"The military commission system is transparent all right – transparently corrupt," Terry Hicks said, exuberant about the leniency of his son's sentence but still furious about the treatment the 31-year-old Muslim convert has endured for five years.

David Hicks will serve a nine-month sentence in a prison in his hometown of Adelaide after admitting last week that he aided al-Qaida in a plea deal at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay.

The deal prevents him from talking to the media for 12 months or pursuing his allegations of abuse while in US custody.

Legal observers and opposition lawmakers have joined Terry Hicks in saying the deal is tailored to remove potential political embarrassment for Australian Prime Minister John Howard, who will seek his fifth three-year term as national leader at elections due later this year.

The agency was required to undertake some type of consultation, informal or otherwise, prior to making a conclusive determination that there would be no effect. Given the 2005 Rule's potential indirect effects on listed species, combined with the USDA's lack of documentation in support of their "no effect" determination, the failure to consult and/or prepare any type of biological analysis in conjunction with the 2005 Rule was arbitrary and capricious.

At the same time, Hamilton declined to reinstate a 1982 regulation, as the environmental groups had sought.

Rodger Schlickeisen, president of Defenders of Wildlife, one of the plaintiff groups, praised Hamilton's ruling, saying:

The Bush administration reversed decades of progress in managing national forests, without considering the impacts on wildlife and the environment. The administration also cut the public out of the loop when considering these large-scale changes to how our nation's forests are managed.

US Justice Department officials are considering an appeal.

A Milan woman has been indicted by a federal grand jury in Jackson on bank fraud and income tax evasion charges, according to a Friday release from David Kustoff, United States Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee.

Donna L. Hardy, 48, of Milan, was charged with 12 counts of bank fraud and five counts of income tax evasion in a sealed indictment returned on Tuesday.
 
She made her initial court appearance on Wednesday, the release said.

According to the indictment, Hardy was employed by The Dedmon Company as a bookkeeper until it merged with Milan Box Corp. in March of 2002.
Hardy then was employed by Milan Box as a plant accountant. The indictment charges that from March 25, 2002 until around December 17, 2004, Hardy devised a scheme to defraud the former Union Planter's National Bank, now called Regions Bank.

Prosecutors said Hardy did not close bank accounts that belonged to Dedmon upon the merger of the two companies as she was instructed to do.

Instead, Hardy transferred funds from Milan Box accounts into the bank accounts belonging to Dedmon that were supposed to have been closed, the indictment said.

Hardy then transferred funds from this account to her personal bank accounts. The indictment lists more than $232,000 in fraudulent transfers from Milan Box accounts to Dedmon accounts.

In addition, the indictment charges Hardy with five counts of income tax evasion for the years 2000 through 2004.

According to the indictment, Hardy did not report over $250,000 in income on her federal income tax returns filed for these years. This resulted in a tax loss to the government of over $58,000.

This investigation was conducted by the U.S. Secret Service and IRS Criminal Investigation.

U.S. District Judge Marianne O. Battani found that Kalymon served in the 5th Commissariat (later designated the 7th) of the Nazi-operated Ukrainian Auxiliary Police (UAP) during World War II, in the city of L’viv. (That city, now in western Ukraine, was part of Poland until 1939.) The judge concluded that the 5th/7th Commissariat, along with other armed L’viv UAP units and other forces, rounded up Jews, shot Jews, prevented Jews from escaping, and transferred Jews to forced labor camps or killing sites for mass execution. Judge Battani further found, largely on the basis of captured wartime reports, that Kalymon shot Jews during these roundups. More than 100,000 Jews in L’viv were killed or displaced between 1942 and 1943 in part as a result of actions by the UAP in which Kalymon participated, according to Judge Battani.

Assistant Attorney General Fisher said, “The court’s ruling confirms that individuals who participated in genocide will not be permitted to retain the privilege of American citizenship.”

Kalymon entered the United States from Germany in 1949 and became a U.S. citizen in 1955. Judge Battani found that he was not eligible for citizenship because his service to Nazi Germany made him ineligible to immigrate to the U.S. She specifically found that he was ineligible to immigrate because Kalymon “assisted in the persecution of civil populations,” “advocated or acquiesced in activities or conduct contrary to civilization and human decency,” and lied about his UAP service when he applied for a visa to the U.S.

“Irrefutable evidence, including a handwritten report prepared by Kalymon in which he accounted to his superiors for ammunition he expended in shooting Jews, proved his participation in Nazi genocide. It has taken 62 long years, but history has at last caught up with John Kalymon,” said Office of Special Investigations (OSI) Director Eli M. Rosenbaum. OSI investigated the case and prosecuted it, in partnership with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Michigan.

