Tag Archive | "Illegal search/entry"

Update: KC Activist Warns Drivers of Checkpoints

In September, I told you the story of KC activist, Michael Mikkelson, and his mission to warn Kansas City drivers of the checkpoints that he viewed as intrusive and a violation of an individuals right to be secure in their person and property.  In the course of Mikkelson’s activism, he has endured harassment by the Kansas city police department, including being handcuffed and placed in a patrol car and having his “Checkpoint Ahead” sign stolen out of his hands by an officer.  In response to the theft of his property, Mikkelson filed an official complaint that was investigated by the KCPD Internal Affairs and reviewed by the Office of Community Complaints.  Unsurprisingly, the Office of Community Complaints found that no policies or procedures were violated by the offending officer and that no further action will be taken.  Here is the first page of the letter Mikkelson received in response to his complaint.

 

Board of Police Commissioners 11 791x1024 Update: KC Activist Warns Drivers of Checkpoints

Apparently, the Kansas City police department has no policy against stealing someone’s property.  The author of the letter, Director I. Pearl Fain, somehow seems to believe that the fact that the property was not destroyed is important to the matter.  Can I use that as a defense if I steal someone’s property?  “But I didn’t destroy it judge, I only took it!” It seems apparent that the Office of Community Complaints did not approve of the message on Mikkelson’s sign and therefore chose to ignore the blatant misconduct on the part of the officer.

Fain also makes the ludicrous claim that Mikkelson was somehow interfering with official police business, even though he was almost a mile away from the checkpoint.  How did Mikkelson interfere with something he was not near?  The “official police business” of a DUI checkpoint is to stop every car that comes through the checkpoint.  Mikkelson’s actions did not prevent them from doing just that.

It should also be noted that the KCPD publicizes these checkpoints before hand, so Mikkelson is only doing what the police do themselves.  The only difference is that he takes his public announcement to the streets instead of to the newspaper.

The get tough on drunk driving crowd will inevitably side with the police in this case because they believe that Mikkelson is protecting drunk drivers, but they should save their ire for the police themselves.  Checkpoints are intrusive and much less effective then the less expensive DUI saturation patrols.  If anything is interfering with the “official police business” of supposedly keeping the streets safe from drunk drivers, it is the police themselves, and their insistence on holding these checkpoints instead of the more effective alternative.

If you would like to contact I. Pearl Fain, Director of the Office of Community Complaints to voice your concerns about this case, you can call 816-889-6641.

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Wilmington NC PD

My brother has been calling me the past two months about traffic stops from the Wilmington Police Department. He calls me every time he is stopped, which has been about 6 times up to this date.

The main problem is the officer’s continuous unconstitutional searches of his vehicle and his person. The first starting with an officer pulling him over for running a stop sign, in which he attempted to dig his hands into my brother’s pants to search for drugs. When my brother refused, he contacted a K-9 unit to search his vehicle and found nothing. They then escorted him downtown to the police station to strip search him (Yes for the running of a stop sign). I must admit that my brother has had a few run-ins with LEOs but this is too much!! They then let him go with just a warning ticket.

He has filed plenty complaints with WPD and none have been investigated at all. The is some serious ethics violations here!!

Another time he was pulled over for the same thing, this time having a friend with him. The officers demanded the two step out of the car, without notifying them of their violations. They began to search his friend, digging their hands into the back of his pants, discovering a bag of weed he was hiding. My brother was taken to be searched again due to this discovery. When my brother advised them of wanting to have his lawyer present, they forced him into the search. Thy found nothing and found out later that his car had been towed.

On another occasion, they pulled him for no reason, held him downtown claiming he was drunk, yet failed to give him a breathalyzer. Luckily he called me and I told him to demand a breathalyzer before they decided to write him up for a will refusal without notifying him of his rights.

They have detained him numerous times without reading any rights or informing him of his alleged crimes. They are using their power to terrorize and harass him. He has come a long way in the 2 years since he did 4 months for a petty drug charge. It seems police have a new tactic of provoking people into fits of anger by degrading them to make them feel less than human. I have overheard outrageous statements by an officer over the phone, so I have advised my brother to make sure he records everything. There has been little effort by WPD to keep the peace. Even while there have been 6 murders in the city, they spend most of their time harassing citizens…

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How To Piss Off A Cop

QUOTE THE CONSTITUTION

 

As many of you probably know, the State of California recently passed a law saying a warrant is needed for police to search your cellphone if you are placed under arrest. Policeone.com picked up the story and the police officers who commented on the story let their true feelings on the Constitution be known.

