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‘Protester’ Who Made Terroristic Threats on Live TV Is a Brooklyn Lawyer

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New York’s legal profession attracts top-quality people:

A George Floyd protester was arrested after he made a threat on live television to burn down Manhattan’s ritzy Diamond District, cops said Sunday.
Israel Burns, 34, of Bath Beach, Brooklyn, was arrested about 8 p.m. on Saturday after he was interviewed on Fox News earlier in the day and threatened to burn down the Diamond District if the mayor and governor didn’t come to speak to a crowd gathered at Barclays Center, video shows.
“Today, I’m giving a demonstration from Barclays Center at 6 p.m. to City Hall, and that’s the first stop and we’re hoping de Blasio and Cuomo come out and talk to us and give the youth some direction,” he told the reporter.
“But if they don’t, then [the] next stop is the Diamond District,” he said. “And gasoline, thanks to Trump, is awfully cheap. So we’re giving them a chance right now to do the right thing.”
Cops arrested the man, who identified himself on the video as “Ace Burns,” after identifying him by his distinctive face mask, authorities said.
Burns was charged with making terroristic threats and aggravated harassment.

In case you don’t know, New York’s “Diamond District” — the neighborhood of 47th Street between 5th and 6th Avenue — is largely Jewish, so that this threat was implicitly anti-Semitic.

 

Gateway Pundit broke the news today that Israel Adam “Ace” Burns is a Brooklyn attorney, who graduated from Rutgers Law School and appears to have many influential friends:

 

After graduating from Rutgers Law School with honors, he was hired as an Associate at the prestigious New York office of Seyfarth Shaw LLP, an international law firm with well over 800 attorneys around the world. He practiced in the Litigation and Employment Law departments and personally handled some of the largest clients in the world including Prudential, Deloitte, and T-Mobile.

Recall last week that two Brooklyn lawyers, one of them a Princeton alumnus, were charged with attempting to firebomb a police car.


 

 

Seven Killed in ‘Cold-Blooded’ Murder

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Valhermoso Springs is an Alabama town in Morgan County about 20 miles south of Hunstsville. Last week, this quiet rural community was the scene of a horrific murder in which seven people were shot to death:

Seven people were killed in a mass shooting at a residence in Morgan County late Thursday.
The shooting took place at a home on the 500 block of Talucah Road in Valhermoso Springs close to Somerville at a little before 11:30 p.m., according to the Morgan County Sheriff’s office. . . .
The Morgan County Sheriff’s Office identified six of the victims: Tammy England Muzzey, 45, and 21-year-old Emily Brooke Payne, both of Valhermoso Springs; Roger Lee Jones Jr., 19, of Decatur; a 17-year-old juvenile girl; 31-year-old Jeramy Wade Roberts of Athens; and 18-year-old William Zane Hodgin of Somerville. A black male victim has yet to be identified.
Deputies said there are two white men, two black men and three white women. . . .
Upon arrival at the residence Thursday night, at 11:23, deputies saw part of the home was on fire and later discovered seven bodies inside after the fire was extinguished.
“It is a horrific scene and to be able to process it will take some time,” MCSO’s public information officer Mike Swafford told a local TV news station. . . .
Swafford told AL.com that investigators believe the suspect went to the residence with the intention of shooting everyone there.
Some victims had multiple gunshot wounds, Swafford said. Authorities are still working to identify all of the victims, but Swafford said some lived at the house where the shootings occurred.
“Incredibly heinous, talking cold-blooded,” Swafford said in describing the homicides.

The seventh victim was later identified as James Wayne Benford, 22, and the Daily Mail reported that the 17-year-old female was Dakota Green. It appears that this mass murder was drug-related:

