Facebook, MySpace Disable Offenders’ Accounts
More than 3,500 registered sex offenders throughout the state have been kicked off online social networking sites Facebook and MySpace in the first database sweep conducted since a new state law went into effect, announced Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.
Under the new Electronic Securing and Targeting of Online Predators Act (e-STOP), which went into effect last year, registered sex offenders are forced to register their e-mail addresses with the state. Social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace can now access that information to prevent sex offenders from maintaining accounts.
Under the first database sweep since the law went into effect, Facebook was able to identify and disable accounts linked to 2,782 sex offenders across the state, while MySpace recently disabled 1,796such accounts. Since some sex offenders had accounts with both sites, the number of individuals purged during the sweep stands at 3,533.
In all, there are more than 8,100 sex offenders who have registered e-mail addresses with the state. That means more than 43 percent of those sex offenders using e-mail have accounts registered with Facebook and MySpace, which are both popular with teenagers. Information about the accounts is now being shared with law enforcement authorities.
While Facebook and MySpace are taking part in the initiative to prevent sex offenders from soliciting new targets through social networking sites, others “remain slow at adopting available new protections against sexual predators online,” the attorney general noted in a press release. In response, Cuomo’s office has sent letters to other sites urging them to take action now to prevent offenders from maintaining accounts.
“We created e-STOP to help put an end to sexual predators using the Internet as a tool to prey on the innocent,” said Cuomo. “Facebook and MySpace are successfully using e-STOP to help make the Internet safer, and it’s time for all social networking to do their part to keep others from being senselessly victimized.”
Under e-STOP, the nation’s more comprehensive law to enhance protections from sexual predators on the Internet, many offenders are banned outright from using social networking sites while on probation or parole. Also, convicted sex offenders must register all of their e-mail addresses, screen names and other Internet identifiers with the state, which shares the information with social networking sites so they can purge offenders from their online worlds.
Sex offenders recently purged from Facebook and MySpace come from all regions throughout the state. Locally, 186 of the removed offenders live in Queens, 101 in Nassau County, 177 in Brooklyn, 143 in the Bronx and 118 in Manhattan.
Showing posts with label andrew cuomo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label andrew cuomo. Show all posts
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Parkway Hospital Claims Failure to Bribe Seminerio Led to Closure
By Conor Greene
New Parkway Hospital is claiming in a lawsuit that it was ordered to shut down by the state after its chief executive officer Robert Aquino refused to pay bribes demanded by former state Assemblyman Anthony Seminerio.
The lawsuit, filed last week in Queens Supreme Court, names the state as a defendant and seeks to have its operating license renewed after it was revoked last November based on the findings of the Berger Commission. Despite that group’s recommendation that the state wait two years before closing the Forest Hills facility, it was shut last year – something the lawsuit blames on Seminerio’s inappropriate lobbying activities.
The state Health Department has previously said that the closing of Parkway was because it received the lowest score on criteria used by the commission to rank struggling hospitals. Seminerio recently resigned after 30 years in office and pleaded guilty to fraud charges accusing him of taking illegal consulting fees from Jamaica Hospital. The lawsuit argues that Seminerio’s guilty plea dissolves his right against self incrimination and seeks to have him deposed regarding his alleged extortion attempt of Parkway.
In court documents, Aquino states that Seminerio told him that he would make Aquino’s life “miserable” if he didn’t agree to pay him consulting fees that reportedly would have been between $10,000 and $15,000 per month. “It is self-evident that Seminerio’s criminal conduct had a direct impact on the decision to close Parkway Hospital,” he argues. “As an operating hospital, Parkway’s license could not be revoked absent of due process. Having a license revoked for the refusal to pay a bribe to a public official surely constitutes the denial of due process.”
Aquino also argues that the 251-bed hospital should be considered for reopening since two other local hospitals closed after the Berger Commission made its recommendations. He also questions whether the city is ready to handle a possible new outbreak of Swine Flu this fall, which has hit the Southern Hemisphere hard during the first few weeks of its flu season.
The federal indictment against Seminerio also accused him of attempting to force another hospital, now know to be Parkway, to pay him monthly consulting fees. When Aquino refused his demands, Seminerio lobbied on behalf of Jamaica Hospital.
“There is little doubt that such ‘advocacy’ resulted in the closure of the ‘non-client hospital,’ which as everyone now knows is the New Parkway Hospital. Indeed, the Department of Health essentially overrode the initial recommendation of the so-called Berger Commissioner that a wait-and-see approach be taken with respect to Parkway and directed its closure,” wrote Aquino in a letter to Gov. David Paterson and state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.
New Parkway Hospital is claiming in a lawsuit that it was ordered to shut down by the state after its chief executive officer Robert Aquino refused to pay bribes demanded by former state Assemblyman Anthony Seminerio.
The lawsuit, filed last week in Queens Supreme Court, names the state as a defendant and seeks to have its operating license renewed after it was revoked last November based on the findings of the Berger Commission. Despite that group’s recommendation that the state wait two years before closing the Forest Hills facility, it was shut last year – something the lawsuit blames on Seminerio’s inappropriate lobbying activities.
The state Health Department has previously said that the closing of Parkway was because it received the lowest score on criteria used by the commission to rank struggling hospitals. Seminerio recently resigned after 30 years in office and pleaded guilty to fraud charges accusing him of taking illegal consulting fees from Jamaica Hospital. The lawsuit argues that Seminerio’s guilty plea dissolves his right against self incrimination and seeks to have him deposed regarding his alleged extortion attempt of Parkway.
In court documents, Aquino states that Seminerio told him that he would make Aquino’s life “miserable” if he didn’t agree to pay him consulting fees that reportedly would have been between $10,000 and $15,000 per month. “It is self-evident that Seminerio’s criminal conduct had a direct impact on the decision to close Parkway Hospital,” he argues. “As an operating hospital, Parkway’s license could not be revoked absent of due process. Having a license revoked for the refusal to pay a bribe to a public official surely constitutes the denial of due process.”
Aquino also argues that the 251-bed hospital should be considered for reopening since two other local hospitals closed after the Berger Commission made its recommendations. He also questions whether the city is ready to handle a possible new outbreak of Swine Flu this fall, which has hit the Southern Hemisphere hard during the first few weeks of its flu season.
The federal indictment against Seminerio also accused him of attempting to force another hospital, now know to be Parkway, to pay him monthly consulting fees. When Aquino refused his demands, Seminerio lobbied on behalf of Jamaica Hospital.
“There is little doubt that such ‘advocacy’ resulted in the closure of the ‘non-client hospital,’ which as everyone now knows is the New Parkway Hospital. Indeed, the Department of Health essentially overrode the initial recommendation of the so-called Berger Commissioner that a wait-and-see approach be taken with respect to Parkway and directed its closure,” wrote Aquino in a letter to Gov. David Paterson and state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.
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