This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Author: Jonn Lilyea

  • US Supreme Court rejects Ronald Gray’s petition for appeal

    US Supreme Court rejects Ronald Gray’s petition for appeal

    Ronald Gray, a cook with the 82d Airborne Division’s 3rd Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment was convicted in 1988 by a general court martial of two counts of premeditated murder, one count of attempted premeditated murder, three rapes, two robberies, and two counts of forcible sodomy. He has been sitting on Fort Leavenworth’s US Disciplinary Barracks death row since his conviction.

    President George W. Bush signed his death warrant and his execution was originally scheduled for December 10, 2008. Appeals were rejected in 2015 and 2017. Now, Stars & Stripes reports that the Supreme Court has refused to hear his latest round of appeals.

    Lawyers for Gray had asked the court to determine whether military or civilian courts should be responsible for hearing appeals in the case.

    Gray has filed numerous appeals in recent years claiming errors during his military trial and subsequent appeals, including claims that his appeals lawyer was ineffective, his sentence was the result of racial discrimination and military authorities failed to disclose evidence about his competency.

    Many of those appeals have been dismissed or delayed in recent years, as the case has been heard by officials from a U.S. District Court in Kansas, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the Army Court of Criminal Appeals and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces.

    Now he’s on the fast track to complete his sentence – the be the first soldier executed by the Army since John A. Bennett was hanged on April 13, 1961 for First Degree Child Rape and Attempted First Degree Murder of an 11-year-old Austrian girl.

  • Dennis R. Castellano; phony Marine Recon

    Dennis R. Castellano; phony Marine Recon

    Our partners at Military Phonies share their work on this Dennis Castellano fellow who claims that he was Marine Recon, that the Marines saw something in him and sent him straight to Recon training from boot camp – avoiding School of Infantry training that every Marine attends, except Dennis, apparently.


    He sports these awards years after he left the Marine Corps;

    He claims that he was wounded eight times during his six years of service, that he was at Beirut for recovery efforts after the bombing by terrorists. All of that, and no Combat Action Ribbon. Well, he was a cook for 13 months of service – so eight Purple Hearts must’ve been earned in one hard-ass mess hall. Maybe if his food was a little bit tastier, he could have avoided the wounds;

    He claims to be a chaplain now which is pretty F’d up – nothing about his military career claims is true. I’m pretty sure a chaplain who claims to minister to veterans should be more trustworthy.

    NOTE:  We were contacted by one of his siblings who does not want to be associated with the brother’s deeds. Please do not confuse this guy with one of his siblings with very similar names. They are very reputable people and deserve our support.“

  • Friday morning feel good stories

    Friday morning feel good stories

    A bunch of you guys sent this link from Dallas, Texas;

    A woman shot a man who she says took her car at a southern Dallas gas station Wednesday night.

    Michelle Booker-Hicks told FOX 4 it happened around 10 p.m. as she was paying for her gas at a Shell station along Interstate 35 near Camp Wisdom Road.

    She saw a man get into the car with her 2 and 4-year-old sons in the back seat. She jumped back in too, grabbed a gun from her glove box and shot the man in the face to get him to stop.

    “I proceeded to jump in my backseat and told the gentleman to stop, to get out the car. He would not get out of the car. He turned around and looked at me. I reached over the armrest to get my glove compartment and that’s when I fired at him once I got the gun from my glove compartment,” she said.

    The carjacker ran the car off the road and crashed into a fence. He was arrested and taken to the hospital for treatment.

    Police identified the suspect as 36-year-old Ricky Wright. He will likely face charges for kidnapping and the unauthorized use of a motor vehicle or carjacking.

    Booker-Hicks and her kids were not hurt.

    She said she fired only one shot but she almost wishes she would have emptied the whole clip.

    From Pleasant City, Ohio;

    According to a report at the sheriff’s office, deputies were dispatched to the home in the 400 block of Elm Street at 4:54 p.m. after a caller reported a male entered the residence and his dad “went for a shotgun.”

    A fight over the shotgun reportedly ensued and a round discharged during the struggle. The caller advised nobody was injured.

    The resident was reportedly able to get the male in a headlock, but the male was able to escape and fled in a white Chevrolet sport-utility vehicle. A possible address for the suspect was provided to deputies.

  • Thank you

    I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who contributed to us this year – this is the second year in a row that our readers paid our rent. I also want to thank the folks who snail-mailed us checks – I just deposited them earlier this week. They don’t get an email “Thank you”, so here’s their thank you.

    For that price we have our own server and dedicated support staff – the best.

    Since I paid the last of our legal bills last month, we might just end this year in the black.

  • Okinawans seek to charge Marines with attempted murder

    Okinawans seek to charge Marines with attempted murder

    According to Stars & Stripes, Okinawan politicians want to charge III Marine Expeditionary Force commander Lt. Gen. Lawrence Nicholson, Camp Smedley D. Butler’s headquarters and support battalion commander Col. William DePue and a group of unidentified Marines because a bullet was fired that went outside of the range fan at a small arms range and struck an unoccupied shed.

