Mother of 3 Arrested for Taking Pictures of Tourist Attraction at Airport

This case is a frightening example of what can happen when a photographer encounters ignorant bullies with badges. According to the complaint filed in Federal Court, Nancy Genovese, a mother of three, was driving home on County Road 31 past Gabreski Airport in Suffolk County. Gabreski Airport displays a decorative helicopter shell by the roadway to the public, which is visible to all who pass by.

Nancy Genovese stopped her car on the side of the road across the street from the airport in an area that is open and accessible to the public, and crossed over the road to the airport entryway that is also open and accessible to the public to take a picture of the helicopter display. While still in her car, she took a picture of the decorative helicopter shell with the intention of posting it on her personal “Support Our Troops” web page.

As Nancy Genovese was preparing to drive away, she was stopped and approached by Robert Iberger, a lieutenant with the Southampton Town Police. Lieutenant Iberger demanded to know why she was taking photographs. Nancy showed the lieutenant her camera, but Lieutenant Iberger grabbed her camera and handled it “without care”. In an attempt to prevent the lieutenant from damaging the camera, Nancy removed her memory card, which Lieutenant Iberger confiscated. To date, Nancy’s memory card still has not been returned to her.

Lieutenant Iberger demanded that Nancy remain where she is, and he refused to allow her to leave. At this time, Lieutenant Iberger notified the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office and the authorities at Gabreski Airport of Nancy’s presence outside the airport, and falsely and wrongfully informed them that she posed a terrorist threat.

Suffolk County Deputy Sheriff Robert Carlock responded to the scene, along with various members of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office. When Deputy Carlock arrived, he placed cameras on the roof of his vehicle, aimed at Nancy Genovese and her 18 and 20 year old sons who had come to the scene at this point to help their mother. Deputy Carlock ordered all three of them to stand directly in front of the cameras, and not to move.

Officials from the airport, as well as other local and federal law enforcement agencies also responded, including, without limitation, the Southampton Police Department, the Westhampton Police Department, the FBI, and the Department of Homeland Security. Nancy was questioned on the side of the road for approximately five to six hours, from about 6pm until midnight, denied food or water, and denied the opportunity to use a restroom, all without having received any warnings as to her rights.

Nancy Genovese also had a left lower leg injury just above her ankle that she had received earlier in the day and which, exacerbated by the stress and length of her roadside detention, was causing her to limp. When the officers saw this, they ordered her to expose her wound, which was bleeding, for no legitimate purpose, and with no regard for Nancy’s health or well-being. Members of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office used Nancy’s leg wound as another object to taunt her with, telling her that they were going to arrest her for an unreported knife wound.

Here’s where the story takes an interesting twist, and why I believe Nancy’s situation hasn’t received more press coverage. Before arriving at the airport to take a picture, earlier that day Nancy had been to the local shooting range with her rifle practicing her hobby, target shooting. During the first hour of questioning, Lieutenant Iberger searched Nancy’s vehicle, without her consent, and came across her unloaded rifle, which Nancy was legally carrying, in a locked case. Now some people throw up their arms (no pun intended) at this point, and say, “what does she want, she brought a rifle to the airport!”, but I would like to remind everyone that it is perfectly legal to drive around with an unloaded rifle in your car. Yes. Really. And Nancy did not enter the airport, she was parked alongside a public roadway. It is important to remember that no matter how you feel about firearms, nothing that Nancy did violated any laws.

Using force, Lieutenant Iberger pushed Nancy Genovese when she objected to the seizure of her rifle. Deputy Carlock taunted Nancy, asking in a disparaging tone, “You’re a real right winger, aren’t you?”, and stating in words or substance that she was never going to see her rifle again.

During the remainder of the six hours that Nancy Genovese was forcibly detained on the side of the road, she was taunted, verbally harangued, threatened, belittled, abused, humiliated and harassed by members of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office. For example, Deputy Carlock repeatedly referred to Nancy as “a right winger” and “tea bagger”, and threatened that they were going to arrest her for terrorism to make an example of her to other “tea baggers” and “right wingers”.

