He's too old. Perhaps it has changed recently, but Federal Law enforcement agencies have never hired candidates over the age of 35. It has to do with the pension requiring a minimum of 20 years to reach eligibility for retirement.

Mine had one friend whose very strict "Tiger Mom" did not allow her to have a phone until high school, and then it was analog calls only, no texting. That young woman has the most amazing communication skills and has outpacing her friend group by miles, excelling in her career.

The "good guy with a gun" was a black guy with dreds. Loved that, but he was seriously at risk of getting capped himself. with the gangsta way he was holding his gun sideways. He's the real hero.

Yeah, it sucks, but has there ever been a moment when this headline was not true? It's the economy stupid.

Stupidest plan ever.

BTW, this was in the Washington DC area. Shortly thereafter, I started working as an LEO in the district. I was a feminist and domestic violence survivor. That is what propelled me towards a career in law enforcement. I got to know the sex workers in my district and cultivated them as informants. They ALL had tales to tell of Washington elite and their engagements with sex workers. In some cases, their credibility was in doubt as they sought to improve their own status quo, but where there is smoke there is fire. Most of their stories were true.

Typo - Prior to my LEO career.

Prior to my LEE career , I worked part-time for a PI. The PI was frequently hired as a process server for civil suits against men who were difficult to locate/serve. My name was "Candy" (could it be any more obvious) and my schtick was pretending to be a stripper the subject had engaged with who was interested in getting the know him better. In most cases, we didn't even know if the target frequented strip clubs. In nearly all cases, they went to strip clubs enough to fall for the ruse and show up for the meetup, hoping to get lucky with the elusive and imaginary "Candy". I never even got out of the car, all of my work was done by telephone.

I'll just keep paying my subscriptions, you know, so the hardworking people who create the contents can keep getting paid.

Sounds like all his fantasies are coming true.

I did hear there was some indication that he was stalking/targeting one of the girls in particular.

He did not provide an explanation, and that was very difficult for the families who always want to know "Why?". The families were upset about the plea bargain, which happened suddenly and without giving them a chance to respond. Realistically, there wasn't enough evidence to be certain of conviction. I have seen homicides with far more compelling evidence result in acquittal or hung juries. With those odds, a plea bargain with a sentence that assures he will never leave prison is one any prosecutor should take.

Apparently during the victim impact portion one of the speakers said something about him being an A student, but that he would be getting a lot of "D's" in prison.

Trump knew they would say No which is why he requested it in the first place.

So cutting Medicaid by $698,000,000,000 will cause 1000 people to die. So in other words preventing these deaths is costing $698 MILLION for EACH person?The math isn't mathing.

He says he was visiting his girlfriend in WV, and overstayed his VISA by 3 days because he couldn't travel due to medical issues, but it is apparent that in that 3 days he did in fact travel at least several hundred miles and got charged with a serious felony for alleged domestic violence. So there is more to this story apparently.

"Thomas and his girlfriend, Malone, were visiting her family in Savannah, Georgia, when Thomas suffered a mental health episode, he and Malone recalled. The two had a conflict in their hotel room and someone overheard it
and called the police, they said.

Malone, who requested to use her middle name to protect her boyfriend's identity, said she was hoping officers would get him treatment and did not want to see him face criminal charges. But police took him to jail, accusing him of "falsely imprisoning" his girlfriend in the hotel room, a charge Malone said she did not support."

A charge she "did not support"? Officers are required to make an arrest where evidence of domestic violence exists, regardless of whether the victim wants to press charges. It would be interesting to see the police report, and I wonder why the reporter didn't do that.

#41 I agree completely. I read Kerr County's emergency management plan and it was surprisingly comprehensive. All of the things I mentioned above were in their plan, Community education and outreach, improving delivery of alerts, enforcement of building codes, etc. Whether there was been follow through, and whether it will experience a decline in effectiveness, certainly budget cuts will impact that.

