Pre-Order: Little Boy Lost (An Alex Taylor Novel) on Amazon.

You can now pre-order the latest Alex Taylor novel: Little Boy Lost at Amazon beginning today. The book will download to your kindle on November 25th, just in time for the Thanksgiving weekend.

Little Boy Lost is the follow-up to Small Town Secrets. It is the 2nd book in the Alex Taylor series. If you are interested in which order to read them, check out my Books page for the listing.

Little Boy Lost marks the first time my wife, Nancy, and I have worked on the actual story line together. If it were not for her I do not think the story would have evolved in the way it did. She brought an element that dovetailed nicely with the characters.

In honor of that wonderful collaboration, you will see her name listed as my co-author on this book. I look forward to working with her again on upcoming novels.

Cover Reveal - Little Boy Lost (An Alex Taylor Novel)

I know that a lot of you have been asking when my next book would be coming out and I am happy to announce that your wait is nearly over.

This is the sequel to Small Town Secrets, which was the first book in the Alex Taylor series. If you are going chronologically, it is book number five in the overall series.

As most of you already know, while the story-line is a stand-alone, characters and events will cross over into the James Maguire series as well.

This novel, which takes place after the events in Bishop's Gate, involve Alex's investigation into the disappearance of a young boy during the Penobscot Founder's Day celebration.

We just finished the final editing on the book and it will be released on November 25th, just in time for Thanksgiving. There will be a pre-order available for this book, which should be in place sometime tomorrow.

San Francisco County Sheriff Defends Release of Illegal Immigrant

San Francisco County Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi defended his department’s release of the suspect in the shooting death of Katie Steinle. The suspect, Francisco Sanchez, an illegal immigrant with an extensive criminal history, and who had already been deported five times, was released, from the San Francisco County jail, after local authorities there declined to prosecute on a drug related charge.

                     

Sheriff Mirkarimi contends that if the feds wanted San Francisco to ‘hold’ Sanchez, then they should have issued a warrant or a court order. Since SanFrancisco is a Sanctuary City, they simply opened the door and let Sanchez walk away.

Pardon me if I take exception to Sheriff Mirkarimi’s statement. During the course of my twenty-two year law enforcement career I ran a county jail. We routinely housed federal inmates, including those that were released to us for the purpose of dealing with local charges. This is exactly the situation that existed in San Francisco.

Sanchez was picked up by federal authorities after he had completed a prison sentence. Since he had an outstanding charge in San Francisco, that charge needed to be addressed before they could process Sanchez for deportation on the federal immigration charge.

Federal inmates, which Sanchez was, are remanded to local authorities with what is called a detainer. Basically it directs the local agency to notify the feds when the local charges have been addressed, either by release or incarceration. In the case of release, the feds come and pick-up the prisoner. In the case of incarceration, they update their records and notify the correctional facility, where the prisoner is remanded to, that they have a federal hold in place and issue another detainer to the facility.

For Sheriff Mirkarimi to say that federal authorities should somehow have done more, belies the simple fact that he did nothing. The optics on this are horrible and he knows it. He is trying to deflect the blame instead of recognizing that San Francisco’s failed sanctuary city policies cost the life of another innocent young person.

Most career law enforcement officers will tell you that they often feel constrained by the politics that seems to pervade local law enforcement policies, but Mirkarimi is not a career law enforcement officer. He is an elected official whose law enforcement career didn’t begin until 2011, when he was elected as sheriff. Prior to that, he was a member of the San Francisco County Board, the same folks who are responsible for the whole Sanctuary City debacle. A policy he vigorously defends, despite being at odds with the members of his own department.

He is no stranger to controversy. In 2012, just after his election, he was suspended from office after being charged with domestic violence battery, child endangerment and dissuading a witness, in connection with an altercation with his wife. He pled guilty to one misdemeanor count of false imprisonment and was sentenced to three years of probation and had to stay away from his wife for seven months. He was reinstated seven months later, after the Board of Supervisors failed to get enough votes to remove him from office.

He has also had to deal with internal issues as well. In March, Mirkarimi issued a directive stating that only he could turn them over to ICE. This was brought about because his deputies, who opposed the policy, were reportedly secretly helping federal authorities get illegal immigrants off the streets.

Under the circumstances, I can understand why he would want to pawn off the blame to someone else.

This is another example of what happens when the rule of law becomes subverted; abused and twisted to comply with the rule of man, or, as it is in this case, the Board of Supervisors.

Mirkarimi, as well as the Board of Supervisors, is trying to push the blame for the tragic death of Katie Steinle to the feds, but it is a responsibility that lies squarely on their doorstep. It was their policy that allowed this to happen and they need to be held responsible.

No Guns Allowed - What are you thinking ?

