Find air-conditioned relief from the heat and enjoy this summer’s lineup of chick-flicks, family comedies, and action-packed, save the world blockbusters. World War Z publicity Photo.
Hollywood is content to blow shit up in the months before May and after August in a way it never used to be, but the dog days are still the time* to find the most literal bang for your dinero. Here’s what the studios are pushing, and what we think.
The Great Gatsby
Does anyone really want to see The Great Gatsby on the screen? Maybe Baz Luhrmann can make Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio) into someone we can identify with while not wanting to strangle Nick (Tobey Maguire) and Daisy (Carey Mulligan). Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge) certainly knows flash, which is just what the jazz age needs. (May 10)
Star Trek Into Darkness
It’s become fashionable to wait a million years between sequels, but even non-Star Trek fans like J.J. Abrams’ 2009 reboot. And we had to suffer through Super 8 in the interim? Weak. Here’s to Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto busting some ass. (May 17)
The Hangover III and Fast & Furious 6
There comes a time in every franchise’s life when its producers and studio must make a decision: Kill it or get the defibrillator. The Hangover II—which was the same movie as The Hangover, but not funny—deserved kill status. The Fast and the Furious should have died in the script phase. In 2000. (May 24)
After Earth
Will Smith and son Jaden Smith star in this sci-fi tale of who gives a shit? Sorry. But seriously, this movie has an original story by Will Smith and direction by M. Night Shyamalan which gives it the appeal of pissing up a flagpole. (June 7)
This is the End
This is the story of six friends (James Franco, Jonah Hill, Seth Rogen, Jay Baruchel, Danny McBride, and Craig Robinson) living in a house and having their lives taped…as the world ends. Find out what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real. Note: It involves me vomiting. And is MTV getting residuals? (June 12)
Man of Steel
In the most recent trailer, Clark Kent’s father (Kevin Costner) suggests a bus load of kids should have died so that Clark (Henry Cavill)’s powers would remain a secret. With a story by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer (The Dark Knight), consider me on board until further notice. (June 14)
World War Z
Zombies. Fast zombies. Expensive zombies. Brad Pitt and zombies. Big, big changes from the zombie novel. Lackluster trailer. Bored with zombies. (June 21)
White House Down
Whoa, whoa. I thought Gerard Butler saved the White House already this year (Olympus Has Fallen). Do I have to sit through this crap again? At least this movie has Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx. (June 28)
The Lone Ranger
I would have loved to sit in on this pitch meeting. Producer: “Guys, let’s update a dead genre with a notoriously difficult history in the way it portrays Native Americans and cast Johnny Depp as Tonto.” Exec: “Green light. Can’t lose.” (July 3)
Grown Ups 2
How do guys who look like Adam Sandler and Kevin James have wives that look like Salma Hayek and Maria Bello? And why isn’t Rob Schneider in this sequel to Grown Ups? Scheduling conflict my ass. (July 12)
Red 2
Hey, whippersnapper. Shootin’ guns ain’t just for the young’uns. Bruce Willis and Helen Mirren proved that with Red, and they’ll prove it again with Red 2. Do me a favor and load my Glock while I power nap, O.K.? (July 19)
Girl Most Likely
Kristen Wiig stars as a loser trying to put her life back together. If that sounds like Bridesmaids, you’re not crazy! But in this movie, her mother is Annette Bening, probably because Jill Clayburgh died before Bridesmaids was released. And Girl Most Likely story sounds totally different on paper (sarcasm implied). But Bridesmaids was fun, so whatever. (July 19)
The Wolverine
They should have called him “The Dork.” Hugh Jackman and his Adamantium claws return. (July 26)
2 Guns
In this corner, we have Denzel Washington. In the other corner, we have Mark Wahlberg, former underwear model and bad actor. Gentlmen, shake hands and let the dick measuring begin. (We even called it 2 Guns, Get it?) (August 2)
*I’ve done no research to determine whether that’s true.
Playing this week:
42
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
21 and Over
Carmike Cinema 6
Admission
Regal Downtown Mall Cinema 6
The Big Wedding
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Company You Keep
Regal Downtown Mall Cinema 6
The Croods 3D
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Evil Dead
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
From Up On Poppy Hill
Regal Downtown Mall Cinema 6
G.I. Joe Retaliation 3D
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Hobbit:
An Unexpected Journey
Carmike Cinema 6
The Host
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone
Carmike Cinema 6
Iron Man
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Jack the Giant Slayer
Carmike Cinema 6
Jurassic Park 3D
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Mud
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Oblivion
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Olympus Has Fallen
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Oz the Great and Powerful
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Pain & Gain
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Place Beyond the Pines
Regal Downtown Mall Cinema 6
Students nibble carrots at the Buford City Schoolyard Garden, one of two Charlottesville community gardens recognized by the Piedmont Environmental Council following a yearlong contest. Photo courtesy of PEC.
Each week, C-VILLE’s Green Scene page takes a look at local environmental news. The section’s bulletin board has information on local green events and keeps you up to date on statewide happenings. Got an event or a tip you’d like to see here and in the paper? Write us at news@c-ville.com.
