The man who for years called himself the “Southern Avenger” says he now seeks to avenge his own honor.

 Jack Hunter, the aide to Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul who has been under fire for comments critical of Abraham Lincoln and sympathetic to the Confederacy, has left the senator’s office to resume his career as a political pundit.

 Hunter told The Daily Caller News Foundation that he wanted to avoid being a distraction for Paul and to clear his own name, which he argues is now unfairly associated with racism.

 A senior Paul aide confirmed Hunter’s departure.

 “I’ve long been a conservative, and years ago, a much more politically incorrect (and campy) one,” Hunter said in an email. “But there’s a significant difference between being politically incorrect and racist. I’ve also become far more libertarian over the years, a philosophy that encourages a more tolerant worldview, through the lens of which I now look back on some of my older comments with embarrassment.”

 Hunter, who has contributed opinion pieces to The Daily Caller, is a personal friend of the author.

 The Washington Free Beacon originally reported that Hunter toasted the birthday of Lincoln assassin John Wilkes Booth, lamented the United States’ shrinking white majority and compared honoring the Founding Fathers while admiring Lincoln to “praising Jesus and worshiping Satan simultaneously.”

 The story set off a firestorm of controversy across the political spectrum. Hunter was most recently criticized by his former editor at the Charleston City Paper for asking him to remove posts and for being the “most common kind of racist, the one that doesn’t realize that he is one.”

 Chris Haire, the Charleston alt-weekly’s managing editor, also described Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh, Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Pat Buchanan as racists. Asked why he published Hunter — a paid columnist — if he believed him to be a racist, Haire tweeted in response, “To reveal the mindset of the SCGOP and the Neoconfederate fringe.”

 Paul described Hunter’s comments as “absolutely stupid” but defended his “incredibly talented” social media director in an interview with The Huffington Post.

 “People are calling him a white supremacist,” Paul said. “If I thought he was a white supremacist, he would be fired immediately.”

 Others have defended Hunter as well, saying that while he may have been attracted to peculiarly Southern forms of conservatism and occasionally naive about racial issues, he is not the figure some critics have portrayed.

 “In all my dealings with Jack Hunter, I have found him to be most impressive, most professional and a committed conservative,” South Carolina Republican Rep. Mark Sanford told TheDCNF. “I think a lot of this has less to do with Jack Hunter than Rand Paul and 2016.”

 Former Charleston City Paper music editor Ballard Lesemann knew Hunter back when he was still wearing a pro-wrestling-style mask emblazoned with the Confederate flag. He told TheDCNF that Hunter was already assuming a less kitschy and provocative persona back then.

 “By the time Jack started working with local AM news/talk station 1250 WTMA, he’d already ditched the mask and the schtick side of the Southern Avenger character, and he began to develop a more serious, thoughtful, in-depth approach and delivery,” Lesemann said.

 While the two of them “bonded more over conversations about Iron Maiden, Rush, and the Who than about political candidates and partisan politics,” Lesemann was familiar with Hunter’s political work.

 “As a left-leaning independent who voted for Ralph Nader in 2000, 2004 and 2008, you can imagine how my own political views could clash with those of Jack Hunter’s,” he said. “But in all of our conversations, interviews, and late-night tavern chats, we never fought or argued.”

 Marcus Amaker edited Hunter’s entertainment writings for the Charleston Post and Courier. He described Hunter as “a good guy” and “professional freelancer.”

 “I never had any issues with Jack,” Amaker told TheDCNF. “Honestly, I haven’t paid much attention to the controversy. Anything that seeks to divide people isn’t on my radar and doesn’t get my energy.”

 Prior to working for Rand Paul, Hunter was the official campaign blogger for Ron Paul during the 2012 GOP primaries. In that capacity, he frequently worked to marginalize extremists within the movement, ridiculing conspiracy theorists and defending the idea of working within the mainstream Republican Party.

 Now the controversy over Hunter’s past writings and radio broadcasts is widely seen as a drag on libertarian-leaning Republicans’ mainstream political ambitions and a reminder of the elder Paul’s newsletters.

 While the former Texas congressman denied writing or even reading the racist content in the newsletters that appeared under his name, questions persisted about their authorship.

 Hunter isn’t denying writing the columns in question, but he does say the coverage doesn’t represent the full body of his writing.

 “The stories made me angry, as well as many who’ve followed my work, because the cherry-picked distortions weren’t even remotely the real me,” he said. “It was enraging to watch neoconservatives, liberals and even some actual racists speculate about what I believe, based on what they were eager to portray me as believing. Not surprisingly, their speculations almost always suited their own political purposes.”

 “Still, the moment I became a distraction for Sen. Paul, I knew it was time to leave. My purpose has always been to help, not hinder,” Hunter added. Now as he once ditched the mask, he will also discard the Southern Avenger name.

 “I also wanted the ability to defend myself in my own voice, not as a member of anyone’s staff or even as the ‘Southern Avenger’ character, which has now been so mischaracterized that I will permanently retire that moniker,” Hunter said.

 In addition to any fallout for Rand Paul’s political future, the controversy raises philosophical questions for conservatives and libertarians.

 “Nothing in American history has done more harm to the limited government cause than the association of state sovereignty arguments with defenses of slavery,” wrote Philip Klein in the Washington Examiner. “Confederates who employed limited government arguments to argue for preserving a brutal and inhumane practice shouldn’t be deemed friends of limited government.”

 Hunter maintains he is now freer to join these debates.

 “I look forward to returning to just being a pundit and fighting these battles on my own,” he said. “The neoconservatives, who first ran and promoted this story, would much rather argue about the Civil War than the Iraq War.”

 “From their standpoint, and given current trends within the Republican Party,” Hunter concluded, “I can’t say I blame them.”

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 Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@ dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

 Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org. |||||
A summary of this is?

