Lufthansa announced Tuesday that Andreas Lubitz—the co-pilot of the Germanwings flight that crashed into the French Alps last week, killing all 150 people on board—had previously informed the airline of a "serious depressive episode."http://gawker.com/prosecutors-ge...

According to documents turned over to German prosecutors, Lubitz had told Lufthansa in 2009—in emails with the airline's flight school to resume pilot training—that he had suffered from depressive episodes. Those emails, the New York Times reports, included medical records.

The company's announcement today appears to square with a previous veiled statement made by the airline's CEO Carsten Spohr at a press conference last week, in which he alluded to an interruption in Lubitz's pilot training for unspecified reasons. Lufthansa operates Germanwings as a budget airline.

[Image via Getty]

French magazine Paris Match and German newspaper Bild have reportedly obtained a cell phone video taken during the final seconds of doomed Germanwings Flight 9525. According to the publications, cries of "My god!" can be heard in several languages before screaming intensifies and then, following a loud bang, silence.

The cell phone video matches the recording from the flight's cockpit voice recorder, a copy of which was also obtained by Paris Match.

Transcripts of the recording show that communication between Captain Patrick Sondenheimer and co-pilot Andreas Lubitz was normal until about 28 minutes after take off, when Sondenheimer goes to use the bathroom and tells Lubitz, "You are in control now."

"I hope so," Lubitz replies with what Paris Match described as a "seemingly light tone of voice."

Within two minutes of Sondenheimer leaving the cockpit, Lubitz locks the door and reprograms the autopilot to descent. One minute later radio control is heard speaking Lubitz, followed by the locked-out captain, who after trying to reach the co-pilot via a camera connected to the cockpit attempts to smash in the door with a fire extinguisher while yelling, "For the love of God, open this door!"

From Paris Match:

10:34 approximately

A first alarm goes off, audible and visual: "SINK RATE, PULL UP."

No reaction from Lubitz.

Through the cockpit door, the first sounds of passengers running in the aisles can be heard.

10:35

The captain asks for the crowbar hidden in the back of the plane. Louder bangs can be heard hitting the door, followed by metallic sounds. The captain tries to bend the door with the crowbar.

10:37 and several seconds

A second alarm is set off, audible and visual: "TERRAIN, PULL UP." Still no reaction from Lubitz.

The captain yells: "Open this f… door!"

10:38

Despite the deafening noises, Lubitz's breathing can cleary be heard through an oxygen mask he put on. He is breathing normally. The plane is at 13000 feet (4000 meters).

10:40

A violent sound can be heard outside. At the same time, inside, screaming. The Airbus hits the mountain with its right wing.

No other sound, save for the alarms and the screaming passengers.

One minute later, the plane crashed into Estrop mountain range, killing all 150 on board.

Image via AP. Contact the author at taylor@gawker.com.

Nearly six months after Tucker Hipps—a Sigma Phi Epsilon pledge at Clemson University—was found floating under a bridge in a lake near campus after being reported missing by his frat brothers, the circumstances of his death remain cloudy. But in a $25 million wrongful death lawsuit filed yesterday, his parents allege Hipps died after a fight with his brothers over McDonald's breakfast.

These are the agreed upon facts regarding what happened the morning that Hipps died. At 5:30 a.m., the Sig Ep pledges were taken on a run that crossed a lake adjacent to campus using Highway 93. At some point during the run, Hipps began to lag. Soon after that, Hipps somehow went over the bridge, causing blunt force trauma, and his death. The rest of the group continued on, Hipps never returned, and later in the day police found his body.

But in their lawsuit—which names brothers and run organizers Thomas King, Campbell Starr and Sameul Carney as defendants, along with the Sig Ep chapter, the Sig Ep national organization, and Clemson University—Hipps' parents make it clear that their version of the rest of the story differs greatly from the picture painted by Hipps' brothers after his death.

Back in September, a local police spokesman relayed this version of the frat's story:

Oconee County Sheriff's Office spokesperson Jimmy Watt said Hipps was on a voluntary pledge run with about 30 other pledges and brothers of the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity when he began to fall behind the group.

What happened next is not known because Watt said no one saw Hipps fall into Lake Hartwell from the Highway 93 bridge that crosses over the Seneca River portion of the lake.

Here, it's easy to see the frat immediately wiping its hands of any knowledge of what happened to Hipps. The frat, by this account, lost track of Hipps, nobody saw him go over the bridge, and only hours later did they suspect something might be wrong.

If that all sounds a little too convenient, the Hipps family lawsuit (which you can read in full here) argues that it is. According to the suit—which, per the Hipps' attorney, was pieced together with information from "other students and sources"—at least several Sig Ep brothers saw Hipps go over the bridge, and at least one searched for him immediately after. Further, the suit says the cause was an argument over, or perhaps punishment for, Hipps declining to purchase a grand breakfast for the frat from McDonald's.

Hipps' parents allege that Hipps, as pledge class president, was required to buy breakfast for the frat from McDonald's. But they say Hipps told his brothers that he couldn't afford it, upon which he was told to figure it out somehow. Evidently, Hipps either chose not to or was not able to procure the breakfast.

Later, during the run, according to the suit, King—one of the named defendants—received a phone call from a Sig Ep brother who was angry that Hipps had not provided breakfast. King, the suit says, then confronted Hipps:

So far this is all pretty straightforward, but next the parents' story gets a little tricky:

According to Hipps' parents, King approached Hipps about the breakfast, which caused a "confrontation." "Subsequently" Hipps then "went over the railing." The immediate next part of the suit then notes that Sig Ep had a "long tradition" of making pledges jump off the bridge and swim to shore.

The suggestion here is not exactly clear. Did Hipps go over the bridge during his "confrontation" with King? Was he forced to jump from the bridge as punishment for not buying breakfast? They state that that Hipps' went over face first, consistent with his autopsy which revealed abrasions and trauma to his chest, hands, and wrists. If he had jumped on his own, would he have not gone legs first? Was he thrown over?

One implication would basically be manslaughter—that Hipps was accidentally killed during a fight with a frat brother. Hipps' parents, and their attorneys, are careful not to accuse King, or the other two defendants, of that, but they also are very careful not to rule it out. They note that Sig Ep was known for making pledges jump into the water, but they explicitly don't state that Hipps himself jumped.

