The Search Intensifies for Missing IU Student

Indiana University Sophomore, Lauren Spierer [20], went to Kilroy’s Sports Bar in Bloomington, IN, last Thursday night/early Friday morning (6/3/11) and has been missing ever since. Surveillance video at the bar shows Lauren drinking with a bunch of friends, and then leaving the bar with no shoes and without her cell phone at about 2:30a.m. Lauren then returned to her apartment building about a block away.

A search warrant was served to the Smallwood Plaza Apartments—where Lauren lives—at around 8:00p.m., Monday night. Oddly enough, even though the police had a search warrant handy, no one in charge at the apartment complex was willing to open the security room for them. So, police used a battering ram to brake down the security room door, where they removed three computers used to record and store information from the security cameras that record the surveillance video outside the complex.


Police say that they do have surveillance video from Lauren’s apartment showing her entering and leaving her apartment around 2:40a.m., on the morning of her disappearance. Police are searching the remainder of the surveillance footage to see if there is any other video of Lauren after that 2:40a.m., departure time. Lauren was with a friend at the time. After leaving Lauren’s apartment, Lauren and her friend headed 3 blocks north to another friends apartment. Lauren left there at 4:30a.m., and hasn’t been seen since. She was wearing black leggings, a white shirt, and no shoes.

Her purse was found in the dirt-riddled alley way that connects her apartment to her friends place. It is not known whether the purse was left there before she went to the friend’s place or after she left, according to Lt. Bill Parker, who supervises the investigation division in the Bloomington Police Department. “We believe the chance that there was foul play is very great because if not Lauren would have made contact by now,” Parker also said. Police have spoken to all of the friends that Lauren was with that night, they even searched the cars of her friends, and they have found nothing. Some credit cards were also missing from Lauren’s purse; a check has been made and none of the cards have been used as of yet. Her keys were also found on a railing near her apartment in downtown Bloomington.


Lauren’s parents, Charlene and Robert Spierer, held a press conference yesterday asking for people to continue praying for Lauren’s safe return and calling for anyone who has any information to come forward. “If anyone saw Lauren on Thursday night with anyone, please share that information with Bloomington police,” her father Robert said. “It doesn’t matter how casual the sighting was; we need to know when you saw her; where you saw her; every little piece of information we get is important.”

Hundreds of people have since converged on Bloomington to help in the search. Police, and volunteers, have canvassed the entire downtown area and they are sending more squads out a bit further, but as of now there is no specific area that police are asking people to search. Police also announced that the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children have assigned a field officer to assist with the volunteer searches.

Social media outlets, such as Twitter and Facebook, are being used by many to help locate Lauren. The hashtag (#FindLauren) has been a top trending topic in recent days on Twitter.

Meanwhile, today on Twitter Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay pledged a $10,000 reward for “serious info that SOLVES Lauren’s Missing Persons…Contact Bloomy Police!!!!!”

Lauren Spierer is a white female who is 4-feet-11-inches tall, a slender build, with blue eyes and blond hair. She was last wearing a white tank top with a light-colored shirt over it and black stretch pants. Police are asking those who have any information on Lauren’s whereabouts to call or send an anonymous email or letter:

Bloomington Police
220 E Third St
Bloomington IN 47404
812-339-4477
police@bloomington.in.gov

PART 2

PART 3

Knox’s Slander Trial Begins

Amanda Knox was back in court today, a saying that has become very familiar over the last few years. This hearing, however, was not part of her appeals trial, but rather on charges of slandering seven Perugia police officials and an interpreter. Dressed in a white long-sleeve t-shirt, black slacks, and a green band in her hair, Knox entered the courtroom and smiled as soon as she saw her father, Curt Knox.

During the seventeen-minute session, Knox answered, “Si” (yes in Italian), to the question from Judge Daniele Cenci if she understood Italian.

Knox's lawyer, Luciano Ghirga, said that the slander trial was adjourned until 15 November 2011, after a brief hearing devoted to procedural issues raised by the defense.

Knox’s appeals trial resumes this Saturday. Independent experts had been scheduled to discuss their review two pieces of DNA evidence that the defense is contesting; however, the independent forensic experts have requested 40 more days to file their report. They are expected to formally make this request on Saturday in front of the judges, at which time a decision on the matter will be rendered.

Laws Targeting Terrorists: A Civil Liberties Debate

“Once you familiarize yourself with the chains of bondage- you prepare your limbs to wear them” –Abraham Lincoln

The U.S. PATRIOT Act was passed (Oct. 26, 2001) in response to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. Simply put, the Act aims to provide law enforcement officials with the tools needed to prevent further attacks. The Act added new provisions to obstruct terrorism that were previously not in place. However, many argue, such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) that the Act “went too far in its unfettering of the federal government and endangering the civil rights of American citizens as well as immigrants.” The Act—specifically sections 202 through 225—states that government can intercept electronic signals relative to national security and terrorism issues. However, this can also impact state and local law enforcement—which after a judicial review can order a search warrant or court order. Note: search warrants are used to seize that which an officer believes already exists; court orders are used to seize future conversations and data.


According to the U.S. PATRIOT Act, the government can now use pen, trap, and trace orders to intercept information about your Internet communications as well. By serving a pen trap, or trace orders on a person’s ISP or email provider, the police can get:

• All email header information other than the subject line, including the email addresses of the people to whom you send email, the email addresses of people that send to you, the time each email is sent or received, and the size of each email that is sent or received.
• Your IP (Internet Protocol) address and the IP address of other computers on the Internet that you exchange information with, with timestamp and size information.
• The communications ports and protocols used, which can be used to determine what types of communications you are sending using what types of applications.
• The police might also use pens, traps, and traces to get the URLs (web addresses) of every website a person visits, allowing them to track what a person is reading while they are surfing the web.
• (Decided Feb. 2, 2006 by U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan in Washington, D.C.) Judge Hogan approved the Justice Department’s request that under the Patriot Act they be allowed to do e-mail monitoring without any evidence of criminal behavior
• Apparently, the Department of Justice’s policy on it is to freely collect information about what site you are visiting using pens, traps, and traces, but to obtain a wiretap order before collecting information about what particular page or file you are visiting. However, there’s no way to confirm that federal authorities actually follow this policy in all cases, and some have serious doubt as to whether state authorities do.