Authorities and neighbors say the shooting deaths in a Valhermoso Springs house could be drug-related, but authorities have been tight-lipped about specific details because of the ongoing investigation. . . .
Payne’s mother, Vanessa Hipp of Madison, fought back tears at the crime scene Friday morning.
“I can’t put how I feel in words,” she said. “We suffered a great loss today.”
Wanda Thompson of Somerville, the mother of Muzzey, said she was in shock.
“I’m lost. I can’t even cry,” she said. . . .
Swafford said sheriff’s deputies are familiar with the residence. He said deputies have responded to six calls at the location during 2020, including three drug overdoses.
He said in past years, calls to the residence have involved drugs, robbery, trespassing and disturbances.
“It’s incredibly heinous (as a crime scene),” he said. “Our theory right now is whoever did this, came in here for a reason, did it and left.”
He said investigators are not ruling out that more than one shooter committed the crime. . . .
Some neighbors said they hear gunshots along the street on a regular basis.
“A barn behind that house burned down a few years ago because somebody was cooking meth there,” said Lawrence Lang, who has lived a few houses to the south of the crime scene for the past 21 years. “I don’t associate with those people.”
Thompson said she was having “problems with the people” at her daughter’s house, which was where the shooting occurred.
“People we didn’t even know were hanging around,” Thompson said. “I ran people off several weeks in a row. … Somebody was angry when they killed them.”
Another neighbor, Dennis Romback, said he observed traffic to and from the house at all hours. “(The shootings) are most likely drug-related. Overall, this is a quiet neighborhood. If authorities come around here, it’s usually to that house.”

Seven people dead and nothing on national news. You’re not going to see coverage on CNN. It’s as if the only time they consider murder to be newsworthy is when they can exploit it for politics.


 

 

Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes

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All those “dumb blonde” jokes? They’re not jokes:

A 22-year-old Michigan woman faces up to 15 years behind bars for allegedly inciting riots by destroying property and encouraging other looters to ransack stores during her Facebook Live broadcast.
Alexandria “Ally” Lyons of Grand Rapids was arrested after reportedly damaging businesses last weekend in Grand Rapids. She allegedly goaded fellow rioters to wreck retail locations by looting and throwing bricks at buildings. Lyons livestreamed video on Facebook of her kicking and shattering the glass window of a store. The riots left more than 100 businesses damaged, according to MLive.com.
Lyons and her friends went on a stealing spree where they stole beers from Mojo’s Dueling Piano Bar and Restaurant, looted a jewelry store, and stole merchandise from a clothing store, authorities said. Lyons and her friends uploaded photos and videos of their actions to social media.
“Defendant could be heard telling her friends to get her a gold bracelet because she already has silver ones,” Grand Rapids police Detective Matt DeJong wrote in a probable-cause affidavit of Lyons instructing others during a robbery of a jewelry store.
“She is heard multiple times encouraging her friends and others to throw bricks or other objects at windows of multiple businesses downtown and at one point picks up a brick herself and mentions heading ‘back to the courthouse,'” the affidavit said.
In one video, Lyons allegedly instructed her friends to break into an ATM.
Lyons shared footage of her having a party at her house, where she was reportedly seen wearing stolen clothing from F. David Barney Clothiers.
Police tracked Lyons down after receiving numerous tips and people sharing social media posts of her looting and destroying businesses.
Lyons was charged with the malicious destruction of a building (between $1,000 and $20,000) in one case and inciting a riot in a companion case, according to Law & Crime.

Because I’m not a racist, I want this white criminal to be punished to the maximum extent of the law. In fact, I consider it unfortunate that she did not get shot, or at least beaten, while resisting arrest. Stupid white people like her are giving the rest of us white people a bad reputation. And some of them might even vote for Joe Biden in November.


 

Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes

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Matthew Lee Rupert is not exactly a criminal mastermind. His career of felonious stupidity began as a teenager, when he stole a van in his hometown of Galesburg, Illinois, and drove it into a ditch:

The van was found in a ditch just outside of Galesburg. Police found Rupert walking in the area where the van was located.
Police discovered footprints in the snow where the van had been parked and, after taking a picture of the bottom of Rupert’s shoes, found the tread to be a match.

That was 2009. Two years ago, Rupert was again facing felony charges:

A Galesburg man pleaded not guilty to charges of having stolen firearms.
Matthew L. Rupert, 24, entered that plea following his preliminary hearing Monday afternoon before Circuit Judge Raymond Cavanaugh. The judge had found probable cause during the evidentiary hearing and the case will progress to a pretrial hearing May 7.
Rupert is charged with felony counts of aggravated possession of stolen firearms, delivery of a stolen firearm, two counts of possession of a stolen firearm, possession of a firearm by a felon, possession of a firearm with defaced serial identification markings and theft.
Those same offenses, except charged under the accountability theory, have been filed against Amanda J. Cutler, 27, Bailey Avenue, as well.
While Rupert is out of custody after posting $7,500 bond, Cutler remains in jail. She went before Circuit Judge Scott Shipplett about two weeks ago for a bail reduction hearing that was ultimately denied.