Natural relations: Jeff Kerwin, emeritus professor and extension specialist in forestry at Virginia Tech, will speak about the relationships between indigenous people and their natural surroundings at this week’s Virginia Native Plant Society meeting. The meeting is free, and will begin at 7:30pm on Wednesday, May 8, at the Ivy Creek Foundation Education Center.
Walk it out: Love walking and biking around town? Want to see more sidewalks, trails, and bike lanes? Join a group of City officials and residents for an open discussion on the economic and environmental benefits of promoting non-motorized transportation in Charlottesville. The event is free, and begins at 7pm on Thursday, May 9, at CitySpace.
Ready, set, grow: The Piedmont Environmental Council is now accepting applications for the 2013 Community and School Garden Awards Contest. The competition is meant to be a celebration of the relationship between nature, food, and community, and PEC will make up to six cash awards for the winning gardens. To nominate a new or long-standing garden for the contest, visit pevca.org.
The platter at La Michoacana is a tough contender. Photo: Preston Long
The fast food franchise gods have extended a gesture of mercy toward us and hath bestowed upon our town a considerable bounty of good tidings with the opening of Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen (1). It might behoove us all to send up thanks with abandon and with earnest zeal as then these gods may see fit to soon grant us a Krystal or a Del Taco, moving us closer to the day when we look over a fully realized national franchise tapestry, as proud as any in the Northern South.
I have lived in a Popeyes-free zone in the past, in Buffalo, New York. The one escape hatch was the Popeyes located at the first service plaza east of town on the New York State Thruway. I merely needed to get a toll ticket, drive 15 or so miles toward Rochester, hit the plaza, gobble down the goodness, get back on the Turnpike, take the first exit, pay a nominal toll, exact a U-turn, get another toll ticket, drive back to my home exit, pay another small fee, and be happy to have done it.
But the logistical issues of the Thruway stunt was nothing compared with trying to get in and out of the Popeyes parking lot on Emmet Street between Hydraulic and Angus. Nevertheless, we are blessed to have it there. What it brings is something there just ain’t enough of around here—red beans and rice.
I have no interest in getting into a chicken argument here. The bird served at Popeyes is just fine. Pulitzer Prize winner, best-selling author, and Alabaman Rick Bragg stated in his 1999 classic, All Over But the Shoutin’, that Popeyes makes as fine a piece of chicken as he has ever eaten. And I bet that dude has eaten some fried chicken. But more to the point, I have known New Orleans natives who consider Popeyes’ red beans and rice the best they have had.
Is it possible that a fast food chain is serving up something so good that it is not surpassed by all these fine dining kitchens, over-staffed with Culinary Institute of America-trained chefs, sous chefs, and sauciers? I think it might be.
I ate red beans and rice on Decatur Street in New Orleans last November. It was quite good. It was soupy and tangy and came with two pieces of fried chicken. I was charged about $9 for this. I mention that because when I went looking for alternatives to Popeyes’ beans and rice, I wound up at Miller’s Downtown. It has long offered NOLA–
inspired fare and I figured the red beans and rice platter deserved a go. I ordered the side portion of beans and rice and must have looked pitiful doing so, as the side portion does not normally come with sausage, but my gracious server persuaded the cook to toss some andouille into my little bowl. Hence, I was able to get an idea of what the dinner platter, which does come with sausage, would taste like. It was lusciously brothy, if not a tad light on flavor, and the andouille sausage gave it a perfectly seasoned balance. Here’s the problem: This entrée costs $14.
At the risk of offending any actual peasants, this is peasant food, after all. I thought the New Orleans price was pretty fair. I can’t imagine that the cost of doing business on one of the most visited streets in the French Quarter is that much less than our Downtown Mall. Heck, on Walworth Road in my old South London neighborhood, there’s a Jamaican bakery selling a huge plate of beans and rice, with a jerk chicken quarter on top, for 5 quid—a little less than the cost of two pints of Stella. Can we really not compete with the food prices of London and New Orleans?
La Michoacana (2) serves a beans and rice platter. Soupy, refried black beans alongside sticky saffron rice with a small salad and fresh avocado slices. It’s great, it’s $8, but it’s not quite enough food at that price.
Mel’s Diner (3) has a red beans and rice side that’s more like a jambalaya. The beans and rice are mixed in together in a sauce-free blend, and it’s quite good once you get some hot sauce in there. It’s a smaller portion, but you can fill out the plate with other great sides. I went for the collard greens and mac-n-cheese. It’s pretty much a meal and the whole thing came to less than $6.
After I had gone around and tried these other fine dishes, I went back to Popeyes to make sure. I got the large side of red beans of rice. It was $4.35 with tax and still the best of the lot. New Orleans native Al Copeland, who came up poor in the housing projects of an impoverished city, started Popeyes in the ’70s, aiming to make cheap food for a broke-ass town. His passing five years ago was mourned by food critics and cultural commentators alike. He came as close as you can to making food that goes out to hundreds of restaurants taste like he’s back there cooking it himself. And don’t pass up the mashed potatoes with Cajun gravy or the corn on the cob.
The documentary introduces Ata, a 6" non-human humanoid found in the Atacama Desert in Chile. Scientists have analyzed and DNA sequenced Ata, and believe it once breathed, ate, and metabolized until its death at the age of 6-8.