Around midnight, officials from the airport and federal law enforcement agencies determined that Nancy posed no terrorist or other security threat. Once most of the other law enforcement officials left the scene, Deputy Carlock ordered Nancy Genovese to be handcuffed by another member of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office. Before placed in handcuffs, Nancy attempted to give her purse containing her wallet and cell phone to her sons. Her wallet contained approximately $13,000 in cash, money she was holding to pay tuition that day for her son’s college and her daughter’s Catholic school tuition. Deputy Carlock refused to allow her sons to take her bag, and ordered her to leave it on the front seat of her unlocked vehicle, even after being informed of the value of its contents. When Nancy’s sons objected, Deputy Carlock threatened to arrest them if they touched it, and ordered them to leave the scene. Not knowing what to do, they left.

When Nancy’s sons responded to a call from the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office in the early morning hours to pick up their mother’s vehicle from the roadside, they found $5,300 of the $13,000 missing. The money was never returned. In addition, the contents of the glove compartment box was missing, and there was damage to the body of the car, particularly around the trunk.

Around midnight, after her sons were ordered to leave upon threat of arrest, Nancy was transported, in handcuffs, to the Suffolk County Jail. While in a holding cell, Deputy Carlock continued to verbally harass Nancy, telling her “you will pay”, and admitting that they had nothing to charge her with, but that he would “find something in order to teach all right wingers and tea baggers a lesson.”

While in her holding cell, Nancy Genovese was interrogated by Suffolk County Undersheriff Caracappa without receiving any warnings as to her rights. Her requests to speak to a lawyer were ignored. Following her “interrogation”, Undersheriff Caracappa informed her that she was being arrested and charged with “terrorism.”

At this point, Nancy requested medial treatment for her bleeding and painful left leg. After several requests, and several hours later, she was taken to the Peconic Bay Medical Center by male members of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office, and handcuffed to a bed. A sonogram was performed on Nancy’s left leg from her ankle to her inner groin, requiring her to disrobe. Despite her and the doctor’s request for them to turn away, the two male Suffolk Deputies insisted on staring at Nancy while she disrobed, further humiliating her. She was prescribed antibiotics, and discharged back to the Suffolk County Jail, with instructions on proper care for her leg wound.

Once back at the jail, the Suffolk County Sheriffs denied her access to her antibiotics, and denied her proper care of her leg wound. This caused a serious and painful staph infection to develop.

The following morning, Nancy Genovese was briefly questioned at the Suffolk County Jail by two FBI agents. No federal complaints or charges were ever brought against Nancy. That same day, Nancy was transported in handcuffs and ankle shackles, with no regard for her ankle wound, to the Southampton Justice Town Court. The driver drove fast and recklessly, intentionally making abrupt turns and laughing. This caused Nancy, who was not secured by a seatbelt, but was instead restrained with her hands cuffed behind her and her ankles cuffed together, to roll about in the back of the vehicle, further exacerbating her leg injury. When she requested that the Deputy Sheriffs secure her with a seatbelt, they laughed at her, and the driver continued to recklessly swerve the vehicle.

Nancy Genovese was brought into the courthouse in handcuffs and leg restraints, and was violently pushed through the door by the Deputy Sheriffs. This added to Nancy’s humiliation, particularly since Nancy knew some of the courthouse employees and other people who were present. Both before and after arriving at the courthouse, Nancy repeatedly requested to speak with an attorney. All of her requests were ignored.

Despite never stepping foot onto airport property, Nancy Genovese was arraigned on a single misdemeanor charge of Criminal Trespass in the Third Degree. She was assigned a Legal Aid Attorney by the Judge. Undersheriff Caracappa and Deputy Carlock intentionally lied to the Judge about the circumstances surrounding Nancy’s arrest, including that she was a terrorist and had surveillance equipment in her car, and the judge set bail in the amount of $50,000.

Due to the excessive amount of bail, Nancy’s children needed more time to come up with the money, so Nancy was returned to the jail. The Legal Aid Attorney assigned to Nancy spoke with the Deputy and Undersheriff, and due to the conversation, directly afterwards informed Nancy that he was no longer her attorney, and that he was going to ask the court to place her on suicide watch.