You might think that charges as serious as these would have been enough to put Rupert behind bars for a long time, but this happened in Illinois, a state controlled by Democrats, which means that criminals are more or less allowed to roam free because . . . “social justice” or whatever.

Let’s pause, for a moment, to discuss #BlackLivesMatter and the consequences thereof. Everyone is against racism and police brutality, but this is not what #BlackLivesMatter is actually about. The real agenda is to help elect Democrats by demonizing police and inciting anti-white hatred, thus to “energize” black voters. This, in turn, is connected to promises of “criminal justice reform” which, in practical terms, means that criminals seldom face serious prison time. While this agenda is intended to pander to the black community, it results in a relaxation of law enforcement that also sets free many white felons, including dangerously stupid criminals like Matthew Lee Rupert:

A man from downstate Galesburg who allegedly appears on video rioting, looting and urging attacks against the police has been hit with what appears to be the first federal criminal charge related to the violence this weekend in Chicago.
Matthew Lee Rupert, 28, has been charged in an eight-page criminal complaint in federal court in Minnesota with civil disorder, carrying on a riot and possession of unregistered destructive devices. The complaint alleges Rupert participated in looting and rioting in Minneapolis in response to the police killing of George Floyd before moving on to Chicago.
In a removal hearing held by telephone Monday before U.S. District Chief Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer in Chicago, Rupert maintained his innocence through his attorney but didn’t challenge being taken in custody back to Minnesota. . . .
Allegations in the criminal complaint against Rupert largely revolve around a Facebook account for “El Ricco Rupert.” Rupert allegedly used that page to announce Thursday night that, “I’m going to Minneapolis tomorrow who coming only goons I’m renting hotel rooms.”
The next day, Rupert allegedly posted video to his Facebook account suggesting he was in Minneapolis. The video appeared to be filmed by Rupert while he was holding his cell phone, according to an FBI special agent’s affidavit. The video was marked “live” and lasted roughly two hours, records show. Authorities allege he passed out explosives, encouraged others to throw explosives at police and appeared to light a building on fire.
At one point, Rupert allegedly said, “There are SWAT trucks up there. They got SWAT trucks up there . . . I’ve got some bombs if some of you all want to throw them back . . . bomb them back . . . here I got some more . . . light it and throw it.” As he made the comments, Rupert allegedly handed out an item with brown casing and a green wick to others.
Rupert allegedly went on to break into a boarded-up liquor store, claimed to set a fire to a Sprint store and then took videos of himself taking items from an Office Depot.
The next day, Rupert allegedly suggested on Facebook he might head next to Chicago and he allegedly posted multiple videos early Sunday indicating he had arrived. He is allegedly seen with others near Van Buren and Dearborn wearing an American flag bandana and a white baseball cap. In one video, Rupert allegedly said he was at “South Plymouth and Ida B. Wells” waiting for his brother.
Rupert is allegedly heard on the video saying something to the effect of “let’s start a riot” and “I’m going to start doing some damage.” The feds say Rupert went into a merchant store but found the cash register empty, so he moved on to a convenience store. He allegedly is seen on video putting items in his backpack, and he references having boxes of tobacco products in his backpack.
Chicago police arrested Rupert and others at 2:21 a.m. Sunday for violating Chicago’s emergency curfew, according to the complaint. When police searched his vehicle, they found “several destructive devices” similar to what he had been using in Minneapolis, it states. He also had a hammer, a flashlight and cash.

Stupidity is not a federal crime, otherwise more Democrats would be in prison, but Rupert’s extreme stupidity — posting evidence of his terrorist spree on Facebook — is worthy of special consideration.


 

Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes

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“Social justice” activists have been busy in Philadelphia:

Police are searching for the persons responsible for vandalizing at least 10 ATMs across Philadelphia overnight.
Officials said in many of the cases neighborhood convenience stores and mini markets were targeted.
Police said the thieves typically run into the store, set off an explosive device and then make off with the cash from the machine.

 

At least one young activist wasn’t hard to locate:

A man died while trying to blow up an ATM in North Philadelphia early Tuesday as thieves blew up or stole cash machines across the city overnight in what authorities believe was an “organized” and “coordinated” effort, police said.
The 24-year-old, whose name has not been released, suffered trauma to his upper body after placing explosive in a sidewalk-facing ATM outside a sports bar along North 2nd Street near Susquehanna Avenue around 6:15 a.m., Philadelphia police said.
Medics rushed the man to a nearby hospital where he died a couple hours later.

