$500K Seized; Strange Situation Reported At Nuclear Plant

[jose]

http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/...21/detail.html

SHIPPINGPORT, Pa. -- Two workers looking for tools set off a security situation at a Beaver County nuclear power plant that drew a response from police and federal investigators, WTAE Channel 4's Paul Van Osdol reported.

State police said the men drove up to the Beaver Valley Power Station in a tractor-trailer on Tuesday night to pick up two large containers of tools for a contractor for whom they worked.

Security guards stopped the men for a routine inspection, but they drove away, police said.

The guards became suspicious and called police, who pulled the truck over about a mile from the plant.


A state trooper got a warrant to search the vehicle and found a duffel bag, which he said contained $504,230 in mostly small bills.

[Nono]

Quote by: Pitts ... set off a security situation ...

What sort of garbage English is that?

[jose]

Police broadcast a description of the truck and Sgt. Davis pulled it over after spotting it on Route 168 south, near the Shippingport Bridge. He said the truckers were polite, but the passenger had no identification and said it had been stolen from the truck the night before.

"Your ID is stolen but not that bag of cash? Red flags were popping up all over," Sgt. Davis said.
The truck driver and passenger, whose names were withheld but who are from Texas, were released without charges because no apparent crime had been committed
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06110/683609-57.stm

[Zeebadee]

Quote by: jose A state trooper got a warrant to search the vehicle and found a duffel bag, which he said contained $504,230 in mostly small bills.

Maybe they were just planning to stop for gas once or twice.

[PatrickHenry]

Naturally the "authiorities" siezed the money :rolleyes:

[carriew]

Maybe they were just planning to stop for gas once or twice.

LMFAO!!! that was f'ing funny as shit!

[jose]

For now, there are still few answers as to what two Texas men were doing with more than $500,000 in cash at the Beaver Valley Nuclear Power Station on Tuesday, but investigators insist there was no terrorist activity involved.

A group of state troopers and investigators from the FBI are continuing to investigate the bizarre incident, in which two men from Houston, Donald R. Kingsby, 29, and William Lewis Jr., 28, went to the plant to pick up tools for Bechtel Corp., a contracting company doing work for the plant's $300 million upgrade. :eek:
http://www.timesonline.com/site/news...d=478569&rfi=6

[Milton Bradley]

Quote by: jose For now, there are still few answers as to what two Texas men were doing with more than $500,000 in cash at the Beaver Valley Nuclear Power Station on Tuesday, but investigators insist there was no terrorist activity involved. A group of state troopers and investigators from the FBI are continuing to investigate the bizarre incident, in which two men from Houston, Donald R. Kingsby, 29, and William Lewis Jr., 28, went to the plant to pick up tools for Bechtel Corp., a contracting company doing work for the plant's $300 million upgrade. :eek: http://www.timesonline.com/site/news...d=478569&rfi=6

What do you want to bet that that will be the last update we get? ( of course, this update comes prior to knowing whos money, or what will eventually happen to it. Incidentally, that is why I am suggesting this will be the last update, so not too many people ask where that money went. )


I always like the follow up stories, but sadly they just don't follow through on so many stories that they use to hook you, and drag you in.


( I'm still waiting on some follow up on the alleged time traveling Wall Street investor who was arrested for having too succesful a go at stock trading. )

[brien]

Quote by: Zeebadee Maybe they were just planning to stop for gas once or twice.

Good one Zee. LOL But just a slight POI. Trucks use diesel fuel, not gas. But even so, the price of Diesel fuel hovers somewhere around the price of Premium unleaded gasoline when it even is less refined. Figure that one out. Get ready for price increases all across the board because trucks deliver, as you know, just about every consumer product you can name.

I have been in trucking biz for about 30 years and I have never, ever met a trucker who has even access to that kind of cash. Let alone a duffle bag full of small bills. The cop had every right to ask for the trucker's log book to see where he was in the last week. It isn't a crime to have that money, but it does beg the question, why? Seems strange but since they commited no crime, they seem to be protected by their right to privacy.

[Zeebadee]

Quote by: brien Good one Zee. LOL But just a slight POI. Trucks use diesel fuel, not gas. But even so, the price of Diesel fuel hovers somewhere around the price of Premium unleaded gasoline when it even is less refined. Figure that one out.

Yeah, I know. I was just using the generic term for motor fuel.

Since there's less refining required for Diesel fuel, the price for it should be less. The fact that it isn't just leads me to believe that the big oil companies are in cahoots to gouge the consumers. This isn't free market, they've cornered the market and will continue to generate huge profits until the consumers force the government to consider either price controls, or taxing excessive profits. As soon as either starts to get serious attention, prices will drop, though not to what they were previously.

[brien]

Quote by: Zeebadee Yeah, I know. I was just using the generic term for motor fuel. Since there's less refining required for Diesel fuel, the price for it should be less. The fact that it isn't just leads me to believe that the big oil companies are in cahoots to gouge the consumers. This isn't free market, they've cornered the market and will continue to generate huge profits until the consumers force the government to consider either price controls, or taxing excessive profits. As soon as either starts to get serious attention, prices will drop, though not to what they were previously.

The tax on diesel fuel is about 44 cents per gallon. I can't write there is a conspiricy on the part of the "big oil companies" to fix the price of diesel fuel. I have no evidence for that statement.

I do suspect that the government "gouges" the consumer through taxes on fuel. They have probably collected more money in "energy taxes" than the oil companies have made in profits on a yearly basis. The government has no overhead and its revenues are ALL profit.