Once back at the jail, Nancy Genovese was processed, including being issued prison “greens” to wear, and was photographed, fingerprinted, and eye scanned. Members of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department continuously verbally harassed Nancy. A woman in civilian clothes then interviewed Nancy. The woman told Nancy she was going to be placed in “general population.” During the interview, two men wearing “Suffolk County Emergency Response Team” jackets entered the room. One of them removed Nancy from the room and held her in the hallway outside of the interview room. From there, Nancy heard the woman who had interviewed her arguing with the other man, saying that “She is not suicidal.”

Despite the woman’s protests, Nancy was physically moved by the two men wearing “Suffolk County Emergency Response Team” jackets to another room. There, another woman who identified herself as a nurse administered, without Nancy’s consent, two injections into Nancy’s arm. One of the men held Nancy’s head so that she could not see what was being done, while the other man held Nancy’s arm down. Despite her demands to know what they were doing, no one answered her. Nancy experienced bruising and swelling in her neck and arm long after she was released from custody.

Nancy was then escorted by the two men into a cell area, where she was forced to disrobe and put on a “suicide gown”, consisting of a heavy, jacket-type blanket that fastens around the body with Velcro. Nancy was not permitted to wear undergarments under the blanket. Nancy was required to wear this same “suicide gown” for the next several days. After three days, Nancy was evaluated by a psychiatrist who determined her to be of sound and stable mind, and immediately removed her from suicide watch.

Later that day, bail was posted, and Nancy was able to go home. Subsequently, all charges against Nancy were dismissed.

Upon Nancy’s release, Undersheriff Caracappa issued a press release in response to media inquiries, titled “Armed Woman Arrested for Trespassing at Suffolk County Gabreski Airport”, which falsely stated that Nancy had been taking pictures of the airport and surrounding security”, and that she became hysterical, and began “screaming and flailing around” when confronted. Undersheriff Caracappa also falsely reported that Nancy had surveillance equipment, 500 rounds of ammunition, and “scary weapons” in her car, and that she was a right-wing extremist and terrorist, and that she had been at the airport trespassing several times and had been warned to stay away. Upon further inquiry, it turns out that Nancy had never trespassed at the airport before, had never been warned by anyone to “stay away” before, had no “surveillance equipment” of any kind other than her point and shoot camera, and certainly was not a terrorist. Undersheriff Caracappa has refused to issue a retraction or correction.

Nancy has filed a Federal Lawsuit seeking up to 70 million dollars from the Town of Southampton, the County of Suffolk, Lieutenant Iberger, Undersheriff Caracappa, Deputy Carlock, Lieutenant Leuete, and various other employees of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department. The lawsuit is still ongoing.

EDITOR’S NOTES:

All of the alleged facts discussed in this article have been taken directly from the court documents filed in this case.
Nancy Genovese was on public property the entire time. At no time did she trespass onto airport property, which is why the trespassing charge (the only charge against her) was dismissed.
Here is the google maps view of the airport entrance, and the helicopter on display.
Although Undersheriff Caracappa released a statement saying that Nancy was previously spotted around the airport in the past and had previously been warned not to return, not a single person can verify his claim. Nancy claims that she was never warned to “stay away” from a public area outside a tourist attraction.
Yes, to some, Nancy’s claims seem far fetched and outrageous. But let’s look at the facts that both sides can agree on. Not a single crime was actually committed by Nancy. Yet, she was held against her will, in an isolated cell, in essentially a straight jacket, with no medical attention, for several days.

UPDATES:

Town of Southampton Defaults in Genovese Lawsuit

Timeline of recent mysterious bird, fish deaths

(NaturalNews) The recent mysterious deaths of birds and fish are causing alarm among naturalists around the world. Birds are literally falling dead out of the sky, and fish are washing up dead on shores and rivers across North America and around the world. The reaction from the mainstream media seems strangely subdued, as if they're all just blowing this off as some unexplained quirk about the natural world that should be largely ignored.

NaturalNews readers think differently. We are concerned when thousands of dead birds fall out of the sky for no apparent reason. The sky itself may not be falling, but previously live animals are clearly falling out of it. If that's not enough reason to wonder what the heck is happening to our planet, then what is?

