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WASHINGTON (AP) -- Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum says the United States should either commit to winning the war in Afghanistan or "get out."...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum says the United States should either commit to winning the war in Afghanistan or "get out."...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum says the United States should either commit to winning the war in Afghanistan or "get out."...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Mitt Romney added to his big lead in the race for convention delegates by winning Republican presidential primaries in Maryland and the District of Columbia....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Heading into Sunday's presidential primary in Puerto Rico, all four GOP hopefuls added delegates when results were finalized from contests that happened days ago....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Heading into Sunday's presidential primary in Puerto Rico, all four GOP hopefuls added delegates when results were finalized from contests that happened days ago....

Bob Greene says visiting an exhibit on Nixon's early life as son, student, suitor gives context--and raises questions--about the enigmatic and controversial president

Mitt Romney will win the Puerto Rico primary, CNN projects. Because he's projected to take more than 50% of the vote on the island, he'll claim all 20 of the U.S. territory's delegates.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — A federal government decision to allow a Wyoming tribe to kill two bald eagles for a religious ceremony is a victory for American Indian sovereignty as well as for long-suppressed religious freedoms, the tribe says.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service granted a permit March 9 to ...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum met privately with conservative leaders on Thursday to craft plans to try to stop Mitt Romney's march to the nomination. Pressuring rival Newt Gingrich to leave the race was part of their overall strategy....

ST. LOUIS (AP) -- Former GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum says no group has done a better job of promoting American freedom than the National Rifle Association....

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Gunfire erupted as throngs were celebrating a mild St. Patrick's Day along a popular downtown canal in Indianapolis, and at least five teenagers were wounded by shots, two critically, police said.

The shots rang out Saturday night near the Downtown Canal on the west side of this ...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- The millions of dollars spent by Mitt Romney's allies on TV ads attacking his two main rivals have helped Romney pull ahead in the GOP presidential race. The resulting bitterness, however, is making it hard for him to lock down the nomination and end the party fighting that delights Democrats....

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) -- At El Sendero De La Cruz evangelical church, Rick Santorum sought prayers along with votes....

[New York Monday March 19]

Our photographer ZD Roberts was beaten by New York City cops with nightsticks while covering Occupy Wall Street's attempt to re-take Zuccotti Park Saturday night.

Zach yelled several times, “I’m PRESS! PRESS!” yet was slammed on the head twice after he’d been thrown to the ground when the police shoved back the protesters. Zach, whose photos of Occupy Wall Street have been seen all over the world on the front page of The Guardian, showed his press badge, an act for which his hair was grabbed, head pulled back and slammed again with a club.

If you remember, Zach was arrested while covering the story three months ago. His trial is coming up (he refused to cop a plea).

We’ve covered the world … but who thought that the toughest combat assignment would be New York?

Here’s Zach story and comment in his own words and photos:

My head hurts. The NYPD did this to me.

3 months after my arrest during an Occupy Wall St. protest on #D17 and two days away from my meeting with the Assistant DA about said arrest - I got beaten by cops just outside of Zuccotti Park.

I wasn't the only one, and I have no doubt I won't be the last. The NYPD has complete authority in this town - I hate using the word police state, but when I saw a girl thrown from a bus, in handcuffs, having a seizure being tossed to the ground - I really am at a loss for any other words.

Cameras documented it. Here's one of the photos I took. There's tons of video. I can tell you from being there that there wasn't a single police officer with a look of concern on his/her face as the girl continued having a seizure on the hard pavement of Broadway.

It took 15 minutes for an ambulance to arrive. I'm told 5 minutes is the usual response time in this part of town.

This is Commissioner Ray Kelly's city, we just live here.

There was no ambulance needed for me. I was lucky… or maybe just stupid.

After the second cleansing of Zuccotti Park, Saturday night, the police continued their pushback under the guise of 'safety concerns' - basically a standard operating procedure to keep protesters and journalists from being allowed to witness arrests and to disperse the crowd in different directions.

It works quite well, that is until it doesn't. The thing is, when you're pushing back with billy clubs and metal barricades, sometimes people can't move back quick enough. Or sometimes, people refuse to move from a public sidewalk. Well as a photographer, I get caught in the middle quite often - usually I'm deft enough to get out of the way - this time I wasn't.

I fell back, and while trying to get up - there was another push from the police - they saw me fall, mind you. Just didn't care.