Aside from the U.S. PATRIOT Act, other recent anti-terrorist laws have been enacted which further cut-away at the civil liberties of U.S. citizens. In a terrorist-related case, the United States Supreme Court took a shot at freedom of speech in June 2010, by a vote of 6-3 on a provision of law making it a federal crime to “knowingly provide material support or resources to a foreign terrorist organization,” even if the “support” consists only of “expert advice or assistance” for “lawful, non-violent purposes”—in other words, political speech. Another step was recently taken that further erodes Constitutional Law, allowing government to target and kill Americans; bypassing due-process. This was done when the Obama Administration authorized the targeted killing of an American citizen, the radical Muslim cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki; who is believed to be an operative of Al Qaeda. While no one wants al-Awlaki, and other radicals who have declared war on America, captured more than me; the stand in this article is simply to identify the unprecedented powers that the government has and is taking beyond the U.S. Constitution.

In yet another recent decision targeting terrorism, the Obama Administration gave law enforcement the powers to bypass the long-standing Miranda protections for American suspects. This was done by adding terror suspects to the one exception to the Miranda protections: the public safety exception. The public safety exception was passed in 1984, and it applies where circumstances present a clear and present danger to the public’s safety and the officers have reason to believe that the suspect has information that can end the emergency. “It looks like to me they're trying to find this middle ground between saying the Constitution applies with full force and the Constitution doesn't apply,” says Sam Kamin, a professor of criminal law and procedure at Sturm College of Law in Denver who has written about terrorism interrogations. “It seems to be a deliberate strategy.”

Terrorists are viewed as war criminals, as well they should be—ideally—and are not subject to the same constitutional rights as every other American citizen. The problem here is that the U.S Government, through this, has been able to bypass many of the constitutional provisions, enabling extraordinary power over not just terrorists, but its citizens as well. This can be viewed as a problem on many fronts. Who’s to say that these new government powers will not be used to target American citizens that are not terrorists, but covertly and intentionally perceived to be? Once the flood gates are opened—i.e. allowing government to target and kill an American citizen without due-process—there is no going back.

Anti-terrorist laws are quite new to the United States. Previous to the 9/11 attacks the U.S. had been a slow ramp-up of these anti-terrorist strategies in place. In 1982, President Reagan issued the National Security Decision Directive Number 30: Managing Terrorists Incidents. This established the first working terrorist incident group. In 1995, President Clinton issued Presidential Decision Directive 39, which called for a critical review of nation’s infrastructural vulnerabilities. In 1998, President Clinton issued Presidential Decision Directive 62, protection against unconventional threats (PDD 62, 1998) and Presidential Decision Directive 63, critical infrastructure protection (PDD 63, 1998).


After 9/11, obviously the laws changed dramatically. Its not that these new laws don’t help fight terrorism better, it’s more that certain provisions have the potential to be disastrous for any American citizen. The problem is that the previous statutes on anti-terrorism were outdated and crimes previously in place to address terroristic acts did not do so sufficiently, particularly with the emergence of the internet and its widespread usage. As we see with several provisions in the U.S. PATRIOT Act, they do provide the government with the necessary tools to help combat terroristic attacks more effectively. I happen to believe that the U.S. Constitution is one of the greatest documents ever written, and I am strongly opposed to such widespread alterations. Until we can come up with a better way to fight terrorists we will have to settle for these new anti-terrorist laws and pray that big-government does not use its power unjustly against its own citizens. The fact that the terrorists have aided in the alterations of our most precious document, we can safely say that it's: terrorists (1), America (0).

The Study Abroad Murder: Trial of the Century

ON SALE NOW!!

List Price: $19.99
6" x 9" (15.24 x 22.86 cm)
Black & White on Cream paper
288 pages
ISBN-13: 978-0615456263
ISBN-10: 061545626X
BISAC: True Crime / Murder / General

The college town of Perugia, Italy has always been known for its beautiful medieval hilltop landscapes, its fine art, and of course its world famous chocolate festival. Yet, all that changed on 2 November 2007, when British Born Meredith Kercher [21] was found brutally murdered in a flat that she shared with three female roommates. Kercher’s lifeless body had been found by Italian police under a duvet in her room (at Via Della Pergola 7) partially clothed with her throat cut and with multiple signs of bruising to her neck and body. The pathologist’s report indicates that she was stabbed at some time between 9.30 p.m., and 11.30 p.m., on the night of November 1, 2007.

Four days after the murder the case took a whole new twist when it was announced that Kercher’s roommate, American born Amanda Knox [20], and Knox’s boyfriend were arrested in connection with the murder. More than two-years after the murder, the verdict came in (on 4 December 2009), and Knox was convicted in an Italian court of being the ring leader in a “sex game gone bad” and sentenced to 26 years in prison. Meanwhile, the American media sided with Amanda Knox and her family—predicating their versions solely on the perceived “archaic Italian justice system” and what they claim was a “lack of evidence.”

This book is the true crime story of the murder of Meredith Kercher, providing a detailed analysis of the trial and a comprehensive forensic analysis of the evidence, the investigation, and the events that led to murder.