These are clear signs that something is wrong. Red flags from nature, if you will. Here's the timeline of recent deaths that have been reported:

12.13.10 - Thousands of dead barramundi fish wash up in Australia, unknown causes (http://www.themorningbulletin.com.a...)

12.15.10 - Thousands of dead fish wash ashore on Florida beach, blamed on cold weather (http://www.cfnews13.com/article/new...)

12.17.10 - Dead fish wash ashore at lake beach in Indiana, blamed on winter storms (http://www.wndu.com/localnews/headl...)

12.18.10 - Thousands of dead fish turn up in bay in Philippines, unknown causes (http://globalnation.inquirer.net/ce...)

12.22.10 - More than a hundred dead pelicans turn up in North Carolina, unknown causes (http://www.carteretnewstimes.com/ar...)

12.23.10 - Hundreds of dead sea creatures wash ashore in South Carolina, blamed on cold water (http://www.abcnews4.com/Global/stor...)

12.23.10 - Ten tons of mostly dead fish found in fishing net in New Zealand, unknown causes (http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/loc...)

12.27.10 - Scores of dead fish wash ashore in a lake in Haiti, unknown causes (http://www.france24.com/en/20101227...)

12.28.10 - 70 bats found dead in Tucson, Ariz., unknown causes (http://www.azcentral.com/news/artic...)

12.29.10 - Dozens of fish found dead in San Antonio, Texas, unknown causes (http://www.ksat.com/news/26316464/d...)

12.31.10 - 5,000+ birds found dead in Arkansas, suffering from massive trauma and blood clots (http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/01/03/ar...)

01.03.11 - 100,000+ dead drum fish found in Arkansas river, unknown causes (http://www.todaysthv.com/news/local...)

01.03.11 - Dozens of dead birds show up in a woman's backyard in Kentucky, unknown causes (http://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/loca...)

01.03.11 - Tens of thousands of dead fish wash ashore in Chesapeake Bay, Md., blamed on cold water (http://www.wbaltv.com/r/26357581/de...)

01.03.11 - 100 tons of dead fish wash ashore in Brazil, unknown causes (http://www.care2.com/greenliving/10...)

01.04.11 - Several dead manatees found on Florida coast, unknown causes (http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news...)

01.04.11 - Thousands of dead fish wash up on creek in Florida, unknown causes (http://www.wftv.com/news/26367953/d...)

01.04.11 - Hundreds of dead fish was ashore on St. Clair River in Ontario, Can., unknown causes (http://www.torontosun.com/news/cana...)

01.04.11 - Hundreds of dead black birds found on highway in Louisiana, suffering from internal injuries and blood clots (http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/11...)

01.05.11 - Hundreds of dead birds found on highway in Texas, unknown causes (http://www.ktre.com/global/story.as...)

01.05.11 - Large amount of dead fish wash up on New Zealand beaches, unknown causes (http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/a...)

01.05.11 - Up to 100 jackdaw birds found dead on road in Sweden, unknown causes (http://www.thelocal.se/31262/20110105/)

01.06.11 - 40,000+ dead Devil crabs washed ashore in the U.K., unknown causes (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503543_...)

01.07.11 - More than 1,000 dead turtle doves found in Italy, unknown causes (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...)

01.10.11 - Countless fish found dead in U.K. brook, unknown causes (http://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/...)

01.11.11 - Thousands of gizzard shad fish float to the top of Lake Michigan and wash up on the shores near Chicago, blamed on cold weather (http://www.hispanicallyspeakingnews...)


Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/030985_mysterious_deaths_birds.html#ixzz1AwxJNjPd

Children need more meditation and less stimulation

If you want your children to feel more relaxed and less stressed, give them silence, not iPods.

This unthinkable idea came to mind after listening to Ernie Christie and Dr Cathy Day, two educationists from Queensland, Australia. They were addressing an audience at Regent's College, London, on the benefits of allowing children to experience regular periods of silent meditation in the classroom.

A pilot study in 2005, involving teaching meditation to five- to 17-year-olds, had shown that children are not only capable of meditation, they actually enjoy it. The benefits to children's wellbeing were so obvious to teachers that it persuaded Cathy Day, director of Townsville Catholic Education Office, to spend precious funds implementing the first Christian meditation programme for all schools in the diocese.