– The Southern Avenger rides alone once more. Jack Hunter has left Rand Paul's employ amidst a firestorm of controversy about his past as a Confederate flag-wearing secessionist shock jock and columnist. Hunter first broke the news to his friend W. James Antle III at the Daily Caller. "I've long been a conservative, and years ago, a much more politically incorrect (and campy) one," Hunter said. "But there's a significant difference between being politically incorrect and racist." He intends to return to punditry. Paul had previously stuck by Hunter. "I think the things he said about John Wilkes Booth are absolutely stupid," he told the Huffington Post two weeks ago. But "if I thought he was a white supremacist, he would be fired immediately." Instead it seems he's been fired slowly. Paul today said he and Hunter had come to a "mutual decision" that he should leave. "I think everybody occasionally has people that work for them who sometimes have a background that damages what you’re trying to do," Paul explained, according to CN|2.


Article:

Women in prisons across the US are being recruited by sex traffickers who force them into prostitution on their release.

 A Guardian investigation has found that traffickers are using government websites to obtain personal information including mugshots, release dates and charge sheets to identify potential victims while they are still behind bars.

 America's outcasts: the women trapped in a cruel cycle of exploitation Read more

 Pimps also use inmates in prisons and jails countrywide to befriend incarcerated women who, on their release, are trafficked into the $9.5bn (£7.2bn) US commercial sex industry.

 The investigation also found cases of the bail bond system being used in sex trafficking operations in at least five different states. Pimps and sex buyers are locating incarcerated women awaiting a court date by using personal data such as mugshots and bail bonds posted online, or through corrupt bondsmen.

 Traffickers are then bailing women out of detention. Once released, the women are told they must work as prostitutes or have their bond rescinded and be sent back to jail.

 Over the course of the investigation, The Guardian found cases of the bail bond system being used by pimps and sex buyers in Florida, Texas, Ohio, North Carolina and Mississippi.

 “The pimps would use bail as a way to control us and keep us in debt bondage,” said one trafficking survivor from Tampa, Florida. She claimed she was forced to work as a prostitute to pay off her bail debt and locked inside a house and beaten if she didn’t bring home enough money.

 “Once when I tried to escape, the pimp revoked my bond. He found me, threw me in a car and got me sent back to jail,” she said.

 Diane Checchio, a former prosecutor for the district attorney’s office in Orlando, Florida, said the bail bond system was routinely exploited by traffickers.

 Up to 80% of the trafficking cases she worked on in 2016 involved bondsmen found to be illegally passing on information about women arrested on prostitution charges to suspected traffickers.

 “Sometimes women are released not knowing who bonded them out or why, or what they’ve gotten into, and now they’re being coerced,” Checchio said. “They come out of jail and there’s someone waiting saying: ‘I posted your bond – now you owe me’ … [They will] threaten to rescind that bond if the girls don’t do what they’re asked or told to do. It’s still happening now.”

 Checchio said traffickers were likely to be targeting women involved in the criminal justice system across the country.

 “I would find it very likely that this is happening in every state that has women’s records online,” she said.

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘Predators thrive off isolation and trauma, so prisons and jails are perfect hunting grounds’: Nikki Bell, head of anti-trafficking organisation Lift. Photograph: Rick Friedman for the Guardian

 Once they have identified a potential target inside a prison or jail, traffickers will try to establish a relationship by using letters, phone calls and promises of money and housing when the victim is released. Prison bank accounts are also used to send money to women, establishing a debt that is used to coerce them into prostitution on their release.

 “When I was in prison [in Ohio] I had pimps I knew from the streets, and men I had never met, writing to me to try and convince me to go home with them,” said Amy Williams*, who was incarcerated in state prisons and county jails in Ohio over a 15-year period.

 “Some of us knew what we were going back into but didn’t feel we had any other choice, as they’d be waiting for us anyway. Other girls I knew had no idea that they would be put on the streets by this person.”

 Pimp-controlled prostitution is now recognised as one of the most brutal and pervasive forms of human trafficking in the US. Trafficking is defined under US federal and international law as when a person is induced to perform labour or a commercial sex act through force, fraud or coercion.

 Over the course of the investigation, the Guardian gathered testimony from more than 20 trafficking survivors in 11 states across the country, as well as correctional officers, convicted sex traffickers, law enforcement officials, lawyers, prosecutors and frontline workers. All corroborated that prisons and jails were being used as recruiting grounds for human traffickers.

 There are currently 1.2 million women under the supervision of the criminal justice system in the US. Women now comprise a larger proportion of the prison population than ever before, with the number incarcerated eight times higher than in 1980.

 Many women are jailed for non-violent offences, with 25% incarcerated on drug-related charges. Many of the women interviewed had been jailed multiple times and had fallen in and out of the control of pimps over a period of years.

 A 2017 survey of 130 trafficking survivors by the National Survivor Network, an advocacy and campaigning group, found that 91% of respondents said they had been arrested not only for prostitution but also for the sale and possession of drugs and a range of other crimes.

 “Predators thrive off isolation and trauma, so prisons and jails are perfect hunting grounds because there you have a captive population of women who often have nowhere to go, and no support when they’re released,” said Nicole Bell, a trafficking survivor and founder of Living in Freedom Together, an anti-trafficking organisation in Massachusetts.

 “Now they have figured out how to work the system, these institutions have become like big fish bowls for traffickers. Incarceration takes vulnerable women and makes them more vulnerable,” she said.

 Anti-trafficking campaigners said correctional facilities must do more to prioritise the safety and protection of inmates and ensure staff understand the vulnerability of their institutions to human trafficking.

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest National anti-trafficking advocate Marian Hatcher has accused prisons and jails of failing women. Photograph: Richard Schultz/Handout

 “Our correctional facilities have a legal responsibility to protect the women who are under their charge,” said Marian Hatcher, a national anti-trafficking advocate and human trafficking coordinator at the Cook County sheriff’s office of public policy in Chicago.

 “If inmates are being targeted while inside our prisons and jails by predators, instead of being offered the chance of an alternative when they are released, then this is a systemic failing of our duty of care to some of our country’s most vulnerable women.”

 The US Department of Justice declined to comment.

 *Name changed to protect identity ||||| Kate had spent three years behind bars at Lowell Correctional Institution, Florida’s largest women’s prison, when the letters from Richard Rawls started to arrive.

