Metals Theft Summit Brings Renewed Commitment to Catch Thieves

PRNewswire/ -- "I'm sure we all wish the passage of a law could eradicate a criminal act, but it doesn't work that way," said Georgia Bureau of Investigations (GBI) Director Vernon Keenan.

Keenan made the remarks at a Metals Theft Stakeholder Summit held Oct. 6 in middle Georgia and telecast in Atlanta. Keenan referred to legislation passed in 2007 which allows prosecutors a greater ability to seek a felony conviction (rather than a misdemeanor) for the crime of metals theft. Despite changes to the law, however, metals thefts continue to rise at an alarming rate.

Consequently, Georgia Electric Membership Corporation (EMC) hosted the Metals Theft Stakeholders Summit during which approximately 100 representatives from across Georgia, representing utilities, telecommunications, law enforcement, district attorneys, railroads, homebuilders, apartment owners, automobile dealers and recyclers, among others, gathered to bring attention to the widespread nature of these crimes and share the devastating impact to businesses and consumers.

Since these organizations and consumer groups have been hardest hit and have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars associated with the problem, they are partnering to galvanize their grassroots efforts in communities throughout Georgia to enhance coordination of security and communication among stakeholders and consider ways to stem the rising tide of these costly crimes.

According to Georgia EMC Vice President of Government Relations and Communications and Member Services Bill Verner, thieves are becoming increasingly bold and careless when stealing metals.

"Consumers foot the bill for the damage left by a wire thief. Utilities must pass along increased costs to replace and repair damaged equipment, and more importantly, our employees and the public are left vulnerable to electrocution hazards in the wake of many such crimes," Verner said.

"Homebuilders, already struggling in today's tough economy, must replace copper stolen from new and vacant houses. Apartment owners must increase rent to recover costs, and taxpayers are bearing the costly treatment in emergency rooms for burn victims who've been injured during the course of break-ins to energized electric substations. The costs to the consumer -- and public safety -- are tremendous," he said.

Consequences extend beyond consumers' pocketbooks. Recreation leagues have been forced to cancel soccer and basketball practice for hundreds of young athletes throughout the state, because copper has been ripped from poles which light soccer fields and basketball courts. Churches have suspended services after copper was taken from pipes and air conditioners, and a small historic church in rural Washington County was burned to the ground last year by copper thieves who tried to cover up their crime with the fire.

According to Verner, metals thefts are now causing power outages in some parts of the country. Yesterday approximately 7,400 residents in Ohio lost power following a copper theft. "When wire is ripped from a substation as happened this week in Ohio," he said, "It can result in entire neighborhoods losing power."

Since metals thefts affect a wide spectrum of businesses and associations, the summit attracted representatives from the electric cooperatives throughout Georgia, Georgia Transmission Corp., Georgia Power, AT&T, MEAG Power, Southwire, Homebuilders Association of Georgia, Prosecuting Attorneys Council of Georgia, Georgia Sheriffs Association, Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police, Norfolk Southern, Georgia Apartment Association and Georgia Automobile Dealers Association, among others.

During the meeting, stakeholders discussed possible ways to reduce the rash of thefts, while representatives ranging from the Homebuilders Association of Georgia to Prosecuting Attorneys Council of Georgia discussed the financial and safety impacts of these crimes and the challenges they face when attempting to enforce the law.

The EMCs in Georgia reported approximately 350 incidents of metals thefts in 2007 with costs reaching $200,000. Companies such as Georgia Transmission Corp. reported as many as 98 incidents (through September 2008) totaling $500,000. AT&T and Georgia Power spokespersons reported 56 incidents (through August 2008) costing more than $100,000, and 147 incidents (through September 2008) totaling $237,000, respectively.

Coalition members pledged to maintain an open dialogue among stakeholders; strengthen relationships among recyclers, sheriffs, chiefs of police, district attorneys, and public and private businesses; pursue additional avenues of prevention and work to close any loops in existing state law.

Stakeholders agree it will take a solid partnership and cooperation to lessen the epidemic and stem the surge of these unlawful acts, and each committed during the meeting to become an active partner in the effort to reduce metals thefts.

Georgia EMC is the statewide trade association representing the state's 42 EMCs, Oglethorpe Power Corp. and Georgia Transmission Corp. Collectively, Georgia's customer-owned EMCs provide electricity and related services to four million people, nearly half of Georgia's population, across 73 percent of the state's land area.

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On Anniversary of 9/11, Interfaith Summit Calls For Action to End Torture

By: Bob Perkins

Speakers on the first day of the inaugural National Summit on Torture at Mercer University’s Atlanta campus Thursday told the more than 200 participants that “this summit affirms our values as Americans.”