The initiative had two important catalysts: a diocesan bishop sympathetic to meditation, Michael Putney, and the input of Laurence Freeman OSB, leader of the World Community for Christian Meditation. Without their help, Day admitted, nothing would have got off the ground. When an almost pathological "busyness" is the norm, valuing stillness and silence is counter-cultural. When our culture trains us to be winners, to compete and to consume, we all sense society's imbalance, said Freeman. We need to give children an experience of another way of relating to themselves and to others.

Deputy director Christie agreed. If children are over-stimulated we rob them of something precious: being allowed to "just be" where children discover their own inner sense of who they are. Hijacked by a "doing" culture that measures everything by what we achieve or possess, meditation helps children access a deeper part of themselves - an inner sanctuary away from a world of incessant activity and noise. They learn to honour their own spiritual life.

We all have a spiritual life, irrespective of any faith we hold, said Christie. Meditation can be practised with a diversity of beliefs: children of other faiths take part in the programme. Meditating in a group can give children an early sense of belonging, says Christie. Children with learning or physical disabilities can join in and feel part of the class. But the practice is introduced gradually. The recommended meditation time is one minute per age level; for five- and six-year-olds, it would be five to six minutes.

A video of interviews with teachers, children and parents was admirably honest. Children of varying ages said meditation helped them to feel "relaxed" or more "peaceful". One boy said it helped his thoughts "just settle"; one girl enjoyed being "quiet". A child from an indigenous community said he was able "to be himself". Teachers reported improved behaviour in difficult children. Yet no one suggested it was a "cure all" practice. But at a recent awards ceremony in the second largest school in Townsville, the key speech was on the positive benefits of meditation.

The health benefits of meditation are well documented: it can relieve stress, lower blood pressure and alleviate depression. Psychiatrist Jonathan Champion said research showed most mental health problems have begun by the age of 14. Giving children periods of quietness and reflection to promote wellbeing could save money on healthcare later.

For Day and her team, meditation is an essential part of religious education. In the foreword to Christie's ground-breaking book, Coming Home: A Guide to Teaching Christian Meditation to Children, Putney says being "still" is very different from being "quiet". "Be still and know that I am God." It is in stillness that God speaks to the heart. Meditation as a way to self-knowledge and self-acceptance is an indispensable first step towards knowledge of God. Teachers hope children will discover a love that accepts them unconditionally and an inner spiritual resource they can draw upon later in life.

When religious schools are seen as intolerant of other faiths, the lost "contemplative" dimension of religion that reaches to a divine source beyond individual differences is surely needed. By training teachers in this depth dimension of faith, this remote diocese on the edge of the Australian outback is already creating waves.

Comment: A very beneficial meditation program for children is the Eiriu Eolas. For more information, please see this link:

EEbreathe.org

Toowoomba Flood 2011.01.10

The Video the US Military doesn't want you to see: The Paradigm Shift

ITS TIME TO CONNECT THE DOTS 2012 1/6

African Farmers Displaced As Investors Move In

Soumouni, Mali - The half-dozen strangers who descended on this remote West African village brought its hand-to-mouth farmers alarming news: their humble fields, tilled from one generation to the next, were now controlled by Libya's leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, and the farmers would all have to leave.

"They told us this would be the last rainy season for us to cultivate our fields; after that, they will level all the houses and take the land," said Mama Keita, 73, the leader of this village veiled behind dense, thorny scrubland. "We were told that Qaddafi owns this land."

Across Africa and the developing world, a new global land rush is gobbling up large expanses of arable land. Despite their ageless traditions, stunned villagers are discovering that African governments typically own their land and have been leasing it, often at bargain prices, to private investors and foreign governments for decades to come.

Organizations like the United Nations and the World Bank say the practice, if done equitably, could help feed the growing global population by introducing large-scale commercial farming to places without it.

But others condemn the deals as neocolonial land grabs that destroy villages, uproot tens of thousands of farmers and create a volatile mass of landless poor. Making matters worse, they contend, much of the food is bound for wealthier nations.