The case was tried in Detroit last fall by OSI senior trial attorneys Jeffrey L. Menkin, William H. Kenety V, and Todd Schneider. The proceedings to denaturalize Kalymon were instituted in 2004 by OSI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of Michigan.

Attorney General Gonzales was also joined in today's roundtable by the Massachusetts Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force Director, Massachusetts State Police Captain Tom Kerle, and other members of the Project Safe Childhood initiative for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

Launched in May 2006, Project Safe Childhood is a nationwide initiative designed to protect children from sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the U.S. Attorneys Offices, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as identify and rescue victims.

Last year, the Department of Justice prosecuted 1,543 cases involving the sexual exploitation or abuse of children. To ensure maximum prison sentences for sexual predators in Massachusetts, the U.S. Attorney's Office provides training for local prosecutors about federal laws and sentences and works collaboratively with District Attorneys and the Massachusetts Attorney General to refer appropriate cases for federal prosecution. As a result, the U.S. Attorney's Office has seen a 300% increase in referred cases, including cases from Plymouth, Essex, Middlesex and Suffolk Counties. The prosecution of child exploitation cases has been a long held priority of U.S. Attorney Sullivan. In 2002, four years prior to the national launch of Project Safe Childhood, the U.S. Attorney's Office created a position and hired an experienced, specially trained prosecutor to be dedicated solely to the prosecution of child exploitation cases. The number of child exploitation prosecutions has consistently increased—from five in 2000 to 18 in 2006.

"Nothing is more important than protecting our children from predators," said U.S. Attorney Sullivan. "The U.S. Attorney's Office and our federal, state and local law enforcement partners are committed to doing whatever we can—through enforcement and educational outreach—to provide that protection. Child predators should not to be lulled into thinking they are safe from law enforcement detection by the perceived anonymity of the Internet. We will find you and use every resource at our disposal to ensure you won't harm again."

Project Safe Childhood partners for the District of Massachusetts include: the Massachusetts Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force; Massachusetts Attorney General's Office; Plymouth County District Attorney's Office; Essex County District Attorney's Office; Suffolk County District Attorney's Office; Middlesex County District Attorney's Office; the Massachusetts State Police; the FBI; ICE; U.S. Postal Inspection Service; and U.S. Secret Service.

In addition to participating in the law enforcement roundtable, Attorney General Gonzales also unveiled a new series of Public Service Announcements (PSAs) regarding online sexual exploitation. The ads, which were developed jointly by the U.S. Department of Justice, National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), and the Ad Council, are designed to educate teenage girls about the potential dangers of posting and sharing personal information online. The Think Before You Post campaign reminds teens that anything you post online, anyone can see, family, friends and even not-so-friendly people.

Popular social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook, and Sconex make it easier for teens to post and share personal information, pictures, and videos, which may make them more vulnerable to online predators. Teenage girls are particularly at risk of online sexual exploitation. A recent study by University of New Hampshire researchers for NCMEC found that of the approximately one in seven youth who received a sexual solicitation or approach over the Internet, 70 percent were girls.http://www.missingkids.com

For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov. For more information about the Think Before You Post campaign, please visit http://www.cybertipline.com

The ruling gives Northwest the advantage in stalled talks with attendants, who hoped to gain leverage with the chance to strike the airline. They're balking at $195 million in annual pay and benefit cuts imposed as the carrier works toward a second-quarter bankruptcy exit.

Northwest enacted the cuts July 31 after the union for its 9,300 attendants rejected two contracts negotiated by their leaders. The savings are part of the Eagan, Minn.-based airline's $1.4 billion in annual reductions in labor spending.

Northwest said in a statement that it was pleased with the ruling and that it hoped to reach a consensual agreement with the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA.

The union was "very surprised" by the decision, spokesman Ricky Thornton said, and the group is considering whether to appeal.

The union wants the National Mediation Board that governs airline labor disputes to "release" it from talks with Northwest, triggering a 30-day countdown to a possible strike. The sides last met face to face Feb. 2, and no new talks are scheduled. The attendants are urging federal lawmakers to press the mediation board to grant the release.

Unlike Northwest's other unions, the attendants don't have a claim in the airline's bankruptcy. The group would have had a $182 million claim had it ratified a contract in 2006. Thornton said there is a risk the attendants will get nothing if they don't reach an agreement before Northwest exits bankruptcy.

In its ruling, the appeals court said the U.S. Railway Labor Act "forbids an immediate strike when a bankruptcy court approves a debtor carrier's rejection of a collective-bargaining agreement" that is subject to the act and allows imposition of new terms.

"For airline unions, this is a big setback," said John Gallagher, a lawyer for the Air Transport Association, the Washington-based trade group for major U.S. airlines.

Northwest filed for bankruptcy Sept. 14, 2005, the same day as larger rival Delta Air Lines Inc. Delta expects to exit bankruptcy by April 30.