In the story, the author noted that this law, which forces police officers to follow the Constitution, was opposed by The Peace Officers Research Association of California. Why did the oppose it? Well because it threatens their auhtority to do whatever they want, law be damned.

The Peace Officers Research Association of California, which opposed the law, argued: “Restricting the authority of a peace officer to search an arrestee unduly restricts their ability to apply the law, fight crime, discover evidence valuable to an investigation and protect the citizens of California.”

And that is just the tip of the iceberg, the quotes on the PoliceOne website and on their facebook page just go to prove what we already knew, cops are not fans of the Constitution when it comes to restrictions on their authority. These people crave power, whether or not it is why they took the job, the power gets ahold of most officers and like the famous saying “power currupts”

PoliceOne.com user kas9kas posted this on the website,

A person arrested loses their fourth ammendment when Peace Officers seize their person and property. Anything found on an arrestee has always been fair game in the courts eyes. If we find counterfeit money in a wallet, a childs porno picture, or narcotics, it was still evidence that was legally obtained by arrest.

User sevans  is really in favor of “Law Enforcement” Officers following the law

Boy am I glad I left California. The whacko legislature and governor know not what they do, unless allowing more criminals to avoid prosecution is their intent. I cannot believe they enacted this law after the California Supreme Court, one of the most liberal in the Country, upheld the search. I started in California and retired from Oregon. I’m truly surprised the liberal Oregon Court (either Court of Appeals, or Supreme Court) didn’t follow California.

I’ve noticed time and time again that anyone that is opposed to something a cop does, or just pisses them off in anyway, is a liberal in the minds of a PoliceOne.com commenter. I’ve yet to figure that out. But before I go on, let’s just take a look at what the US Constitution has to say about searching a persons property

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

This is an amendment that was written because British soldiers and were allowed to search any home they liked, at any time and for whatever reason they wanted. And since many Founding Fathers were smugglers, they did not like this. But if you want to piss off a cop, just quote the 4th amendment. Make sure you tell them that you have the right to be secure in your effects. This really sets them off, especially PoliceOne user rhaney1313

OK everybody…lets all of us standup and applause the absolute morons in Sacramento and that awesome looser Gov. Jerry (Sunshine) Brown. He and his merrymen and dancing babes did it again. Another BAD law………….From all of us real Californians…My apologies to the United States of America and to the citizens in each State.

That’s right, a real Californian is against getting a warrant to search someones property, and that is what your cell phone and any other electronic device you have in your car is, your private property. Now not all cops are against the Constitution restricting their path to absolute authority, USO131  is one of the good guys.

When you start eliminating the need for a warrant you start to go down a very slippery slope of the loss of your constitutional rights..
If you can’t wrap your head around what I am saying then wrap it around this… Some one is arrested for DUI and all the contents in their electronic device was downloaded? The key here is the subject was arrested… Their cell phone was searched even when the reason for the arrest had nothing to do with possibly of any evidence to USE AGAINST THEM MIGHT BE ON THAT CELL PHONE…
Again remember this YOU CAN AND WILL BE SEARCHED LIKE THIS AS WELL…

Glockman39 is another one of the good guys, however small that group may be. Here he responds to rhaney1313

You want to stand up an applaud the upholding of the constitution? That document which you were, I assume, sworn to uphold?

Tell me, what reason would you have to search an individual’s cell phone for, say, an open container arrest? Are you hoping to find pictures of him imbibing on previous occasions?

We have the fourth amendment, and warrants signed by judges for a reason. The same reason we have the second amendment right to protect ourselves with individual firearms ownership.

Really, folks, I can’t fathom why some of you are so upset by this, unless you are too lazy to put in the extra effort required to protect individual liberty.

And this isn’t a left/right issue. It’s a rule of law issue.

