Aim your browsers here in an hour for a chat with poker superstars Howard Lederer and Andy Bloch. They’ll be here primarily to discuss the bill sponsored by Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) that would legalize and regulate online poker and online gambling. But feel free to inquire about poker policy in general, including the raids on neighborhood games we’ve discussed here, the history and culture of the game, and whatever else tickles your fancy. Because we’ll only have them for an hour, however, I doubt they’ll be answering much in the way of tips on strategy, etc.

Andy Bloch is one of the guys who beat the Vegas casinos at blackjack, providing the inspiration for the recent movie 21. He has won over $4 million playing professional poker. He’s one of the sponsoring pros at the poker website Full Tilt Poker, where he donates all of the money he wins on low limit games to charity. Read more about Bloch at his website (or follow his Twitter feed).

Howard Lederer has two World Series of Poker gold bracelets and has finished in the money at the event 38 times. He’s probably one of the most well-known faces of the game. Wikipedia puts his lifetime live winnings at $4.8 million. Lederer is a co-founder of Full Tilt and on the board of directors of the Poker Players Alliance, the lobbying group that’s trying to get the online game legalized. Read more about Howard here.

PPA also helped set up this chat.

I’m tardy in blogging this, but Cato has published a terrific study by Glenn Greenwald on Portugal’s eight-year experiment with drug decriminalization. The fact that most people probably weren’t aware that use of even hard drugs in Portugal doesn’t carry a criminal sanction is a pretty good sign that the program is working.

And that’s what Greenwald found when he visited. Overdoses were down, drug-related crime and violence was down, and there was no measurable uptick in overall drug use.

Even Portugal’s approach still falls short of a policy centered around individual freedom, and we should hesitate before drawing any broad conclusions about a policy enacted in a country with a comparable small and homogenous population (as compared with the U.S.), but it’s certainly a nice counter to people who always invoke Amsterdam in the drug war debate.

Generally speaking, anyone who claims to know for certain what would happen if America were to legalize drugs tomorrow is spewing nonsense. We’ve had some form of prohibition in this country for 100 years. No one knows exactly what will happen.

That’s why I favor a federalist approach. There are sound Ninth Amendment arguments for finding an actual constitutional right to control what you put into your body. That’s never going to happen. And even if it did, I’d be afraid the change would be too sudden and drastic for much of the country. Instead, just end the drug war at the federal level. A federalist approach would let states and, preferably, localities formulate their own policies. You’d have little Amsterdams, Portugals, and Switzerlands, and you’d also have little Utahs, Louisianas, and Georgias. You’d probably have some cities that completely legalize. And you’d have places, probably entire states, that don’t change a thing.

We’d then have lots of models to look at and analyze. And people for whom this is an important issue could then vote with their feet, and move to jurisdictions with drug laws that reflect their own values.

Greenwald’s study shows that decriminalization over broader geographic area doesn’t have to produce the tourist effect we’ve seen in Amsterdam (although even that effect tends to be exaggerated).

Better yet, the study has gotten some really nice play in the media, including write-ups in Time and the Scientific American.

Here’s Greenwald discussing the study and a few other issues with Reason.tv:

Words fail:

With no medical examiner or pathologist at the top of the state’s food chain, Attala County Coroner Sam Bell asked the Attala County Board of Supervisors to consider hiring Dr. Steve Hayne as the county’s pathologist.

Bell said Hayne had been hired by 38 other counties and he wanted Attala County to be the 39th. He said it would be at no additional cost to the county.

For years, many counties had relied on Dr. Steve Hayne to do autopsies. But in August, Public Safety Commissioner Steve Simpson removed Hayne from a list of approved pathologists.

The state has contracted with Forensic Medical Inc. of Nashville to conduct autopsies here. The company is paid $1,000 per autopsy.

Bell said with the Nashville company, there is a three to four month turnaround to getting the autopsies.

The company rotates a pathologist every week to perform autopsies in Mississippi. The pathologist works out of the medical examiner’s office at the state Crime Lab.

Bell added that the company’s reports are also not has extensive as the reports were from Hayne. He said District Attorney Doug Evans’ office was in favor of using Hayne.

I’m sure he is. Hayne’s typical turnaround time on an autopsy report was 6-7 months, though if there was a homicide that might require his testimony, he could get it all done quite a bit more quickly. When he was fired by the state last summer, he had a backlog of 600 cases.

Meanwhile, it’s been more than a year now, and the state still has not hired a state medical examiner, a position that’s required by state law, but has been vacant for 14 years. Oddly, the Clarion-Ledger article states that the state’s coroners and district attorneys thus far have had no complaints about the private firm in Nashville.

