REDEYE 4/5/17

It’s legal: billion-dollar companies pay zero taxes, stealing trillions
NYT, 3/10 — Complaining that the United States has one of the world’s highest corporate tax levels…Trump [has]…repeatedly vowed to shrink it.
Yet…why have so many companies’ income tax bills added up to zero?
That’s what a new analysis of 258 profitable Fortune 500 companies that earned more than $3.8 trillion in profits showed….
…The report, by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy…found… 100 of them …paid no taxes in at least one year between 2008 and 2015. Eighteen…occurred a total federal income tax bill of less than zero over the entire eight-year period — meaning they received rebates….
Companies take…tax loopholes…that enable them to legally avoid paying what they owe….
Multinational corporations like Apple, Microsoft…and Coca-Cola…book profits overseas, out of the reach of the Internal Revenue Service….
…A rigged tax code …has essentially legalized tax dodging for large corporations….One five-story office building in the Cayman Islands is now “home” to more than 18,000 corporations….
Facebook, Aetna and Exxon Mobil, among others, give options to top executives to buy stock in the future at a discount….then…deduct their huge payouts as a loss….
Individual industries have…tax breaks that function as subsidies:…drilling for gas and oil, building Nascar racetracks or railroad tracks, roasting coffee,…producing ethanol or making movies (which saved the Walt Disney Company $1.48 billion over eight years….
Companies with the biggest tax subsidies over eight years…included:
AT&T ($38.1 billion); Wells Fargo ($31.4 billion); JPMorgan Chase ($22.2 billion); Verizon ($21.1 billion); IBM ($17.8 billion); General Electric ($15.4 billion); ExxonMobil ($12.9 billion); 21st Century Fox ($7.6 billon); Goldman Sacks ($5.5 billion).
Racism keeps innocent Black people imprisoned the longest
NYT, 3/8 — Black people convicted of murder or sexual assault are significantly more likely than their white counterparts to be later found innocent of the crimes, according to a review of nearly 2,000 exonerations nation-wide….
Innocent blacks also had to wait disproportionately longer…to be cleared than innocent whites….Blacks wrongfully convicted of murder…spent an average of three more years in prison before being released than whites who were cleared….
…Blacks make up a disproportionate share of the wrongfully convicted….
The causes…run from inevitable consequences of patterns in crime and punishment to deliberate acts of racism….Misconduct, such as hiding evidence, tampering with witnesses or perjury…also have contributed to the racial disparity.
‘Pro-life’ = pro-death for Ireland’s infants
GW, 3/10 — A mass grave containing the remains of infants has been found at a former Catholic care home in Ireland  where it has been alleged up to 800 died….at the…former Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in…Galway….
…Ages of the deceased ranged from 35 weeks to three years old….Bon Secours was one of more than a dozen such homes….The Bon Secours Sisters, a Catholic order,…received unmarried pregnant women to give birth. The women were separated from the children….The discovery confirms decades of suspicions that the vast majority of children who died at the home were interred at the site in unmarked graves….
Torment pregnant prisoners
NYT, 3/15 — When Stephanie Jorge reported to a federal jail in Brooklyn [NY]…to begin a three-month sentence for bank larceny…she was pregnant.
The correctional officers showed little interest. [When]…she began to hemorrhage, the officers would typically refuse to call an ambulance until they could summon three officers….that often took an hour or two….
At the hospital, doctors recommended bed rest and that she avoid exertion….But Ms. Jorge…was ignored the moment she was discharged back to the Metropolitan Detention Center….
Ms. Jorge…was made to strip, squat and cough A guard watched to see if contraband fell from her vagina. The bleeding worsened….
“If it was up to them,” Ms. Jorge said, “I would have lost this baby….”
The National Association of Women Judges, which sent a delegation to the jail, said the conditions were “unconscionable” and violated…rules pertaining to prisoners….Female inmates told the…Women Judges that the food is frequently rotten….
“I am ashamed of what we did to you,” one federal judge…told Ms. [Joselin] Rosario….as he ordered her to Aruba….Sealed records amounted to “an indictment of the Bureau of Prisons for what they did in your case….”
…She said one officer confiscated her vitamins and another refused to let her, then eight months pregnant, remain in bed during the inmate count. “I told her I was dizzy…” The officer replied, “You’re not dying. You’re just pregnant. Get up.”
Mexico: a police state torturing and killing
NYT, 3/17 — Even as Mexico fumes over President Trump’s aggressive stance toward its people, the Mexican government is…trying to rip up basic legal protection for its citizens at home….
The governing party says the [“reform”] bill…will make “adjustments” to Mexico’s new legal system, a linchpin of cooperation with the United States that was completed last year with more than $300 million in American aid….
…It will broaden the power of the Mexican government to detain suspects for years before trial, enable the police to rely on hearsay in court and potentially allow prosecutors to use evidence obtained in torture….
…Rather than innocent before proved guilty, it would shift…the burden of proof to the accused….
“Mexico has worked hard to promote its image as a state that defends or advances international human rights….But at home, the human rights situation is dimply dreadful: severe abuse, torture, summary executions and virtually guaranteed impunity….
…Since the drug war began a decade ago, torture and extrajudicial killings have soared….The elite marine forces…kill 30 people for every person they injure….These laws…are…transitioning the country into something like a police state….
The United States has been notably quiet about the new bills….