A warrant isn’t always needed, most people are too afraid to say no to an officer, and they know it. One trick cops use all the time, one which I fell for during a traffic stop a few years back, is just simply asking the person if they can search their property, as coolcoin points out

Hey, just ask for consent, most of the time you will get it, just like consent to search a car. The morons think they are smarter than you, and if they give you permission, they are banking on you being too lazy to follow through, because “they have nothing to hide”, right?

Yep, you heard it correct, this officer thinks we’re all morons, at least he admits it. Over at the PoliceOne.com facebook page, where officers are always more bold and hateful, commenter Matt Osborne expresses his disdain by claiming his job will me millions of times harder if he has to follow the rules he swore to uphold.

damn bunch of tree huggers. California is the i hate police state lets make their job 8000000000000 times harder. Every police officer just needs to take a day off at the same time and see how they fill about that.

Nothing says “fuck you, respect my authority” like an idle threat written with the wrong word (see how they FEEL about that)

Hey Johnny Lubeck, what do you think about this?

The best thing that can happen for the country is a west coast earthquake, where it seperates Cali, and it floats out into the pacific.

Oh, I see. That was rather……harsh.

Hey Thomas John Staubly Jr., you’re the next contestant on “I hate you private citizens who make us follow the law, I hope you fucking die” (In case there is confusion, I don’t hope he dies, I’m implying he wants you to die)

next their gunna make officers get a warrant before they can even knock on their door….this is absurd. thank god i live in a redf state that is actually pro-law enforcement and actually let them do their damn jobs

Oh I’m sorry Thomas, you weren’t done? You had something else to say about freedom loving Americans who love the Constitution and limits on governmental power, like someone else, who was it? Oh yeah, the Founding Fathers. But anyways, I believe you had something else to add to the conversation later on

 lets face it, these people who take issues with these type of searches arent hurt or offended by the searches. the ones who take issue with this are the anti leo and/or thuggin gangbangers trying to get out of a charge. if you dont have anything to hide and arent committing any crime, then quess what, you likely wont get searched. keep your nose out of crime and this wont be an issue. the majority of supreme court decisions are made from some thug trying to get out of a charge or some liberal nut case who is super anti-leo

Oh that’s right, anyone who stands up for their rights must be a….hold on, I wanna get this term correct…..thuggin gangbanger. Well he showed us! Good upstanding people wipe their ass with the Constitution, thuggin gangbangers are the ones who want their rights to be upheld.

Like I said earlier though, there are good cops who are in favor of this new law, I was unaware there was so many thuggin gangbangers with badges, like Christopher Powell.

some of you are crazy or lazy…how is it anti-le to say that someones cell phone is subject to protections of the 4th ammendment? Ask somebody if you can look at their cell phone, if they tell you no, than get a warrant…if you don’t have PC or enough to get a warrant, then you probably have no business looking anyway.

It’s really scary to see what cops honestly think of this ruling. So many of them are bold enough to come right out and say they don’t want to have to get a warrant to search a persons property, even though they swore to uphold a document that says they do.

But the real problem is that Probable Cause is never really defined in the Constitution. Cops use this all the time, they just saw “I had probable cause to believe that…….” and they can search anything without a warrant.

It’s time to stand up for your rights, if you aren’t already. If you are pulled over, and a cop asks if he can search something (your car, cell phone, laptop, whatever) tell him no. Just be prepared to deal with a pissed off cop, and maybe carry a pocket constitution with you at all times.

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¨Move, just F`ing blink and I`m gonna F`ing shoot you in the face¨

This post was sent to us via CopBlock.org’s Submit Tab.

Kalispell,MT-      One evening I was having a drink at a Hotel Lounge with an old friend from High-School that I bumped into earlier in the day. As part of our catch-up discussion, he told me of his time in the service and why he felt the need to get out. He had some very strong feelings that apparently offended a group of servicemen around the corner from our table. My friend left and after paying the tab, I too left out of a separate entrance.

My girlfriend was getting off of work three blocks away and I was going to leave my vehicle in the Hotel parking lot and ride home with her. However, when I left, I was followed by the four angry servicemen who wanted to teach me a lesson in patriotism. Sometime during their assault on me, the police were called and they responded very quickly.

