Tag Archives: FOIA

Guest Posts

An Op-Ed the New York Times Refuses to Publish: Wolfgang Halbig’s Quest For the Truth

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By Alison Maynard

TO:  opinion@newyorktimes.com

(Sent April 7, 2019)

[Editor’s Note: The author concedes that the New York Times typically does not publish pieces in direct in response to, or complaining about, reports which appear in the paper. Still, a perspective defending school safety expert Wolfgang Halbig’s credibility has yet to appear in the Times, or for that matter any other news outlet reporting on the legal actions brought by Sandy Hook parents. Nor have such outlets honestly covered any of the ensuing controversy leading up to these most recent activities. Such one-sidedness more than suggests the increasingly propaganda-like nature of such news media’s “reportage” and commentary.]

Wolfgang Halbig’s Quest for the Truth

The article by Elizabeth Williamson published in the New York Timeson March 29, 2019 (“How Alex Jones and Infowars helped a Florida man torment Sandy Hook families”), is so monstrously full of misinformation—and disinformation–that it deserves a response.

The “Florida man” is Wolfgang Halbig, a 71-year-old school security expert and former state trooper.  Mr. Halbig has been dogged—and uncompromisingly ethical—in his search for the truth about the so-called Sandy Hook shooting, a search prompted initially by horror, giving way to astonishment and disbelief at glaring inconsistencies and falsehoods in the reportage.

At no time has Halbig “harassed,” “hounded,” “pursued,” or “tormented” Sandy Hook families.  He has focused, instead, on obtaining public records from state, federal, and local agencies, such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency; Newtown Police Department; Newtown Public Schools; and Connecticut State Police. Most of these agencies provided no records whatsoeverin response to Wolf’s Freedom of Information requests, despite legal mandates.

For example, Wolf has tried, in vain, to obtain the log created pursuant to a sign that said “Everyone Must Check In” which shows up in photos of the fire station taken Dec. 14, 2012, as well as the transmission log of “Trooper 1,” the state police helicopter in the air that day, purporting to track a suspect in the woods.  Halbig has been denied these indisputably public records.  He subpoenaed witnesses who had presumptive knowledge of conditions at the school for his FOIA hearings, but Newtown’s attorney Monte Frank improperly told them to ignore the subpoenas, and Wolf was provided no relief for this misconduct.  The police at last gave Wolf “dash cam videos” he had requested, which are not, in fact, dash cam videos, since they do not show the hood of the car.  They also show different scenes putatively taken from the same location at the same time, so were clearly faked.

Continue reading An Op-Ed the New York Times Refuses to Publish: Wolfgang Halbig’s Quest For the Truth →

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Guest Posts

The Long Arm of the Lawless

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The Official Oppression of Wolfgang Halbig Continues

By Alison Maynard

Editor’s Note: In this important article Colorado-based attorney Alison Maynard updates readers on school safety expert Wolfgang Halbig’s ongoing defense in a lawsuit brought by parties in the Sandy Hook school shooting event. Also described are the Connecticut Court’s overreach while attempting to frustrate this defense.

Maynard then discusses recently revealed investigations of Halbig at the hands of none other than the FBI, U.S. Department of Justice, Lake County Sheriff’s Office, City of Orlando Police Department, Florida Dept. of Law Enforcement, and Orange County Sheriff’s Office, all of which have over several years conducted at least 13 unwarranted records investigations of Halbig. The 70-year-old’s only “crime” has been his relentless pursuit of government documents detailing what transpired at Sandy Hook.

Because I’ve been helping Wolfgang Halbig defend against the frivolous suits brought by seven Sandy Hook “parents” in Connecticut Superior Court, I’m in a good position to tell the world what’s going on in those, how not only the judge, but the clerks, are sabotaging his defense.

School safety expert Wolfgang Halbig

He’s filed a few motions in this case, the one of longest standing being a motion to dismiss because the court lacks personal and subject matter jurisdiction over him.  “No personal jurisdiction” means the Connecticut court can’t entertain this suit against him, because he’s a resident of the State of Florida and conducts no business in Connecticut.  “No subject matter jurisdiction” means the plaintiffs don’t have standing to sue, because they alleged no injury personal to themselves.

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News, Videos

RFK Jr. Discusses Father’s Role in Aftermath of JFK Assassination

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Tucker Carlson
FoxNews

(Unexpurgated interview segment available here.)

The final classified files on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy will now be withheld from the public until 2021. On June 6 Robert Kennedy Jr. appeared on Tucker Carlson’s primetime FoxNews program to explain that material released by the federal government thus far “tends to link the CIA to the assassination one way or another.”

Kennedy notes that following the assassination his father, who served as attorney general under JFK, was without power to investigate November 22, 1963 murder after Lyndon Johnson assumed power. “Bobby Kennedy was the best investigator of that era,” RFK Jr. explains.