Regardless, this account of what happened on the bridge goes to great lengths to refute the frat's story that they lost track of Hipps and never saw him go into the water. Where Sig Ep has insinuated that Hipps fell behind the entire group to the point that his whereabouts became unknown, his parents say that King was tasked with running behind all of the pledges.

The theory that at least one, if not several, Sig Ep brothers were present on the bridge when Hipps went over appears to be backed up by a 911 call released by police back in September. In that call, a brother named Cam seemed to pause and omit details when telling the emergency operator about the circumstances of Hipps' disappearance.

Further, Hipps' parents allege in the suit that the Sig Ep brothers have tried to obfuscate the investigation. First, his parents say that a fellow pledge lied to Hipps' girlfriend about him having been seen on campus in order to give the frat some time to figure its story out:

Hipps' parents also say that one brother deleted the entirety of a group text, that King attempted to delete all of his phone calls from the days before and after Hipps' death, and that Starr—one of other named defendants—deleted his calls and changed his phone number during the investigation.

The suit may result in no material victory for the Hipps family—one figures that various teams of high-priced Southern law-yurs will do their damnedest to get their clients removed as defendants, and the suit dropped altogether. Maybe filing the suit is meant to be more of a kick in the ass to the local investigators, who have kept details close to their vests as they conduct their criminal investigation.

In a statement released with the suit, the Hipps' attorney said the following:

"Tucker Hipps's death was a senseless and avoidable tragedy. The culture of hazing and inappropriate conduct by social fraternities must be stopped. Universities and fraternities must make change from within to protect their own. Cynthia and Gary Hipps have filed these lawsuits in the hopes that change will happen and that no other parent will feel the pain that they have been forced to endure. Tucker lost his life, but we must not let it be in vain."

What if that change was the end of frats as we know it?

UPDATE (3:40 p.m.): A tipster points out that Sam Carney, one of the three defendants named in the lawsuit, is the son of Delaware representative John Carney. Carney was the state's lieutenant governor for eight years, and has been in the House since 2011.

Contact the author at jordan@gawker.com.

A crazy thing to do is kill another person. A less crazy thing to do is to take an axe to a tree in the Upper West Side and deplete it of the nutrients it needs to survive. The latter, however, is still a bad and terrible way to release your anger, so if it was you—own up!

DNAinfo has the report on a tree located on West End Ave and West 103rd Street whose trunk was hacked mercilessly one day or night last week, and was discovered by residents of the neighborhood who compared the image to a "murder scene." Because of the damage done to the tree, there is a chance it may have to be chopped down. Costello Caldwell, the owner of a garden store who had previously built a protective barrier around the tree, says he is going to attempt to revive it:

He explained that without that layer of bark, the tree's nutrient-delivery system becomes interrupted and it could die.

But Caldwell hasn't given up on the tree yet and is planning a grafting operation to try to save it, he said Monday.

First, he plans to remove a small strip of bark from the upper part of the tree and apply it to the section that was stripped off, using beeswax to make it stick. Next, he'll cover it with a wet towel and protect it with a plastic bag, he said.

Residents of the area have left poetry, flowers, and candles at the murder scene, sending along well-wishes and heartfelt feelings for the tree's speedy recovery. The NYPD reportedly has no leads on a suspect, though one resident in the area feels confident that the tree was hacked with an axe.

If you did this, it was pretty fucked up. You should probably come clean!

Image via DNAinfo. Contact the author at dayna.evans@gawker.com.

For the past 36 hours, hurricane-force winds have raked through western Europe as a result of a strong low pressure system crashing ashore in Denmark. The strong winds are causing widespread damage, knocking out power, and interrupting hundreds of flights at some of the busiest airports in the world.

The low pressure system responsible for the intense winds reached a minimum pressure of around 968 millibars last night, which makes it a pretty formidable storm system, all things considered. For reference, if we saw a 968 millibar nor'easter off the coast of New England, weather geeks would be drooling over it and The Weather Channel would have 11 crews stationed on the beach.

Sustained winds of 60 MPH with gusts of 70+ MPH were not uncommon across the region at the height of the storm. The steep pressure gradient between the low over the North Sea and an Azores High west of the Iberian Peninsula left communities from Scotland to central Europe in the firing zone for a good buffeting.

Hours after the peak of the storm, we're still seeing widespread reports of sustained winds of 35 knots (40 MPH) from northern Scotland to the southeast into Slovakia. Wind barbs show winds in knots; long bars indicate 10 knots, short bars indicate 5 knots, while flags indicate 50 knots. Four long bars and a short bar on a wind barb indicates a reported wind of 45 knots.

The gusts are even stronger, with two stations—a buoy in the North Sea and a station in eastern Germany—reporting a wind gust of 63 MPH at 17z.

The strong winds resulted in hundreds of cancelled flights across the continent, with "at least 80 flights" cancelled at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport, and hundreds of flight delays at London-Heathrow. Thousands of people lost power across the region as trees and power lines toppled against the force of the wind, but there's one bit of damage that causes this blog an extra level of pain.

The Vane is in mourning this afternoon upon learning of the critical injury sustained by an apparently-famous weather vane at Lord's Cricket Ground in London. The world-famous cricket venue has served as home to this weather vane since 1928; the direction-telling hunk of metal withstood the scourge of World War II and countless storms, but the winds from this storm managed to do it in. The Vane remembers all vanes across the world that succumb to the elements, and wish this vane the best of luck as experts try to restore it to its former glory.

Winds should slowly start to die down over the next 12 to 24 hours as the storm weakens and pulls away from the area.

[Images: AP, GREarth]

You can follow the author on Twitter or send him an email.

This week, Holy Week, we ponder the life of a man who was born to an unwed teen mother and a carpenter father. A man who started with very little, but whose followers would go on to change the world. A man who knew how to get down with hookers, who was betrayed and tortured by his own people. A nobody who became a beloved somebody, followed by a hated everybody, and finally, a humiliated anybody, cleansed by suffering. I’m speaking, of course, of Justin Bieber.