 Men had written to Kate in prison before, but this time was different. Although she had never met him, Rawls made her feel special. He wrote that he’d seen her mugshot online and couldn’t stop thinking about her. Somehow aware that she was getting out soon, he offered her money, a home and unconditional love when she was released.

 The letters promised Kate a future she never imagined possible – a way out of the cycle of prostitution and incarceration that had defined her life after a childhood of chaos and abuse. Soon, Rawls stopped signing his letters “Rick”; instead, he urged her: “Come on home to your daddy.”

 The Trap – the deadly sex–trafficking cycle in American prisons Read more

 “When you’re in prison, all you think about is getting out,” Kate says. “The hours go by and it really hurts to know that nobody thinks about you in there.

 “So when you get a letter it’s like a gift from God. He told me everything that I wanted to hear. He said I wasn’t going to be a prostitute any more, that I could go home with him and live at his house, and that he would be the love that I was searching for.”

 When Kate walked out of prison, Rawls, a career criminal and convicted felon with more than 47 charges for sexual battery, child abuse, drug possession and assault, was there to pick her up. Just as he had promised.

 I got in the car. He’d brought me two sweater dresses, a Heineken and a lot of crack

 “When I got into the car, he’d brought me two sweater dresses, a bottle of Heineken and a lot of crack,” she says. “I went right back to smoking crack my first day out of prison.”

 When she got back to Rawls’ house, Kate knew immediately she was in trouble. Instead of the comfortable home she had been promised, the house was filthy and chaotic. Cockroaches crawled up the walls. The windows were sealed shut. And hungry, chained pit bull dogs whined and barked outside. Inside the house, Kate found half a dozen other former Lowell inmates.

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest Kate was one of at least 18 women in Florida who fell prey to Richard Rawls over a five-year period. Photograph: Todd Anderson for the Guardian

 “It was just crazy in there, really a living hell,” she says. “At first he gave me all the drugs I wanted, but he made sure that I watched him beat the other girls and I wasn’t allowed to leave his room. Then, after two weeks, it switched up and he started telling me that I owed him for all the drugs he’d given me, and now I had to go make him money.”

 Four months later, a heavily armed Swat team blew in the windows of the house and arrested Rawls, who was later convicted and jailed for human trafficking.

 An 18-month police investigation concluded that, over the course of five years, Rawls had trafficked Kate and at least 18 other women out of jails and prisons across Florida.

 Play Video 1:59 ‘I went right back to smoking crack' – a clip from sex-trafficking documentary The Trap

 At the time of his arrest, he was making thousands of dollars a month from prostituting the multiple women he was keeping at the house. Controlling them with narcotics, prescription pills and brutal beatings, he touted them on street corners and escort websites.

 Rawls remains the only person convicted of trafficking women out of criminal justice institutions in the US. Yet his case is by no means exceptional.

 A flawed system

 A Guardian/Observer investigation has found that jailhouses and prison cells across the US are routinely used as recruiting grounds by pimps and sex buyers.

 Exploiting gaps in the criminal justice system, predators are targeting some of the country’s most vulnerable and isolated women, trapping many in an endless loop of criminalisation and exploitation.

 State to state, the recruitment methods being used to target victims are broadly the same.

 The first stage involves finding potential victims. US public record legislation means that, in many states, anyone charged with a criminal offence will have their personal data posted on government websites. The information can include mugshots, home addresses and details of criminal records. In some states, details of arrests and charges are also printed in local newspapers.

 This means predators can cherrypick potential targets, find where women are being held, and on what charges, and – in some cases – learn when they are likely to be released.

 Information posted online can also include information on bail bonds set for women awaiting court dates.

 Becki, a trafficking survivor from Cincinnati, Ohio, said that in 10 years coming in and out of the criminal justice system, she routinely witnessed pimps and sex buyers using corrupt bail bondsmen to access women in jailhouses.

 “[The pimps] bail you out and when you walk out of jail that’s it, you owe them,” she says. “You’ll do anything not to go back to jail, and so you go out and you have to work it off – and more than likely, you’re then never getting away from this man. He’s got you now.”

 Inside prisons and jails, the use of prison and jail commissary accounts – which allow inmates to receive money from outside to spend on food, toiletries and other essentials – is a key vehicle for recruitment.

 I’d tell the girl he wanted whatever she needed to hear to get in the car with him. It was like ordering food off a menu

 In many facilities, anybody can send money to an inmate.This means that many women are, in effect, financially supported through incarceration by men on the outside, who then demand repayment when they are released.

 Traffickers are also using inmate bank accounts to pay in-house recruiters to scout out potential targets.

 “When I was in prison I’d speak to my pimp every week and tell him about what new girls had come in and then he’d send me money,” said Chloe, a former inmate at a state prison in Ohio.

 “I’d tell the girl he wanted whatever they needed to hear to make sure she got in that car with him when she left. It was like ordering food off a menu.”

 A hotbed for recruitment

 In a remote and dusty prison complex in Venus, Texas, Anthony Harris, a former pimp who who was convicted of compelling prostitution in 2015, laughs when he is asked if he’s heard about pimps recruiting women from prisons and jails.

 “Oh yeah, I hear about that all the time,” he says. “[Jails and prisons] are good recruiting places, because they come out of jail and they have nothing, they have nowhere to go, they have no family, don’t have any money or any food. Other girls will see someone in jail and say: ‘Hey, my guy wants to talk to you’ – and the next thing, you’re putting money on her books and sending her letters.”

 When women are released, pimps wait outside to collect them “like a line of cabs”, says Harris.

 “They probably have never seen you a day in their life, but they become loyal to you because of what you did [for them inside]. So when they get out they feel obliged to continue to be loyal to them, so you just got yourself a new girl.”

 Over the course of the investigation, the Guardian was granted access inside the Western Massachusetts Regional Women’s Correctional Center. It is one of the few institutions that acknowledges it has an issue with the trafficking of inmates.

 Nicole Bell, a trafficking survivor and founder of Lift, a local anti-trafficking organisation, runs workshops inside the jail to prevent inmates being groomed and recruited by pimps and sex buyers. She was repeatedly incarcerated at the jail when she was in the grip of addiction and prostitution on the streets of Worcester.