I think I woke up on the silly side of stupid and entered the Utopian world of No Guns Allowed.

Have you seen these little signs that have popped up all over? They are quite adorable, if you believe in that sort of nonsense. I guess that I am just a cynic.

Over the course of a day I encountered these little gremlins in a series of different places: a hospital, DMV, the bank, and a pizza shop. You see them popping up at malls, schools, movie theaters, hotels. Heck, even private citizens are putting them up outside their homes. Not the brightest of ideas, but hey, to each his own. I did get a pretty good chuckle out of the fact that the Mall of America in Minnesota has ‘no gun’ signs up.

I wonder, in light of the recent threat to the mall, made by the terrorist group Al Shabaab, if the State Department should notify them that they will have to select a different target? Maybe Jen Psaki can send them a tweet. #PickAnotherMall

In the end, I finally threw my hands up in disgust and made a beeline straight to my sanctuary, far away from the lunacy that seems to grip society today. In fact, the grip seems to be more like a full-on death throttle, threatening to kill off any sort of resistance to their peace, love and harmony position.

It’s kind of ironic, isn’t it? 

Reminds me of those warm and cuddly folks over in the Middle East and their mantra: Convert, or Die.

Now before you start screaming about how you are just trying to protect innocent people, let me stop you. First, if that’s the best you can do, you need to go back to whatever school of higher learning you attended and demand a refund of your parent’s money. That’s just stupid, right out of the gate. Unlike you I have real world experience, earned during a twenty-two year career in law enforcement.

You’re not protecting people; you’re promoting your agenda. Let’s be honest, you don’t like guns, plain and simple. You think they are barbaric instruments that have no place in a civil society. The problem is that you place responsibility on the wrong thing. You believe that the tool is the problem, instead of looking at the person wielding it. You don’t have an answer for that, so you shift the focus away to something you can vilify.

During the course of my career, I encountered a number of people that were truly evil, and many more, who I would describe as ambitiously evil, those who had no qualms about using violence to further their criminal activities. These people were not encumbered by such niceties as obeying the law, respect for individual rights and properties. No, they believed that their particular needs, real or imagined, provided them the right to take from others. They did it with whatever tool was available at the time, whether it was a gun, knife, hammer, or physical force.

This is not a new trend, in fact it dates back to the earliest days of man, when Cain set upon his brother, Abel, and killed him out of jealousy and anger. I don’t recall any firearms being around at that time, and I don’t believe there was a big outcry of ‘No Stones.’

In the end, the actual culprit was not the weapon, but the person wielding it. The same is true today.

However, just like in the biblical days, man doesn’t seem to have an answer for man’s inhumanity to man. Not that we haven’t tried, ad nauseum, in terms of correctional rehabilitation, psychiatric care, and at-risk outreach programs. Yet the fundamental issue is that some people just don’t get along well with others. I’ve seen this many times over, and yet civil society has no answer. We believe that a term of imprisonment is sufficient to ‘correct’ a person’s behavior, but what about the person who likes his behavior and doesn’t want to change? To them, jail or a psychiatric facility is simply an imposed time-out, a place to wait until they can be unleashed on society again.

Do you think these folks worry about your silly little signs?

Do you think someone intent on robbing a bank; is going to simply walk away, his crime spree ground to a halt, because of a ‘no gun’ sign?

Do I need to answer that? Seriously?

The simple fact, based on my real world experience, and not some hippie-happy utopian fairytale is that criminals are not hampered by such niceties as the law. The politicians know this, the courts know this, and, honestly, so do you.

But you are not really interested in that, are you?

No, the truth is that you don’t like guns. You want them banished because they offend your sensibilities. They force you to recognize that there is evil in the world. An evil you pretend does not exist and one that I dealt with on a daily basis for twenty-two years. You believe that, because some professor taught you that guns were bad, grotesque, things that had no place in civil society. The same professors who taught you that prisons are inhumane and that those who are incarcerated are good people who were made into criminals, because of the socio-economic pressures that were imposed on them by a privileged society.

Yes, there are some that become criminals by virtue of necessity, but it has been my experience that those folks rarely use a weapon to further their crime. No mom is pulling out an MP-5 to heist a gallon of milk and a loaf of bread. No, it is the ones who have embraced the violent criminal lifestyle that use a weapon and they are not impeded by laws. If they were, we’d have no crime.

No, the sad truth is that these signs are hung up by idiots, who believe that this small placard will protect them from the wolves of society. That somehow this little plastic shield will keep them from harm. Jeez, why didn’t we think of this hundreds of years ago? Think of all the wars we could have prevented, just by hanging one of these signs at the border crossing. I’m sure Hitler would have turned away at the Polish border if there was a ‘No Invasion’ sign. In fact, why didn’t Wyatt Earp think about that? He could have just hung a sign saying no guns in Tombstone and could have avoided the whole O.K. Corral fiasco…… oh wait, he did. Guns were outlawed in Tombstone in 1878, three years before the gunfight. Yeah, I guess that worked out well.

