Skepticism about what government is doing. I had the programs reviewed and putting additional safeguards to make sure there is federal Court Oversight as well as congressional oversight, that there is no spying on americans. We dont have a domestic spying program. What we do have are some mechanisms where we can track a phone number or email address that we know is connected to some sort of terrorist threat. Edward snowdens father says he believes president clinton will continue to stand firm in the face of pressure from the Obama Administration to hand r his son whom the name president Vladimir Putin will continue to stand firm in the face of pressure from the Obama Administration to hand over his son. This isnt about russia. The fight isnt in russia. The fight is right here. The fight is about these programs that undermine, infringe upon, violate our Constitutional Rights. Presiding over the sentencing hearing of Army WhistleblowerBradley Manning has rejected some of the governments evidence about the alleged damage caused by the publication of documents he gave to wikileaks. Army colonel denise lind said evidence about the supposed Chilling Effect of mannings leaks on u. S. Foreign relations would only be admissible if the impact happened directly after the documents were released. The judge tossed out the claims by Top State Department official Patrick Kennedy that the impact continues to this day. The group of young immigrants 9 have been dream released from detention in her xoma while they seek asylum in the United States. They had been held for nearly three weeks after attempting to cross u. S. Mexico border to protest the Obama Administrations record deportations. They were all brought to the u. S. As children. While most have previously been deported or left the u. S. Do to current policies, some of them have fled to mexico in order to accompany the others back. Several of the Group Members were graduation outfits. Officials this week determined they had her credible fear of persecution of deported to mexico, a decision which allows their bid for asylum to move forward. That process could take years. In the meantime, the dream 9 will be allowed to remain at home in the United States. Syrian rivals are claiming to have fired rockets that hit the motorcade a president Bashar Al Assad as he traveled to a mosque in the capital damascus. The government denied the claims in the state tv showed footage of alassad attending prayer. Ervices the Syrian Military on wednesday killed more than 60 rebel fighters in an ambush near the capital. Theate news agency said group along to the al nusra fro nt, which the u. S. Considers a terrorist organization. Than 100 thousand people have died since the conflict in syria began in 2011. In egypt, supporters of ousted president Mohamed Morsi are gathering today for rallies honoring the muslim holiday which marks the end of ramadan. The United States and European Union have both called on morsi supporters and egypts interim government to resolve what they termed a dangerous stalemate after the egypts interim president said diplomatic efforts to solve the conflict had failed. The Egyptian Military said to be holding off for now on threats to clear sit in spy morsi supporters in cairo over fears that Vice PresidentMohamed Elbaradei might resign over such a crackdown. The interim Prime Minister issued more warnings to pro morsi demonstrators on wednesday. We asked them once more to leave quickly and return to their homes and work without resistance those who do not have blood on their hands, the state promised to provide them free transportation. The cabinet warns against the continuing dangers excavation and incitement escalation and incitement and those who are deceiving them amongst the leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood that threatens national security. A missouri judge has found death row prisoner Reggie Clemens was beaten by police and coerced into confessing to a role in the murders of two women in 1991. In a sweeping review of the case, judge michael manners found state prosecutors violated his Constitutional Rights by concealing evidence about the beatings and said the suppression might have changed the outcome of the case. However, the judge manners, who was appointed by the mistress of court missouri supreme to conduct the review, also said clemens had failed to make a sufficient case that he is innocent. Clemons, who is african american, was one of four men charged in the deaths of two White Sisters who are raped and then drown in the mississippi river. The Missouri Supreme Court will now decide his fate. Walmart has agreed to approve improve safety conditions as part of a settlement with federal health and safety regulators. Federal inspectors have uncovered what they termed repeat and serious violations at a store in rochester, new york. Under the deal, walmart will improve procedures relating to trash compactors and the handling of chemicals and hire an outside monitor to ensure compliance at store locations in 28 states. Walmart will also pay 190,000, tiny fraction of its profits which amounted to 17 billion dollars last year. In a statement, the worker group our walmart, which has lisa only which has recently led a number of historic strikes, said last month workers at a california warehouse that moose products for walmart launched a twoday strike to protest alleged retaliation after reporting safety issues that included blocked emergency exits, nonfunctioning forklift brakes and a lack of sufficient ventilation, and water under intense heat. Japans Prime Minister has ordered Government Action to help stop radioactive water leaks at the embattled fukushima day to Nuclear Power plant. Thecials now estimate contaminated water is leaking into the Pacific Ocean at a rate of 300 tons per day, enough to fill an olympic serving pull in a week. Reuters is reporting Chesapeake Energy has abandoned a twoyear legal battle to retain leases on thousands of acres of land in new york where it plan to drill natural gas using the controversial technique of fracking, provided new york state lift a ban on the practice area did land owners have been fighting to prevent the firm from extending leases signed over the past decade under their current terms. Now chesapeake reportedly lands to walk away from the leases. Another grass gas firm has come under fire following revelations it imposed a gag order on a pennsylvania couple that prevented their children from ever talking about fracking. The family reached a settlement in 2011 after being sickened by a castrol in operation adjacent to the property. The settlement, which was unsealed last week, bars the family from commenting on the marcella shales fracking activity. The gag orderw applies to the whole family, and would be enforced that way. At the time of the settlement, the children were seven and 10 years old. Last week the Company Spokesperson denied the gag order applies to the children. More women have come forward with Sexual Harassment claims against san diego mayor bob filner. Her teen women have publicly accused filner of unwanted sexual behavior ranging from verbal remarks to groping. According to cnn, at least 8 of the women are military veterans, most of whom were victims of Sexual Assault while serving. A retired air force Master Sergeant who was rate three times role in the military says she was speaking last year at an event for the National WomensVeterans Association of america when filner, then a u. S. Congressmember, made unwanted advances. Filner