 Play Video 2:32 ‘I treated [my women] like queens' – a clip from sex-trafficking documentary The Trap

 “I remember the feeling of dread whenever I came back here [to the jail], the feeling of hopelessness, the [sense of]: ‘How did I get back here?’” she says. “It took me a long time to recognise I was a victim myself, because society just treats us like criminals.”

 The problem, says Bell, is that the women she works with don’t fit what many people imagine to be the profile of a trafficking victim. Much domestic trafficking in the US doesn’t involve people being transported across borders or controlled by organised criminal gangs. It is often very small and very local. In 2016, 37% of women who called a national helpline for trafficking victims said they had been trafficked by their partner.

 “Trafficking for many of these women started with a relationship that turned exploitative, or a past that has led them to drug use – but because they’re involved in prostitution and addiction and have a criminal record, they’re treated like a throwaway population,” Bell says.

 In the US, trafficking is defined by exploitation, with victims controlled through fraud, force or coercion.

 “These woman have been hurt and exploited by people their whole lives, but society doesn’t care what happens to them,” says Bell.

 When you get the letters … sometimes you want to believe what they’re telling you is real

 Inside the jail, female inmates showed letters from men they didn’t know. In an effort to befriend them, the senders offered to send them cash and provide them with money, drugs and housing after their release. This grooming process often goes on for months.

 “It gets so lonely in here,” says Jill, 24, her tiny frame swamped by a baggy regulation orange jumpsuit. This is her 22nd time in the jailhouse.

 “I have a boyfriend on the outside but he lets me prostitute, so does he really love me? And he lies to me all the time. When you get the letters from these men, sometimes you want to believe what they’re telling you is real.”

 She shrugs her shoulders. “When you’re in jail, you’re all alone. Sometimes, without them we’d have nobody,” she says. “My family won’t help me.”

 Many of the women here know the men writing to them are pimps or sex buyers, but say that without their support they’d have nowhere to go when released.

 “I know girls who survive in here because of the men,” says Katrina, another inmate. “Imagine you’re in here for a year and they’re supporting you. What do you think they want when we get out? Imagine you say you don’t want to go back to disrespecting your body. That’s just not going to fly. Nothing’s for free, I’ve learned that.”

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest A scene from The Trap. Photograph: Alex Healey for the Guardian

 A matter of survival

 While many women in America’s booming $9.5bn (£7.2bn) sex trade work independently, pimp-controlled prostitution is now widely acknowledged as one of the most brutal and pervasive forms of human trafficking in the US.

 Prostitution is illegal in every state bar a few counties in Nevada. According to FBI data, more than 39,000 people were arrested for prostitution and related charges in 2016. It is believed that 80% of women arrested on prostitution charges are either under the control of a third party or have been trafficked at some point.

 Of the 20 trafficking survivors who contributed to the investigation, the majority alleged they had been arrested multiple times for crimes committed while they were under the control of a trafficker.

 “Vulnerable women who are being controlled and exploited continue to be arrested every day,” says Rebecca Bender, a national anti-trafficking advocate. She says a recent move in many states away from arresting women for prostitution has been falsely held up as a solution to the criminalisation of trafficking victims.

 “There is little awareness that many women in a trafficking situation are also forced into many different illegal activities, which make them a target for re-arrest by the police,” she says.

 The impact of having a criminal record often makes it impossible for women leaving incarceration to find employment and safe housing, or to regain custody of their children.

 Facebook Twitter Pinterest Nikki Bell, founder and director of anti-trafficking organisation Living in Freedom Together. Photograph: Rick Friedman for the Guardian

 “I try to help them when they get out but we don’t have a safe house, so when they’re released the traffickers are the ones who can help meet their basic needs,” says Bell. “It’s a matter of survival.”

 Solutions, say advocates like Bell and Bender, have to start inside the facilities themselves, where there is an urgent need for staff training and more interventions to support women.

 Since the Rawls case, the Department of Corrections in Florida has implemented anti-trafficking training and awareness measures designed to educate staff and inmates about human trafficking.

 In a statement to the Guardian, the Florida Department of Corrections said it had fully cooperated with the Rawls enquiry and added: “The department is committed to preventing human trafficking and working with our partners in law enforcement to ensure any individual involved is criminally prosecuted. We take all allegations of this devastating crime very seriously, and have implemented aggressive measures to protect our most vulnerable populations from this enterprise.”

 For many, however, support either in prison or outside is simply not available.

 “These are some of the most vulnerable, high-risk individuals in our society,” says Bell. “At the moment, most are just trapped in a continuous loop of abuse and exploitation.”

 • Living in Freedom Together supports survivors of sexual exploitation in Massachusetts |||||
What is a summary?

– The information is readily available online: The mugshot of a female inmate, the charges she was convicted on, and her release date. And predators are using it, finds the Guardian in an investigation. It reports that sex traffickers are both wooing "potential victims while they are still behind bars" and even preying on them before they get there by manipulating the bail bond system. The Guardian found cases where pimps paid women's bail—alerted to their situation, again, by online records or nefarious bondsmen—only to force them into sex work to "pay off" that debt in Florida, Texas, Ohio, North Carolina, and Mississippi. And it's not occasional, according to a former Florida prosecutor who tells the Guardian that all but about 20% of the sex trafficking cases she handled in 2016 involved these bondsmen working with traffickers. For the women already in prison, the traffickers use letters and calls to reel them in. In a companion piece, the Guardian shares Kate's story: While incarcerated at Florida's Lowell Correctional Institution, a stranger named Richard Rawls began to write to her, saying he saw her mugshot online and that it stuck with him. He knew she'd be out soon. He told her to "come on home to your daddy," that he would provide a comfortable home and all the love she needed. Instead, she was taken to a roach-infested house guarded by pit bulls; inside were other former inmates from the same prison. Rawls fed her drugs then demanded she pay him back for them by working as a prostitute. Four months later, she was freed by a SWAT team. Read the full investigation here, or more on Rawls here.


