Insane Clown Posse fans sue feds, say FBI gang label is 'un-American'
Source: Detroit Free Press
The U.S. government claims that fans of the Detroit-area rap group Insane Clown Posse — known as Juggalos — are members of a criminal gang.
But in a lawsuit filed Wednesday, fans blasted that label, saying some have been harassed by police, interrogated, denied admission into the U.S. military, and lost custody of their children just for liking the eccentric musical group. And they now fear losing their jobs and gaining criminal records.
Filed in U.S. District Court in Detroit against the FBI and the Department of Justice, the lawsuit says the government’s 2011 designation of the group’s fans as a “hybrid gang” has targeted innocent people across the U.S. who are part of a peaceful, fun-loving movement.
“It’s un-American,” said Farris Haddad, a Southfield attorney who’s a longtime fan of the band and helping with the lawsuit. “It’s as if we’re living in the Soviet Union.”
Read more: http://www.freep.com/article/20140108/ENT04/301080077/Insane-Clown-Posse-to-discuss-fans-gang-label
Also covered by: Al Jazeera America, NY Times
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Last I heard, they fired Biohazard as their opening act because when they left the stage, half the audience left, too!
rocktivity
Last edited Mon May 12, 2014, 09:33 PM - Edit history (2)
It's taken 20 years, but ICP's chickens have come home to roost. Payback's a female canine, isn't it, guys?
rocktivity
Last edited Wed Sep 23, 2015, 03:04 PM - Edit history (2)
Rap acts have always been attractive money-laundering troughs for gangster drug money.
rocktivity
I've heard their music. For me, loud caliope and Faygo don't mix, so I'd thought it had to be something else.
You know who really appreciates drug money? Ask Richard Grasso (left, photo below), then-head of the New York Stock Exchange, as he gives a nice warm hug to Raul Reyes, (photo, right) then-living FARC #2.
The Real Deal: The Ultimate New Business Cold Call
NYSE's Richard Grasso and the Ultimate New Business "Cold Call"
Monday, 18 February 2002, 10:13 am
Column: Catherine Austin Fitts
Lest you think that my comment about the New York Stock Exchange is too strong, let's look at one event that occurred before our "war on drugs" went into high gear through Plan Colombia, banging heads over narco dollar market share in Latin America.
In late June 1999, numerous news services, including Associated Press, reported that Richard Grasso, Chairman of the New York Stock Exchange flew to Colombia to meet with a spokesperson for Raul Reyes of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (FARC), the supposed "narco terrorists" with whom we are now at war.
The purpose of the trip was "to bring a message of cooperation from U.S. financial services" and to discuss foreign investment and the future role of U.S. businesses in Colombia.
Some reading in between the lines said to me that Grasso's mission related to the continued circulation of cocaine capital through the US financial system. FARC, the Colombian rebels, were circulating their profits back into local development without the assistance of the American banking and investment system. Worse yet for the outlook for the US stock market's strength from $500 billion - $1 trillion in annual money laundering - FARC was calling for the decriminalization of cocaine.
To understand the threat of decriminalization of the drug trade, just go back to your Sam and Dave estimate and recalculate the numbers given what decriminalization does to drive BIG PERCENT back to SLIM PERCENT and what that means to Wall Street and Washington's cash flows. No narco dollars, no reinvestment into the stock markets, no campaign contributions.
It was only a few days after Grasso's trip that BBC News reported a General Accounting Office (GAO) report to Congress as saying: "Colombia's cocaine and heroin production is set to rise by as much as 50 percent as the U.S. backed drug war flounders, due largely to the growing strength of Marxist rebels"
CONTINUED...
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0202/S00069.htm
Money. Makes the world go 'round. Must be why the Feds go after the low hanging fruit and not the big money.