"The food security of the country concerned must be first and foremost in everybody's mind," said Kofi Annan, the former United Nations secretary general, now working on the issue of African agriculture. "Otherwise it is straightforward exploitation and it won't work. We have seen a scramble for Africa before. I don't think we want to see a second scramble of that kind."

A World Bank study released in September tallied farmland deals covering at least 110 million acres - the size of California and West Virginia combined - announced during the first 11 months of 2009 alone. More than 70 percent of those deals were for land in Africa, with Sudan, Mozambique and Ethiopia among those nations transferring millions of acres to investors.

Before 2008, the global average for such deals was less than 10 million acres per year, the report said. But the food crisis that spring, which set off riots in at least a dozen countries, prompted the spree. The prospect of future scarcity attracted both wealthy governments lacking the arable land needed to feed their own people and hedge funds drawn to a dwindling commodity.

"You see interest in land acquisition continuing at a very high level," said Klaus Deininger, the World Bank economist who wrote the report, taking many figures from a Web site run by Grain, an advocacy organization, because governments would not reveal the agreements. "Clearly, this is not over."

The report, while generally supportive of the investments, detailed mixed results. Foreign aid for agriculture has dwindled from about 20 percent of all aid in 1980 to about 5 percent now, creating a need for other investment to bolster production.

But many investments appear to be pure speculation that leaves land fallow, the report found. Farmers have been displaced without compensation, land has been leased well below value, those evicted end up encroaching on parkland and the new ventures have created far fewer jobs than promised, it said.

The breathtaking scope of some deals galvanizes opponents. In Madagascar, a deal that would have handed over almost half the country's arable land to a South Korean conglomerate helped crystallize opposition to an already unpopular president and contributed to his overthrow in 2009.

People have been pushed off land in countries like Ethiopia, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia and Zambia. It is not even uncommon for investors to arrive on land that was supposedly empty. In Mozambique, one investment company discovered an entire village with its own post office on what had been described as vacant land, said Olivier De Schutter, the United Nations food rapporteur.



© The New York Times
Deals for farmland have involved many African nations.
In Mali, about three million acres along the Niger River and its inland delta are controlled by a state-run trust called the Office du Niger. In nearly 80 years, only 200,000 acres of the land have been irrigated, so the government considers new investors a boon.

"Even if you gave the population there the land, they do not have the means to develop it, nor does the state," said Abou Sow, the executive director of Office du Niger.

He listed countries whose governments or private sectors have already made investments or expressed interest: China and South Africa in sugar cane; Libya and Saudi Arabia in rice; and Canada, Belgium, France, South Korea, India, the Netherlands and multinational organizations like the West African Development Bank.

In all, Mr. Sow said about 60 deals covered at least 600,000 acres in Mali, although some organizations said more than 1.5 million acres had been committed. He argued that the bulk of the investors were Malians growing food for the domestic market. But he acknowledged that outside investors like the Libyans, who are leasing 250,000 acres here, are expected to ship their rice, beef and other agricultural products home.

"What advantage would they gain by investing in Mali if they could not even take their own production?" Mr. Sow said.

As with many of the deals, the money Mali might earn from the leases remains murky. The agreement signed with the Libyans grants them the land for at least 50 years simply in exchange for developing it.

"The Libyans want to produce rice for Libyans, not for Malians," said Mamadou Goita, the director of a nonprofit research organization in Mali. He and other opponents contend that the government is privatizing a scarce national resource without improving the domestic food supply, and that politics, not economics, are driving events because Mali wants to improve ties with Libya and others.

The huge tracts granted to private investors are many years from production. But officials noted that Libya already spent more than $50 million building a 24-mile canal and road, constructed by a Chinese company, benefiting local villages.

Every farmer affected, Mr. Sow added, including as many as 20,000 affected by the Libyan project, will receive compensation. "If they lose a single tree, we will pay them the value of that tree," he said.

But anger and distrust run high. In a rally last month, hundreds of farmers demanded that the government halt such deals until they get a voice. Several said that they had been beaten and jailed by soldiers, but that they were ready to die to keep their land.