Here’s the thing, I won’t sacrifice my freedom and safety, because you’re not comfy with my gun. The fact that you will never know that I have one, unless I have to defend myself or you, means nothing. Your signs indicate to me that you do not value me as a customer, just my money. So I will not give you either. I think of it as doing you a favor. The less money you have, the less you have to lose when the armed criminal comes in and rips you off.

I pray that nothing befalls you. Unlike the criminal, I believe in and respect laws. I wish that we lived in a peaceful world where there was no need for guns, the police or laws. I wish we were more civil with one another, but we aren’t.

And therein lies the rub: Society has no answer for the criminal element.

Politicians make more laws, that criminals will not follow, and businesses put up signs, that criminals will not follow.

When the folly of these things becomes known, then the next step is to ban firearms from legal owners.

In 2008, during a campaign event in Lebanon, Virginia, then Sen. Barrack Obama said:  "I believe in the Second Amendment. I believe in people's lawful right to bear arms. I will not take your shotgun away. I will not take your rifle away. I won't take your handgun away.”

On February 13th, during another infamous late Friday information dump, the ATF revealed that it is proposing to put the ban on 5.56 mm ammo on a fast track. The reason for this, the ATF contends, is that the ammo can be used in semi-automatic handguns and that they pose a threat to police. So the agency now proposes to reclassify it as armor-piercing and not exempt, meaning that they will be banned from production, sale and use. This would then be signed into effect through a presidential executive order. I guess he was right; he doesn't want to take away your rifle, just the ammunition for it.

You would think that I, a veteran member of law enforcement, would be behind such a well-intentioned rule. But I see past the line of drivel they are spewing.  This is simply a ruse. One of those ‘surely you’re not opposed to common sense laws, designed to protect our law enforcement officers, are you?’ charades.

The ATF has not even alleged, much less offered evidence,  that even one such round has ever been fired from a handgun at a police officer, despite the fact that there are millions upon millions of rounds that have been sold and used in the U.S.

So why are they doing this?

It’s like the ‘no gun’ placard. They don’t have an answer for the real problem, so they go off chasing unicorns. It makes them feel better.

This isn’t about doing anyone any good; it is about pursuing their agenda of outlawing firearms. They don’t like them, and if you don’t agree you’re one of those knuckle-dragging, violence mongers who can’t be trusted to know what is best for you. I guess the fact that I served in law enforcement for over two decades means nothing.

Here’s a novel idea, you hold onto your beliefs. If you don’t like me and my guns, I will respect that and not patronize your establishment. At the same time, I demand that you respect my rights, protected under law. If you don’t like guns, I won’t force you to own one, but do not be so misguided to believe that you can tell me that I cannot own one.

Follow me on Twitter - @Andrew_G_Nelson

The Face of Evil: Taking up the fight against Terrorism

In my book, Queen’s Gambit, one of the central themes is the threat that we face from terrorism. It is a topic that I dealt extensively with during my time with the NYPD. 

Back in the 90’s I was part of a unit that provided dignitary protection and conducted threat assessments, both for individual security as well as commercial and residential sites. It was a difficult task, one that was made ever harder when we encountered resistance from the people we were trying to protect.

A case in point was in 1997, after the Centennial Olympic Park bombing in Atlanta, Georgia. I was sent to a major sporting venue and asked to evaluate their security and make recommendations. I spent several days going through their facility assessing the risks and taking notes. On the last day, I sat down with the senior members of the organization, and made my recommendations.

I instructed them on tightening perimeter security, establishing designated areas where spectators and packages could be searched, etc. It was nothing that I would consider overly egregious. It took about five minutes before I realized that I was just wasting my breath. I vividly recall one of the execs commentating that they couldn’t search attendees because their event didn’t draw that type of person.

I closed up my folder and wished them luck.

Not long after that, an individual was apprehended inside the venue by officers assigned to the event. This person had a large carving knife in their possession, something which would have been picked up long before the individual had entered the facility. A tragedy was avoided only by sheer luck.

It is the way I feel about the times that we are living.

As we have seen in the recent terror attacks in Paris, France, coupled with those in Ottawa, Canada, and Sydney, Australia, terrorism is alive and well. The real problem is not that terrorism exists, but our unwillingness to properly address it.

To be certain, the outcome in Paris was a failure, not a success. The minute the terrorists began their killing spree inside Charlie Hebdo we lost. In essence, we became reactive to the situation, attempting to put an end to it, when in reality; we should have been proactive and kept it from happening in the first place.