On Thursday, Dr. Steven Greer will appear at the Paramount to introduce the biographical documentary SIRIUS, which follows Greer, an emergency room physician better known for his work with extraterrestrials and government secrets. Extraterrestrials, he says, have been visiting this planet for some time, and our government has been shooting their vehicles down and studying their technology.
This technology can free us from our dependence on fossil fuels and change our lives for the better, but fossil fuels make too much money for certain powerful people, and those people are bent on keeping this technology a secret.
Dr. Greer has been battling them for some time via two organizations he founded: the Center for the Study of Extraterrestrial Intelligence (CSETI), which makes contact with E.T.s and welcomes them to our planet, and The Disclosure Project, which is dedicated to securing the release of everything the government knows. SIRIUS is part documentary about that work, and part fundraiser for the third step, actually bringing that alien technology to the people. C-VILLE spoke with Dr. Greer recently at his farm in western Albemarle County.
C-VILLE: How did you get into this line of work? Do you call it ufology?
Dr. Steven Greer: No, never.
What do you call it?
The UFO term is a misnomer. It was invented by the intelligence community after they knew that they weren’t unidentified. When I was about 8 I had a sighting of a disc-shaped craft outside Charlotte, North Carolina, and I knew what I had seen, because it was completely non-aerodynamic.
These objects that people see fall into two categories: extraterrestrial vehicles, which are ones that are quite unusual, and things that are man-made that look like a flying saucer that we began developing in the ’40s and ’50s.
So, the big story here is probably less of the E.T. story, than it is a technology story and the national security state run amok.
Basically, there are areas that are called Unacknowledged Special Access Projects. A USAP is a coded or numbered program that is run completely without any real paper trail, and without the review of Congress or the President. It’s the subject no one wants to talk [about]. It’s the giggle factor. It’s the kook factor. No one wants to be associated with it because, to be honest with you, the media…have been lackeys in my opinion.
C-VILLE isn’t important enough to be made a lackey.
I know that. You’re not the New York Times, which is why you can do this story. The New York Times wouldn’t be allowed to. In fact I have a family member who worked for The Boston Globe and she said, “Absolutely, we would not be allowed to do a story on this.”
What led you to start actually studying them with CSETI?
In 1990 I had another contact event, and I thought ‘what I ought to do is see if we could put teams together to go out and make contact.’ I discovered that there was no department anywhere dealing with the fact that we’re being visited, and that there ought to be some sort of diplomatic outreach. CSETI is our global attempt, and now we have several thousand teams who are learning these protocols that are very controversial because they involve remote viewing consciousness, things that are into the weird area. But I tell people, if it’s not pretty strange, it’s not going to be E.T.
You say that people working with you have been killed.
Back in the day, before I authorized the level of security and protection we have now, there were some folks who really wanted to help us, and they, three or four of them, died in quick succession.
One was my right hand assistant, Shari Adamiak—[she] and a member of Congress and I all got metastatic cancer—we were all supposed to die. Very mysteriously, you wonder how it happened, virtually the same month. So they all died, and I survived. Barely.
Then, there’s a former CIA director named Bill Colby who had been part of these classified programs and knew about these technologies, and he was going to bring one of these technologies out to us, and the week that he was going to meet with a member of my board they found him floating down the Potomac River.
At this point I don’t take anything for granted in terms of my security, but what I tell people is, there’s safety in numbers, and there’s safety in having a lot of people know what you’re doing. Everything I have (and about 85 percent of the material I have is not in the public yet) is in places that if something happens to me, boom. And it would be devastating.
Tell me about Sirius.
We’ve started a company called Sirius Technology Advanced Research, STAR, which would be the parent company to raise the funds to build a research [facility] here in the Charlottesville area. I have a disc with several thousand pages of designs and unknown patents that has been provided to us. But you need a laboratory.
You can’t walk into UVA and do this at a lab. Why? Because their equipment isn’t dealing with 10 million volts at a fraction of a watt. You have to custom build the systems.
This is the part that people don’t understand, that this is actually really serious science. This is about a $10 million R&D effort, $6 to 10 million, conservatively. But it’s got to be done. You’re dealing with such complex physics and materials. You need nanocrystalline materials, you need specialized Kawasaki analyzers that can deal with thousands or millions of volts as opposed to 110 or 120 which is what we run our appliances on.
There have been various people, I mean, George Shultz has been involved in this committee. Dick Cheney has been involved with the committee, there was a Democrat from California who’s passed away, named Congressman Brown who was on this committee, CIA director Helms…
Not all of them are intelligence and military, some of them are corporate titans. Their consensus has been, until fairly recently, that this stuff is secret and should stay secret. Now, I found out a few years ago that now there’s a majority of them that think it should come out, but they’re still a little afraid to do it.
This work subjects you to a lot of ridicule.
Oh, and hatred.
Has that been difficult?
I think it’s been more difficult for my family than it has been for me. For me, I persevere. Some of it’s been painful, and frightening, and sad, but ultimately what keeps me going is the vision. Once you know this is true, and you know that there are, not only intelligent life out there in the universe that’s here, but that we may have come from some of these civilizations, life on Earth may have been seeded from them, and then on top of that, there are sciences and technologies that are already existing that would give us a whole new civilization without poverty or pollution, that’s worth doing something about.