He was like Mueller of that era. For ten years he had been investigating the unions–the Teamsters and the mob. So why wouldn’t he investigate [the JFK assassination]? But the truth is the day that his brother was killed he lost all of the investigative capacity at the Department of Justice. He had 30,000 FBI agents who worked for him. But he never talked to J. Edgar Hoover again, not a single time after my uncle Jack was killed. Hoover at that time began reporting directly to Johnson, and my father, who was ostensibly Hoover’s boss, really lost control of the FBI and the investigative capacity of the Department of Justice, and he resigned afterward.

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The CIA and the Media

The CIA and the Media: Historical Fact #88

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In a significant April 2018 freedom of information decision in favor of government censorship Judge Colleen McMahon of the Southern District of New York ruled that the CIA has full discretion to provide classified information to journalists and news organizations of its choosing while withholding the identical information from other reporters or the broader public when the same information is requested under the Freedom of Information Act.

In 2017 free lance journalist Adam Johnson filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the CIA, citing a 2012 FOIA request to the Agency by Gawker journalist John Cook for exchanges between the CIA and several prominent journalists. In many of the documents CIA produced the responses to journalists were redacted. Johnson was concerned with the preferential treatment meted out by the Agency while the same information was granted to others.

All of the journalists in question had strong rapports with the CIA and worked for corporate-controlled news media: Jo Becker and Scott Shane of the New York Times; David Ignatius of the Washington Post; Ken Dilanian and Brian Bennett of the Los Angeles Times; Matt Apuzzo and Adam Goldman of the Associated Press; and Siobhan Gorman and Evan Perez of the Wall Street Journal.

One example from Johnson’s suit cites the Wall Street Journal’s Gorman, who inquired of the CIA’s Office of Public Affairs,

I’m told that on runs, Director Petraeus’s security detail hands him bottles of water, relay-style, so as not to slow him down. And you mentioned the director’s running a 6-minute mile, but I was told that the agency-wide invitation was that if you could run a 7-minute mile, you can come run with the director. I wanted to make sure both are is [sic] accurate. On the chart, it’s accurate to say that the congressional gym and the Pentagon gym ranked high, right? And I was just told that the facilities at the black sites were better than the ones at CIA. Don’t know whether that’s something you want to weigh in on, but I thought I’d see if you did.

The CIA’s response came just hours later: “Siobhan …” The body of the response is redacted. The CIA’s closing reads, “We can chat more on Monday, hope this helps.” That’s it. The entire response was regarded as too sensitive for the FOIA requester and broader public, but permissible for Siobhan Gorman, who replied, “Thanks for the help. I hope I wasn’t the cause of your dental appointment delay. This is very helpful as I try to tie up loose ends on this story. Sometimes ‘fun’ stories take as much work as their ‘less fun’ brethren. Sorry for all the qus [sic].”

Citing the National Security Act of 1947, the CIA contended that “limited, selective disclosures of classified information to journalists are perfectly legal,” CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou observes. “The National Security Act of 1947, they said, only requires protection of intelligence sources and methods from “unauthorized” disclosure, not from authorized disclosure. And because the disclosures at issue were actually intended to protect intelligence sources and methods, they were fully authorized.”

John Kiriakou, “Why Does the CIA Prefer Corporate Media?” Reader Supported News, February 23, 2018.

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News

CIA Communications to Corporate News Media Deemed Classified

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In Key FOIA Case Judge Grants Agency Broad Discretion in Leaking Info to Select Journalists, News Organizations

Tim Johnson
McClatchey
(April 30, 2018)

Washington – The CIA can selectively divulge classified information to selected reporters in emails yet withhold that information from other journalists or members of the public when they seek the same information under the Freedom of Information Act, a federal judge in New York has ruled.

The decision appeared in the court record on Friday but became more widely disseminated Monday.

The ruling comes amid vigorous national debate over leaks to the media and the use of anonymous sources in covering national security news, including an ongoing FBI investigation into Russian attempts to influence the 2016 presidential election.

Judge Colleen McMahon of the Southern District of New York ruled that the CIA does not have to release parts of five emails senior CIA officials sent to journalists from the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and The Washington Post in 2012. At the time, the CIA was facing pressure over links it may have had to a Pakistani doctor who helped American forces hunt down Osama bin Laden.

“The Director of Central Intelligence is free to disclose classified information about CIA sources and methods selectively, if he concludes that it is necessary to do so in order to protect those intelligence sources and methods, and no court can second guess his decision,” McMahon ruled.

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News

Wolfgang Halbig Files FOIA Request For Records on Lucy Richards’ Investigation

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Former school safety expert and Sandy Hook truth activist Wolfgang Halbig has filed a Freedom of Information Act Request with the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Palm Beach offices for records pertaining to the investigation and arrest of Lucy Richards.

Over the past five years school safety expert Wolfgang Halbig has filed numerous freedom of information requests with Connecticut authorities concerning the Sandy Hook massacre event.

In 2016 Richards was arrested for allegedly making telephonic death threats to Leonard Pozner, one of forty parent figures involved in the Sandy Hook massacre event. The Palm Beach branch of the FBI undertook the investigation that led to Richards’ arrest and prosecution in federal court.

