7.0 Earthquake Tuesday in Haiti

[Posting a link?]

Forum Guidelines
Posting a link? Read This!

Forgot your password? Need help?
Click Here To Contact Us

Mudflats Merchandise
AKMuckraker Amazon Store
Support AKM Merchandise

Download it here!

[Lani]

CNN reporters in Haiti investigated the group's claim, including speaking with them in jail, then with their translater and with parents who gave up children.  Armed with new info, they returned to the prison to ask more directed questions.  This time, the group refused to speak with them further, launching into loudly singing hymns instead.

[daMamma]

Ms. Silsby made her intentions known to child protection officials, human rights experts and Dominican authorities in Haiti, all of whom warned her that she could be charged with trafficking if she tried to take children out of the country without proper documentation.

bold is mine

This one paragraph speak volumes about many things.  Particularly this woman knew what she was doing was wrong and could land her in a heap of trouble.  How much of these conversations she shared with the others with her is anybody's guess.  

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/05/world/americas/05orphans.html?hp

[Sirenoftitan]

<snip>
Justice Minister Paul Denis has said that they should be tried in Haiti despite the damage done to the country's judicial infrastructure and casualties among judges and court staff.  There had been suggestions that the 10 could be tried in the US.  "It is Haitian law that has been violated, it is up to the Haitian authorities to hear and judge the case," he told AFP news agency.  "I don't see any reason why they should be tried in the United States."  The US ambassador to Haiti, Kenneth Merten, said that the US would do all it could to ensure the group were treated fairly and in accordance with Haitian law.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8499679.stm

[futurexpat?]

They don't really care if they are breaking the law. They figure that they are answering to a higher authority. 

[daMamma]

Perhaps it is just me, but it seems that christians, particularly Americans feel that they can just walk into any nation and disregard the laws of the land.  Expecting fully to be backed by their own government when caught breaking laws while they hide behind their god to justify what they do.

Maybe other religions do it, I haven't heard of those stories though.  

(I in no way mean all christians, just a few of them)

[pacos_gal]

This is just heart breaking.

Two Americans Killed In Haiti Aid Chopper Crash

Two Florida men contributing to aid efforts in Haiti were killed when their helicopter crashed into a mountain in neighboring Dominican Republic, officials and family members said Friday.

[Sirenoftitan]

<snip>
Ms Silsby, who is currently in a cell in Haiti, is due in court in Idaho for a civil jury trial on February 22.

She is also due to appear in court in March to answer a second civil suit brought against her by an Idaho law firm, Beer & Cain, for $4,526 in unpaid fees.

Other cases include a claim last year by a company called Disaster Kleenup seeking $3,225.79 and a 2008 action by a debt collection agency for $731.33 for money claimed by the fire brigade.

Baptist Laura Silsby who set off to 'rescue' orphans left behind debts and bad wages by James Bone, The Times

I wonder why doesn't this surprise me?

[daMamma]

With all that debt and misconduct going on back home (I think she's going to be missing some of those court dates!) I really begin to wonder if those kids she was "rescuing" weren't really to be "sold" whether into adoptive families or not is anyone's guess at this point.

I certainly do not believe that there was any altruistic motivations on her part.

[futurexpat?]

Well, here's some good news for Haiti.

The world's leading industrialised nations have pledged to write off the debts that Haiti owes them, following a devastating earthquake last month.

http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/good-news-g7-nations-announce-they-wi

[Lani]

Man 'buried under rubble for four weeks' found alive in Haiti http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7020176.ece

A man who has been pulled alive from the rubble of a marketplace in Port-au-Prince may have been trapped there since the devastating earthquake struck the Haitian capital 28 days ago.

The 28-year-old, identified as Evans Muncie, was found under the remains of the Croix Bossal market where he sold rice. He had not been seen since the 7.0 magnitude earthquake levelled the city on January 12, killing over 200,000 people.

Mr Muncie was discovered by people who had been digging at the marketplace. He was taken to an American field hospital in Port-au-Prince where he was treated for severe dehydration and malnutrition.

As the photo shows, he is severely emaciated, but alive.   It is believed that he must have found some food and water in the rubble to have survived this long.   