It was a “mostly peaceful” protest, until he exploded himself.


 

Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes

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First, there was the rioter in St. Louis who decided he could win a contest against a FedEx truck, and lost. This morning, we had the story of the young Philadephians who decided that robbing a gun store was a good idea, to their eternal regret. Now we have the tale of a young “social justice” activist in Omaha, Nebraska, who chose poorly:

A handful of grainy and graphic videos led Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine to conclude that a white bar owner acted in self-defense when he shot and killed a 22-year-old black Omaha man Saturday night.
As a result, Jake Gardner, owner of the side-by-side Gatsby and Hive bars downtown, will not face charges in the death of James Scurlock.
A surveillance video from Gardner’s bars, played Monday at a press conference, shows a group of young people, including Scurlock, approaching Gardner.
Walking backward, Gardner lifts his shirt to show a handgun, then pulls it to his side and continues backing up. Two people from Scurlock’s group — a man and a woman — tackle Gardner, who ends up on his back in a puddle in the street.
He fires twice into the air — he characterized them as warning shots in an interview with Omaha police. The two people run away from him.
Four seconds after that, Scurlock rushes from the sidewalk and dives on Gardner. Kleine said Scurlock was on Gardner’s back and had his arm around the bar owner’s neck. Gardner could be heard on another bystander’s video hollering, “Get off me, get off me.”
His right arm pinned, Kleine said, Gardner switched the gun to his left hand and fired over his shoulder. The bullet hit Scurlock in the shoulder-neck area, killing him.
Under Nebraska law, a person can be justified in killing another if he has a reasonable belief that deadly force is needed to protect himself or others. People are not allowed to use deadly force to protect property.
Kleine said he and Chief Deputy Brenda Beadle spent Sunday breaking down videos and witness statements “with all of the homicide detectives.”
“There was a consensus that the actions of the shooter were justified,” he said. “We certainly wish that none of this would have happened. It’s a senseless death.”

Here’s the report from Omaha’s KMTV:

 

 

That television report doesn’t make clear the context of what happened. James Scurlock was part of a group of criminals who were vandalizing businesses in the Old Market district. Scurlock was seen on surveillance video with an accomplice at 10:15 p.m. smashing up an architecture firm on Harney Street half a block from Gardner’s bar. Forty minutes later, the rioters smashed the glass in Gardner’s bar. The owner and his father were inside, protecting their business, and when the owners came out on the sidewalk, Scurlock’s accomplice attacked Gardner’s father, shoving him to the ground. This led to the fatal altercation.

In the video, the person who first jumped Gardner was a 19-year-old woman named Alayna Melendez. It is not clear whether she herself was part of the gang of vandals smashing up Harney Street, but she was obviously (a) in the vicinity, and (b) sympthetic to the rioters:

One of the protesters who tackled Gardner told KETV Newswatch 7’s Michelle Bandur, she had to act when she heard someone had a gun.
“I knew it was not going to end well,” Alayna Melendez said.
Melendez, 19, said she had been at the protests Friday and Saturday at 72nd and Dodge and moved downtown closer to home.
“Silence is violence,” she said.
Melendez said as a person of color, she had to jump in to help.
“I grabbed him from behind and pulled him to the ground and as soon as I pulled him to the ground, people gathered around us and he had his hand positioned in a way and just shot,” she said.
Melendez said Gardner fired two warning shots.
“The very last shot, that got him (Scurlock) and that killed him,” she said.
Melendez gave a statement to police hoping it would help bring charges against Gardner.
She also says she would do it again.
“I was not scared to lose my life that night. I was fully indebted to losing my life and fully aware I could have lost my life that night,” Melendez said.

Why hasn’t Alayna Melendez been charged with assault? By the way, there is another video of this incident that went viral:

“It’s not worth it!”

They didn’t listen. James Scurlock could not be reached for comment.