Organized by Dr. David P. Gushee, Distinguished University Professor of Christian Ethics at Mercer, the summit is titled “Religious Faith, Torture, and Our National Soul.” The event is cosponsored by Evangelicals for Human Rights, Mercer and 13 other organizations represented by three major faith groups.

“This is an interfaith gathering,” said Gushee, who also serves as president of Evangelicals for Human Rights. “It began as a Baptist and evangelical event and I’m really happy to say it evolved. I think that’s profound. I think it’s terribly exciting. We do share this country. We need to learn each other’s name. I’m excited about the interfaith aspect of this gathering and I believe that only religious belief provides the grounding that we need to pull us out of our worst self.”

Dr. Karen Greenburg, executive director for the Center on Law and Security at New York University, told those attending the morning session that the seeds of the U.S. torture policy were planted in the days following Sept. 11, 2001, but public awareness wasn’t raised until photos of abuse surfaced from Abu Ghraib prison.

“Those photos alerted us to the fact that there was some sort of abuse and torture going on,” Greenberg said. “Those photographs raised the following questions: were the people conducting the acts rogue elements or was it policy? The answer is it was both.”

Greenberg said since the photos were released, at least 12 reports were commissioned by various government organizations that outlined in detail the methods used in secret prisons established after Sept. 11.

“Reading these reports was like being transported to Mars,” Greenberg said. “It was an unbelievable document, but it was what the government telling us what happened in these places.”

Greenberg reminded attendees that Sen. John McCain was himself a prisoner of war, and endured torture as best as he could.

“John McCain said he went to Viet Nam with a love of his family, a love of his church and a love of his country,” Greenberg said. “When he returned home, he said he learned under torture that he loved his country more, his family more and his religion more. When you’re talking about victims of torture who are not John McCain, do you really want them to become more impassioned about their universe?”

For this reason, Greenberg said, she does not believe that torture makes our country safer.

Dr. Ron Mahurin, vice president for academic affairs at Houghton College, said no one should doubt what happened at Abu Ghraib actually happened.

“What strained moral argument will we use to justify the use of torture?” Mahurin asked. “The facts are no longer in dispute. We should never equivocate. Torture is wrong. It is undeniably, morally wrong. If our nation is not haunted by the question, ‘is torture never wrong?,’ then we bear the same responsibility of those people who carried out those acts on behalf of our government.”

Steve Xenakis, retired U.S. Army brigadier general and adviser to Physicians for Human Rights, said nothing claimed in the name of defending our country can justify the cruel and degrading treatment of another man or woman.

“The indefinite incarceration of prisoners from Afghanistan barely drew the level of discontent from Americans,” Xenakis said. “Our country was paralyzed with fear from seeing the World Trade Center vaporize. Most Americans didn’t blink an eye when our officials argued ‘roughing up a few prisoners could save American lives.’”

Xenakis said sometimes decent people get caught up in indecent acts. “This summit affirms our values as Americans,” Xenakis said. “Much has improved since the dark days of 2002 in the minds of many. But our nation’s image around the world has diminished. I fear our image of the Statue of Liberty has been replaced by that poor prisoner in a hood with his arms out-stretched. It is time to right these wrongs, and we all have a collective duty to do so.”

Another perspective on the torture issue is its effects on survivors. Douglas Johnson, executive director of the Center for Victims of Torture, said besides healing from the physical wounds of being tortured, victims often battle the rest of their lives with the mental wounds from torture.

“One survivor stated, ‘I didn’t mind the physical pain so much as I did listening to the cries of other prisoners being tortured,” Johnson said. “Some forms of torture include forcing a parent to watch a child being tortured. This not only brings about the feeling of the pain of the child for the parent, but the feeling the pain of failing as a parent.”

Johnson said the body is merely a weapon against the mind, because the ultimate goal of torture is to break the soul. “Just because we don’t see our actions through those lenses, doesn’t mean the rest of the world doesn’t view us that way.”

Johnson said the death of Jesus has been so sanitized that people don’t always remember that he was tortured until death.

In an afternoon session titled “What the Torture Debate Reveals About American Christianity,” Gushee said white evangelicals have proven susceptible to being blinded on the matter of torture because of a strict interpretation of Romans 13:1-7, “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established (NIV).”

“This is related to a broader evangelical authoritarianism, especially in our most conservative quarters, that elevates the role of the man over his family, the male pastor over his church, the president over his nation and our nation over the rest of the world,” Gushee said. “The kinds of checks and balances provided by democratic constitutionalism, the wisdom of other nations, and international law are devalued.”

Gushee said because the George W. Bush administration has altered longstanding American policies on torture, there is reluctance among white evangelical to criticize a Republican administration, especially when Bush himself is a white evangelical.