It took Justin Bieber just months to rocket from obscurity to fame, and years for that fame to sour and curdle into a reputation as one of music’s foremost shitheads. Little short of divine intervention could salvage Bieber. And divine intervention is exactly what Bieber is going for.

As somebody who spent an inappropriate amount of hours during her Catholic childhood pondering the suffering another dude whose name starts with J went through in the hours up to and including his crucifixion, last night’s Justin Bieber roast couldn’t have been more bizarrely evocative if it served as the lead in to Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments. From the moment Kevin Hart (playing the role of a tiny, foul mouthed Pontius Pilate in this analogy) took to the stage in a minister’s robe to introduce Bieber to the stage, the event was pure New Testament.

Bieber’s roast followed a familiar path laid out by what Catholics call the Stations of the Cross, a long somber pondering of the suffering Jesus endured so that we could all be saved. Just replace “Jesus” with “Bieber” and “we” with “Bieber’s career” and we’ve got a Comedy Central Roast Order of Show.

1. Bieber is condemned to death

“Tonight we are gonna do what parents and the legal system should have done a long time—give the boy an ass-whuppin’ he deserves,” says Kevin Hart at the top of the show.

2. Bieber carries his cross

There he is, turd-faced Justin Bieber, still gawky in a sharp blue suit.

3. Bieber falls for the first time

Bieber emerged from the ceiling wearing enormous angel wings as a gospel choir sang about him, before falling the final portion of descent, only to stand up, grinning winsomely. Subtle.

4. Bieber meets his mother.

5. Chris D’Elia helps Bieber carry the cross.

In the Bible, a guy named Simon helped Jesus carry the cross (an actual wooden object) as the Jews cheered on his suffering. In Justin Bieber’s roast, a guy named Chris D’Elia (Who? Oh. Him. Why does he keep getting cast in things? He seems terrible!) helped Bieber carry the cross (the burden of being a douchebag) as showbiz people (some of whom were Jews) cheered on his suffering. At the end they hugged, but I really wanted them to kiss like Judas and Jesus.

6. Bieber falls the second time.

Throughout the night, Bieber put on his best “This is fun and I’m cool with this” face, but every once in awhile, the facade cracked. Like at this moment, when you almost feel sorry for him, a little, because he looks like he just remembered that his dog died. Sometimes he’d hide his near-tears by standing up and clapping. Everybody who has ever tried to stop themselves from crying knows that trick, Justin. I know you’re trying to dry out your tear ducts with a mini whoosh of air circulation.

7. Bieber meets the women of Jerusalem.

This technically happened before the show, but what a stunning portrait of a young non-monster who has clearly been cured of his narcissism.

8. Bieber falls the third time.

The part where Jeff Ross calls Justin Bieber the “King Joffrey of Pop” like he came up with it (nope, and nope), and Justin applauds appreciatively like he’d never heard it before. That is the part of the roast that made me the saddest.

9. Bieber is stripped of his garments.

10. Bieber is crucified.

Hannibal Buress, cold as ice.

11. Bieber dies.

This one got cut from #BieberRoast. I get it. pic.twitter.com/mTKExQEuuM

— Hannibal Buress (@hannibalburess) March 31, 2015

RIP Justin Bieber. Deadpan executioner Hannibal Buress has killed you.

12. Bieber is taken down from the cross.

During his rebuttal, which contained jokes that he most surely did not write himself, Bieber launched into the redemption speech we all saw coming from a mile away and without our contacts in.

There was really no preparing me for this life. I was thrown into this at 12 years old and I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into. There’s been moments I’m really proud of, and a lot of moments I look back and I’m pretty disappointed in myself for. But the things that I’ve done really don’t define who I am. I’m a kindhearted person who loves people. And through it all I lost some of my best qualities. For that, I’m sorry. But what I can say is I’m looking forward to being someone that you guys can all look at and be proud of. Someone you can smile at and see some of yourself in. Someone close to me once said “It’s how you rise from a fall that truly defines you as a man.” I’m excited for that challenge and I want to say thank you so much for taking this journey with me and I’m excited for you to see what’s next. Thank you, God, for your grace and for never giving up on me.

Biebus Wept.

13. Bieber is entombed.

And given a monkey, which he will surely kill soon. RIP, little monkey.

Of course, Bieber’s career resurrection won’t be complete until he actually puts out another album. A “surprise” album. The only people who will be “surprised” by it, though, are those who don’t have a sense that this was all a real-time euthanizing of the “old” Bieber, so a new Bieber, a friendly and chill Bieber, could take his place.

Is Justin Bieber the person actually even remotely comparable to Jesus the person? Of course he is not. No reasonable person would think Justin Bieber is like Jesus, apart from their scant biographical similarities. Actual Jesus was not Canadian. Actual Jesus didn’t go drunkenly drag racing in Miami, as neither cars nor Miami existed during Bible times. Actual Jesus didn’t egg his neighbors’ house just for funsies; he overturned merchant’s tables in the temple for angry-sies. And actual Jesus never used the N-word. But, let’s assume for our purposes that Justin Bieber isn’t a reasonable person. Let's assume instead that he’s a desperate and craven person who is the gravy train for a lot of other people, and all of them are so desperate to save his career from his own immaturity that he consented to having his personality crucified by his heroes in front of everybody he loves, as a means to an end.

Somewhere, the Mel Gibson of Beliebers is writing a screenplay in Aramaic.

Top image by Jim Cooke, others via Getty.

The logo and the company name change, but business stays the same. The mercenary syndicate formerly known as Blackwater has raked in more than half a billion dollars from U.S. contracts to thoroughly fail at stemming the terrorist-supported trade in Afghan opium, according to a new government report.

That report, part of a larger investigation by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) on how the U.S spent an allocation of $66 billion in Afghanistan, notes that Academi—Blackwater's latest name, after a series of changes to rehabilitate its public image—has racked up hundreds of millions in taxpayer money to train, equip, and coordinate an Afghan counternarcotics force that's spun its wheels as the country's farmers continue to pump out more opium than any other nation on earth.

