Lawsuit from 25 Conservative Groups Against IRS

The scandal plaguing the IRS has just taken another twist as the agency is being hit with lawsuits filed in district court by the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) on behalf of many groups who claim they been unfairly targeted by the tax agency.

ACLJ’s Chief Counsel Jay Sekulow announced this morning that he was filing “an inch-thick” complaint from 25 groups. Sekulow also believes that original complaint will be amended next week to “add another dozen or so groups.”

Among ACLJ’s evidence that this was not a low-level problem created by two rogue employees in Cincinnati:

15 letters to various groups demanding answers to IRS questions were all hand-signed by Lois Lerner. (as seen on TheBlaze on 5/17)

At least 4 different offices were involved over the past year and a half.

Jay Carney claimed the targeting stopped in May of 2012, one of Jay’s clients has a letter from May of this year. Read more >>

Washington launches four different investigations into IRS scandal

Capitol Hill aides spent their Memorial Day weekend scanning hundreds of pages of documents related to the IRS scandal in order to prepare their bosses for what will inevitably be a frantic month of June involving multiple simultaneous investigations into government wrongdoing. By the time lawmakers return to session next week, at least four different investigations will be underway.

As The Daily Caller has reported, at least five different IRS offices including Cincinnati, Ohio; Baltimore, Maryland; Chicago, Illinois and El Monte and Laguna Niguel, California improperly targeted conservative nonprofit groups for extra scrutiny between 2010 and 2012.

The IRS’ shenanigans, chronicled in a damning report by Treasury Inspector General J. Russell George, started when a “team of [IRS] specialists” came together in April 2010 to process the tax-exempt nonprofit status of conservative groups that might be “potential political operations” (page 13 of the IG report). The IRS added “additional specialists” to this effort in December 2011. Read more >>

Dow Falls to Lowest Level Since January

U.S. stocks declined, sending the Dow Jones Industrial Average to the lowest level since January, as Greece struggled to form a new government amid growing speculation the nation may leave the European currency.

The S&P 500 slid 1.1 percent to 1,338.35 at 4 p.m. New York time, the lowest since Feb. 2. The Dow fell 125.25 points, or 1 percent, to 12,695.35. The Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index, which measures the cost of using options as insurance against S&P 500 losses, rose 10 percent to an almost four-month high of 21.87. About 6.6 billion shares changed hands on U.S. exchanges, in line with the three-month average.

“The fear factor is definitely higher,” said Madelynn Matlock, who helps oversee about $14.7 billion at Huntington Asset Advisors in Cincinnati. “The whole European (SX7P) political situation is really the focus at this point. Nobody really knows what’s going to happen next and the market hates uncertainty.” More...

Girls aged 12 and 14 hold up bank in Ohio

The U.S. unemployment rate among those 16 to 19 years is almost thirty percent.

Telegraph
The young girls walked into a branch of 1st National Bank in Cincinnati, Ohio and handed a note to the cashier demanding money. According to police the note implied the girls would harm employees if the money was not given to them. They did not appear to have any weapons.

Staff complied and the girls walked out with a bag full of money. They then evaded an extensive police search which included a helicopter and sniffer dogs. One of the girls was described as heavy set, around 5 feet 4 inches tall, and was wearing a hooded top and blue jeans.

The other was said to be second thin, around 5 feet tall and wearing a baseball cap. Local police released a grainy black-and-white surveillance photograph of one of the alleged bank robbers.

The robbery took place at 3.20pm on Tuesday and the girls were seen leaving on foot and heading for a nearby housing estate.