[daMamma]

That is truly amazing! 

[judi]

The world's leading industrialised nations have pledged to write off the debts that Haiti owes them, following a devastating earthquake last month.

 YEA YEA YEA

And the finding of that man alive...wow...miracles do happen

(Modified by Forty Watt to attribute quote)

[Lani]

So many lives lost!  And this doesn't include those not yet found and those buried privately.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Haiti's government has raised the death toll for the Jan. 12 earthquake to 230,000 from 212,000 and says more bodies remain uncounted.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/09/haiti-earthquake-death-to_0_n_455841.html

[futurexpat?]

Yes, and it said this is as many as in the 2004 tsunami. Really awful and sad. 

[daMamma]

That is such a huge number.  I can understand it when you talk about cash, or population of a city, or seeds in a bin, or bees.

To think of those numbers in terms of those who have died, it becomes hard to grasp. 

[Lani]

Turns out there are some rabbis as crazy as the christians who blame the earthquake and other disasters on their god's dissatisfaction with certain humans. 

1000 Rabbis Warn: Open Homosexuality in the Military is a Disaster and May Cause Further Natural Disasters http://www.christiannewswire.com/news/9630112926.html

Thirteen months before 9/11, on the day New York City passed homosexual domestic partnership regulations, I joined a group of Rabbis at a City Hall prayer service, pleading with G-d not to visit disaster on the city of N.Y. We have seen the underground earthquake, tsunami, Katrina, and now Haiti. All this is in sync with a two thousand year old teaching in the Talmud that the practice of homosexuality is a spiritual cause of earthquakes. Once a disaster is unleashed, innocents are also victims just like in Chernobyl.

"We plead with saner heads in Congress and the Pentagon to stop sodomization of our military and our society. Enough is enough."

I haz confuze about that "underground earthquake".  Are there usually above ground earthquakes? 

Suggests one blog:

The alternate headline should be “Jews: Just as wacky as Christians”

http://www.cynical-c.com/?p=16259

[pacos_gal]

Rumors are that a Haitian judge is going to release the accused christian child abductors.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/10/haiti-judge-to-free-us-mi_n_457643.html

Judge Bernard Saint-Vil finished questioning the Americans and the next step would be to issue a recommendation to the prosecutor, something that could happen Thursday, lawyer Gary Lassade said.

Reuters is reporting, citing a judicial source, that the judge has decided to release the missionaries

[Lani]

This case just gets stranger and stranger.  And the Americans are still in jail.

There are so many allegations in this article that it should be read in full.  Adviser to Detained Americans in Haiti Investigated http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/12/world/americas/12haiti.html?hp

The police in El Salvador have begun an investigation into whether a man suspected of leading a trafficking ring involving Central American and Caribbean women and girls is also a legal adviser to many of the Americans charged with trying to take 33 children out of Haiti without permission.

A lawyer for the group has already been dismissed after being accused of trying to offer bribes to get the 10 Americans out of jail.

There were questions about whether Mr. Puello, the adviser, who said the Central Valley Baptist Church in Idaho had hired him to represent the Americans, was licensed to practice law.

Puello told the press that he was representing the Americans free of charge.

But other lawyers for the detainees said that the families had wired Mr. Puello $12,000 to pay for the Americans’ transportation out of Haiti if they were released, and that they had been told by Mr. Puello in a conference call late Tuesday that he needed an additional $36,000.

[ds55]

Haiti is attracting rip-off artists.   

[futurexpat?]

I watched a program on The Discovery Channel last night about the earthquake in Haiti. It followed their search for the fault and the history of the Caribbean plate. It essentially wasn't good news for Haiti and a few other places in the Caribbean, particularly Jamaica. They think that the fault only partially slipped. They also think that this is likely to be the beginning of a series of quakes to come. They said that this was also the way it happened when Haiti was hit the last time, about 200 years ago, when it was relatively unpopulated. In people's time, it was about 19 years until the second big quake after the initial one; in geological time, that's not even the blink of an eye. What Haiti has to do is to build new structures that will withstand what the experts think is coming.

I'm going to watch for this program to be repeated, as all things are on The Discovery Channel. I think it's also going to be on The Science Channel, so I'll start searching for it.