“Government has incredible power and must be watched vigilantly and resisted forcefully when it strays, and evangelicals are not very good at that,” Gushee said. “We must recognize that the gracious Savior whose forgiveness we claim is also the sovereign Lord who demands our entire lives, our setting aside of all ideologies, loyalties and fears that hinder our faithfulness to his will, and our embodied love for the enemy, the alien and the abandoned of the earth.”

At the evening session, Gita Gutierrez, an attorney with the Centre for Constitutional Rights, shared stories about the abuse and ill treatment for detainees being held by the U.S. in Guantanamo prison. Gutierrez was one of the first lawyers to meet with prisoners there, and she said it is important for people to know the stories of detainees.

“The system in Guantanamo has been set up for us to fail,” Gutierrez said. “Professionally, we have to recognize as lawyers that we play a very small role. But it’s time that more people learn about what is going on down there.”

Gutierrez represents detainee Mohammed Al-Qatani, who has been featured in TIME magazine and by other news organizations as one of the first detainees to undergo the “first special interrogation plan,” a regime of torture and inhumane treatment authorized by the Secretary of Defense.

“Everyone is someone’s child,” Gutierrez said. “Mohammed’s elderly, sick father went to meet with lawyers from the Centre for Constitutional Rights and filled out papers so his son could get legal representation.”

Gutierrez said Al-Qatani has been imprisoned at Guantanamo since 2002 and his torture so extreme that he wouldn’t even agree to meet with her on her first visit. She went back to her hotel that night and called her home church to ask for prayers for her and Al-Qatani that he might open up and allow her to meet him.

“The next day, he was tricked into meeting me in a very tiny cell,” Gutierrez said. “He was curled up in a corner and he was so terrified that the interpreter in the room kept having to ask him to pull his arms away from his mouth so they could understand what he was saying.”

Gutierrez said in many ways, she’d have the same meeting over and over for years with Al-Qatani until she finally gained his trust.

Gutierrez said in her view, we have moved backwards has a nation. “We have two threats. One is the threat of our democracy and lost freedom,” she said. “The other is we have learned to dehumanize people based on race, religion or beliefs. We have developed the capacity to see other human beings as less than human.”

Mark Denbeaux, professor of law at Seton Hall Law School, compiled profiles on all of the detainees housed at Guantanamo and discovered some fascinating statistics.

“We found that 55 percent of all of those detained at Guantanamo are never alleged to committed a hostile act,” Denbeaux said. “My students call them enemy civilians. One student found that the only reason one detainee was there was he was listed as an assistant cook for al-Qaida.

“How could this happen,” Denbeaux said. “Guantanamo is the equivalent of the perp walk. It’s a public relations gesture. If you don’t believe me, look at the evidence that the government has collected.”

Earlier in the day, Rich Killmer, executive director of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture said he hopes this historic meeting will have a positive outcome. He hopes one day to be able to tell his grandson good news. “Our task moving forward is to be able to say that, yes, we once used torture techniques, but we don’t do that anymore.”

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National Summit on Torture September 11-12 Sold Out at Mercer University Atlanta

An impressive lineup of speakers including prominent scholars, leaders from the faith community, former military officers and a victim of torture are on the program for a sold-out National Summit on Torture at Mercer University’s Atlanta campus September 11-12. Titled “Religious Faith, Torture, and Our National Soul” and scheduled for Thursday and Friday, the conference is being organized by Dr. David P. Gushee, Distinguished University Professor of Christian Ethics at Mercer.

Gushee, who also serves as president of Evangelicals for Human Rights, a conference co-sponsor, said the program is designed to “go to the source of the problem, to diagnose how we got here, and to chart a way forward to a better American future.”

On Thursday at 10:45 a.m., results from a new poll commissioned by Mercer University and Faith in Public Life and conducted by Public Religion Research will be released. Among the findings are evidence that white evangelical Christians in the South are significantly more likely to oppose torture if they rely on Christian teachings or beliefs to form their views and that a majority agree with the Golden Rule argument against torture — that the U.S. government should not use methods against our enemies that we would not want used on American soldiers.

Among the more than 50 speakers, presenters and moderators scheduled to participate in the conference are academics from institutions such as Yale University, the University of Notre Dame, New York University, Seton Hall Law School, Morehouse College, Georgetown University, Vanderbilt University, Princeton Theological Seminary and Mercer. Presenters will also include retired senior military officers, leaders from Christian, Jewish and Islamic organizations, and a Catholic nun who was tortured while serving as a missionary in Guatemala.

Among the other co-sponsors of the conference are the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, the Center for Victims of Torture, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, Evangelicals for Social Action, Faith and the City, the Islamic Society of North America, Morehouse College, the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, No2Torture, Rabbis for Human Rights, Sojourners and Third Way.

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