had formerly served as head of the House Veterans Affairs committee. She said she believes he targeted survivors specifically. We are all victims of military Sexual Assault. It appears to me that he was targeting this organization and hitting on the women in this organization because they were easy prey, so he is part of an organization that is against Sexual Assault and Sexual Violence toward women and Sexual Harassment him a that he is doing the very thing that we are fighting to make stop in our service and in our country. She was speaking on cnn. Hagel isecretary chuck reportedly completing a number of new rules to address rampant Sexual Assault in the military after Pentagon Survey estimated 26,000 people in the armed forces were sexually assaulted last year. The National Institutes of health says it has reached an unprecedented deal with the family of Henrietta Lacks that gives them a say in how her genetic material is used for research. Henrietta lacks was a poor africanamerican tobacco farmer who died of Cervical Cancer in baltimore in 1951 at the age of 31. Her cancer cells collect it without her consent or knowledge did not die in the lab as others had, but instead they multiplied and became the backbone for tens of thousands of studies, aiding in key medical breakthroughs. s family did lacks not learn how they were being used until decades later. Their struggle to come to terms with that lack of control became the subject of the bestselling book the immortal life of Henrietta Lacks, by rebecca skloot. Group of year, a european scientists published the genome of one of her cell lines without telling the family. Family members objected and finally reached a deal which will require researchers to submit applications to access Henrietta Lackss genome which will be reviewed by a panel that includes two members of their family. A grand jury in the bronx for a new york city has failed to read and i the new York City Police officer who fatally shot unarmed africanamerican teenager Ramarley Graham who was shot at close range last february after being chased by an aquatics officers into his building. Police say he was trying to empty a small bag of marijuana into the toilet before he was killed. Officer Richard Hastings invited manslaughter,r but a judge reluctantly throughout the indictment in may on procedural grounds. On wednesday, another grand jury chose not to indict officer haste a second time. Ramarley grahams mother Constance Malcolm told the New York Post the family will hold a News Conference today to announce the next steps. Those are some of the headlines. This is democracy now , democracynow. Org, the war and peace report. Im amy goodman. We begin today with a Major Development for opponents of new York City Police departments controversial stop and frisk row graham. In a settlement announced wednesday, the nypd agreed to stop storing the names of people who were arrested or issued a summons after being stopped and frisked and later cleared of any criminal wrongdoing. For years police have used the database to target new yorkers for criminal investigations, even though it includes people who were victims of unjustified police stops. Since 2002, the Police Department has conducted over 5 million stop and frisk. The vast majority of those stopped have been black and latino. According to the Police Departments own reports, nearly nine out of 10 new yorkers stopped and frisked have been innocent. Two of the people at the center of the case spoke about what happened to them in 2010 in this video produced by the new york Civil Liberties union, which filed the case just settled. First we hear from daryl kahn who was pulled over by two Police Officers in an unmarked van and issued a summons for riding his bicycle on the sidewalk. The summons was later dismissed. We also hear from clive lino, who is issued a summons for spitting in public and possessing an open to tanner. His charges were also dismissed. I was riding my bike through the streets of new york. Name came up in his secret database with by private information in it, for doing nothing wrong. Anyone in the city can end up in a database. I have been stop so many times i have lost count. It is a waste of my time and an embarrassment, especially when you havent done anything at all. See n average when i on edge when i see officers. I feel like a hostage in my own neighborhood. I was riding my bike when i was pulled over by a couple of members of the nypd. Usually im not doing anything when i get stopped. They let me go. They started asking me a series of questions, none of which i was comfortable asking because i had done nothing wrong. When i protested, more Police Officers were called over. I am usually just speaking up for myself and the officers dont like that. Against thismed up van with my arms wrenched behind my back, handcuffed in my head slammed against the van repeatedly. No, im not a bad person. I dont have a felony. Ive never been to prison. I hold a job. Up my mastersd degree at mercy college. The voices of clive lino and daryl kahn who sued the new york Police Department for its stop and frisk database. A federal judge is expected to issue a ruling in a major case challenging the constitutionality of the overall stop and Frisk Program. For more were joined by donna lieberman, director of the new york Civil Liberties union. The new york Police Department did not respond to our request for comment. Donna, explain the settlement. It follows a couple of years of litigation. It is an important victory for all new yorkers because it really closes the last loophole in the nypd stop and frisk database. A law was passed in 2010, signed into law by governor paterson, that prohibits the Police Department from maintaining the names and addresses of individuals who were stopped and frisked and not arrested. The people who were arrested and cleared of criminal wrongdoing have their names kept in the Police Department database, even though there is a statute that says when someone has been charged their charges are dismissed, the database has to be cleared with regard to the incident. So the Police Department was doggedly holding onto this information, so we had to go to court. Finally, they agreed to settle it after the Appeals Court said we had valid claims. Explain who was in this database and how many people are in it. Millions, 5e million, 6 Million People in the nypd database. Ay kelly and the letter couple of years ago said this is important for us to have because it helps us to investigate crimes translates into rounding up the usual suspects. There were many who believed in fact the proliferation of stop and frisk of hundreds of thousands, millions of new yorkers and youre so innocent they walked away without even a summons, was prompted by the Police Departments desire to get a database of all black and brown new yorkers. That may be a little extreme, but who knows . Who knows how it was really being used. We do know the Collateral Damage of the stop and Frisk Program that targeted people of color is totally out of control, was this Police Database of innocent new yorkers and there is no reason why there should be a Permanent Police file of innocent people by virtue of stop and frisk. We invited the new york Police Department on. The Deputy Commissioner paul browne could not join us but its in the following comment funny the court didnt inc. So. Funny the port didnt think so. The striking the personal information for the people who werent arrested and the other was an already existing law that re