http://www.cooperativeresearch.org The Center for Grassroots Oversight aims to provide the public with a means to collaborate on investigations at the grassroots level. en-us http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=us_health_care_tmln_136#us_health_care_tmln_136 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=us_health_care_tmln_136#us_health_care_tmln_136 After announcing plans to commemorate the death and clinic closing of murdered late-term-abortion-providing OB/GYN George Tiller by laying flowers at the clinic building, hardline anti-abortion group Operation Rescue changes the location of the event to its Wichita headquarters due to an announced counter-protest by abortion rights supporters. However, about 10 abortion opponents return to the clinic in the evening to lay hundreds of flowers, after the abortion rights supporters have left. Marla Patrick, state co-ordinator for the National Organization for Women, which organized the counter-protest, says: "Our original intent was to prevent them from doing their proverbial dance on a murdered man's grave. The fact they changed plans tells me we were successful." Suspicions persist of murder suspect Scott Roeder's connection with Operation Rescue . KarenWehrstein 2009-07-01T22:26:33-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=us_health_care_tmln_131#us_health_care_tmln_131 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=us_health_care_tmln_131#us_health_care_tmln_131 Fellow anti-abortionists say that Scott Roeder, arrested in connection with the murder of late-term-abortion-providing OB/GYN Dr. George Tiller, has long been a hard-line opponent of abortion. Kansas anti-abortion activist Regina Dinwittie, who was ordered by a judge to cease using a bullhorn within 500 feet of an abortion clinic in 1995, says: "I know that he believed in justifiable homicide. He very strongly believed that abortion was murder and that you ought to defend the little ones, both born and unborn." Dinwittie recounts Roeder confronting Dr. Robert Crist, who worked at the Kansas City Planned Parenthood clinic in 1996: "He stared at him for approximately 45 seconds. Then he [Roeder] said, 'I've seen you now.' Then he turned his back and walked away, and they were scared to death." Dinwittie says she herself is "glad" of Tiller's death, saying, "I wouldn't cry for him no more than I would if somebody dropped a rat and killed it." After attending Tiller's trial, Roeder told fellow Kansas anti-abortion activist Eugene Frye that the whole process was "a sham." Frye says, "He felt justice had not been served." "In this situation, Scott viewed Tiller as the violent person," Frye said. "Scott didn't see himself as that. He saw this man as perpetrating murder on these innocent babies. ... Scott had that conviction." Dave Leach, publisher of the Iowa magazine Prayer and Action News, which has said "justifiable homicide" against abortion providers can be supported, and to which Roeder subscribed, says: "Scott is not my hero in that sense; he has not inspired me to shoot an abortionist. But definitely, he will be the hero to thousands of babies who will not be slain because Scott sacrificed everything for them." In signing a petition against Tiller in September 2007, someone giving the name Scott Roeder wrote, "Tiller is the concentration camp 'Mengele' of our day and needs to be stopped before he and those who protect him bring judgment upon our nation." KarenWehrstein 2009-07-01T22:23:31-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a073107roleintillmandeath#a073107roleintillmandeath http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a073107roleintillmandeath#a073107roleintillmandeath According to Army officials, retired Lieutenant General Phillip Kensinger could face demotion for misleading testimony and false reporting in the case of Pat Tillman's death in Afghanistan . In a memorandum condemning Kensinger's administration of the Army's investigation into Tillman's death, Army Secretary Pete Geren states that Kensinger "compromised his duty to the acting secretary of the Army by providing a report including information he knew to be false." He further accuses Kensinger of adding to the Tillman family's grief in not carrying out the procedural policies of the Army and the Department of Defense regarding investigations into suspected friendly fire deaths. VPresley 2009-07-01T22:22:54-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a04230604militknowstill#a04230604militknowstill http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a04230604militknowstill#a04230604militknowstill Although an Army investigation conducted within a few days of Pat Tillman's death (see and ) concludes that Tillman died due to his own unit's "gross negligence," shot three times in the head, this information is not given to the Tillman family for several weeks. Not until after a televised memorial service is held do Tillman relatives and the American public learn that Tillman died under "friendly," not enemy fire. It will be another year before the Washington Post breaks the story that Tillman's fellow Rangers had reported details of a friendly fire incident immediately and that US Army local command and top officials knew the truth well in advance of the family, but deliberately chose not to share it. A report consisting of 2,000 pages of investigative material, made by Brigadier General Gary M. Jones at the request of Tillman's family and Senator John McCain (R-AZ), will reveal that Army commanders know the results of an initial, in-house investigation days before the memorial at which they award Tillman the Silver Star. VPresley 2009-07-01T22:22:16-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a012799SixYemeniArrests#a012799SixYemeniArrests http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a012799SixYemeniArrests#a012799SixYemeniArrests Acting on a tip-off from a local sheikh, Yemeni security forces capture six men wanted on terrorism charges by Al Batan mountain, around 250 miles northeast of Aden. Four of the men are wanted in connection with a series of planned bombings in Yemen . They are: Mohammed Kamel Mostafa, son of Abu Hamza al-Masri, a British militant leader and informer for the security services there . Abu Hamza's stepson is already in custody; Shazad Nabi, a British citizen; Ayaz Hussein, another British citizen; and Ali Meksen, an Algerian who apparently uses a number of false identities. 