News article:

US turns over Hezbollah prisoner to Iraqi government

 By Jeremy Herb -

 The U.S. handed over a Hezbollah prisoner suspected of being involved in the deaths of five U.S. soldiers to the Iraqi government Friday, as U.S. troops prepare to leave the country, the White House said.

 The Obama administration had been pushing Iraq to allow the U.S. to keep Ali Musa Daqduq in U.S. custody, and President Obama discussed it with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki when he visited the White House Monday, National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said.

 But the Iraqi government wouldn’t agree to let the U.S. taking Daqduq out of Iraq, and the U.S. legally had to transfer him to Iraqi custody under the security agreement negotiated by the Bush administration in 2008, Vietor said.

 The decision to hand the last prisoner in U.S. custody over to the Iraqis was blasted by Republicans and Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) Friday, who had wanted him transferred to Guantánamo Bay for a military tribunal.

 A statement from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Lieberman and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) called the move “disgraceful.”

 “Coming on the heels of the Administration's failure to maintain a small American military presence in Iraq to support the fragile peace there, this failure to keep a committed murderer of Americans in U.S. custody sends exactly the wrong message to our allies and enemies in the region,” the statement said.

 Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said: “Given Iraq’s history of releasing detainees, I expect it is only a matter of time before this terrorist will be back on the battlefield.”

 Vietor said that the administration did not want to send any more detainees to Guantanamo, and the U.S. had discussed transferring him to a U.S. military commission.

 “The president has been clear that he believes it’s in our national security interest to close the detention facility of Guantanamo Bay, not add to the population,” Vietor said.

 Vietor said the Iraqis have given assurances to the administration that Daqduq will be tried for his crimes.

 Daqduq is accused of organizing a 2007 raid in Karbala, Iraq, where five U.S. soldiers were killed.

 Under the security agreement with Iraq, the U.S. must return all prisoners to Iraqi custody as it leaves the country. The U.S. marked the end of the Iraq war Thursday and is in the process of withdrawing the final troops from the country by the end of the month. ||||| As the United States winds down its military role in Iraq , on Friday it turned over its last detainee in the country to Iraqi authorities, but not without serious concerns.The Obama administration had been trying to convince the Iraqi government for months to allow the extradition of Ali Mussa Daqduq, a suspected Hezbollah operative, to the U.S. for trial. Daqduq is accused of orchestrating a 2007 kidnapping that resulted in the killing of five U.S. military personnel.But ultimately, Baghdad would not cooperate.“Because of the president’s concerns about the crimes Daqduq is alleged to have committed, we worked a wide range of options consistent with U.S. and Iraqi law to effect his transfer to a U.S. military commission. We did so because we felt that was the fastest possible way to bring him to justice. We are continuing to discuss this case with the Iraqis, and as of this morning, he has been transferred to Iraqi custody,” said Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the National Security Council, said in a statement.“We take this case very seriously, and for that reason have sought and received assurances that he will be tried for his crimes,” Vietor said. “We have worked this at the highest levels of the U.S. and Iraqi governments, and we continue to discuss with the Iraqis the best way to ensure that he faces justice.”But that wasn’t enough to reassure lawmakers who said they remain concerned the Iraqi government will release Daqduq for political reasons.In a statement, Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), and Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the Senate minority leader, termed the administration’s actions “disgraceful.”“The real test regarding Daqduq was not whether the United States should violate our security agreement with Iraq in order to maintain custody of him outside of the country. The real test was whether the United States could exercise our influence effectively with the Iraqi government to ensure that a committed killer of Americans would be held accountable for his crimes in the U.S. system of justice. The administration has clearly failed that test,” the senators said. “As a result, we are deeply concerned that Daqduq will never have to answer for his involvement in killing U.S. citizens, that he could be released from Iraqi custody for political reasons, and that he would then return to the fight against the United States and our friends.” |||||
What is a shorter version of the above article?

– As the US wound down its operations in Iraq this week, it transferred its last remaining detainee over to Iraqi authorities, reports the Los Angeles Times. The move was a controversial one because Ali Musa Daqduq is accused of being a Hezbollah operative behind a 2007 Iraqi raid that resulted in the deaths of five US soldiers. Critics—especially Republicans—wanted him transferred to Gitmo, but Iraqi authorities refused to let him out of the country, explains the Hill. "This failure to keep a committed murderer of Americans in US custody sends exactly the wrong message to our allies and enemies in the region,” said a statement from John McCain, Mitch McConnell, Joe Lieberman, and Lindsey Graham. Their fears that he'll get soft treatment may come true: The AP reports today that he will be prosecuted in Iraq only for the relatively minor charge of using a forged passport to enter the country. However, the US promises to press the case, and it's possible further charges could come.


Summarize this article:

U.S. v. Michael Cohen (1:18-cr-850, Southern District of New York)

 Michael Cohen of New York, New York, pleaded guilty on Nov. 29, 2018, to making false statements to the U.S. Congress in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1001 (a)(2). Cohen was sentenced on December 12, 2018, to serve two months in prison and pay a $50,000 fine.

 Plea Agreement

 Criminal Information

 U.S. v. Paul J. Manafort, Jr. (1:17-cr-201, District of Columbia)

 Paul J. Manafort, Jr., of Alexandria, Va., pleaded guilty on September 14, 2018, to a superseding criminal information filed today in the District of Columbia, which includes conspiracy against the United States (conspiracy to commit money laundering, tax fraud, failing to file Foreign Bank Account Reports and Violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act, and lying and misrepresenting to the Department of Justice) and conspiracy to obstruct justice (witness tampering).

 Superseding Criminal Information

 Exhibits

 Plea Agreement

 Statement of the Offense

 U.S. v. Viktor Borisovich Netyksho, et al (1:18-cr-215, District of Columbia)

 A federal grand jury in the District of Columbia returned an indictment on July 13, 2018, against 12 Russian nationals for their alleged roles in computer hacking conspiracies aimed at interfering in the 2016 U.S. elections. The indictment charges 11 of the defendants with conspiracy to commit computer crimes, eight counts of aggravated identity theft, and conspiracy to launder money. Two defendants are charged with a separate conspiracy to commit computer crimes.

