John Ruch

Family of DeKalb County man sues county, police officers after deadly welfare check The family of Arben Pilici has filed a lawsuit against DeKalb County after he suffocated in the back of a police car during a February 2024 welfare check at his home.

Filipovits & Smith attorneys appeared on WABE's "Closer Look with Rose Scott" yesterday to discuss the lawsuit about the death of Arben Pilici in police custody. Listen here: www.wabe.org/family-of-de...

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In Central State Hospital demolition decision, ‘in-depth’ historic preservation study was a single phone call - SaportaReport Read In Central State Hospital demolition decision, ‘in-depth’ historic preservation study was a single phone call by John Ruch for SaportaReport here.

One of several unexpected treats at last week's ATL Rare Book Fair: Running into Central State Hospital preservationist Edwin Atkins, who recently helped pull off a $40M rescue plan year after the state lied to our faces to tear it all down... 🤘to all local heroes. saportareport.com/in-central-s...

Every cool person has the Yips. I was just blasting them while driving through EAV.

Arrowmask: Still godkilling www.amazon.com/Arrowmask-Go...

Arrowmask: Still 'Against All Flags' www.amazon.com/Arrowmask-Ag...

Facial recognition error prompts police to arrest Asian man for burglary 100 miles away Exclusive: Alvi Choudhury claiming damages against Thames Valley police after biased technology confused him with man looking ‘10 years younger’ Police arrested a man for a burglary in a city he had never visited after face scanning software deployed across the UK confused him with another person of south Asian heritage. Alvi Choudhury, 26, a software engineer, was working at the home he shares with his parents in Southampton in January when police knocked on his door, handcuffed him and held him in custody for nearly 10 hours before releasing him at 2am. Continue reading...

Facial recognition error prompts police to arrest Asian man for burglary 100 miles away

Dunwoody pauses Flock contract for security and legal review Dunwoody City Council voted to delay a Flock Safety 911 dispatch software contract after raising data privacy, security, and policy concerns.

The Dunwoody City Council unanimously voted to defer a 12-month contract with Flock Safety for its 911 dispatch software on Monday.

Now 103% funded!

The 'Surrender to Death' ATL underground metal comp is total metal up your Beltline. Thanks to whoever this is. (And RIP Marco, Hallow's Eve, et al.) 🤘 borisrecords.bandcamp.com/album/surren...

Atlanta Roller Derby Buys a Venue! by Atlanta Roller Derby - Indiegogo Help Atlanta Roller Derby and Atlanta Junior Roller Derby Buy a Venue!

Join me in helping Atlanta Roller Derby fund its own (historic) venue. (Yes, an ATL sports team can have a home you pay for by choice rather than your taxes and whose matches are the cool fun antithesis of a weird paramilitary sterile-suburbia Big League experience) www.indiegogo.com/en/projects/...

The 'Atlanta Way' is also the Columbus Ohio Way and the way in every city as the megarich are not satisfied by merely scheming but also must imagine themselves special geniuses at doing so

Wexner’s World: The Spatial Impact of Columbus’ Billionaire With economic and political power, an individual billionaire like Les Wexner tends to also take on the roll of a city planner and…

RIP Columbus, Ohio's The Other Paper, who was on to Les Wexner ages ago -- before corporate media struck back and literally ate it alive. One of many lessons from the alt weekly golden age. medium.com/the-columbus...

Man Opposing Data Center Arrested for Speaking Slightly Too Long An Oklahoma man tried to talk about a data center coming to his community. Police arrested him when he went a few seconds over his time limit.

a man in Oklahoma was speaking out against a data center in his community. He went a few seconds over time and the city had him arrested for trespassing

As I found writing about this over a half-decade ago, when they're doing meetings, they already have property taking maps and they are already cutting deals. Reporters should Open Records Act a little. roughdraftatlanta.com/2020/02/07/i...