Tickets for the screening of SIRIUS are $15 and available at www.theparamount.net. CSETI also offers three day Contact Trainings and Expeditions for $495 (there’s one in Charlottesville May 10-12). For budget minded DIYers, there’s an E.T. Contact Tool app, $6.99 for iPhone, $9.99 for iPad.
The house at 920 Rugby Road, where federal investigators say three Charlottesville residents were manufacturing fake IDs. Photo: Graelyn Brashear.
This is an updated version of a story that ran last Wednesday, shortly after the three Charlottesville residents arrested earlier in the week for manufacturing fake IDs appeared in court for the first time.
Secret surveillance at the Charlottesville post office. Swapped license plates. Luxury cars paid for in cash. A stockpile of money and assault rifles in a house in a tony neighborhood near Grounds.
Kelly Erin McPhee
These are just a few of the details coming out of the months-long investigation of an alleged fraud ring traced to Charlottesville, which ended last Monday night in the massive raid of a house at 920 Rugby Rd. by federal agents in SWAT gear, where Kelly Erin McPhee, 31, and Mark G. Bernardo, 26, were arrested.
A third man, Alan McNeil Jones, 31, fled in a white Range Rover and was tracked down and arrested the next day by Charlottesville police, who surrounded him outside Harris Teeter in the Barracks Road Shopping Center. All are now in the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail awaiting bond hearings May 16. They each face multiple fraud counts, accused of running a covert business that sold thousands of “high quality fraudulent driver’s licenses,” and, if convicted, could be in jail for decades. More charges are expected, said U.S. Attorney Timothy J. Heaphy.
The raid and arrests shocked neighbors in the upscale block of Rugby, who said they knew little about the occupants of the $3.1 million spec home that allegedly housed the fake ID factory. One homeowner, who didn’t want to be named, said she thought the renters had moved in a year or so ago, after the newly built house failed to sell. She occasionally spotted a young man and woman who lived there, she said, “but they were never sociable.”
Jane McDonald, who lives across the street, noticed them, too. “I thought they looked awfully young to be renting that place,” she said. “I figured, new young high-tech millionaire—and I guess it was. It just wasn’t legal high tech.”
The complaints reveal little about the suspects, but McPhee is a familiar face in Charlottesville.
She alone appeared to have supporters looking on when the trio appeared one at a time, shackled and in jail jumpsuits, before U.S. Magistrate Judge B. Waugh Crigler in federal court on May 8.
Her parents and several friends sat behind a tear-streaked McPhee, joined by Charlottes-ville defense attorney Andrew Sneathern, who said he’ll be representing her.
A former employee of social media software developer Cloudbrain, McPhee helped organize a social group in 2008 called “The Club” that alerted its 20- and 30-something members of weekly drink specials via Facebook and text and gathered regularly at local bars. But she dropped off the scene two or three years ago, said Charlottesville resident Kim Blick, once a Club regular.
“I hadn’t seen her in years,” said Blick. “I’d assumed she’d moved away.”
That is, until Blick spotted her about two weeks ago getting coffee at Paradox Pastry Downtown. They exchanged pleasantries, she said, and then McPhee left.
“She got into this huge white Range Rover,” Blick said. “I was like, huh. That’s a $90,000 car.”
Alan Jones, a.k.a. Joshua Tucker, one of three people arrested in an alleged fake ID ring police believe was being run out of a Rugby Road house. Photo: United States Attorney’s Office.
The feds think they know how the three made their money. Complaints filed against them May 6 in federal court in the Western District of Virginia include nearly identical eight-page affidavits that tell the story of a months-long investigation.
Late last year, South Carolina police caught several College of Charleston students with fake driver’s licenses, according to the affidavits. The students admitted to buying the IDs through a company called “Novel Designs,” which advertised through word of mouth on college campuses. Customers would mail payment to a Charlottesville post office box, and a week later, their fakes would arrive in the mail from a company called “ND & Associates” with a box in Richmond.
The Richmond box didn’t exist—the senders printed the fake return address on labels with free post office software, the affidavits claim—but the Charlottesville box was very real. In January, Homeland Security set up a covert surveillance camera at the post office on Route 29, where they saw a man checking the box almost daily before leaving in a white Range Rover, often accompanied by a woman.
On January 23, agents followed the Range Rover to 920 Rugby Rd. That’s when investigators expanded surveillance, the affidavits say. They often observed two other cards in the driveway of the large stucco house: a red Jeep and a black Cadillac.
It was the Jeep that led investigators to their first name. Its tags were traced to a 2005 Dodge Ram registered in Alabama to an Alan McNeil Jones. When agents tracked down the landlords of the Rugby house, they learned it was rented to a man who called himself Joshua Tucker, who matched a photo of Jones. He paid the rent in cash, the owners told agents, spoke of buying a $60,000 car in cash, and used various aliases. On a recent visit, they had noticed a fortified room full of boxes and latex gloves, and a safe.
Next, the affidavits say, came the sting. Agents e-mailed Novel Designs and got back “very specific” instructions on how to buy a fake. On Monday, May 6, they got the e-mail that triggered the dramatic raid: Their ID was ready.