The watchdog news site District Sentinel offers additional detail and context on the sweetheart deal:

Between 2002 and 2013, Academi received $569 million from the Pentagon for counternarcotic operations—a sum that accounted for 32 percent of all money spent on contractors involved in drug interdiction.

Other major defense and security companies like Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin, and Raytheon also did counternarcotics work in Afghanistan but none won bids worth half the value of the contracts secured by Academi.

Despite the national security investments, Afghanistan is still the world's leading producer of opium. In a report released last December, SIGAR said that "Afghan farmers are growing more opium than ever before."

Here's SIGAR's rundown of who else profited from the failed drug war:

On the plus side, SIGAR did not report that Blackwater's contemporary soulless husk in Afghanistan shot and killed any civilians, bribed any local officials, billed any government agencies for hookers, or held any homoerotic orgies at its headquarters. It appears the new corporate entity has joined the pantheon of respectable, mature defense contractors who limit their crimes to being minimally ineffective for maximum profit.

[Photo credit: Getty Images]

Here in the liberal media, we all like to joke, in our little liberal elite cabal, about how dumb Republicans are. And Republicans sure are dumb! But are they dumber than Democrats?

The Republicans are a party that openly celebrated and promoted the leadership skills of George W. Bush. Republicans also make up the majority of fans of Tim McGraw. Republicans are, without a doubt, extremely dumb.

Democrats, we therefore assume (no doubt in part because we are thinking of ourselves), are a more urbane and sophisticated group of people, capable of effortlessly carrying out tasks like not forwarding crude racist email jokes to the entire office, or understanding that The Onion is a parody site. We are, we imagine, a little less fucking stupid than the other side.

Is our worldly and streetwise self-image justified? Or may there come a day when Democrats fall prey to the same sort of pitfalls that trip up Red Staters who we so often deride as morons?

@Gawker Jackass, really?

— Tory (@vpm) March 30, 2015

@Gawker calling our commander in chief a 'jackass' is super classy. Well done.

— penny (@penny) March 30, 2015

@Gawker Wow, pretty sure this makes Gawker the jackass. Your whole scene has gotten so tasteless.

— Duante's Pique (@jazzfan360) March 30, 2015

When u call the POTUS a jackass for clickbait I unfollow! Now that's disgusting! #gawker

— Deborah Summa (@dsumma) March 30, 2015

Jaw-droppingly disrespectful and idiotic post about President Obama by Gawker. #shameful #unfollow http://t.co/Mdmz9C0CId

— All Wonky (@allwonky) March 30, 2015

@Gawker Calling the President a Jackass for a little tumble? Really? 😠

— Shadow Sting (@MorgulBlade) March 30, 2015

@Gawker Crass disrespectful column proves Hamilton Nolan is a stupid jackass.

— Buki Williams (@BukiWilliams) March 30, 2015

@Gawker Calling our president a jackass? Just because he tripped? Disrespectful and rude. 👎

— mnycg (@mnycg) March 31, 2015

Your intention is showing, and it's ugly. “@Gawker: Jackass Obama damn near busts his ass. http://t.co/EDjfGfUD5j”

— Pauretajt (@Troubledogrescu) March 30, 2015

From Facebook:

"I am not a fan of this POTUS based on his policies and his lack of leadership skills (strictly my opinion) but calling the President of the United States as jackass is disrespectful. And no, I did not read the article. I did not have to after the tag line."

"Are people so desperate that they have to use a slip as an excuse to go on a rant? There are plenty of substantive things about the man to criticize without scraping this low. Give me a break!"

"So, I suppose the author of this rather flagrantly opinionated and crass article has never lost footing? They have with me- unfollowing. Why don't you go make fun of crippled people or something with that adolescent condescension."

"Regardless of how anyone might feel about the President or his policies...he is still our President...and deserves our respect. This is garbage reporting."

"Did he just really write a full article about the president almost falling down the stairs? Not to mention with overtones of disrespect."

"I have yet to see in an article where they called George bush a dumb ass! Smh! Double standard as always."

"Oh, good grief, you right-wing jerks need to find something substantive to talk about. BTW, if you've ever walked down a set of stairs vs. one of those portable, enclosed ramps, you know very well that those steps can be a bit tricky. You nut jobs on the right are hopeless."

"I love when the shared from this site come through. It reminds me of the kids in college you knew weren't going to do anything meaningful with their lives- like the ones who grew up to drive celebrities over the edge or run princesses off the road. Or better yet- show disrespect for their country because they think it's cool. That's the real funny part of their articles- how dumb they are."

From Email

Subj: Really disgusting article on President Obama

WTF kind of article is this Tea Party Presidential bummer love ? ? stupid article Hamilton Nolan

Subj: [No Subject]

I'd like to say, I've never heard such a lack of respect for our president! I see you are one of the many ignorant, disrespectful America's that has a problem with COLOR.....let's be HONEST, if it w were George "Fuck boy" Bush, would you have called him a "jackass"? Or, Bill "Fuck anything that moves" Clinton? I think not, we work hard to keep this country together, just like any other white American! I not prejudice, never been! But, have to call it OUT, when I see fit. You say your an American, then act like one. Show respect for our Commander in Chief, he's worked hard to accomplish things, That's most online dream of! Probably, including yourself, wonder would you have called him that to his face?"

Subj: Obama fall on stairs- you're story is ridiculous

Can't believe you compare someone tripping to their ability to do their job. You're an idiot.

Subj: Obama article

Mr. Hamilton,

The complete and utter disrespect you have for our president astounds me. PEOPLE TRIP! And you have the audacity to claim the president is an unfit imbecile for slipping on the steps on an airplane? Does the fact that he has normal humanizing tendencies diminish his role as the leader of our nation? Is he not supposed to have the same movements and motions that we lesser humans possess? The fact that you are a "journalist" who writes such utter and complete drivel makes absolutely no sense to either me, or the myriad of commentors on the article you posted. The immediate negative feedback your article has received should be a wake up call that not everything is funny, that sometimes you can cross a line, and that line is disrespecting the president of the United States for slipping on stairs, like LITERALLY EVERYONE ELSE DOES EVERY DAY! What you wrote is not journalism, it is not news, it is not worth calling yourself a write for. You can go tell your supervisors that many of your readers have had enough of the things you people post on a daily basis, for it has lessened in humor and reached further than borderline offensive, and many of your readers (you can just look in the facebook comment section of that pathetic excuse you call an article) have resolved to unfollow your "news" page based solely on this article. Tell your supervisors you are responsible for the loss of readers. Thank you and goodbye.