My aim here is not to play Monday morning quarterback, but to instruct.

Think of terrorism as a tool, like a hammer. It is used to bring about a particular response; it is the reason why you hear it referred to by different names: political terrorism, narco-terrorism, biological terrorism, and even eco-terrorism. The real threat however is the person wielding that tool. In order to properly address the threat, you need to know the mindset of the person.

The immediate threat that we face today is one driven by a religious zealotry to the nth degree. That is a statement of fact which simply cannot be ignored. If you want to be politically correct, and bury your head in the sand, then you better pray that you are just as lucky as those sporting executives were and pray that law enforcement, or the intelligence communities, catch them before they do whatever it is they are planning.

Those who subscribe to the religious tenants of radical Islam have no desire to sit down and discuss their animus toward you. They believe in only two things: conversion or death.

Amazingly, there is a certain segment of society which believes that ‘we cannot be like them’. As if by simply doing nothing, we will somehow convince them to lay down their swords to join us in some utopian global citizen fairytale.

It sounds quite naïve to decry the use of non-lethal interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding and sleep deprivation, when your enemy is only interested in killing you. If you don’t understand this fundamental difference, you are part of the problem.

For starters, when it comes to the basics of Islam, most are woefully uneducated. The majority of folks couldn’t tell you what the difference was between Sunni or Shia, or the many other denominations of Islam. Not that I can blame them, as many struggle with defining their own religious beliefs let alone a complex religion like Islam. The issue I have is that, if you are uneducated, you shouldn’t be interjecting yourself into the conversation.

George Bush, and enhanced interrogation techniques, did not create the problem of Jihad, it has been around for over a thousand years. We are not in a traditional war, but a religious one. Our enemy cannot be appeased with money or land; they seek only to spread their brand of religion, opposition to which means death.

The French are going to have to come to terms with a monster that they helped create. In an attempt to be politically correct, they allowed their core principles to be modified. The first time they surrendered, they set in motion a practice that has brought them to the brink.

There are now an estimated 750 Zones Urbaines Sensibles, or No-Go Zones, across the nation of France. These are areas where the government has simply raised the white flag, allowing the local community to take over. As a result, these areas are not governed by the laws of France, but by Islamic Sharia law. In many instances the police or other public safety, such as fire and ambulance services, will not even go in to these areas.

This is not isolated to France; this is also seen in growing areas of the United Kingdom and Sweden. Even in the United States, there are burgeoning Muslim communities in places like Dearborn, Michigan, where locals are calling for the equivalent of No-Go Zones and the institution of Sharia courts.

What the French failed to realize is that terrorism is not a criminal problem. Islamic terrorists, like the Kouachi brothers and Amedy Coulibaly, are at war. Treating them as if they are a common criminal, who can be rehabilitate and returned back to society, is ludicrous. In fact, lax prison rules have allowed them to become a prime recruiting location.

Amedy Coulibaly converted to radical Islam while in prison in 2005. It was during that prison stint when he met Cherif Kouachi.  The two men became devoted followers of Djamel Beghal, a French-Algerian man with ties to al-Qaeda, who was convicted of plotting in 2001 to blow up the U.S. Embassy in Paris. Coulibaly tried to break another militant Islamist, Smain Ait Ali Belkacem, out of prison in 2013. Although he was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison, he served only several months before he was released early.

This is the mindset that believes that a terrorist is a criminal and a prison sentence administers the proper amount of justice. It is a mindset that we are seeing here in the United States as well. Western civilization seems loath to accept the fact that this is a war we are fighting; choosing to believe it is a criminal justice issue.

Imprisoning people like this serves only to keep them isolated for a finite amount of time until they are once again released to the battlefield, a fact we have seen replayed when Gitmo prisoners have been released. In their minds, they are prisoners of war and their duty does not end till they die or the war is won.

Whether you like it or not, this is the reality we now face.

Yesterday, over forty world leaders participated in a march in Paris denouncing terrorism. It was the largest assemblage since the Americans liberated that city during WWII. Unfortunately, absent from the scene were representatives of this administration. Yes, the American Ambassador was there, somewhere, but when you have the representative heads of France, Israel, England, Germany, and so many other nations, the least the administration could have done was send the vice-president.

However, this administration does not want to address the real threat posed by radical Islam. It wants to paint a narrative that terrorism is on the decline, not the upswing that we are witnessing with our own eyes.  They want to view it as a simple criminal justice problem and mete out sentences in civilian court. What could go wrong with that?

After all, we saw how well it worked out for France.

The photo at the top of this article is the enemy that we now face. It speaks to the contempt with which they view us. The glint of orange fabric at the bottom was just the latest victim, but, to be sure, they envision each and every one of us in that position. 

It's our choice to decide whether we try to reason with the devil or fight back.