Browse my prior reporting on Hayne and Mississipi’s broken forensics system here.

Snap of a mini-van bumper sticker sent in by a reader.

Once again, cops aren’t soldiers. American cities aren’t battlefields. And U.S. citizens aren’t potential combatants. This isn’t pedantry. It’s about the mentality with which police officers approach their job, and about what sort of relationship they’re going to have with the people whose rights they’re supposed to be protecting.

This is just amazing.

And she’s suing.

Back in 2005, a Walmart worker in Pennsylvania reported 59-year-old Donna Dull to local authorities after she dropped off some film that included shots of her three-year-old granddaughter in and just out of the bath. Dull was arrested–roughly, she says–and charged with producing and distributing child pornography. The charges were dropped 15 months later when a Pennsylvania special prosecutor overruled the local DA. Only Dull, her attorney, and police and prosecutors have apparently seen the photos, which are now under seal.

In this follow-up article from the York Daily Record, state officials seem to be trying to reassure parents and grandparents that they have nothing to worry about–that you needn’t fret about having your life ruined and reputation destroyed by false child porn charges for taking nude pictures of your infant and toddler son or daughter. Problem is, their reassurances aren’t very convincing.

Christopher Moore, a special prosecutor in the York County District Attorney’s Office, is after “perverts, not parents.”

Moore was commenting on the “gray area” between the typical family picture of the 2-year-old getting a bath in the kitchen sink and a picture a pedophile may enjoy.

It can be the same picture, Moore said.

But, Moore added, that is not a reason for parents and grandparents to avoid taking those pictures…

“It’s not what the (child protection) law was designed for. Your rights are not restricted in any form by the law.”

But it appears that’s precisely what Dull was arrested for. And the DA in Dull’s case insists he was right. Or at least he’s pretty sure he was:

[District Attorney] Rebert said in Dull’s case, “What made them offensive was their graphic nature. A little girl with her bare butt showing, kind of looking over her shoulder.

“It’s a difficult distinction to make. What’s a cute butt and what’s pornographic?

“I think what she (Dull) did was stupid and in very poor judgment. It was an interesting case and I think we did the right thing.”

So because the photo could have been interpreted as pornographic by someone who was looking for child porn, arresting the woman and ruining her life (or at least severely disrupting it) was the “right thing” to do. From the description, we aren’t talking about splayed legs or exposed genitalia, here. It’s a kid’s butt, and a playful peer over the shoulder. I’m glad Special Prosecutor Moore overruled District Attorney Rebert, but that Dull was arrested in the first place puts the lie to Moore’s assertion that this sort of hysteria “is not a reason for parents and grandparents to avoid taking those pictures.” It most certainly is. Or at least getting them printed somewhere outside your home. Unless you consider an arrest and 15 months under the label of “accused child pornographer” to be harmless.

It only gets more confusing from there. Here’s the prosecutor who initially approved the charges against Dull:

David Cook, now in private practice . . . declined to say if he disagreed with Rebert’s decision to dismiss the charges.

He did say, “There was no legitimate purpose for those photographs. I would never pose my daughter or my step-daughter like that.

“It kind of boils down to a gut feeling. If it feels wrong, it probably is.”

That sounds . . . ambiguous. How are Pennsylvania residents supposed to follow the law if the state’s prosecutors can’t even agree on its application?

Here, once again, is Special Prosecutor Moore, again laying out yet more guidelines that are nearly impossible for anyone to follow:

“It’s a subjective versus objective standard,” Moore said. “You think it’s cute. Someone else might think different. That doesn’t make it a crime.

“Lots of sexual offenders use the Sears catalog to get off. That doesn’t make (the catalog) illegal.”

“It’s a reasonable person standard with the reasonable person being a juror,” Boyles said.

“And reasonable people can disagree,” Moore said. “That’s the gray area. That’s when it comes to us.”

Boyles and Moore also agreed that parents don’t need to worry unnecessarily.

“Family pictures are family pictures,” Boyles said.

“But if more of your pictures of your kids are of them naked rather than clothed, you might have a problem.”

So in sum, if you don’t want to get arrested and charged for taking nude photos of your infant or toddler, make sure you know what criteria your local prosecutor uses when navigating that “gray area” between a cute butt and a criminally alluring one (note: you probably don’t want to actually pose this question to your DA). Also, if you find yourself under investigation after dropping a roll of film off at the CVS, you might want to bake the prosecutor some cookies, since it appears that his “gut” will be the final arbiter of whether you’re a doting parent or an accused child pornographer.