Subj: Go fuck your self & burn in Hell! You piece of Sorry excuse for a racist human being!

You keep my presidents name out your mouth... Before you utter any anything think about your dumb as life!

Foolish fuck!

Subj: Fucking fart!

You Sorry piece of excuse for a racist human being!

While Republicans are too dumb to understand the intricacies of journalistic bias, Democrats do something about it. Our partisan pride is safe for now :).

[Photo of jackass via]

Over the last week we've been writing about a series of deeply suspicious emails sent by former journalist and Clinton family adviser-fixer-creep Sidney Blumenthal. Blumenthal is well-known in political and media circles—but despite his apparent power, he's unknown outside of D.C. and New York. Let's get to know Hillary's private email spook, and his shadowy under-the-table intelligence operations.

Meet Sidney Blumenthal

Washington, in addition being a deeply uncool fortress of dullards and flatterers, is also a black hole of back-biting, betrayal, and seething hate. Even by these high standards Sidney Blumenthal is a widely disliked individual. But he's legendary as an adviser, fixer, snooper, and muckraker, and diehard Clinton family ally, a post that he doesn't seem to have ever mentally resigned from—despite having left the administration fourteen years ago.

Through the 1980s Blumenthal worked as a journalist and commentator, covering politics for The New Republic, New Yorker, Vanity Fair, and others. His close rapport with the Clintons, begun while Bill campaigned in the New Hampshire primary in 1992, helped earn him a place as the New Yorker's Washington correspondent under the first Clinton administration—Andrew Sullivan once called him "the most pro-Clinton writer on the planet," which probably made Blumenthal blush—and then, in 1997, as a senior adviser to the president.

Blumenthal was, as White House advisers are, deeply loyal and incredibly cutthroat (his knack for toxic smearing, more than anything else, earned him a permanent place in the Clinton lore). He also had a a rolodex that included many of the most notable political writers of the time. And he used it.

Sid Blumenthal helped destroy Monica Lewinsky's reputation...

In 1998, before the Lewinsky Affair had full frothed over, Blumenthal allegedly started painting young intern Monica Lewinksy not as a victim of a philandering president, but as a sex-crazed psycho antagonist of a teen horror movie. Christopher Hitchens signed an affidavit swearing that Blumenthal was running his mouth about Lewinsky in private—contrary to what he'd told a Senate committee under oath:

"During lunch on March 19, 1998, in the presence of myself and Carol Blue, Mr. Blumenthal stated that, Monica Lewinsky had been a 'stalker' and that the President was 'the victim' of a predatory and unstable sexually demanding young woman. Referring to Ms. Lewinsky, Mr. Blumenthal used the word 'stalker' several times. Mr. Blumenthal advised us that this version of the facts was not generally understood."

Hitchens added that he had "knowledge that Mr. Blumenthal recounted to other people in the journalistic community the same story about Monica Lewinsky that he told me and Carol Blue." The revelation ended the longtime family friendship between Hitchens and the Blumenthals, and forced Washington media insiders to choose their loyalty between two unpleasant men.

...and tried to do the same to Barack Obama...

Despite his longtime allegiance to a Democratic political dynasty, Blumenthal participated in the the right-wing defamation spree that that preceded Obama's 2008 election victory. A Huffington Post article from that year alleged that Blumenthal was circulating anti-Obama articles—regardless of how batshit they were—to a private mailing list of his many close personal journalist friends:

Almost every day over the past six months, I have been the recipient of an email that attacks Obama's character, political views, electability, and real or manufactured associations. The original source of many of these hit pieces are virulent and sometimes extreme right-wing websites, bloggers, and publications. But they aren't being emailed out from some fringe right-wing group that somehow managed to get my email address. Instead, it is Sidney Blumenthal who, on a regular basis, methodically dispatches these email mudballs to an influential list of opinion shapers — including journalists, former Clinton administration officials, academics, policy entrepreneurs, and think tankers — in what is an obvious attempt to create an echo chamber that reverberates among talk shows, columnists, and Democratic Party funders and activists.

Blumenthal, a former journalist himself, had both the contacts and story sense to spread any pernicious anecdote he chose. Among the narratives that Blumenthal helped ferry from the political fringe to GOP mainstream were Obama's relationships with Bill Ayers and Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

...which came back to bite him.

After Obama foiled character assassins like Blumenthal and won the White House, Sid was eager to take a job with the man he'd just tried to ruin. It didn't work out, as detailed in a long account at Politico:

No Clinton insider was more reviled in the West Wing than Blumenthal, who goaded reporters to pursue the most salacious rumors about Obama during the 2008 campaign, according to four reporters interviewed for this article. In 2009, when Clinton's people floated the idea of Blumenthal joining the State Department as a kitchen cabinet adviser, Obama press secretary Robert Gibbs told White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, "Hell, no. If she hires him, I'm out of here," according to a person with knowledge of the exchange. "Me, too," added David Axelrod, Obama's top messaging adviser. Emanuel was tasked with delivering the no-go news to Clinton.

Since the end of Clinton's campaign in 2007, it's unclear what exactly he's done to pay the bills. He's written some books, done some vague consulting and punditry work, and described himself as an adviser to the sprawling Clinton Foundation. He doesn't, though, seem to have a full time job.

But he does have a lot of very important friends.

A look through Blumenthal's AOL account, broken into by the Romanian hacker Guccifer and distributed in 2013, shows what spending years as a political insider will get you: friendships with a bunch of other eerily ambitious people.

Here's infamous Clinton family friend and worshipper Cody Shearer sending him classified documents over email:

Here he is whining about Obama with Reuters columnist and pundit Nicholas Wapshott:

And here he is asking Tina Brown for horny General David Petraeus' email address (she gives it to him, of course—but says "u must never say came from me"):

Blumenthal is a gifted schemer, with enough influential buddies to make him smart in the way a person sneaking looks at their smartphone during trivia night is very smart.