'The other two are members of the Islamic Army of Aden, a local al-Qaeda affiliate. One is known as Abu Haraira, the other is Abdullah Salah al-Junaidi. Both had participated in a hostage-taking operation aimed at freeing six associates of the British men . KJF 2009-07-01T21:27:31-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a98AbuHamzaBurnley#a98AbuHamzaBurnley http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a98AbuHamzaBurnley#a98AbuHamzaBurnley Following a talk in Burnley by radical London cleric and informer Abu Hamza al-Masri , seven young men from the northern English town go to Afghanistan, where two of them die. At the talk, one of Abu Hamza's aides, a man from Birmingham in central England who had fought in Afghanistan and Bosnia, had given a warm-up speech demanding violence and "blood sacrifice" in Britain. He told the audience: "Get training. There must be some martial arts brothers amongst yourselves. You have to pump into the brothers what you are training for. It's so you can get the kuffar and crush his head in your arms, so you can wring his throat, so you can whip his intestines out. That's why you do the training, so you can rip the people to pieces. Forget wasting a bullet on them, cut them in half." The seven local men leave shortly after, saying they are going to Pakistan to study in religious schools. A few months later, news arrives that two of the men, one a university student, the other an accountancy graduate, have been killed in shelling by the Northern Alliance in Kabul. It comes to light that they had been approached to help the Taliban. Local community leader Rafique Malik will say: "Nobody knew, not even their parents, that they were going to Afghanistan. They went to Pakistan and the next thing their parents heard is that they are dead." Abu Hamza will subsequently be banned from preaching in the Burnley mosque. KJF 2009-07-01T21:27:01-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a012099AbuHamzaOverthrowYemen#a012099AbuHamzaOverthrowYemen http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a012099AbuHamzaOverthrowYemen#a012099AbuHamzaOverthrowYemen Abu Hamza al-Masri, a leading London-based radical cleric and informer for the British security services , calls for the overthrow of the government of Yemen, headed by President Ali Abdallah Saleh. This is part of a war of words after Yemen arrested Abu Hamza's stepson and some other associates for allegedly planning attacks in Yemen. KJF 2009-07-01T21:26:21-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=aafter080798CIAYemenFinsbury#aafter080798CIAYemenFinsbury http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=aafter080798CIAYemenFinsbury#aafter080798CIAYemenFinsbury Following al-Qaeda's bombing of two US embassies in East Africa, the CIA notices that the Islamic Army of Aden (IAA), an al-Qaeda affiliate, has praised the attack on its website. Also noting Yemeni links to the bombing itself, the CIA turns its attention to the IAA and its leader Zein al-Abidine Almihdhar. The CIA is assisted in this by the local Yemeni authorities. Officials in the Yemeni capital of Sana'a begin to compile a dossier on Almihdhar and his links to the West, including his fundraisers and supporters in Britain. They identify Finsbury Park mosque, run by British intelligence informer Abu Hamza al-Masri, as "crucial" to the IAA's operations. Almihdhar has a co-operation agreement with Abu Hamza that provides him with money and recruits, and an IAA emissary will allegedly visit London in September . KJF 2009-07-01T21:25:50-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=afall99AbuHamzaKillInfidels#afall99AbuHamzaKillInfidels http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=afall99AbuHamzaKillInfidels#afall99AbuHamzaKillInfidels Leading London-based radical cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri, an informer for the British authorities , calls on his followers to "kill the infidels" during a sermon delivered in Arabic in Finsbury Park mosque. He says: "When the forbidden months are past, it is a timed period, then fight and kill the infidels wherever you find them. He [Allah] did not say only here or here or here. Wherever you find them, except where it is forbidden like the Sacred Mosque. Wherever you find them, the kuffar is killed. Wherever you find them, take them and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem." KJF 2009-07-01T21:25:33-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a0998IAAVisitsAbuHamza#a0998IAAVisitsAbuHamza http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a0998IAAVisitsAbuHamza#a0998IAAVisitsAbuHamza An emissary of the Islamic Army of Aden (IAA), a Yemeni-based al-Qaeda affiliate, visits Finsbury Park mosque in London, according to an unnamed intelligence service. The mosque is run by Abu Hamza al-Masri, a leading radical and informer for the British security services . According to authors Sean O'Niell and Daniel McGrory, the emissary is "greeted like a hero" by Abu Hamza, addresses worshippers at the mosque, distributes leaflets, and collects money, presumably for jihad in Yemen. Abu Hamza and the IAA are co-operating closely at this time . The intelligence service, possibly the CIA or a local Yemeni service working with it, learns of this visit around the time it is made, and the visit is one reason it finds the London connection is "crucial" to the IAA . KJF 2009-07-01T11:56:33-07:00