To me, the most troubling factor in all of this is the absolute recklessness of operating a camp which requires children to sleep in non-compliant structures built within a well studied floodway with a high likelihood of dangerous flooding, which would be entirely illegal under current laws, for very good reason. In addition to this they have likely violated numerous laws through their additional construction and "improvements" and the dams that alter the natural course of the creek. The camp should have been closed years ago, but at the very least they should have moved the children to higher ground at the mere HINT of flash flood danger. Their apparent disregard for these dangers is so reckless it borders on criminal negligent homicide.

Yeah, I was encouraging my daughter to get at least take a cheap AM radio from me to monitor news during a hurricane a few years back. She said, "I have an a radio app on my phone". She just didn't get it that when the power goes out and the towers go down her apps won't work.

The AM radio used to be helpful to listen to local news updates and commentary from the Emergency Operations Center, but during the last couple storms the local radio news stations were just playing talk radio reruns, no live coverage at all. Local TV stations stayed live, but I always lose Cable.

The apps are more helpful to filter out some of the constant repetitive noise from weather band as the storm approaches, but once it arrives, I switch to the weather band for the NOAA updates. That radio is essential.

Correction, Kerr county is 1100 square miles.

And for the inevitable question, what if you don't get good cell service, you should have a NOAA alert radio and turn it on during a watch. That will wake you up and immediately provide details. Sirens are not always close or loud enough to wake you indoors and you have to memorize the patterns to try to figure out what it means. They are being phased out in most areas.

#25 I did look further into the sirens, across various sources. The pitch was based on the San Marcos system which employs 14 sirens with an outdoor audible range of 1-2 miles, to encourage people outside to seeek cover indoors. San Marcos has 14 sirens covering 35 square miles of a densely populated community. By contrast Kerr County is 1,100,000 square miles of sparsely populated rural hill country, so imagine how many $50,000 sirens would be needed, I would agree with those who thought a system like that would be less effective than text or internet based solutions, which is why they decided to stick with "Code Red", which clearly the Judge was unfamiliar. Apparently not all residents are in the database, and they encourage them to make sure they verify registration.

So yes, there is an early warning system, and it appears to have notified residents who were registered and had cell service. Apparently the camp has cell service, but campers are barred by policy from having cell phones, watches or tablets. Don't know about the counselors..

So, solutions:
Build in flood zones only according to CURRENT regulations and at your own expense and risk.
Occupy non-compliant, grandfathered structures at your own risk.
Grandfathered existing, non-compliant structures should not be permitted to be used as commercial dwellings

Better delivery systems/apps for warnings with filters that allow you to screen alerts.
For example, in my area, I get Advisories, Watches, Warnings and Severe Warnings from up to 100 miles away, for fog, heavy rains, thunderstorms, tropical storms high winds, rip currents, dangerous lightning, wildfires, water spouts, tornados. All of which are repeated with an alert tone every few minutes. I have tied many different apps, most of which have a direct feed of NOAA data, but none that can effectively filter these by distance or severity.

Ideally, I would like one that can limit geographical difference, and send an alert tone only with new or changing alerts. For example, during a hurricane, I've been on alert for hours already and I'm hunkered down. I don't need to be awakened every five minutes with a piercing tone telling me there is a still a severe thunderstorm watch in effect, just let me know when there a tornado spotted within 10 miles so I can wake everybody up and get to the safest room in the house. I haven't yet found an app that can do that, but I don't sleep much anyway during a hurricane.

Did a little more research, it appears the camp property is divided into two camps. The new dam I pointed out and the adjacent cabins are on the new camp to the south. The lost children were in the older part of the property to the north directly on the South Fork of the Guadalupe river which has an older dammed off swim area, so they were getting water from both waterways. The entire old/north camp where the children were housed lies within a regulatory floodway which essentially defines the riverbed, and I don't think you can build ANY structures in a floodway anymore, but the old camp may be grandfathered in.