From Wickepedia:

United States of America
The first U.S. state tax on fuel was introduced in February 1919 in Oregon. It was a 1 cent per U.S. gallon (0.3¢/L) tax. In the following decade, all 48 U.S. states and the District of Columbia introduced a gasoline tax, and by 1939 an average tax of 3.8¢/gal (1¢/L) of fuel was levied by the individual states.

While state fuel taxes had been around for more than a decade, the first federal gasoline tax in the United States was created on June 6, 1932 with the enactment of the Revenue Act of 1932 with a tax of 1 cent/gal (0.3¢/L). The U.S. federal gasoline tax as of 2005 was 18.4¢/gal (4.86¢/L), and the gasoline taxes in the various states range from 10 cents to 33 cents, with an average about 22 cents per U.S. gallon (5.8¢/L). Unlike most goods in the U.S., the price displayed includes all taxes, rather than being calculated at the point of purchase.

from:

History of the Gasoline Tax
by Dr. William Buechner
From 1932, when Congress first enacted an excise tax on gasoline, until 1956, the proceeds of the gas tax went into general revenues, although the amount raised each year was used as an informal benchmark for Federal highway spending. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 established the Highway Trust Fund and stipulated that 100% of the gas tax be deposited into the fund. From 1956 to 1982, the Highway Trust Fund was used solely to finance expenditures from the federal highway program.

Highway Trust Fund revenues were first allocated to mass transit in the Surface Transportation Act of 1982, when Congress raised the gas tax from four cents per gallon to nine cents per gallon and dedicated one cent, or 20 percent, of the increase to the newly-established Mass Transit Account. Each time there has been an increase in the amount of gas tax going into the Highway Trust Fund—1990, 1993 and 1997—20 percent of the increase has been allocated to the Transit Account and 80 percent to the Highway Account. Of the current gasoline tax of 18.3 cents per gallon, 2.86 cents per gallon is allocated to the Mass Transit Account.

Three tables on the gasoline tax follow.

Table 1 provides a history of the gasoline tax and how it has been distributed among various uses from 1932 to the present.

Table 2 shows the percentage distribution of the gasoline tax among the different uses, including amounts used for general revenues and deficit reduction.

Table 3 show how the portion of the gasoline tax allocated to the Highway Trust Fund has been distributed among the Highway and Transit accounts in percentage terms. This table excludes the portion of the gas tax used for deficit reduction. Note that the first lines in Tables 2 and 3 omit the 0.1 cent per gallon dedicated to repairing underground storage facilities.

Table 1: History of the Gasoline Tax
Purpose
Date Tax
Rate in
cents
per
gallon General
Revenues Highway
Account Mass
Transit
Account Other
Trust
Funds
June 21,
1932 1.0 1.0
June 17,
1933 1.5 1.5
Jan. 1,
1934 1.0 1.0
July 1,
1940 1.5 1.5
Nov. 1,
1951 2.0 2.0
July 1,
1956 3.0 3.0
Oct. 1,
1959 4.0 4.0
Apr. 1,
1983 9.0 8.0 1.0
Jan. 1,
1987 9.1 8.0 1.0 0.1
Sep. 1,
1990 9.0 8.0 1.0
Dec. 1,
1990 14.1 2.5 10.0 1.5 0.1
Oct. 1,
1993 18.4 6.8 10.0 1.5 0.1
Oct. 1,
1995 18.4 4.3 12.0 2.0 0.1
Jan. 1,
1996 18.3 4.3 12.0 2.0
Oct. 1,
1997 18.4 15.44 2.86 0.1



Table 2: Percent Distribution of
Gasoline Tax Revenues Since 1983
Percent Distribution
Date General
Revenues Highways Mass
Transit
Account Other
Trust
Funds
Before
1983 100.0%
Apr. 1,
1983 88.9% 11.1%
Dec 1,
1990 17.7% 70.1% 10.6% 0.7%
Oct. 1,
1993 37.0% 54.3% 8.2% 0.5%
Oct. 1,
1995 23.4% 65.2% 10.9% 0.5%
Jan. 1,
1996 23.5% 65.6% 10.9%
Oct. 1,
1997 83.9% 15.5% 0.5%



Table 3: Percent Distribution of
Highway Trust Fund Revenues since 1983
Percent Distribution
Date Highways Mass Transit
Account Other Trust
Funds
Before
1983 100.0%
Apr. 1,
1983 88.9% 11.1%
Dec 1,
1990 86.2% 12.9% 0.9%
Oct. 1,
1995 85.1% 14.2% 0.7%
Jan. 1,
1996 85.7% 14.3%
Oct. 1,
1997 83.9% 15.5% 0.5%

Note: Table 3 excludes any portion of the gas tax allocated to general revenues.


With the above in mind, perhaps it is better to suspend taxing fuel at the point of consumption. The allocation of the tax to federal highway funds is decreasing every year. No wonder roadways are suffering. Perhaps it is better to tax the vehicle at the point of use, ie the roadways where the tax is spent or not spent, as when the tax money is redirected to mass transit. Perhaps it is better to tax vehicles according to their consumption. Perhaps it is better to collect taxes for local roadways at the local level since the locals use local roads the most often.

I advocate the total elimination of the gasoline and fuel taxes at the point of consumption.
This will take the revenue out of the Congressional pork barrel and return it to local use and those taxes collected at the point of use will directly go to the roadyway that is used for travel. The point of use revenue can't be rediected to some other pork projects that some crooked politician wants to direct to his district. Are you listening DC?