He's used these connections a lot over the years.

Leaked emails poached in 2013 by the Romanian hacker Guccifer show that Blumenthal didn't let the fact that he was despised by the Obama camp prevent him from indirectly working for Obama. His outbox is filled with meticulously formatted diplomatic intelligence memos to Hillary Clinton, using her private email address that remained a secret years after her tenure as Secretary of State.

We don't know the full extent of Blumenthal's backdoor influence with Clinton, or the extent to which she ever paid attention to his AOL.com diplomatic cables. But this wasn't just some try-hard with an erection for Tom Clancy novels—Blumenthal not only had access to Clinton's secret email address, but to a network of very plugged-in friends.

There's nothing necessarily wrong with being an ambitious sycophant with a contact list filled with important people—this is the tax base of our nation's capital. But Blumenthal isn't just a well-connected family friend: Guccifer showed the world an outbox brimming with attempts to influence the State Department, based on God knows what and for God knows what reasons. Recent revelations about Hillary Clinton's efforts to keep her emails out away from federal transparency laws only make the whole arrangement more opaque—we might never know what relevant emails she chose to delete. We can only expect so much integrity from our national security apparatus, but we should at least hope our presidential cabinet members aren't getting advice from a guy who still uses AOL.

Again, there's no proof Clinton used anything Blumenthal handed her, but he handed quite a bit.

We've found evidence of Blumenthal discussing foreign intelligence with John Kornblum, a 25-year veteran of the State Department, as well as Tyler Drumheller, who ran CIA operations across Europe.

It was this network that provided the basis for Blumenthal's memos to Clinton.

We've learned Blumenthal attempted to lobby Clinton on behalf of Bidzina Ivanishvili, a friend of Vladimir Putin who became the prime minister of Georgia.

We've found evidence of Drumheller et al. planning some sort of four-man mission to Tunisia, most likely to cross the border into Libya.

We've found evidence of Blumenthal's connection with multiple private sector defense and intelligence contractors, with plans for operations inside Libya.

We know a lot about Sid Blumenthal, but there's still a lot we wish we knew. But because this was all conducted in the dark on private email servers, away from the prying eyes of federal transparency laws, we don't yet know is why a Clinton cheerleader would be running a secretive international intelligence-gathering operations, or who paid for it. None of If you could help fill us in, we'd love to learn more about Blumenthal from you.

Photo via Flickr

Contact the author at biddle@gawker.com.
Public PGP key
PGP fingerprint: E93A 40D1 FA38 4B2B 1477 C855 3DEA F030 F340 E2C7

The campaign to humanize Justin Bieber continues. Is it going well? Not exactly. I guess it depends on how you feel about Justin Bieber already, but to be honest, sometimes it's hard to figure out what he's even talking about. Examine:

In a new interview with USA Today, the little baby shitstain says that you can tell he has changed as a person because his eyes are somehow different now:

Well, my eyes. You know how you can tell a person by their eyes, their intentions and where they're at? Well, my eyes changed, they got softer and brighter. They're open. I have more of a grasp of who I am at this point.

They look pretty much the same to me, Bieber. Your move.

Contact the author at dayna.evans@gawker.com.

In addition to designing jewelry, writing her forthcoming self-help book Balancing on Heels, and promoting a "natural" lifestyle by declining to vaccinate her children, Kristin Cavallari is—according to Kristin—active in her husband Jay Cutler's charitable foundation. She revealed this Kristin fact in an interview with Michigan Avenue magazine last year.

During the interview, Michigan Avenue asked Kristin about her work with charities. Kristin responded,

For a few years I was bouncing around doing a lot of stuff, and luckily I've never been personally affected by a major disease. Then I met Jay, who has Type 1 diabetes, so I decided to put all of my focus into the Jay Cutler Foundation, which he founded to help kids with the disease.

Luckily!

This has been 500 Days of Kristin.

[Photo via Getty]

A Turkish prosecutor and the two gunmen holding him hostage were killed today after police stormed a courthouse in Istanbul. Prosecutor Mehmet Selim Kiraz was shot three times in the head and twice in the body, according to Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.

Six hours earlier, gunmen from Marxist group Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front, or DHKP-C, took Kiraz hostage, apparently because he'd led an investigation into the death of Berkin Elvan, a 14-year-old boy who fell into a coma and died nine months after being struck with a tear gas canister during an anti-government protest last March. The DHKP-C reportedly demanded that the police officers involved in Elvan's death be tried in the "people's court" and that all charges be dropped against members who attended the protests.

Elvan's family distanced themselves from the group in a message released earlier today. From Reuters:

In a brief video message on a widely followed Twitter account describing itself as that of Elvan's family, the boy's father had seemed to call on the group not to harm Kiraz.

"We want justice. We don't want anyone to shed even a drop of blood. We don't want other mothers to cry," Sami Elvan said.

Police chief Selami Altunok told Reuters that authorities worked to establish communication with the DHKP-C members but decided to storm the courthouse after shots were heard from inside the building.

"Our forces have worked with patience and endurance for six hours and took all necessary security measures," he said. "We cannot underestimate the seriousness of this incident."

On the one hand, Kinfolk is a lifestyle magazine founded by a small circle of friends that is designed to help you live your best life, full of warm pie and soft colors. On the other hand, Kinfolk is a constipated manual for minimalist try-hards and mushroom foragers, full of photographs of obsessively staged gatherings and didactic articles on "simple living."

Founded at Brigham Young University by Nathan Williams and a small circle of friends in 2011, it soon took up its headquarters in Portland, Oregon. The magazine is like a caricature of Portland itself, full of reclaimed wood, wildflowers, and twine. It uses the tagline "a guide for small gatherings," praises slowness, and provides tips on being neighborly. This is also a lifestyle that's extremely photogenic, as suggested by its strong presence on Instagram.

I started the The Kinspiracy tumblr after I noticed a pattern emerging from dozens of Instagram users—my own personal Beautiful Mind moment. It was suddenly so clear: Every account cultivating that Kinfolk look seemed to follow a specific formula. Every account had a photo (or several) of the following: A latte with a foam leaf design, a fresh piece or two of citrus, a glimpse of a pair of small feet—often in a well-worn pair of boots—an ice cream cone, weather permitting, some glasses here and there, twine, the occasional fixed-gear bike. And always, in every damn account, Kinfolk.