 

‘Young Philadelphians’

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Play stupid games, win stupid prizes:

Police said one person is dead following a shooting during a burglary attempt inside a South Philadelphia gun store early Tuesday.
It happened around 4:20 a.m. on the 1500 block of South Front Street in the Pennsport section of the city.
Police were called to the Firing Line Gun Range and Gun Store.
Officers said when they arrived at the store they found a man on the second floor with a gunshot wound to the head. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Investigators said the gun shop owner told them he was staking out his store following an earlier burglary attempt. He said he watched the security screen show three or four men use wire cutters to break through the gate and enter the store.
The owner said he pointed his gun at the man inside the store and fired, striking him in the head. The two to three other people ran from the scene.
Officials said another person arrived at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital with a gunshot wound to his shoulder. Police are unsure if this shooting is connected to the incident at this time.
Police said the owner of the gun store is cooperating with the investigation.

 

Police told Fox News there will be no charges against the store owner, as this is the very definition of justifiable homicide. Meanwhile . . .

Most Looters Are Young Philadelphians
Not Associated With the Protests, DA Says

That’s the headline from Philadephia’s WCAU-TV, which quotes the Soros-supported Democrat district attorney Larry Krasner:

“I think it would be fair to describe most of these as looting cases,” Krasner said in an interview with NBC10 Monday. “They are often situations in which people are caught inside of a store… within Macy’s or at some other location.”
For the looting and burglary, Krasner said it’s mostly been 18- to 24-year-olds from Philadelphia in what he called crimes of opportunity. Many of them, he said, were first time offenders.
Among the protesters, police found a few people with guns, Krasner said. So his office has charged three people with illegal gun possession charges. . . .
So far, he said, the looting videos have shown different crowds from those protesting.
“They don’t seem to be carrying signs, talking about political issues or talking about police accountability, they don’t seem to have t-shirts on that are political in nature,” he said. “They seem to be committing opportunistic crimes and they seem to be doing it within the context of peaceful protest.”

Why does this distinction between protesters and looters matter so much to Krasner? Is it not obvious to everyone with two eyes and a brain that the people who organize the “peaceful protests” are doing so with the intent of causing riots? And that the people committing “crimes of opportunity” understand this as well as the political organizers do? Of course, the protest organizers are funded by Soros, the same man who spent nearly $2 million to elect Krasner. Democrats are the party of criminals. Someone should write a book about that.

Oh, wait . . .


 

Rioter vs. FedEx Truck: Guess Who Won?

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Here’s a helpful hint for young “social justice” activists — truck drivers have no obligation to surrender to armed hijackers:

Authorities said a man was hit and killed by a FedEx truck during protests over George Floyd’s death in St. Louis.
A preliminary investigation revealed that the driver of a FedEx double tractor-trailer was rerouted because protesters shut down certain areas near downtown St. Louis.
St. Louis Police said the driver stopped due to a large gathering of protesters. While he was stopped, several people gained access to the first trailer and started to remove items.
Two men, “while standing on the passenger side footboard of the truck cab, displayed guns to the driver. The driver, fearing for his safety, sounded the airhorn and drove off until he was stopped by police,” Sgt. Keith Barrett said in a statement.
The driver didn’t realize that a person was stuck on the converter dolly between the two trailers, police said. The man had been caught by the trailer tire, pulled under and was eventually run over by the tire.
Authorities are now investigating the incident but they believe the man who died appeared to be one of the protesters.

I’ve seen two different videos of the incident. The graphic nature required the local Fox affiliate to censor some images, but you get the idea:

 

The thing that struck me about this entire nightmare — here’s a good roundup of Sunday night’s anarchy — is how stupid and senseless it all is. Police in Minneapolis killed a guy who was caught trying to pass a counterfeit $20. Why does this require people to riot all over the country?

What purpose were the protest marches intended to accomplish? To express disapproval of racism? Yet if practically everybody is against racism — and it is quite difficult to find self-avowed racists in 21st-century America — who are the protesters marching against? Consider the case of Minneapolis, in particular. The city has long had a reputation as a bastion of liberalism. Hubert Humphrey, an outspoken champion of racial equality, was mayor of Minneapolis before winning three terms in the U.S. Senate and becoming vice president during the presidency of Lyndon Johnson. Minnesota is such a stronghold of the Democratic Party that not even Ronald Reagan’s historic 1984 landslide could tip the state into the GOP column. So if Minneapolis is now run by a secret cabal of racist officials determined to oppress the city’s black residents, these oppressors must be Democrats. Surely such an accusation cannot be what inspired the protest marches that followed the death of George Floyd, can it?
Whatever wrongdoing might have been committed by the police implicated in Floyd’s death, no one could plausibly assert that officials in Minneapolis endorsed it. . . .

Read the rest of my latest column at The American Spectator.