Finally, even if the nude photos you’ve taken of your kids pass the clear-as-mud “cute butt,” “gut feeling,” and “reasonable people can disagree/that’s when it comes to us” tests, and are deemed innocent as a basket of puppies, you could still be in violation of the law if the state determines that the clothed to unclothed-but-innocent ratio in your family photo albums is inappropriate.

Got all that? Good. Because we promise, you really have nothing to worry about.

Below, a list of where I’ll be speaking over the next couple of months. The Drexel event I believe will be open to the public. The others require you to purchase tickets of some sort.

Thursday, May 7: Las Vegas
Clark County Libertarian Party
Gordon Biersch Restaurant
More details here.
Topic: Criminal justice

Tuesday, May 12: Drexel University
Details forthcoming.
Topic: Police militarization.

Saturday, May 16: Indiana/Kentucky Libertarian Party Convention
Clarksville, Indiana
Details here.
Topic: Libertarianism.

June 19 and 20: The Independence Institute’s Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Party
Bennett, Colorado
Details here.
Topic: The Nanny State.

Ashton Kutcher, writing about the founders of Twitter in the latest issue of Time:

Years from now, when historians reflect on the time we are currently living in, the names Biz Stone and Evan Williams will be referenced side by side with the likes of Samuel Morse, Alexander Graham Bell, Guglielmo Marconi, Philo Farnsworth, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs — because the creation of Twitter by Stone, 35 (right), Williams, 37, and Jack Dorsey, 32 (not pictured), is as significant and paradigm-shifting as the invention of Morse code, the telephone, radio, television or the personal computer.

Twitter is fun. But it isn’t going to revolutionize the way we communicate any more than Ashton Kutcher has revolutionized the way we play practical jokes on one another.

University of Illinois police arrest 21 students after a months-long investigation into drug dealing that began last fall. Here’s what they seized:

…180 grams of marijuana, traces of cocaine, anti-anxiety pills, $3,100, two vehicles, three flat-screen televisions and two laptop computers…

So by my calculations, that averages out to less than nine grams of pot, 1/21 of a “trace” of cocaine, some prescription anti-anxiety meds, and less than $150 in dirty drug money per arrestee. Thank God these kingpins are off the street!

Those arrested were not all working together, said university police Lt. Roy Acree.

“I would hope it would send a message to students that if you are selling drugs, there is a good chance you’re going to get caught,” Acree said.

Yeah, somehow I don’t think that’s the message the campus’ actual drug suppliers are going to take away from this.

Hat tip: Dr. X.

Interesting Pew study says religiosity is correlated with support for torture. Torture support is highest among evangelical protestants, at 60+ percent. It’s lowest among those with no religion, at 40 percent.

But even more interesting, the group with the highest percentage saying torture is “never justified” was non-evangelical or “mainline” protestants at 30 percent, a bit higher than even the non-religious.

I want to elaborate a bit on the Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police’s shameful defense of Officer Jeffrey Cudjik, a cop now under internal and federal investigations for habitual lying on affidavits; harassing, terrorizing and possibly stealing from immigrant shop owners; and routinely violating procedures on dealing with informants (see post below). Cujdik’s exploits have been exposed by the Philadelphia Daily News. Check out this February article on the FOP’s rally in support of Cujdik:

The Fraternal Order of Police and Officer Jeffrey Cujdik’s lawyer joined forces yesterday to attack Daily News stories that raised questions about Cujdik’s relationship with a paid police informant.

“It’s a shame we have to stand here today to defend a highly decorated police officer in the Narcotics Field Unit, an officer who confiscates a ton of drugs, a ton of guns and is out there doing what a lot of other citizens in the city of Philadelphia do not want to do,” FOP President John J. McNesby said.

Flanked by more than a dozen officers at a news conference inside FOP headquarters, on Spring Garden Street near Broad, McNesby said that the FOP would defend Cujdik “to the wall.”

[...]

At times the attack seemed personal: “You have to remember, you’re dealing with a confidential informant here. A confidential informant in the city of Philadelphia is one step above a Daily News reporter,” McNesby said, prompting cops to applaud and laugh.

McNesby is referring to allegations against Cujdik made by one of his former informants. But those allegations have since been bolstered by statements from victims of Cujdik’s raids, and by a review (see post below) of search warrants conducted by Cujdik’s unit.

The sad irony here is that when an informant makes an allegation against a citizen, his word is considered good enough to send a squad of police officers to kick down that citizen’s door. In some states, the word of a confidential informant, without any corroboration, is enough for an indictment and arrest on drug charges, putting even innocent people in the position of having to decide whether to fight the charges and risk a prison term or plea to something they didn’t do, and accept probation and a criminal record. This is what happened in places like Tula and Hearne, and what I’m sure happens all over the country with these narcotics unit, whose funding tends to rest on how many arrests and seizures they make.