The Kinspiracy catalogs the brown shoes, piles of wood, American flags, twine scissors, and Wes Anderson-like lined up objects arranged just so. I collect four photos from the same account to create what is basically the same thing over and over again.

Kinfolk, foam leaf lattes, glasses, citrus.

Instagram: maryhoagland

Kinfolk, boots, foam leaf latte, glasses.

Instagram: beauxmondes

Kinfolk, foam leaf latte, glasses, citrus.

Instagram: upthewoodenhills

Kinfolk, bicycle, foam leaf latte, glasses.

Instagram: savannahwilliams

Kinfolk, foam leaf latte, ice cream cone, glasses.

Instagram: sabribeny

Kinfolk, foam leaf latte, glasses, citrus.

Instagram: nuanceandbubbles

Kinfolk, boots, ice cream cone, twine package.

Instagram: alena_myrr

Kinfolk, foam leaf latte, ice cream cone, bicycle.

Instagram: m_dunc

Glasses and Kinfolk, boots, foam leaf latte, miscellany.

Instagram: felixpraditpta

Kinfolk, foam leaf latte, ice cream cone, citrus.

Instagram: alinakolot

Once you see the hundreds of photos of the same things using the same VSCO filters with the same types of captions: "Inspiration," "Perfection," "Mindfulness," the effect is fucking eerie. It is one big circle-jerk with Kinfolk magazine in the middle. They praise each other's uniqueness, repeat it themselves, and wait to be praised in turn. And with somewhere around 10K followers apiece on Instagram, there's no shortage of praise and encouragement. It's a cult.

I hope Jesus was on #TeamFollowBack.

It looks like nature is finally catching up with the calendar, as the southern and central portions of the United States are facing a risk for severe thunderstorms every day through Friday. Unfortunately for residents and vehicles alike, April promises to be more active than this underwhelming March.

Looking Back at March

March is usually the time of the year when severe weather picks up in earnest across the United States, as warm, unstable air filters in from the Gulf of Mexico and cool air leftover from the winter stays strong in the upper-levels of the atmosphere. This kind of an environment is ripe for instability, allowing explosive thunderstorms to develop and produce damaging winds, large hail, and tornadoes.

Up until last week, we hadn't really seen the ingredients for severe thunderstorms come together in any meaningful way. The record lull in severe weather was bound to break at some point, but unless there's a string of major severe weather outbreaks this year (which is always possible), the number of severe weather reports through this point in the year is the lowest we've seen in a long time.

Through Monday, we've only seen 37 (preliminary) reports of tornadoes, compared to the 10-year average of 222 through the same date.

We've only seen 194 reports of large hail through March 30, which is just 31.5% of the 10-year average.

Even more astounding is the fact that we've only seen 17% of the damaging wind reports that we typically see up to this point in the year.

Of course, that's not at all a bad thing. As I said a few weeks ago, the atmosphere doesn't build up potential energy like stress along a fault line; this lull in severe weather isn't going to cause the atmosphere to store energy and explode in some freakish, apocalyptic nightmare scenario. However, it doesn't mean that you should let your guard down. Last year got off to a quiet start, too, and 35 people died in an ugly tornado outbreak that occurred at the end of April.

Let's take a look at what you can expect this week.

Tuesday

The Storm Prediction Center has a pretty thick swath of the south painted under a slight risk for severe weather this afternoon, which is a two on a scale from zero to five. The predominant risks this afternoon are damaging winds and large hail (some larger than golf balls, as we've already seen), but a tornado or two can't be ruled out, especially towards Oklahoma and Texas.

Severe thunderstorms are firing up across the southern United States this evening, with severe thunderstorm watches (shaded in blue) in effect from Oklahoma to Georgia through the early nighttime hours. More watches are possible as unstable air spews forth and births vigorous convection. The above image is valid as of 4:30 PM CDT—check the Storm Prediction Center for the latest watches.

The storms are nasty hail producers—around 2:30 PM CDT, the National Weather Service received several reports of hail the size of baseballs (2.75 inches in diameter) in a nasty supercell in southeastern Arkansas. A three-dimensional radar image of the supercell that produced the baseball-size hail is visible in the image at the top of this post.

Wednesday

A strengthening low pressure system will briefly dip down into the Dakotas during the day on Wednesday, allowing warm, moist air to flow across the plains from the south ahead of a cold front approaching from the west. The Storm Prediction Center expects severe thunderstorms to develop in the warm sector ahead of and along the cold front as it swings through the area on Wednesday afternoon. Discrete storms will carry the risk for large hail, and the threat will transition to damaging winds once the storms start to form into one or more squall lines.

Thursday

Second verse, same as the first. Thursday's severe weather will be similar to what's possible on Wednesday, with storms developing along the cold front as it stretches from the Great Lakes through northeastern Texas. Large hail and damaging winds are the main threats, with severe weather slightly more likely across areas that were battered by thunderstorms last week.

Friday

The golden egg of doom (a 15% risk for severe weather) threatens the western half of Dixie Alley on Friday. Provided there's enough instability and wind shear, the threat on Friday should be the same as it is/was on Wednesday and Thursday.

Ho-hum

Once the novelty of seeing severe weather on a regular basis again wears off, you'll quickly come to see that low-end threats like this are tedious to cover (and read about!) since the threat is the same day in and day out—large hail, damaging winds, maybe a tornado or two. This will probably be the last time that I cover low-end threats in-depth like this unless there's a noteworthy threat, like hail the size of golf balls in Atlanta or New York City.

Even a regular ol' severe thunderstorm warning is nothing to sneeze at, as even a modest hailstone can inflict serious injury if it hits you or busts through your windows at home or in your car. Similarly, damaging winds are called "damaging" for a reason—it doesn't take much to down trees and power lines, and stronger winds can cause structural damage and launch loose objects (like branches or lawn gnomes) with little effort.

Even though it can get pretty routine, this is the time of the year where you should always pay attention to the risk for severe weather and listen for watches and warnings in your area.