In June 2017 Richards was given a five month prison sentence for “making death threats against the parents of one of one of the students killed in the attack,” the Washington Post reported. Following imprisonment Richards will be required to undergo five additional months of house arrest and maintain a journal of her online activity for three years, news reports claim.

“Why did the Palm Beach FBI not provide Lucy Richards her Constitutional right of DUE PROCESS?” Halbig asks in his FOIA request.

This is an official United States Freedom of Information Public Record requests on the arrest of Lucy Richards.
Case Number:   16-80206-Cr-Cohn
Date of Birth:  07-22-1959
  1. Provide copy of the criminal complaint filed by the victim that is dated and signed in there own handwriting.
  2. Provide copy of the FBI investigative report that was forwarded to the Federal Prosecutor Karen Gilbert in in Souther Federal Judicial District in Florida.
  3. Provide a copy of the investigative timeline by the FBI that provided the evidence to convict Lucy Richards.
  4. Provide copy of Leonard Pozner interview with the FBI when filing the Criminal Complaint against a 57 year old Disabled women on Food Stamps.
  5. Provide copies of the phone calls made and copy of the email send to Leonard Pozner computer and his home phone that the FBI copied for evidence.
  6. Provide copy of Lucy Richards Miranda right card that she signed before being questioned by the FBI.
I will pay for all copying and mailing to the following address or you can email to wolfgang.halbig at comcast.net
The request comes shortly after lawsuits were filed in Texas by two sets of Sandy Hook parents against popular right wing broadcaster Alex Jones, one of which reportedly references Richards’ communications. In March 2018 after withdrawing a lawsuit filed against Halbig claiming invasion of privacy, Pozner successfully requested that State Circuit Court Judge Don F. Briggs recuse himself from the case.

Halbig, who has made numerous public records requests of Connecticut state officials pertaining to the December 2012 Sandy Hook massacre, may very well be on to something with this documents request, particularly since much of the information used in Richards’ investigation and prosecution has been viewed through the media’s lens and not been made available for broader public scrutiny. Further, it appears that major news organizations retracted some of their coverage of the courtroom proceedings, yet curiously without issuing corrections.

In April 2017 Richards was arrested for failing to appear at a plea hearing. At her June 2017 sentencing, presiding US District Judge James Cohn purportedly stated that he found the defendant’s actions “‘disturbing,.'” Cohn reportedly went on to comment,

“I’m sure [Mr. Pozner] wishes this was false and he could embrace Noah, hear Noah’s heartbeat and hear Noah say ‘I love you, Dad’,” Cohn said, as reported by the Associated Press. “Your words were cruel and insensitive. This is reality and there is no fiction. There are no alternative facts.”[Emphasis added]

As noted, Cohn’s above quotes were attributed to a report published by the Associated Press. Yet although the story was carried widely, the original Associated Press article can no longer be found online. The article in question also appears to have been scrubbed from the Washington Post‘s website,

In 2017 Pozner claims he moved from Boca Raton after being threatened with arrest by Boca Raton police detective John Turek for cyberstalking a minor.

According to the Daily News, Pozner then “filed a complaint against Turek with Boca Raton police and sent an email to the city’s mayor. He got a letter in late August saying an investigation found ‘no evidence’ Turek violated department policy.”

“At a minimum, I want Detective Turek sent for retraining,” Pozner complained. “I was the victim of a really bizarre, false report, but he spun it around and turned me into the aggressor targeting her. Really all I did was post something in my defense.”

“A police spokesman disagreed with Pozner’s position. ‘This case was a suspicious incident and never became a criminal investigation,’ Mark Economou told The Daily News.”

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Guest Posts, Videos

Wolfgang Halbig Notches Win in Sandy Hook FOIA Fight

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Dash-Cam DVDs Deemed Public Records, Officials Pull Out Stops to Keep Docs Private

Tony Mead
Facebook – Sandy Hook Hoax

On February 18, 2016, Wolfgang Halbig appeared in the CT FOIA Commission Hearing to continue his attempt to obtain public records from the Newtown PD and Department of Sandy Hook PanoramaEmergency Services and Public Protection, who are entrusted with the CT State Police report and are the holders of those records.

The Hearing begins and it becomes immediately apparent that Vincent Perpetua is much more rigid than Matthew Streeter (the previous hearing officer). This is a no nonsense, by the book, informed and educated attorney who seems to view Wolfgang and his attorney along with Christine Plourde (Legislative Manager and basically “gatekeeper” of DESPPP records) and her attorney with equally condescending disdain.

Kay Wilson explains to Perpetua that Wolfgang has been getting the “runaround” on his FOIA request for written police reports from both the Newtown PD and the DESPP as each refers him to the other agency. Newtown claims that they are NOT in possession of the records as the State Police were the “investigating agency”. Christine Plourde claims that the records are exempt from public disclosure as they are “signed witness statements”.

Continue reading Wolfgang Halbig Notches Win in Sandy Hook FOIA Fight →

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