But witness how quickly cops will trash an informant whose word was gold in search warrant affidavits for years the moment he comes forth with allegations of police corruption.

Previously (here and here), I blogged about a rogue narcotics unit in Philadelphia that was raiding bodegas on the flimsy excuse that the stores were selling resealable zip-lock bags that could potentially be used by drug dealers. Bodega owners say the cops were cutting the lines to surveillance cameras, then stealing cash, alcohol, cigarettes, and snack food from the stores. The Philadelphia Daily News was able to obtain footage of the cops cutting off one of the cameras during a raid, then inquiring to the store owner about whether the camera feeds went to a computer that was on or off-site.

The lingering question, here, is how this unit was able to operate like this for so long without any oversight. Why wasn’t anyone questioning the use of such aggressive tactics in searches not for drugs, but for no more than an otherwise legal product? Why did no one in the department ask why an “elite” narcotics unit was wasting its time busting immigrant shop owners with no criminal record for selling bags instead of pursuing actual drug distributors?

It’s one thing to have a few rogue cops that, once caught, are fired and—hopefully—criminally charged. It’s a more wide-ranging and serious problem if there are institutional failures in the Philadelphia police department that allowed Officer Jeffrey Cujdic’s scam of terrorizing immigrant shop owners to flourish.

Now, the Daily News has published the results of its review of the search warrants obtained by Cujdik’s unit over the last several years, and the results are troubling. They find a wholesale lack of supervision of Cujdik and his men, even as complaints against them mounted.

Narcotics enforcement is ripe for corruption because officers handle large amounts of cash and drugs, legal experts say.

So the Police Department has procedural safeguards: A supervisor must review and approve all applications for warrants, officers must never meet an informant without another officer present, and at least two officers should conduct drug surveillances.

Yet supervisors and officers often disregarded those rules, a Daily News review of hundreds of search warrants found.

In several cases, officers worked alone with informants and were the only ones to watch drug buys. Yet supervisors approved those search-warrant applications…

Cpl. Mark Palma, a narcotics-squad supervisor, was apparently not bothered when Officer Richard Cujdik, Jeffrey’s brother, worked alone on a three-day surveillance job in September 2007.

Palma approved a search-warrant application for Jose Duran’s West Oak Lane grocery store, based on Richard Cujdik’s assertion that he watched a confidential informant – CI #142 – enter the store to buy ziplock bags three times.

The validity of that search warrant is now in question.

For the last buy, Richard Cujdik wrote that he “observed” CI #142 enter Duran’s store at about 4:30 p.m. on Sept. 11, 2007. Yet the Daily News watched the time-stamped Sept. 11 surveillance footage of the store between 4 and 5 p.m., and no one asked for or bought a ziplock bag.

Sgt. Joseph Bologna supervised the ensuing raid, part of which was captured on video. The Daily News obtained the video and posted it on its Web site, philly.com.

The video shows Bologna directing officers to “disconnect” camera wires. They do so with pliers and a bread knife. Bologna makes no effort to stop Richard Cujdik when the officer searches Duran’s van, allegedly without a warrant.

Duran alleges that officers seized nearly $10,000 in the raid but documented taking only $785.

While Cujdik has been demoted to desk duty pending the results of internal and federal investigations, Bologna has since been promoted to lieutenant.

The Daily News reports that all of this has happened less than five years after an agreement between the city and civil rights groups expired, stemming from a scandal in the 1990s in which narcotics cops went to jail for lying on search warrants, shaking down drug dealers, and making dozens of wrongful arrests. That agreement required more vigilant oversight of the city’s narcotics units by police supervisors to guard against mistaken raids, corruption, and false statements on search warrant affidavits. Not only does it appear the brass in Philly didn’t learn from that scandal, the Daily News writes that it’s unclear if Philly PD officials ever actually carried out the requirements put forth in the agreement.

Hats off to Daily News reporters Wendy Ruderman and Barbara Laker for pursuing and sticking with this story, despite attacks on their character and credibility by Cujkik’s supporters in the Philly police union.

This week, we’ll go with “Dignity,” a great song that was almost never released. It was originally recorded for the Oh Mercy album in 1989, but didn’t make the final cut. It was finally remixed and added as an extra track to Dylan’s third volume of greatest hits, released in 1994. The song gained some fame when Dylan then played an acoustic version on MTV Unplugged. Unfortunately, Seeqpod is down right now, so we’ll have to go with the unplugged version.