ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, February 20, 1997 TAG: 9702200042
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
High-tech crime via 3rd world
WASHINGTON - In what authorities describe as a fraudulent new high-technology scheme, telephone and Internet marketers are joining with telecommunication companies in emerging nations to bilk unsuspecting consumers around the world.
The latest operation, uncovered by federal regulators and American phone company investigators this month, enticed on-line computer browsers with a promise of free pornography and then subjected users to exorbitant telephone charges billed from a number in Moldova, a former Soviet republic.
A federal judge in New York shut down the operation, allegedly run by three Long Island residents, after the Federal Trade Commission accused the defendants of running ``one of the most insidious scams'' it had seen.
Federal officials said they expected such schemes to proliferate as sophisticated World Wide Web site operators employ the growing telephone systems of underdeveloped nations to defraud naive Internet users.
- The New York Times
FBI feared shooter, but took no action
DENVER - A senior FBI official testified Wednesday that law enforcement authorities feared someone might try to assassinate Timothy McVeigh in the moments after he was arrested.
Special Agent James Adams, the second-in-charge at the FBI's command post in Oklahoma City in the days after the April 1995 bombing, said officials were concerned that someone upset over the deaths of 168 people might be angry enough to try to shoot McVeigh as agents led him out of a small-town courthouse.
But Adams also acknowledged that he ordered agents to escort McVeigh out of the courthouse in a bright orange jumpsuit, and said he never considered giving McVeigh a bulletproof vest to wear as he was walked past a large, angry crowd.
Adams testified in federal court here in the second day of a preliminary hearing about whether certain government eyewitnesses should be allowed to testify at McVeigh's trial, to begin in six weeks.
- Los Angeles Times
No court martial in Army sex scandal
One of the first three soldiers charged in the Aberdeen Proving Ground sex scandal that rocked the military will not be court-martialed, Army officials announced Wednesday.
Staff Sgt. Nathanael C. Beach, 32, will have his case decided in a less-serious disciplinary forum, one that would not lead to jail time.
Beach, a former instructor at the U.S. Ordnance Center and School, was charged last fall with committing adultery by having consensual sex with two female recruits, discussing his religious beliefs with a recruit, ordering a recruit to write a research paper for him, and disobeying orders to stay away from recruits while he was under investigation.
Beach's lawyer, Capt. Vincent Avallone, declined to comment on the decision other than to say Beach is ``looking forward to resolving the matter and getting on with his life.''
- The Baltimore Sun
LENGTH: Medium: 63 linesby CNB