Common Folk Mon Feb 16 with Edith on WRAS-HD-2 Atlanta 88.5 FM The finest selections of folk, bluegrass, Americana, country, etc. from the past hundred or so years. Email: commonfolk88@gmail.com and Instagram: @commonfolk88Hosted by Edith

Wearing my old 'Save WRAS' T-shirt so naturally I turn on WRAS and naturally it turns me on to like five extremely cool acts -- 'Common Folk' is friggin amazing. 🤘 spinitron.com/WRAS/pl/2199...

Dude did his part in the 1980s edition of outraging dipshit presidential administrations seeking totalitarian control of media, women, women in media, etc etc 🤘

Frederick Wiseman in the editing bay

And the hits just keep on coming: RIP Frederick Wiseman, another legend of American cinema

RIP. Such great work for so many auteurs and especially great when he finally got to be an auteur himself with 'The Apostle.'

Cool & kind that not only did Faith No More's Roddy Bottum sign his new memoir (www.acappellabooks.com/pages/books/...) for me at Criminal Records yesterday, but he also asked about my own book. When a FNM guy thinks your cover art is wild, you know to stay weird... 🤘 www.amazon.com/Arrowmask-Ag...

Berlin presents bid to rehost Olympics with 100th anniversary of 1936 Games looming Berlin has formally presented its bid to rehost the Olympic Games. The presentation took place in the same stadium where Jesse Owens starred during the 1936 Games under the Nazis.

Zany as it may sound, Germany is bidding on the 2036 Olympics, which would mark the 100-year anniversary of the "Nazi Games" overseen by Hitler & Goebbels (and in the very same stadium no less). The anti-Olympics group @nolympiaberlin.bsky.social is organizing against it.
apnews.com/article/berl...

You can still buy a Sochi shirt, too. Wonder if Putin immediately takes it back? shop3.olympics.com/en/olympic-g...

We could have finished off the Olympics in 2014 if the media was more interested in the mythical mission of public service rather than in getting its share of blood money. Funny how much IOC and FIFA corruption scandals revolve around PR and TV licensing...

A fresh reminder that LA only 'won' the Olympics because Boston loudly drove out bid planners for these and many other disgusting reasons (including, for you Epstein-watchers, sex-trafficking criticisms!), forcing the IOC to do a panic double-award to LA and Paris like the cornered rats they were

Sticking taxpayers with corruption & exploitation is the purpose of the Olympics, not a mistake to reform. Why'd L.A. cozy up to a biz that shielded Larry Nassar & glamorized Putin, who then immediately invaded Crimea & did this to its biggest Olympics critic? www.theguardian.com/world/2026/f...

DeKalb County mother sues after son dies in police restraint The family of a DeKalb County man who died after being restrained on his stomach by police said in a federal lawsuit this week that his civil rights were violated.

The AJC covers our new lawsuit filed on behalf of the family of Arben Pilici: 'DeKalb County mother sues after son dies in police restraint' www.ajc.com/news/2026/02...

DeKalb Co. family files complaint after man with mental illness allegedly dies while in police custody; calls for better training The family of 49-year-old Arben Pilici called police for help after he refused to go to his appointment to renew mental health prescriptions, but it turned deadly.

11Alive covers our new lawsuit filed on behalf of the family of Arben Pilici: "DeKalb Co. family files complaint after man with mental illness allegedly dies while in police custody; calls for better training" www.11alive.com/article/news...

Clark Atlanta Student Speaks Out After ‘Humiliating’ Classroom Arrest - Capital B News - Atlanta Sierra Morrison remembers the first time she stepped onto the campus of Clark Atlanta University. She traveled from her Minneapolis high school to tour colleges, and something just felt right about th...

After being handcuffed in class for not having her ID, Sierra Morrison says in her first interview that she is now weighing legal action.

atlanta.capitalbnews.org/clark-atlant...

How much to shove the illegally parked ones into a space?

Piloted in ATL *of course.* The City Too Busy to Shame.