Hasta La Gadget!

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York Police Department Commissioner James O’Neill are not impressed with the Justice Department’s claim that their city is “soft on crime.”

“New York City continues to see gang murder after gang murder, the predictable consequence of the city’s ‘soft on crime’ stance,” the Justice Department said in a statement Friday, an assertion that doesn’t appear to be in line with the facts.

The DOJ warned nine jurisdictions around the country that they could potentially lose federal law enforcement grant money if they continued to operate as “sanctuary cities.” 

De Blasio called the statement about his city’s approach to crime “outrageous.”

“It is an unacceptable statement that denigrates the people of New York City and the NYPD,” de Blasio said during a press conference. “It is an outrageous statement and absurd on its face, and ignores a quarter century of progress in this city in bringing down crime.”

“I would say to President Trump and to Attorney General Sessions, if you believe this statement is accurate, come to New York City, look our police officers in the eye and tell them you believe they are soft on crime,” the mayor added. “See how that feels.” 

O’Neill also denounced the claim, calling it “unbelievably disrespectful.”

“I’d like to think of myself as a pretty calm and measured person, but when I read that statement by DOJ this afternoon, my blood began to boil,” he said during the press conference.

O’Neill added that the NYPD arrested more than 1,000 people in 100 gang takedowns in 2016. According to the NYPD, overall crime within the city has decreased 76 percent since 1993. 

Former Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara also added his opinion on the Justice Department’s claim. 

“I don’t know why one storied law enforcement institution (DOJ) would ignorantly malign another (NYPD),” he wrote on Twitter. “That makes no one safer.”

In response, a spokesman for the Justice Department doubled down on the earlier statement, saying it was “New York City’s policies that are soft on crime” and referencing an MS-13 gang member the city released from Rikers.

“Those policies, implemented by New York City’s Mayor and his administration, are directly responsible for a dangerous MS-13 gang member walking out of Rikers Island in February,” the spokesman said, switching the focus from the NYPD to the mayor.

“Unfortunately, the Mayor’s policies are hamstringing the brave NYPD officers that protect the city, and only serve to endanger the lives of the hard working men and women of the NYPD who care more about keeping their city and country safe than they do about city hall politics.” 

It’s an odd statement, considering the DOJ is threatening to take away the department’s grant money to make a political point.

Sessions did have some words of praise for the city earlier in the day. “I would say this about New York: New York has done some great things in criminal justice,” the nation’s top cop said during a press conference in San Diego on Friday. “They are following policies that have proven to reduce crime in America.” 

Earlier this week, Sessions didn’t seem to understand that a federal judge who serves in Hawaii has the power to block President Donald Trump’s revised travel ban.

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Fake Instagram accounts aren’t new and if you are an avid Instagram user, you might notice that every now and then you might get these weird blank accounts or accounts advertising for porn or other products that start following you. There are also services that allegedly help you gain more followers.

According to a report from Business Insider, it seems that Instagram has had enough of these fake accounts and are cracking down on that behavior, starting with the closing of a service called Instagress. This is a pretty popular service amongst Instagrammers who pay $10 a month to get “real” Instagram followers.

In a post on its website, Instagress writes, “Sad news to all of you who fell in love with Instagress: by request of Instagram we were forced to close our web-service.” While Instagram refused to comment, a spokesperson did link Business Insider to Instagram’s developer policy which prohibits third-party developers from selling Instagram data.

This isn’t the first time Instagram is purging fake accounts, and recently Facebook themselves have been working at cracking down on fake accounts as well. That being said, fake accounts will always continue to exist but we suppose with Instagram keeping a watchful eye, hopefully it won’t be happening quite as frequently.

Instagram Appears To Be Cracking Down On Fake Accounts , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.

With Motorola promising to support its Moto Mods initiative, this means that we can also expect newer handsets that will support these accessories. So far only the Moto Z family supports the Moto Mods, and the handsets are starting to get a bit long in the tooth, but the good news is that we can expect successors soon.

We have been seeing several several leaks so far and thanks to a new render published by the folks at Techno Buffalo, we now have a pretty clear image of what the Moto Z2 Play allegedly looks like, which you can see for yourself above. The render shows us that the handset will sport a home button where presumably the fingerprint sensor is, and at the back we can find the connector pins that will be used to connect Moto Mod accessories.

As for specs, that is still unclear at this point in time but as Techno Buffalo points out, one of the key features of last year’s Moto Z Play was its battery life which came in at 3,510mAh. Paired with a Full HD display it meant that the handset could last users quite a while. Presumably that trend will continue this year, but we guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

There is still no word on when the new Moto Z2 handsets will be revealed, but the render shows a date of the 8th of June, so maybe that’s when we’ll have the official details.

Alleged Moto Z2 Play Render Surfaces , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.

We have been hearing rumors that HTC’s upcoming handset, the HTC U, will feature a touch-sensitive frame. We are unclear as to how that might work or what kind of functionality it could offer. However in a recent video that surfaced, it is allegedly a teaser video for the upcoming phone that shows off the touch-sensitive frame in action.

From what we can tell, all users have to do is squeeze the sides of the phone for the feature to activate. They can then slide their finger or thumb up and down the side of the phone’s frame in order to navigate the different apps that can be launched, and tap again to launch it. Basically this is a shortcut of sorts that saves users time from poking around the screen, and also enables one-handed use.

Launching the camera via this method was one of the examples shown in the video. Now we should point out that the video was not uploaded by HTC but by a YouTube channel called Tech Tera. We can’t speak to how authentic the video was, but it does look pretty real. Either that or it is a very elaborately made concept video. Either way HTC has confirmed that the HTC U handset will be officially announced on the 16th of May, so we guess we’ll just have to wait until then to find out more.

Possible HTC U Teaser Video Shows Touch Sensitive Frame In Action , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.

It’s only been a few weeks since Tyga and Kylie Jenner reportedly “took a break” from their relationship — again — but the rapper already seems to seeking some comfort elsewhere. He was caught Thursday night in photos published by TMZ stepping out with onetime Justin Bieber date Jordan Ozuna at a West Hollywood restaurant.  

Tyga hasn’t said a word so far, but Ozuna jumped on Twitter Friday to insist the two are not dating. 

Some people on Twitter didn’t seem to be buying it:

Tyga, 27, and Jenner, 19, began dating in 2014 and took their first break a year later. They last hit a rough patch when Jenner’s brother Rob Kardashian started dating Tyga’s ex Blac Chyna (and the two later became parents to Dream Kardashian).

Tyga and Jenner haven’t been photographed together since March. Both partied separately at Coachella.

The reality show makeup queen, however, did post a Snapchat video early this month lip-syncing to Tyga’s new single “Act Ghetto,” which includes the lyrics: “Gettin’ checks like Kylie / Yeah, every day I do it.”

But just before the TMZ shots emerged, an Instagram fan account posted a Snap of her in bed, declaring: “Haven’t left this position in 25 hours.”

Stay tuned.

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