Two or three people made it over me without falling as well, using me as their sidewalk (they didn't have any other choice) - but then came the rush - four or five people fell on top of me.

The police kept pushing. Then came the batons. I couldn't see if the people that were on top of me previously got hit at all but I certainly did, twice to the back and once on the head.

I'm not quite sure what the logic is of literally beating a man when he's down. But once he saw that his baton beating wasn't getting me going he decided to try to pick me up by my hair. That didn't work either - but by then I was up enough to get my footing under me as I continued screaming "PRESS!!! PRESS!!!" That was enough to get the beating to stop - but I still was pushed/thrown back into the crowd, again almost losing my footing as I had to leap over a pile of garbage into the street.

Checking my bag and camera for damage I moved outside of the crowd to compose myself before pushing back in.

Read the rest at SuicideGirlsblog.com later tomorrow and visit our facebook page for some exclusive photos from the raid.

Please support our kickstarter campaign to support the research and filming of a DVD and book on Billionaires and Ballots.

Greg Palast is the author of Vultures' Picnic: In Pursuit of Petroleum Pigs, Power Pirates and High-Finance Carnivores.

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When the officer approached this stopped vehicle, he smelled marijuana. When defendant was ordered out of the car, the officer saw hollowed out blunts and loose tobacco which told him that the blunts were to be packed with marijuana. That justified a search of the trunk because that’s a place marijuana could be kept. State v. Morris, 2011 S.C. App. LEXIS 419 (November 2, 2011), substituted for opinion filed August 17, 2011.

The defendant juvenile’s car was stopped because of the pointing of a rifle at a law enforcement officer. The police used a dog to sniff the trunk to see if a person was hiding there, but they stopped because the dog was distracted. Finally, they just opened the trunk as “SOP.” There were no exigent circumstances justifying a search of the trunk under New Mexico law. The search of the trunk also failed as a “protective sweep” looking for a person, but the evidence did not support that either. State v. Leticia T., 2012 N.M. App. LEXIS 12 (March 13, 2012).*

One officer was writing a traffic ticket for the defendant when another officer asked for consent to search the car. Since the request did not extend the stop any, it was valid. State v. Nims, 2012 Ore. App. LEXIS 266 (March 14, 2012).* [Oregon website has no March cases posted yet.]

BAYAMON, Puerto Rico (AP) -- Looking toward the critical primary in Illinois, Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney wrapped up a shortened campaign trip to Puerto Rico on Saturday as he prepared for more tough contests against chief rival Rick Santorum....

FRANKENMUTH, Mich. (AP) -- Now the likely Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney was back home in Michigan on Tuesday - where, he says, the "trees are the right height."...

EFFINGHAM, Ill. (AP) -- Rick Santorum on Saturday morphed his chief rival for the Republican presidential nomination into the incumbent Democrat both are fighting to unseat, calling the two indistinguishable on key issues of the day....

Defendant was stopped for a traffic offense, and he had a bandana with a marijuana leaf design hanging from the mirror. The officer asked for consent to search his person and then called for back up. He then asked for consent to search the car. The court holds there is no right under state law to have the Fourth Amendment read more broadly to require that juveniles get a warning of a right to refuse a search of a car. State v. Carlos A., 2012 N.M. App. LEXIS 13 (March 13, 2012).*

Police stopped behind defendant’s car which was double parked in front of a garage at 3 a.m. They had a CI’s report, and the car matched a radio call of it being involved in an incident. The occupant made a furtive movement toward the floor. On the totality, they had reasonable suspicion. United States v. Parker, 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 5509 (3d Cir. March 16, 2012) (unpublished).*

Defendant failed to show that he had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the hotel room of another that was searched. He was neither the renter nor the additional guest, but he had a key. It was not shown that the key was to that room. “In any event, as he concedes, possession of a key to a hotel room, without more, does not establish a reasonable expectation of privacy in the room. Cooper, 203 F.3d at 1286 n.7 (citing United States v. Conway, 73 F.3d 975, 980 (10th Cir. 1995)). Nor did Bushay prove that the vehicle he was operating was a vehicle that was ‘registered’ for room 308.” He was not an overnight guest, and he lacked standing to contest a search that produced a gun associated with him. United States v. Bushay, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 33653 (N.D. Ga. January 24, 2012).*