Pope Francis, @Pontifex, Excommunicates #Mobsters with Calabrian Mafia from Catholic Church

Pope Francis concluded his one-day trip to the southern Italian region of Calabria with strong words against the Calabrian mafia, calling it “adoration of evil and contempt for the common good.”

“Those who in their lives have taken this evil road, this road of evil, such as the mobsters, they are not in communion with God, they are excommunicated,” he said to applause.

The Pope made these statements on Saturday during the feast-day Mass he presided for Corpus Domini on the plains of the small town of Sibari, a once-important city in the Hellenistic period of Calabrian history.

Organizers planned for 200,000 faithful to attend. They gathered under the hot sun, with temperatures flirting around the 30-degree mark. Sitting in the first rows of the assembly were those with illness and disability, rather than local dignitaries—a decision the local bishop chose to underline ahead of the Pope’s trip.

The Pope’s visit to the region, marked by violence and corruption and renowned for mafia activity, was highly anticipated by the locals, who in recent months were rocked by the murder of Fr. Lazzaro Longobardi, as well as the death of a three-year-old boy, the innocent victim of a mafia homicide.

In his homily, the Pope spoke about the evils that can occur when adoration of God is replaced by adoration of money. “Your land, which so beautiful, knows the signs of the consequences of this sin," he told those assembled. "This evil must be fought, must be expelled.” He called on the local Church to expend itself even more “so that good can prevail”.

“Our children ask this of us,” he added.

He said faith can help in responding to these demands. He called  the faithful of the Church in Calabria to be brothers and to show each other practical solidarity, noting signs of hope in local families and in the Church. He also urged young people not to allow themselves to be robbed of hope.

He told the faithful his trip was intended to express his support for the local Church, to confirm the people in faith and charity, and to encourage them in their journey with Jesus Christ.

“Today,” he continued, “we ask the Lord to enlighten us and to convert us, so that we truly adore only him and we renounce evil in all its forms.”

He concluded, saying that in adoring Christ and following him, parishes will grow in faith and charity and they will be places where people walk alongside each other and support, help and love each other, even in difficult moments

Thanks to Vatican Radio.

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"The White Boy Confessions" Chronicles Gang Life, Violence, Poverty and Race Relations in San Antonio, Texas

The White Boy Confessions: The Explosive Story of Marcus Valdespino and San Antonio's Hood, the powerful autobiography of San Antonio native Marcus Valdespino. White Boy Confessions deals with gang life and violence in San Antonio and such controversial subjects as race relations, poverty, and interracial crime. The first twenty-nine years of Valdespino’s life were compelling and tragic. Valdespino witnessed his father’s drug dealing to high profile people and he, unfortunately, followed in his footsteps. Valdespino’s story shows the worst of humanity and is chilling in its depiction of sex and violence and heartfelt, poignant and sad in its betrayal of the rite of passage of a young person growing up in this world.

The White Boys Confessions is also extremely powerful in its social and political commentary. There are several layers of the story contained within it that are both frightening and humorous. As white boy operated primarily in an African American environment, Valdespino had to prove his worth beyond a reasonable doubt. Yet, he went from a know nothing white kid of the streets in 1989 to second in command to a drug dealer in charge of a crack cocaine empire. The FEDS were after him and his crew from 1998 to 2000. There were many shoot outs, home invasions, beat downs, violent rapes, police raids, graphic explicit sex, human trafficking and even a murder.

Today, all of Valdespino’s friends are in the penitentiary, dead or their whereabouts are unknown. Yet, by some miracle he went unscathed and experienced no penitentiary time.. All of Valdespino’s story—the bad and the ugly-- is in The White Boy Confessions, a story of not just survival but also redemption.

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Jewelry Store Owner Pleads Guilty in International $200 Million Credit Card Fraud Conspiracy

A New Jersey jewelry store owner who used his business to further one of the largest credit card fraud schemes ever charged by the Justice Department admitted his role in the scheme, the 17th conspirator to do so, New Jersey U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.

Vinod Dadlani, 51, of Lyndhurst, New Jersey, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Anne E. Thompson in Trenton federal court to an information charging him with one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud.

According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:

Dadlani was indicted in October 2013 as part of a conspiracy to fabricate more than 7,000 false identities to obtain tens of thousands of credit cards. Members of the conspiracy doctored credit reports to pump up the spending and borrowing power associated with the cards. They then borrowed or spent as much as they could, based on the phony credit history, but did not repay the debts—causing more than $200 million in confirmed losses to businesses and financial institutions. These debts were incurred at Dadlani’s jewelry store, among many other locations, where Dadlani would allow fraudulently obtained credit cards to be swiped in phony transactions.

The scheme involved a three-step process in which the defendants would make up a false identity by creating fraudulent identification documents and a fraudulent credit profile with the major credit bureaus; pump up the credit of the false identity by providing false information about that identity’s creditworthiness to those credit bureaus; and then run up large charges.

The scope of the criminal fraud enterprise required Dadlani’s conspirators to construct an elaborate network of false identities. Across the country, the conspirators maintained more than 1,800 “drop addresses,” including houses, apartments, and post office boxes, which they used as the mailing addresses for the false identities.

During his guilty plea proceeding, Dadlani admitted he worked with other conspirators, who came to his Jersey City, New Jersey store and allowed them to swipe cards he knew did not legitimately belong to them. Dadlani would then split the proceeds of the phony transactions with the conspirators.

The count to which Dadlani pleaded guilty carries a maximum potential penalty of 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine or twice the gain or loss caused by the offense.

Dadlani is scheduled for sentencing by Judge Thompson on September 24, 2014.

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New Book Investigates One of America's Most Controversial Spy Cases #SpyofDavid

Strategic Media Books is pleased to announce the publication of a timely book that profiles one of the biggest spy cases in U.S.  history. Winston Churchill’s description of Stalinist Russia in 1939 – he called it “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma” – easily could have been said about the case of Jonathan Jay Pollard, the U.S. Naval Intelligence analyst who, in March of 1987, received a mystifying life sentence for passing classified secrets to Israel,  an American ally . Now, twenty-seven years later, the debate over America’s most controversial spy has apparently once again been rekindled.

A sequel to author Elliot Goldenberg’s previous book, The Hunting Horse, Spy of David: The Strange Case of Jonathan Pollard and the Two Decade Battle to Win his Freedomchronicles the obstacles faced by Goldenberg and his partner in a motion picture project as they navigate the perilous waters of Hollywood and Washington in an attempt to not only separate fact from fiction about the Pollard spy case but, hopefully, make a feature film based on The Hunting Horse.

Always provocative, Spy of David intertwines the story of America’s most debated case of espionage with the dangers of international Islamic terrorism (including Middle Eastern ties to the Oklahoma City bombing), and the selling of a major motion picture. Simply put, Spy of David is an attempt to shed a bright light over a dark stain on both the American judicial system and our intelligence community, while, at the same time, solve a decades-old puzzle – knowing that, for way too long, the truth surrounding this most gut-wrenching of spy cases has remained hidden, blurred, and obscured.

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