Credit Card Number? Who's Asking?

Several states, if not the majority use prisoners to field phone calls requesting tourist information and at least Arizona, if not others have used to have active prisoners answer other types of call. I don't know the extent that Arizona still uses the resource, but a few years ago, I needed a record and a recording told me that they couldn't take credit card numbers over the phone for this reason.

An investigation by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published Sunday, discovered that a local call center has been using convicted felons to solicit charitable donations in violation of Pennsylvania law. Granted, the felons have served their sentence, but they were given names, addresses and amounts of previous donations to call those who had previously donated to the company's clients in 38 states.

Also of interest is that Outreach Associates, doing business as Direct Advantage Marketing is a subsidiary of Integrated Fundraising and Marketing Solutions, headquartered in Massachusetts.

Massachusetts law doesn't preclude criminals from working for a charitable solicitor, but they do require that this information be disclosed to the state and the person who completed the registration form in both states, Chief Compliance Officer Howard B. Cloth has a previous conviction for embezzling $393,000 from his law firm's clients.

Between the halfway house-type program ending their relationship with the company because they didn't feel comfortable letting their charges have access to so much personal info, and the revelation that Federal probationers aren't allowed to work at Outreach because it'd mean consorting with known criminals, the Post-Gazette has put together a good argument for knowing who's on the other end of the phone.

When the Bad Guys Have the Badge

Lashanna Snipes was fatally wounded in a St. Louis car crash and another adult passenger was also injured, as were three children.

The accident occurred when a car being pursued by Upland Park Police ran a stop sign, hitting Ms. Snipes' vehicle in an intersection and though at least one of the suspects have since been arrested, the driver, the two people in the car being pursued originally fled on foot.

While investigating the accident for a February (sweeps) report, the local Fox affiliate (KTVI) discovered that the officer who engaged in the high-speed chase, which tragically ended more than two miles out of his jurisdiction was not licensed to be a police officer by the State of Missouri and had not received the required training.

They also found that the unlicensed police officer had previous convictions for assault, stalking and possession, plus he had been arrested 51 times for similar crimes along with trafficking, forcible rape, assault on an officer and 1st degree murder.

When trying to get a statement from a local official, investigative reporter Chris Hayes was asked to leave the "night court" by another officer, whom Mr. Hayes knew to be on criminal probation.

And as the result of preparing dossiers on previous officers from the same department with a troubled history, Reporter Hayes found a former partner of one mentioned in the original report working in neighboring town, also unlicensed and lacking the proper training.

Both video reports follow the jump;

An Investigative Guide to Smuggling Liquid

Alberto Stegeman is an investigative journalist and host of Undercover in the Netherlands, a hidden camera show where they infiltrate and disclose some of the darker parts of life. Among the show's successes, they've exposed a child prostitution ring, a travel agency offering sex tours, shady private detectives and holes in Dutch royal security.

He has also smuggled a fake bomb and drugs onto an airliner with the assistance of an associate, who had taken a job as a baggage handler.

Early last month, his team purchased six bottles of Bacardi from a duty-free shop, took them home, replaced the contents with water and on February 16th, they got them through security at the Amsterdam airport, changed planes at Heathrow and managed to transport the six liters of liquid all the way to Dulles without incident.

As you may remember, the "Underwear Bomber", Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab also boarded a plane at Amsterdam bound for the United States and as Stegeman has demonstrated, perhaps security hasn't gotten much tighter.

Detroit News reporter Catherine Jun was interviewed for the March 7th broadcast and thus, her paper has the details.
---

ETA: I didn't see the broadcast and no video appears available on the web, but according a report, Mr. Stegeman was subjected to an extra-thorough search, yet the adulterated liquids were not discovered.