Agents in SWAT gear swarmed the house at about 10:30pm, and arrested McPhee and Bernardo. Inside, they found a 5’x3’x3′ safe, documents relating to the manufacture of the fake IDs, $200,000 in cash, and guns, “including high power assault rifles.” In a statement detailed in the court records, Bernardo told agents he knew Jones as “Carter,” and had been paid in cash starting last December to edit the photos for the IDs. McPhee, he said, helped make the fakes, and had been doing just that when police raided the house.
Mark G. Bernardo
The Cadillac turned out to be Bernardo’s, bought by his brother-in-law Bai Wu in Pennsylvania, he told agents. Bernardo admitted to arranging the straw purchase, paying Wu $50,000 in cash—proceeds from the IDs—to buy and finance the car for him.
Nothing in the complaint indicates the trio were selling their wares in Charlottesville, but at least one local resident said the purchase process sounded very familiar, and his story indicates someone might have been manufacturing fakes here for years. The former PVCC student, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said he bought a Virginia driver’s license through the mail in 2004, before the Commonwealth adopted more high-tech IDs.
He said he has no idea if the same people arrested last week made his ID, but the buy went down exactly as investigators described in the affidavits. He sent $300 to a post office box in Charlottesville, and a week later, got a package from a Richmond address.
Pricey, but worth it, he said. “The quality was awesome.”
Here’s the original story, which was posted Wednesday, May 8:
Secret surveillance at the Charlottesville Post Office. Swapped license plates. A stockpile of cash and assault rifles in a house in a tony neighborhood near Grounds.
These are just a few of the details coming out of the more than year-long investigation of an alleged fraud ring traced to Charlottesville, which ended Monday night in the massive raid of a house at 920 Rugby Road by federal agents dressed in SWAT gear.
Arrested during that raid were Kelly Erin McPhee, 31, and Mark G. Bernardo, 26. A third man, Alan McNeil Jones, 31, fled in a Range Rover and was tracked down and arrested Tuesday evening. All now face multiple counts of fraud, accused of running a covert business that sold thousands of “high quality fraudulent driver’s licenses.”
Complaints against all three suspects were filed May 6 in federal court in the Western District of Virginia, and the nearly identical eight-page affidavits included in each tell the story of the investigation and raid in vivid detail. Here are the facts according to those affidavits:
Late last year, police in Charleston, South Carolina caught several College of Charleston students with fake driver’s licenses, who admitted to buying the IDs through a company called “Novel Designs.” News of the fake ID factory spread through word of mouth, the students told law enforcement, and the purchases went like this: Mail payment—it’s unclear how much per ID—to a P.O. box under the name “Com Services” in Charlottesville, and a week later, you’d get your fake in the mail, sent from a company called “ND & Associates” with a P.O. box in Richmond.
Investigators soon discovered the Richmond box didn’t exist, and the people behind ND & Associates were using free U.S. Postal Service shipping software to print labels with the fake return address, stick them on flat-rate packages, and mail them to college campuses around the country.
The Charlottesville P.O. box, though, was very real. On January 11, Homeland Security set up a covert surveillance camera at the Charlottesville Main Post Office on Route 29, where they saw a man checking the “Com Services” P.O. box almost daily, leaving the post office, and getting into a white Range Rover, often accompanied by a woman.
On January 23, agents followed the Range Rover to 920 Rugby Road. The surveillance effort expanded, and a camera was set up to monitor the house. Two other cars were observed parking in the driveway of the large stucco house, located on a block of Rugby dotted with large, pricey homes: a red Jeep and a black Cadillac.
It was the Jeep that led investigators to their first name. Its tags were traced to a 2005 Dodge Ram registered in Alabama to an Alan McNeil Jones. When agents tracked down the landlords of the Rugby house, they learned it was rented to a man who called himself Joshua Tucker, who matched a photo of Jones. He paid the rent in cash, the owners said, and used aliases. On a recent visit, they had noticed a fortified room full of boxes and latex gloves, and a safe.
Next came the sting. On April 28, agents e-mailed ND & Associates, asking how to buy a fake ID, and the response included “very specific” instructions, right down to which class of mail and which add-on services to use. The agents sent payment, and on Monday, May 6, they got the e-mail that triggered the dramatic raid: Their ID was ready.
Agents in SWAT gear swarmed the house at about 10:30pm, and arrested McPhee and Bernardo. Inside, they found a 5’-by-3’-by-3’ safe, documents relating to the manufacture of the fake IDs, $200,000 in cash, and guns, “including high power assault rifles.” In a statement, Bernardo told agents he knew Jones as “Carter,” and had been paid in cash starting last December to edit the photos for the IDs. McPhee, he said, helped make the fakes, and had been doing just that when police raided the house.
The Cadillac turned out to be Bernardo’s, bought by his brother-in-law Bai Wu in Pennsylvania, he told agents. Bernardo admitted to arranging the straw purchase, paying Wu $50,000 in cash—proceeds from the IDs—to buy and finance the car for him.
Jones fled in the Range Rover, and was apprehended Tuesday evening by cops who found his car parked at the Barrack’s Road Shopping Center and surrounded him outside Harris Teeter.
