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Warm conditions will persist Sunday across the central U.S., while heavy snow moves through the Rockies. A low pressure system and associated cold front that brought heavy rain and heavy mountain snow to the West Coast continues moving eastward and into the Rockies....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Dozens of police officers cleared the park where the Occupy movement was born six months ago and made several arrests after hundreds of protesters returned in an anniversary observance and defiantly resisted calls to clear out....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Dozens of police officers cleared the park where the Occupy movement was born six months ago and made several arrests after hundreds of protesters returned in an anniversary observance and defiantly resisted calls to clear out....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Dozens of police officers cleared the park where the Occupy movement was born six months ago and made several arrests after hundreds of protesters returned in an anniversary observance and defiantly resisted calls to clear out....

SANAA, Yemen (AP) -- Two gunmen on a motorcycle shot dead early Sunday an American teacher working at a language institute in a central Yemeni city, the region's provincial governor said....

SANAA, Yemen (AP) -- Two gunmen on a motorcycle shot dead early Sunday an American teacher working at a language institute in a central Yemeni city, the region's provincial governor said....

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....

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....

LAKE TAPPS, Wash. (AP) -- Bypassed for a promotion and struggling to pay for his house, Robert Bales was eyeing a way out of his job at a Washington state military base months before he allegedly gunned down 16 civilians in an Afghan war zone, records and interviews showed as a deeper picture emerged Saturday of the Army sergeant's financial troubles and brushes with the law....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Authorities say a floor of a New York City three-story house where a large party was taking place collapsed, injuring a dozen people....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Authorities say a floor of a New York City three-story house where a large party was taking place collapsed, injuring a dozen people....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Authorities say a floor of a New York City three-story house where a large party was taking place collapsed, injuring a dozen people....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Authorities say a floor of a New York City three-story house where a large party was taking place collapsed, injuring a dozen people....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Dozens of police officers cleared the park where the Occupy movement was born six months ago and made several arrests after hundreds of protesters returned late Saturday night in an anniversary observance and defiantly resisted calls to clear out....

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- Gunfire erupted from a car as throngs were celebrating St. Patrick's Day in Indianapolis and at least five teenagers were hurt, police said....

[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.]

NEW YORK (AP) -- Police by the dozens have swept through a downtown Manhattan park, moving out Occupy Wall Street demonstrators who were celebrating their six-month anniversary....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- His jacket was only moss green but his pint was true Guinness....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- His jacket was only moss green but his pint was true Guinness....