 Indictment

 U.S. v. Konstantin Kilimnik (1:17-cr-201, District of Columbia)

 A federal grand jury in the District of Columbia returned a third superseding indictment on June 8, 2018, against Konstantin Kilimnik, of Moscow, Russia. Kilimnik is charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice and obstruction of justice.

 Third Superseding Indictment

 U.S. v. Richard W. Gates III (1:17-cr-201, District of Columbia)

 Richard W. Gates III of Richmond, Va., pleaded guilty on Feb. 23, 2018, to a superseding criminal information that includes: count one of the indictment, which charges conspiracy against the United States, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 371 (which includes conspiracy to violate 26 U.S.C. 7206(1), 31 U.S.C. 5312 and 5322(b), and 22 U.S.C. 612, 618(a)(1), and 618(a)(2)), and a charge of making false statements to the Special Counsel’s Office and FBI agents, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1001.

 Superseding Criminal Information

 Plea Agreement

 Statement of the Offense

 U.S. v. Paul J. Manafort, Jr., and Richard W. Gates III (1:18-cr-83, Eastern District of Virginia)

 Paul J. Manafort, Jr., of Alexandria, Va., and Richard W. Gates III, of Richmond, Va., were indicted by a federal grand jury on Feb. 22, 2018, in the Eastern District of Virginia. The indictment contains 32 counts: 16 counts related to false individual income tax returns, seven counts of failure to file reports of foreign bank and financial accounts, five counts of bank fraud conspiracy, and four counts of bank fraud. On March 1, 2018, the court granted a motion to dismiss without prejudice the charges against Gates, following his guilty plea in a related case in the District of Columbia (1:17-cr-201). On Aug. 21, 2018, a federal jury found Manafort guilty on eight counts: counts 1-5, subscribing to a false individual income tax return for tax years 2010-2014; count 12, failure to file reports of foreign bank and financial accounts for year 2012; count 25, bank fraud; and count 27, bank fraud. The court declared a mistrial on 10 counts (counts 11, 13-14, 24, 26, 28-32). As part of his plea agreement on Sept. 14, 2018, Manafort admitted his guilt of the remaining counts against him in this case.

 Indictment

 U.S. v. Alex van der Zwaan (1:18-cr-31, District of Columbia)

 Alex van der Zwaan, of London, pleaded guilty on Feb. 20, 2018, to making false statements to FBI agents, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1001. Van der Zwaan was sentenced on April 3, 2018, to serve 30 days in prison and pay a $20,000 fine.

 Criminal Information

 Plea Agreement

 Statement of the Offense

 U.S. v. Internet Research Agency, et al (1:18-cr-32, District of Columbia)

 A federal grand jury in the District of Columbia returned an indictment on Feb. 16, 2018, against 13 Russian nationals and three Russian entities accused of violating U.S. criminal laws in order to interfere with U.S. elections and political processes. The indictment charges all of the defendants with conspiracy to defraud the United States, three defendants with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and bank fraud, and five defendants with aggravated identity theft.

 Indictment

 U.S. v. Richard Pinedo, et al (1:18-cr-24, District of Columbia)

 Richard Pinedo, of Santa Paula, Calif., pleaded guilty on Feb. 12, 2018, to identity fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1028. On Oct. 10, 2018, Pinedo was sentenced to serve six months in prison, followed by six months of home confinement, and ordered to complete 100 hours of community service.

 Criminal Information

 Plea Agreement

 Statement of Offense

 U.S. v. Michael T. Flynn (1:17-cr-232, District of Columbia)

 Lieutenant General Michael T. Flynn (Ret.), of Alexandria, Va., pleaded guilty on Dec. 1, 2017, to making false statements to FBI agents, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1001.

 Criminal Information

 Plea Agreement

 Statement of the Offense

 U.S. v. George Papadopoulos (1:17-cr-182, District of Columbia)

 George Papadopoulos, of Chicago, Illinois, pleaded guilty on Oct. 5, 2017, to making false statements to FBI agents, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1001. The case was unsealed on Oct. 30, 2017. On Sept. 7, 2018, Papadopoulos was sentenced to serve 14 days in prison, pay a $9,500 fine, and complete 200 hours of community service.

 Criminal Information

 Plea Agreement

 Statement of the Offense ||||| 01:34

 White House chief of staff John Kelly waded into the debate over Confederate statues late Monday, stating in an interview that the civil war was prompted by an inability to compromise, while suggesting both sides acted in “good faith”.

 Speaking with Fox News in a rare interview, Kelly described Confederate general Robert E Lee as “an honorable man” while discussing the recent push to remove monuments and symbols memorializing the pro-slavery Confederacy.

 “There are certain things in history that were good, and other things that were not so good,” Kelly told Fox News host Laura Ingraham.

 Kelly went on to say that Lee, the general of the Confederate army during the American civil war, “was a man that gave up his country to fight for his state”.

 “It was always loyalty to state first back in those days,” said Kelly, while adding:

 But the lack of an ability to compromise led to the civil war. And men and women of good faith on both sides made their stand where their conscience had to make their stand.”

 Kelly’s comments echoed those made by Donald Trump in the aftermath of the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia in August, when a white supremacist drove his car into counter protesters, leaving one woman dead and several others injured.

 The president sparked controversy in the days that followed by blaming violence “on both sides”, appearing to put neo-Nazis and white supremacists on equal footing with those demonstrating against them. ||||| George Papadopolous, a former foreign policy adviser to President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign, admitted to lying to the FBI in January, before Robert Mueller took over the probe. | Jacquelyn Martin/AP Former Trump campaign adviser pleads guilty to lying to FBI about Russia contacts Papadopoulos said he had been told as early as April 2016 that Russia had 'thousands of emails' related to Hillary Clinton.

 A foreign policy adviser to President Donald Trump’s campaign secretly pleaded guilty earlier this month to lying to the FBI and said he had been told as early as April 2016 that Russia had "thousands of emails" related to Democrat Hillary Clinton, court records made public on Monday show.