    “This incident happened in Japan, and on Japanese soil; we should be able to apply Japanese law and bring justice,” said Ichiro Miyagi, a member of the Social Democratic Party and one of the complaint’s nine signatories.

    Police have a few days to determine whether there is enough evidence to pursue the case. They declined to comment Thursday.

    Marine officials could not be reached for comment Thursday afternoon.

    The alleged shooting incident occurred sometime between 11 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. June 21 in Sukuta, Nago, according to Japanese police. A mango farmer told authorities he had come home from shopping to discover two broken windows in his shed and a 2-inch-long bullet on the floor.

    […]

    The law regarding attempted murder in Japan states that intent usually must be present to qualify for conviction, however, the bar can also be met if there was a “plan or high risk of causing death to the other party.”

    Good luck with that Mr Miyagi.

  • Therese Okoumou; Abolish ICE

    Therese Okoumou; Abolish ICE

    Therese Okoumou climbed the feet of the Statue of Liberty yesterday to protest the Trump immigration policy that has been in effect through the last three presidential administrations. Her stunt resulted in an end to planned July 4th festivities on Liberty Island according to the New York Post;

    Cops say Therese Patricia Okoumou — a 44-year-old immigrant from the Democratic Republic of the Congo — was the person responsible for the Fourth of July protest.

    She lives in the St. George neighborhood of Staten Island and is currently in federal custody, according to police sources.

    Officers from the NYPD’s Emergency Service Unit transported her to a federal detention center Wednesday night following her three-hour standoff with authorities. Her case is being handled by prosecutors in the Southern District of New York.

    Sources said Okoumou told investigators she climbed up to the feet of Lady Liberty to protest President Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy on immigration and the separation of families at the border.

    From The Washington Times;

    Regardless of her status, she and a group of self-styled “resistance” members ruined Independence Day celebrations for numerous New Yorkers and tourists. After about six were arrested for unfurling a banner calling for the immigration-enforcement agency to be abolished, her bid to scale the statue and refusal to come down prompted the National Park Service to shut the park down for the rest of the afternoon.

    Despite pleas that she come down from the side of the statue, according to NBC News, Ms. Okoumou said she wouldn’t until all the immigrant children detained by ICE have been released.

    She’ll face numerous misdemeanor charges in Federal court today.

  • Daniel Dwayne Reed; phony Ranger

    Daniel Dwayne Reed; phony Ranger

    Someone sent us their work on this Daniel Dwayne Reed fellow who claims that he was a Ranger with the 1st Ranger Battalion in Savannah, Georgia;

    I don’t know how he thinks that people would believe that he was stationed with the 101st Airborne Division in Fort Campbell, Kentucky and the Ranger Battalion at Hunter Army Airfield, Georgia, a few hundred miles apart, at the same time but there you go.

    His Facebook photos contain little gems like this one;

    Tineye says that the picture is at least four years old and it’s a stock photo. Also, Mr Reed claims that he was with the Rangers back in 1990 – the tan berets weren’t around until until 2001. All of the soldiers in that picture are wearing Ranger Tabs and Combat Infantryman Badges – Mr Reed has neither.

    Here’s another picture that Reed claims is him;

    Tineye says this stock picture has been around at least ten years – it’s a book cover and it’s been used 93 times on the web;

    Mr Reed was in the 101st, he was a 5-jump chump, and his career in the Army only lasted 18 months and he left as a Private First Class (E-3).

    No Ranger training, no Ranger assignments, no combat.

  • Thursday morning feel good stories

    Thursday morning feel good stories

    From LaMar Township, Pennsylvania;

    A man and woman believed to be high on bath salts started firing bullets into the sky to chase away “alien lasers,” which were actually fireflies, according to Pennsylvania State Police.

    Troopers say just after midnight on Saturday, Jesse Shields fired a .357 Magnum handgun at the “lasers,” according to the Centre Daily Ties.

    Shields and Katherine McCloskey, fearing they were being chased, ran to a nearby home, according to WNEP. Someone inside the Clinton County house called 911.

    The duo then ran to a neighboring home where the homeowner took away their gun, police said. Shields allegedly asked that homeowner if he could take a shower to “get the goo off him that was burning his skin.”

    Troopers showed up and arrested Shields and McCloskey, both of Mill Hall. They each face charges of felony burglary, a felony criminal trespassing, disorderly conduct and public drunkenness, according to the Centre Daily Times. McCloskey also faces a count of misdemeanor DUI.

    Shields faces additional felony counts of carrying a firearm without a license and recklessly endangering another person. He also faces several other misdemeanor charges – unlawful possession, possession of drug paraphernalia and two added summary charges.

    Drugs…stop it.

    From Chicago, Illinois;

    The owner of a business shot two men Tuesday night during an attempted armed robbery in the South Side Englewood neighborhood.

    The men, ages 21 and 29, walked into the store about 7:05 p.m. in the 300 block of West 75th Street and pulled out weapons in an effort to rob it, according to Chicago Police. The business owner then shot both men.

    The younger man suffered a gunshot wound to the abdomen, while the older man was shot in the arm, police. They showed up at St. Bernard Hospital, where the younger man was listed in serious condition and the older man was in good condition. The younger man was later transferred to Stroger Hospital.