[Images: Gibson Ridge, SPC, GREarth, author]

You can follow the author on Twitter or send him an email.

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A Pennsylvania man who basically died at the hands of his dead mother-in-law Monday will reportedly be laid to rest this week "right in front" of the spot where she killed him.

Ed Kublius, a caretaker at the St. Joseph's Cemetery, tells WNEP 74-year-old Stephen Woytack and his wife, Lucy, liked to visit the cemetery every Easter to pay their respects. Kublius was working nearby Monday when Woytack—tending to his mother-in-law's gravesite—got trapped underneath her gravestone. Via the Times-Tribune:

Stephen and Lucy Woytack were attaching a religious ornament to the stone when it toppled, pinning Mr. Woytack underneath, according to Lackawanna County Coroner Tim Rowland. The warmer weather "made the terrain, monument and its base unstable," Mr. Rowland said in an emailed press release Monday. The coroner listed the manner of death as accidental.

For years, cemetery caretaker Ed Kubilus saw the Woytacks when they visited the gravesite, and he said he knew Mr. Woytack well. After the stone fell on her husband, Mrs. Woytack found Mr. Kubilus on the other side of the cemetery. He called police and rushed to the gravesite, where he tried to lift the 300- to 400-pound granite block, but couldn't. Police arrived a few minutes later, but by then it was too late, he said.

Kublius told the Times-Tribune shifting gravestones can be an issue in the spring when the ground begins to thaw out.

"It's just a freak thing that happened," he told the paper. "It's heartbreaking."

Look at this creepy lamb reportedly born in a village in Dagestan earlier this month. Described by some as the "anti-Christ" and others as an "old man," the deformed baby sheep has terrified everyone who's laid eyes on it.

According to Yahoo News, farmer Blasius Lavrentiev told he "nearly died" after seeing the critter's awful little face.

"We had quite a tough winter but when I noticed she was pregnant I was delighted as it meant I would be able to sell the lambs and start making some money again," he reportedly said. "But when I went down to see how it was going I nearly died."

Another villager described the lamb as "both freaky and sweet."

"I don't know what to make of it really - but she terrifies my grandchildren," Dana Mishina said. "It will be interesting to see what she looks like when she gets older."

Contact the author at taylor@gawker.com.

Law enforcement officers have reportedly detained the former girlfriend of Andrew Rork Getty, an heir to the Getty Oil fortune who was discovered dead Tuesday "under suspicious circumstances" apparently involving a serious rectal injury.

Getty, the grandson of oil scion J Paul Getty, was in his late 40s.

It's still unclear what happened—Getty's ex-girlfriend, who called 911, apparently told the operator he had suffered a cardiac arrest, and TMZ's initial report contained a now-excised reference to a gunshot wound to the face. Now, in an updated post, TMZ reports Getty's death involved a "traumatic injury to the rectal area" with "significant bleeding."

It also wasn't the first time cops had responded to the address—the LA Times reports Getty sought the restraining order against her as recently as two weeks ago. And, via TMZ:

Our sources say Andrew and his ex-girlfriend have a storied history with the LAPD. Cops have been to his residence 31 times, mostly for domestic disturbances. Our sources say they have both frequently been under the influence of drugs during the police visits.

We're told the drugs cops found in the past were prescriptions.

As for their relationship, we're told he has a restraining order against her and she has been placed under a 5150 psychiatric hold in the past, after injuring cops when they responded to the house. We're also told she's allegedly broken into Andrew's house on numerous occasions.

[image via AP]

Contact the author of this post at gabrielle@gawker.com

On Tuesday, the Arkansas legislature passed a near-copy of Indiana's widely criticized "religious freedom" bill—believed by many to allow discrimination against gays and lesbians—drawing staunch criticism from an unexpected source: Walmart.

"Today's passage of [the Religious Freedom Restoration Act] threatens to undermine the spirit of inclusion present throughout the state of Arkansas and does not reflect the values we proudly uphold" wrote CEO Doug McMillon via a corporate Twitter account, apparently without irony. "For these reasons, we are asking Governor Hutchinson to veto this legislation."

Our statement on Arkansas #HB1228 pic.twitter.com/KFPd91ejdo

— Walmart Newsroom (@WalmartNewsroom) March 31, 2015

With this statement, the Arkansas-based retail giant joins a surprising alliance of organizations, including NASCAR and the NCAA, that recognize the (business-killing) odiousness of such laws and have stepped forward to denounce them.

Predictably, some customers did not appreciate the company's sudden attack of conscience:

@WalmartNewsroom Wal-Mart OPPOSES religious freedom. Good to know. #BoycottWalmart

— Aaron Henager (@AaronHenager1) March 31, 2015

When did @WalmartNewsroom become hostile to religious ppl & religious liberty! Trying to kiss the ass of ppl who normally hate you? #RFRA

— JoeC (@JoeC1776) April 1, 2015

Others, however, took a more nuanced view:

You know you're a dick when Walmart speaks out against you. RT @WalmartNewsroom: Our statement on Arkansas #HB1228 pic.twitter.com/Og76iLlwCY

— justin kanew (@justin_kanew) March 31, 2015

[Image via AP Images//h/t Huffington Post]

At a press conference today, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced that he will not sign the anti-gay religious liberty bill passed by state legislature on Tuesday. Instead, Hutchinson—whose own son signed a petition against the act—asked lawmakers to recall the bill and alter it to make it more similar to a federal one passed in 1993.

"This is a bill that in ordinary times would not be controversial," he said, according to the New York Times. "But these are not ordinary times."

The bill has been compared to the Religious Freedom Restoration Act passed last week in Indiana, which effectively gives corporations the right to discriminate against LGBT people.

Hutchinson, who had previously expressed support for the bill, also said he may issue an executive order that would make Arkansas "a place of tolerance."

One reason for Hutchinson's change of heart, aside from his son's objection? Walmart, which is headquartered in Arkansas and is one of the states' largest employers, publicly objected to the bill on Tuesday.

Our statement on Arkansas #HB1228 pic.twitter.com/KFPd91ejdo

— Walmart Newsroom (@WalmartNewsroom) March 31, 2015

[Image via AP]