Which brings us to today, when all three of the alleged criminals, dressed in jumpsuits and cuffed, were brought before a federal judge. Each is charged with multiple fraud counts, and each faces hundreds of thousands in fines and decades in jail.
They were remanded, and will be in court again May 16 for preliminary and bond hearings.
Alan Jones, a.k.a. Joshua Tucker, one of three people arrested in an alleged fake ID ring police believe was being run out of a Rugby Road house. Photo: United State Attorney's Office.
Three fraud ring suspects arrested earlier this week following a massive raid of a Rugby Road house are in custody after an initial appearance in federal court Wednesday morning.
Alan McNeil Jones, 31, Kelly Erin McPhee, 31, and Mark G. Bernardo, 26, suspected of running a fake ID ring, were charged Monday night after heavily armed federal officials swarmed a house at 920 Rugby Road. Bernardo and McPhee were arrested at the scene, but Jones fled, and was apprehended Tuesday evening after a day-long hunt for his white Range Rover that ended with police surrounding him outside Harris Teeter in the Barracks Road Shopping Center.
The three were brought into court in jumpsuits and handcuffs to face a number of fraud charges. Jones—who also goes by Joshua Tucker, Jonathan Williams, Charles Miller, and several other aliases—and McPhee are charged with wire fraud, mail fraud, and fraud and related activity in connection with identification documents. The first two carry a maximum sentence of 20 years and a fine of up to $250,000; the last, up to 15 years and $50,000.
Bernardo also faces the latter charge, plus a charge of money laundering, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years and up to a $50,000 fine.
U.S. Attorney Timothy J. Heaphy said he expects to file more charges against all three suspects.
According to court records obtained by the Daily Progress, the raid yielded $200,000 in cash and weapons, including assault rifles.
McPhee alone appeared to have supporters looking on in the courtroom. Her parents and several friends sat behind Charlottesville defense attorney Andrew Sneathern, who said he’ll be representing McPhee. Jones, too, said he planned to hire a lawyer, but Bernardo requested a court-appointed attorney, claiming he had no assets beyond $3,000 bank account and a Cadillac his brother-in-law bought in his name.
The three will face preliminary and bond hearings May 16.
This is a developing story. Check C-VILLE.com for updates in the coming days.
Seventh grade students at Jack Jouett Middle School discuss a legal article during their daily AVID elective class. Photo: John Robinson
It’s 11am on a Tuesday, and class at Jack Jouett Middle School is in full swing. Seventh graders in Christine Jacobs’ class are sitting in a circle, discussing a legal article they read and analyzed for homework the night before. Everybody’s either engaged in the conversation or actively taking notes, nobody is doodling in a notebook or staring into space, and a student who used to hesitate to speak up in class raises his hand and compares the Civil Rights Movement to the current struggle for gay rights.
Jacobs teaches the Advancement Via Individual Determination* (AVID) elective course, an international nonprofit college readiness program that is designed to prepare middling students for advanced classes, but also to improve overall school-wide performance. Jouett adopted the program four years ago with Jacobs’ help, and with its new status as an AVID demonstration school, will serve as an example for visiting teachers and administrators who want to implement the program elsewhere. About 60 kids currently participate, and Jacobs said next year’s numbers will be higher than ever.
The AVID program is competitive, with an extensive application process. Students must maintain a 3.0 grade point average, have a good attendance record, meet an SOL score minimum, and interview one-on-one with administrators. Jouett is one of six Albemarle County schools with the program, and Charlottesville City Schools have also incorporated the system into their curriculum.
Jacobs said the program targets kids who fly below the radar with decent grades, but don’t yet have the motivation for advanced classes. Most AVID students come from homes with parents who are unable to provide the academic support they need to excel, and would be the first in their families to graduate from a four-year university.
“The majority of these kids didn’t think they would go to college,” Jacobs said. “We’re sort of selling them the dream.”
Once they’re in, they learn organizational skills, note-taking, and public speaking, and work twice a week in small groups with local college students. They also develop “soft skills,” Jacobs said, like making eye contact, sitting in the front of a classroom, and asking challenging questions.
“It’s always been so important that students leave the class knowing facts and specific bullets of information,” Jacobs said. “This makes me instead think it’s much more important for them to be critical thinkers, critical readers, and to have really good questions and discussions about that factual information.”
With heightened pressure on Virginia’s teachers to push students to higher SOL scores, education is becoming increasingly more standards-driven, said AVID Eastern Division Director Ann Hart. Teachers and administrators agree that standardized testing is important, but the program is designed to teach students how to problem-solve and work step-by-step through tough questions rather than memorizing facts.
“State standards are the what, and AVID is a how,” Hart said. “It provides the process and structure, the organization.”
Hart said tracking the program’s success has been a challenge. Nearly 70 percent of AVID seniors go on to college, but she said without a mechanism to examine retention rates and numbers, success stories beyond graduation have been anecdotal thus far. About 85 percent of colleges and universities across the country are sharing their data now, and AVID should release a report about success rates within the next eight months.
Jouett AVID Coordinator Ashby Johnson, who oversees the program and works with both students and teachers, said it can only be sustainable and successful with strong support from administrative staff. Luckily, she said, Principal Kathryn Baylor has been behind it since day one.
Baylor said she has had to carefully budget for the instructors’ salaries, which are just below the cost of a full teaching position.