 George Papadopoulos, 30, entered the guilty plea in a closed courtroom in Washington on Oct. 5, special counsel Robert Mueller’s office announced. Papadopoulos is cooperating with Mueller’s prosecution team, according to a plea agreement released Monday.

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 The court records offer the clearest evidence yet that a Trump-connected individual knew Russia had obtained thousands of emails related to Clinton, months before the leaks began of exchanges hacked from Democrats' email accounts. Papadopoulos' agreement was also the first guilty plea to be made public in Mueller's long-running probe of Russian interference in the 2016 campaign.

 The documents became public on the same day an indictment was unsealed against Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and adviser Rick Gates for money laundering and other charges. But unlike the 12 counts against that duo, the single felony count against Papadopoulos directly relates to 2016 presidential campaign activity.

 An attorney for Papadopoulos, Thomas Breen, declined to comment. “We will have the opportunity to comment on George’s involvement when called upon by the Court at a later date. We look forward to presenting all the facts that led to the events that resulted in this charge," Breen said.

 White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders sought to distance the president from Papadopoulos on Monday, referring to him as a "volunteer" whose role with the Trump campaign had been "extremely limited." At no point was Papadopoulos acting in an official capacity for the campaign, Sanders said, saying he was part of an advisory committee that met only once.

 "We've been saying from day one there's been no evidence of Trump-Russia collusion and nothing in the indictment today changes that at all," Sanders said. "I'm not here to speak on behalf of the, you know, thousands of people who may have volunteered on the campaign."

 The 30-year-old was photographed at a meeting with Trump, and the president listed him among his advisers during a 2016 meeting with The Washington Post's editorial board, characterizing him as an "excellent guy."

 In the agreement, Papadopoulos admitted to lying to the FBI in an initial interview in January — shortly after Trump's inauguration and months before Mueller took over the probe — about contacts with an overseas professor with Russian government contacts and with a representative of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

 Papadopoulos acknowledged in the initial interview that the professor claimed the Russian government had "dirt" on Democratic presidential candidate Clinton in the form of "thousands of emails." However, Papadopoulos admitted in his plea that he had falsely told the FBI the contacts took place a year or so before he joined the Trump campaign.

 It is unclear exactly which emails Papadopoulos believed Russia had or how they had obtained them. But in July 2016, the website Wikileaks published emails hacked from the accounts of the Democratic National Committee. Trump, then the Republican nominee, subsequently called on Russia to hack and release Clinton's own emails from her time as secretary of state.

 Later in the campaign, hacked emails from Clinton's campaign chairman, John Podesta, were also made public. The intelligence community has said the hacks appeared to be part of a wide-ranging effort by Moscow to meddle in the 2016 election and to hurt Clinton. Mueller's investigation includes whether any Trump campaign aides helped Russia with that effort.

 A statement of facts Papadopoulos agreed to as part of the plea also shows he repeatedly discussed his Russia-related contacts with top campaign officials, including a potential meeting between the then-Republican candidate and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

 The encounter never took place, but the court filing notes that an unnamed campaign "supervisor" approved a trip to Moscow by Papadopoulos and another foreign policy adviser.

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 Previous reports said then-campaign manager Corey Lewandowski approved a trip to Russia by Trump adviser Carter Page. Lewandowski and Page were not accused of any crime in the cases unsealed Monday.

 J.D. Gordon, a former Defense Department spokesman who acted as a national security adviser to the Trump campaign along with Jeff Sessions, now Trump's attorney general, said Papadopoulos acted outside the campaign's chain of command.

 “I was surprised to learn today what George Papadopoulos was up to during the campaign. He obviously went to great lengths to go around me and Senator Sessions. Presidential campaigns are like that," Gordon said. "It’s very hard to know what every single person is doing, especially since some folks deliberately go around the chain of command or circumvent it. George Papadopoulos obviously represents an extreme case.”

 Papadopoulos’ stint on the Trump campaign followed a brief stint advising the campaign of Ben Carson, who dropped out of the race after Trump gained steam.

 Carson’s campaign manager Barry Bennett — who went on to join Trump’s campaign after Carson dropped out — said he never interacted with Papadopoulos after leaving Carson’s camp.

 “He came on in December and left after Iowa, so he was on 6 weeks or so. He was 28 then. Very junior. Have no idea how he got on Trump list,” Bennett said in an email. “Did not and would not have suggested it.

 The court document also appears to reference Manafort. In May 2016, Papadopoulos sent an email to a "high-ranking campaign official" saying, "Russia has been eager to meet Mr. Trump for quite sometime and have been reaching out to me to discuss." The official forwarded the note to another campaign aide and said: "Let[']s discuss. We need someone to communicate that OT is not doing these trips. It should be someone low level in the campaign so as not to send any signal."

 In August, the Washington Post reported that Manafort had received a similar email from Papadopoulos and forwarded it to Gates, saying, "We need someone to communicate that DT is not doing these trips."

 Shortly after Papadopoulos’ second round of questioning by the FBI in February, he deactivated his Facebook account, ceased using his cell phone number and switched to a new one, according to the factual statement he admitted to in his guilty plea.

 The former campaign adviser was arrested July 27 at Dulles airport outside Washington as he arrived on a flight from Munich, court records show. The day after Papadopoulos' arrest, he appeared in court in Alexandria, Va., and was released on his own recognizance after prosecutors did not seek his detention.

 While the initial complaint in the case charged Papadopoulos with both making false statements and obstruction of justice, that charge was dropped when the plea deal was filed early last month.

 The felony false statements charge carries a maximum possible penalty of five years in prison, but sentences are typically much shorter than that, especially when a defendant pleads guilty and cooperates with prosecutors.

 Papadopoulos' guilty plea was unsealed Monday morning just as Trump took to Twitter to downplay the significance of the Manafort and Gates charges and to note that they did not appear to relate to the campaign.

 "Sorry, but this is years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the Trump campaign. But why aren't Crooked Hillary & the Dems the focus?????" Trump asked, adding: "Also, there is NO COLLUSION!"

 The president did not immediately address the Papadopoulos plea, which has a much stronger nexus to the 2016 Trump campaign.