"The famine will start very soon," shouted Ibrahima Coulibaly, the head of the coordinating committee for farmer organizations in Mali.
"If people do not stand up for their rights, they will lose everything!"
"Ante!" members of the crowd shouted in Bamanankan, the local language. "We refuse!"

Kassoum Denon, the regional head for the Office du Niger, accused the Malian opponents of being paid by Western groups that are ideologically opposed to large-scale farming.

"We are responsible for developing Mali," he said. "If the civil society does not agree with the way we are doing it, they can go jump in a lake."

The looming problem, experts noted, is that Mali remains an agrarian society. Kicking farmers off the land with no alternative livelihood risks flooding the capital, Bamako, with unemployed, rootless people who could become a political problem.

"The land is a natural resource that 70 percent of the population uses to survive," said Kalfa Sanogo, an economist at the United Nations Development Program in Mali. "You cannot just push 70 percent of the population off the land, nor can you say they can just become agriculture workers." In a different approach, a $224 million American project will help about 800 Malian farmers each acquire title to 12 acres of newly cleared land, protecting them against being kicked off.

Jon C. Anderson, the project director, argued that no country has developed economically with a large percentage of its population on farms. Small farmers with titles will either succeed or have to sell the land to finance another life, he said, though critics have said villagers will still be displaced.

"We want a revolutionized relationship between the farmer and the state, one where the farmer is more in charge," Mr. Anderson said.

Soumouni sits about 20 miles from the nearest road, with wandering cattle herders in their distinctive pointed straw hats offering directions like, "Bear right at the termite mound with the hole in it."

Sekou Traoré, 69, a village elder, was dumbfounded when government officials said last year that Libya now controlled his land and began measuring the fields. He had always considered it his own, passed down from grandfather to father to son.

"All we want before they break our houses and take our fields is for them to show us the new houses where we will live, and the new fields where we will work," he said at the rally last month.

"We are all so afraid," he said of the village's 2,229 residents. "We will be the victims of this situation, we are sure of that."

Agents Search Home of Pilot Critical of TSA

An airline pilot is being disciplined by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) for posting video on YouTube pointing out what he believes are serious flaws in airport security.

The 50-year-old pilot, who lives outside Sacramento, asked that neither he nor his airline be identified. He has worked for the airline for more than a decade and was deputized by the TSA to carry a gun in the cockpit.

He is also a helicopter test pilot in the Army Reserve and flew missions for the United Nations in Macedonia.

Three days after he posted a series of six video clips recorded with a cell phone camera at San Francisco International Airport, four federal air marshals and two sheriff's deputies arrived at his house to confiscate his federally-issued firearm. The pilot recorded that event as well and provided all the video to News10.

At the same time as the federal marshals took the pilot's gun, a deputy sheriff asked him to surrender his state-issued permit to carry a concealed weapon.

A follow-up letter from the sheriff's department said the CCW permit would be reevaluated following the outcome of the federal investigation.

The YouTube videos, posted Nov. 28, show what the pilot calls the irony of flight crews being forced to go through TSA screening while ground crew who service the aircraft are able to access secure areas simply by swiping a card.

"As you can see, airport security is kind of a farce. It's only smoke and mirrors so you people believe there is actually something going on here," the pilot narrates.

Video shot in the cockpit shows a medieval-looking rescue ax available on the flight deck after the pilots have gone through the metal detectors. "I would say a two-foot crash ax looks a lot more formidable than a box cutter," the pilot remarked.

A letter from the TSA dated Dec. 6 informed the pilot that "an administrative review into your deputation status as a Federal Flight Deck Officer has been initiated."

According to the letter, the review was directly related to the discovery by TSA staff of the YouTube videos. "The content and subject of these videos may have violated regulations concerning disclosure of sensitive security information," the letter said.

The pilot's attorney, Don Werno of Santa Ana, said he believed the federal government sent six people to the house to send a message.

"And the message was you've angered us by telling the truth and by showing America that there are major security problems despite the fact that we've spent billions of dollars allegedly to improve airline safety," Werno said.

The pilot said he is not in trouble with his airline, but a supervisor asked him to remove public access to the YouTube videos.

He does, however, face potential civil penalties from the TSA. He said he would likely go public when it becomes clear what the government plans to do with him.