“We’ve had to rearrange staff to make that work out,” Baylor said. “But I believe all the sacrifice is worth the reward. The students’ individual determination to get better spreads out to all the other kids in this school.”
Part of Jouett’s success is a concerted effort to expand AVID tools and processes into every classroom, not just the electives. Nearly half of the school’s teachers participate in summer training on AVID systems and techniques, and Baylor said she’s seen the whole student body transform as students get comfortable in the program and push their peers to do the same.
Eighth grader Nate Gibson is wrapping up his first year in the program, and said his organizational skills and grades have already improved.
“You can ask any of my teachers,” he said. “My organization was terrible. They used to tell me I left a paper trail behind me.”
In addition to a higher GPA and a more manageable three-ring binder, Gibson said his favorite thing has been the field trips. Jouett’s AVID classes took joint trips with Burley Middle School to visit the University of Maryland and the Charlottesville Albemarle Technical Education Center, which Gibson said gave him new ideas about what he wants to study.
Classmate Alexis Johnson said her organizational skills have also improved, and the overall atmosphere of the elective is not the same as other middle school classes.
“People were more welcoming,” she said. “There’s really a family feeling in class.”
Now that Jouett has been named a demonstration school, Johnson and Gibson said they have a new feeling of accomplishment, and are proud to be a part of moving the school and the program forward.
“I think it’s pretty cool,” Johnson said. “We’ve put in a lot of work to get to where we are.”
The selection process for demonstration schools is a long one, and only about 140 of the 4,900 worldwide schools with AVID are given the title. The status gives Jouett bragging rights, but Baylor says it also keeps them on their toes.
“It’s just the beginning of a whole new aspect of the journey,” Baylor said. “Now that we’ve achieved that goal, our task is to become even better. Our job is to continue to grow within our school and share the journey with others.”
*AVID was incorrectly identified in the print version of this story as “Advancement Via Individual Development.”
The Willamette Valley is the largest AVA in Oregon, with more than 100 miles stretching southwest of Portland to Eugene. File photo.
If rain is Oregon’s best-known cliché, then Pinot Noir is the runner-up. With May celebrating Oregon Wine Month, and the Willamette Valley being one of my favorite wine regions in the world, what better time than now to delve into this sustainable wine mecca?
Viticulturally, Oregon is a big state, with five AVAs (American Viticultural Areas) of varied terrain, climate, and soils. The largest of these is the Willamette (pronounced Will-AM-ette, it rhymes with dammit) Valley, which stretches southwest of Portland and runs for 100 miles south to Eugene, with the Coast Ranges to the west and the Cascades to the east. The Willamette Valley is situated an hour from Portland and the coast, about 30 minutes from a plethora of mushroom foraging, biking, hiking, and moss-saturated adventures in the mountains. The area has it all—including a rainy season lasting from October to May, which creates challenges for winemakers.
“The weather—that’s the biggest issue in growing grapes here in the Willamette Valley, which can be a positive and a negative,” said David Lett of Willamette’s Eyrie Vineyards. “The negative is that if it rains at the wrong time you’re had. The positive, of course, is having the great wines that come out of here.”
Lett set up shop in the northern section of the Willamette Valley, where he uprooted 20 acres of prune trees to plant Pinot Noir and establish Eyrie (which is currently run by his son, Jason). His peers thought he was crazy to grow grapes in such a wet, cold, and unpredictable climate, but his foresight and perseverance led the way to many world-class wines. In 1970, Jim Maresh, David Adelsheim, and a few others planted vines in the Dundee Hills, which is now the most concentrated wine region in the Willamette Valley.
But Oregon wine is more than just Willamette. The Tualatin Valley has a group of good, primarily white, vineyards in the north. Heading south, the Chehalem Mountains grow some of the finest fruit. The Eola Hills south of McMinnville also produce some great wines. Brooks Winery, located on the Eola Crest, makes some of the most intriguing wines in the area. Winemaker Chris Williams has a natural skill with all grapes (some of which are estate grown) but shines with Amycas, a blend of Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc, Gewürztraminer, Muscat, and Riesling. It is crisp with a touch of minerality and a lot of personality. Try a bottle at the Ivy Inn Restaurant or Greenwood Gourmet Grocery.
The backbone and vision of the first grapes grown in Oregon are based on two great European styles of wine—the Rieslings of the Rhine and Mosel valleys in Germany, which are flinty and mineral driven, and classic Pinot Noirs from Burgundy, with refreshing acidity and red cherry fruit. Pinot Noir reigns, but Pinot Gris and Chardonnay are sneaking up behind. The Amalie Robert Chardonnay is a fine example of this subtle, Chablis-style chardonnay, handcrafted by Dena Drews and Ernie Pink at their winery near Salem. Find it at Beer Run for $25.99 per bottle.
As for Pinot Noirs, Belle Pente’s 2010 has complex aromas of mint, red fruit, flowers, and smoke, and is available at Greenwood Gourmet Grocery. Cameron Winery consistently makes solid Pinot Noir, and sources from a few vineyards throughout the Willamette Valley; the 2005 Abbey Ridge in Dundee is stellar and lean, with bright cherry fruit notes, and reminiscent of red burgundy; and Left Coast Cellars does an excellent job of making quality, affordable wines that are versatile and accessible. The 2011 Cali’s Cuvée Pinot Noir is a great accompaniment to light meats and charcuterie at the Ivy Inn, or on the shelf at Beer Run.