 Kyle Cheney, Darren Samuelsohn, Josh Meyer and Josh Dawsey contributed to this report.

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 An early foreign-policy adviser and aide to President Donald Trump's campaign team secretly pleaded guilty earlier this month to making false statements to the FBI about the nature and extent of his contacts with foreign nationals who he knew had ties to senior Russian government officials.

 George Papadopoulos, 30, was a foreign-policy adviser to Trump's campaign in early 2016. He sent at least six emails to top Trump advisers during the campaign offering to set up meetings with Russian officials, The Washington Post reported in August. The first of those emails was sent in March 2016 with the subject line "Meeting with Russian Leadership - Including Putin."

 The newly unsealed charge, filed October 3 by the special counsel Robert Mueller's office, said that on January 27 Papadopoulos lied to FBI agents about "the timing, extent, and nature of his relationships and interactions with certain foreign nationals whom he understood to have close connections with senior Russian government officials."

 Papadopoulos told the FBI that his outreach to the Russia-linked foreign nationals occurred before he joined the campaign, the FBI document said. But his first interaction with an "overseas professor" with ties to high-level Russian officials occurred on March 14, 2016, weeks after he joined the campaign. That professor told Papadopoulos just over a month later that the Russians had dirt on Hillary Clinton that came in the form of "thousands of emails," according to the FBI document.

 Papadopoulos further told the FBI that he met with a Russian woman who claimed to be a relative of Russian President Vladimir Putin — Papadopoulos described her as Putin's "niece" in one email — before he joined the campaign, but he actually met her on March 24, according to the special counsel's office.

 "He believed she had connections to Russian government officials; and he sought to use her Russian connections over a period of months in an effort to arrange a meeting between the campaign and Russian government officials," the filing says.

 linkedin/gpapadopoulos7

 The professor introduced Papadopoulos via email to a person in Moscow with ties to Russia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs on April 18, according to the filing. They had multiple conversations over the next few weeks to lay the groundwork for a meeting between the Trump campaign and Russian government officials.

 Papadopoulos emailed then-campaign manager Corey Lewandowski in April saying he had received "a lot of calls over the past month" about how "Putin wants to host the Trump team when the time is right," according to The Post. He emailed Lewandowski and another campaign adviser, Sam Clovis, on May 4 to ask again about setting up a meeting.

 "There are legal issues we need to mitigate, meeting with foreign officials as a private citizen," Clovis replied.

 Two months later, on July 14, 2016, Papadopoulos emailed one of the foreign contacts and indicated a meeting had "been approved from our side."

 The meeting, Papadopoulos wrote, would be "for August or September in the UK (London) with me and my national chairman, and maybe one other foreign policy adviser and you, members of president putin's office and the mfa to hold a day of consultations and to meet one another."

 Papadopoulos was arrested on July 27 of this year upon his arrival to Dulles airport in Washington, DC, and met with government agents several times thereafter. He pleaded guilty on October 5 and now appears to be a cooperating witness in Mueller's investigation.

 "The Papodopolous guilty plea seems very significant," said William Yeomans, a former deputy assistant attorney general who spent 26 years at the Justice Department.

 "As I understand it, he lied about his contact — while he was with the campaign — with a professor with ties to the Russian government. That brings campaign collusion into play. It's early. There will undoubtedly be more to come."

 Read the full statement of the offense against Papadopoulos below: ||||| An advisor to President Donald Trump's campaign pleaded guilty on Oct. 5 to lying to FBI agents about when he met with Russian nationals to get "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, according to court filings released Monday.

 The documents revealed that George Papadopoulos was arrested on July 27 upon arrival at Dulles International Airport from an undisclosed location.

 According to the documents, shortly after Papadopoulos learned he would become a foreign policy advisor to the Trump campaign, he met in March 2016 with a Russian professor who claimed to have "dirt" on Clinton. Investigators say Papadopoulos had told them he met with the professor before he learned of his role in the campaign.

 Ten days later, Papadopoulos met with a female Russian national who was introduced to him as a niece of Russian President Vladimir Putin with ties to senior Kremlin officials, investigators said.

 Papadopoulos later learned, however, that the woman was in fact not related to Putin.

 He told investigators that his correspondence with the woman was superficial when in fact the purpose of the contacts was to set up a meeting between Russian leaders and the Trump campaign, the court filings said.

 The filings say Papadopoulos is cooperating with the U.S. government in its ongoing investigation of Russian attempts to interfere in the 2016 election.

 In a Monday afternoon press briefing, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Papadopoulos had an "extremely limited" role in the 2016 campaign. She said he was in a "volunteer position" and had not done work in an "official capacity on behalf of the campaign."

 But investigators said a campaign supervisor had urged Papadopoulos to try to visit Russia for an off-the record meeting with officials.

 Papadopoulos' attorneys declined to comment on the case.

 "We will have the opportunity to comment on George's involvement when called upon by the Court at a later date," his legal representatives said. "We look forward to telling all of the details of George's story at that time." |||||

– The unsealed indictment against Paul Manafort made big headlines on Monday, but another development in the Robert Mueller investigation might have more troubling implications for President Trump. That's because while the Manafort charges have no connection to the Trump campaign, this one does, notes Politico. Former campaign adviser George Papadopoulos, 30, has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his outreach to a Russian national who promised "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, reports CNBC. Papadopoulos initially told the FBI that this contact was a "nothing," but he has since acknowledged that he knew the professor had "substantial connections to Russian government officials," per the New York Times. The case is outlined in court documents here. Papadopoulos also told the FBI that his contact with the professor took place before he joined the Trump campaign, when, in fact, Papadopoulos met with the professor days after becoming an adviser, reports the Guardian. The Times calls his guilty plea, which occurred earlier this month, "the most explicit evidence connecting the Trump campaign to the Russian government's meddling in last year's election." Similarly, Papadopoulos met with a woman he believed to be related to Vladimir Putin after joining the campaign, even though he told the FBI the contact occurred beforehand, reports Business Insider. "He believed she had connections to Russian government officials; and he sought to use her Russian connections over a period of months in an effort to arrange a meeting between the campaign and Russian government officials," per the court filing.