What truly differentiates Oregon winemakers from their peers? A lack of ego. “It really started out with a bunch of well-educated hippies sitting around in meadows passing around bottles, critiquing each other,” said Josh Bergstrom of Bergstrom Winery in Newberg. “It was all about sharing information. [That mentality] is still very much alive today.”
In Oregon, the close relationship between winemakers, alongside an overall sense of camaraderie, has created a truly unique wine-based community. With a laid back attitude, and a strong focus on sustainability, Oregon wines are only gaining strength and popularity. As long as the rain doesn’t get in the way.
Tracey Love is the event coordinator at Blenheim Vineyards, the sales and marketing associate for the Best of What’s Around farm, and proprietress of Hill & Holler.
The best organic weed killer? Sweat. Grab a hoe and get cultivating. File photo.
Longer days and rising mercury mean big leaps forward for your backyard row crops—but the path to fresh veggies doesn’t always run smooth. Read on for some timely gardening tips.
Tender vegetables
Recent cool nights are a good reminder that we’re not out of the woods yet when it comes to cold weather that could prove catastrophic to tender vegetable plants.
Technically speaking, last frost dates tend to fall in mid- to late-April in Central Virginia. Chances are that if you planted tomatoes, melons, peppers or other non-hardy crops, they’ll be just fine. However, I’m reminded of a friend and former farmer who lost three-quarters of her tomato crop on May 24 to a freak frost several years ago. So, remember to keep an eye to the forecast and the thermometer, and if temps do drop, be prepared to cover your plants with row cover, a tarp, an old bedsheet—almost anything will suffice to provide a few additional—and crucial—degrees of protection from the cold.
Seedling shopping
I am often asked where I purchase vegetable seedlings, or “starts.” For plantings of tomatoes, peppers, melons, and other long-lived vegetable crops, you’re best starting with transplants as opposed to starting from seeds in the ground to ensure the soonest possible harvest. My first stop is always Charlottesville’s City Market, where vendors offer a wide array of plant varieties, many of which are grown free of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers. Better yet, these pros grow what they sell, so in addition to providing your plants, hit ’em up for their advice on growing conditions, pests, and other info.
Want to buy plants and support local food and farming organizations? Urban Agriculture Collective of Charlottesville (uaccville.wordpress.com) offers seedlings for sale at Gibson’s Market on the corner of Hinton and Avon streets in Belmont, and the proceeds benefit their community gardens at Friendship Court, Sixth Street, and West Street.
The Local Food Hub (localfoodhub.org) holds its annual plant sale and open house on Saturday, May 11 from 10am-3pm at its educational farm in Scottsville. In addition to stocking up on organically grown vegetable seedlings, you can take in kids activities, live music, and farm tours.
Weed control
Nurtured by rain and warming temperatures, advantageous plants such as purple dead nettle, hairy bittercress, onion grass, creeping Charlie, and henbit are exploding in number. Soon we’ll be overrun with poke weed, morning glory, and autumn clematis.
What’s the best way to deal with weeds organically? Get yourself a hand cultivator, shovel, or better yet a spading fork, and dig them up. Pulling by hand often breaks off the topmost part of the plant leaving roots free to re-sprout. For smaller weeds that are just getting established, a simple pass with a hand cultivator or a stirrup hoe will suffice.
Regardless of what you’re weeding, try to remove these pesky plants before they go to seed. And don’t forget what comes after weeding—mulching! Cover newly weeded areas in vegetable garden beds with straw mulch (not hay) to prevent new weeds from sprouting.—Guinevere Higgins
Guinevere Higgins is owner of Blue Ridge Backyard Harvest, which provides consultation, design, and installations for home-scale edible gardens. When she’s not gardening, she works in fundraising for City Schoolyard Garden and the Center for a New American Dream.
Two Charlottesville residents suspected of manufacturing fake IDs are in custody and one is at large after a Monday night raid on a house near UVA.
Kelly Erin McPhee, 31, and Mark G. Bernardo, both of Charlottesville, were arrested by federal agents executing a search warrant at 920 Rugby Road, according to Brian P. McGinn, spokesman for the local U.S. Attorney’s Office. A third suspect, Alan McNeil Jones, who also goes by Joshua Tucker, 31 and also of Charlottesville, fled the scene and is now considered a fugitive.
All three have been charged with wire fraud, mail fraud, and “fraud and related activity in connection with identification documents,” McGinn said.
According to an NBC29 report, the investigation of students in Charleston, South Carolina purchasing fake IDs online led to the Charlottesville raid, which observers said involved Virginia State Police in SWAT gear.
Homeland security is leading the joint investigation, joined by the United States Postal Inspection Service and state and UVA police.
McPhee and Bernardo are scheduled to make an initial appearance at 10:30am Wednesday in federal court here in Charlottesville.
Police are searching for Jones, who they say may be traveling in a white Range Rover with Washington State plates that read AIH-8881. Anyone with information on the suspects is asked to call 802-872-6020.