The men went inside and I was immediately treated as the suspect, searched, handcuffed, belittled, and sat on the curb. As the men were brought out and questioned, they had a few good laughs with the cops, shook hands, and were released.

Then I was asked, ¨Where’s the gun?¨.  Well, there was NO gun. They asked how I got there and I told them that I drove my vehicle that was parked in the lot. They asked which one, took my keys, and began to search my vehicle. One of them yelled out, ¨Look what we found”.   The officer accompanying me slammed me to the ground, put his knees into my chest, and drew his gun into my face saying, ¨Move, just F`ing blink and I’m gonna F`ing shoot you in the face, just move¨.

A Sheriff on the scene told the cop that he was out of line and to holster his gun and the city cop responded by telling him that he was out of his jurisdiction. He continued to wave his gun in my face and I could tell he really did want to pull the trigger.

So, back to what they found…a baseball bat. They came over and said ¨What is this?¨, as if they had just discovered an assault rifle. I wasn’t sure if it was a rhetorical question or what. I pointed out that it was a baseball bat, not a gun and that there is a HUGE difference. (Mind you I had not even entered my vehicle since I’d parked earlier on in the evening so how they were able to justify searching it was beyond me) Then, they asked very seriously and accusingly ¨Why do you have a baseball bat in your SUV?¨  I told them that if they would notice that the back of the vehicle was used for transporting my black lab as it had a dog blanket, black hair, and a big ball with teeth marks in it from when I would hit the ball for him to fetch…with said baseball bat.

They never cared to get a statement from me about the assault that had taken place; the issue now was what to do with me? I was charged with public intoxication, carrying a weapon, criminal mischief, and disorderly conduct. They did let me go in time to hitch a ride home with my girlfriend and meanwhile got my vehicle towed as well.

Jay Young

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KC Activist Warns Drivers of Checkpoints

Armed with Twitter, Ustream, and a “Checkpoint Ahead” sign Michael Mikkelsen, of Kansas City, hopes to bring attention to the Fourth and Fifth Amendment violations inherent in DUI checkpoints and to help drivers avoid such checkpoints in the Kansas City area. In the course of Mikkelsen’s checkpoint protests he has endured harassment by Kansas City police officers, including being handcuffed and placed in a patrol car.  Recently, in a brazen act of armed criminal theft, a Kansas City police officer stole Mikkelsen’s “Checkpoint Ahead” sign right out of his hands.  According to Mikkelson:

I was engaged in a 1st (First) Amendment protected political protest. There was an obvious public interest for the speech that I was providing to the community. Officer Stewart observed my protest for approx. 10 to 15 minutes from across the intersection. I was holding a 2ft by 4ft coroplast sign. Officer Stewart was in a white marked police van with lights. She turned on the lights and pulled up next to the sidewalk that I was holding my sign on. She got out of the vehicle and approached me asking what I was doing. She did not ask me to leave or accuse me of a crime. She grabbed my sign and I said, “Please do not touch my sign.” She then pulled the sign out of my hands bent/folded it and put it in the passenger seat of her van. I asked her nicely “will you please give me back my property?” She said, “No.” I asked her for her name and she said it was officer Stewart. I turned and walked away. She drove up beside me as I was walking away and asked my name. Then she drove off with my sign.

I went to the police station at 1200 E. Linwood to report the theft of my sign, the violation of my free speech rights, and to inquire about getting my property back. I spoke with Office Zeplin and then Sgt. Cutburth (#692) who refused to take my criminal complaint of theft. After multiple inquiries about the location of my property, Cutburth informed me that officer Stewart took my property to the DUI checkpoint. I went to the DUI checkpoint and inquired. I was told that my sign had been put in truck #308 and taken to the police gas station at 1245 Prospect. I recovered my sign on a bench at the front of the service station building.I spoke with Sgt. Sticken at East Patrol who was told by Officer Stewart’s supervisor Sgt. Lenz, that there was not an incident  report regarding my property and the custody thereof.

 

I know some who read this will say, “But drunk drivers are dangerous, I support these checkpoints, Mikkelson deserved to get his sign stolen”.  I will not argue here whether or not DUI should be a crime.  I will argue, however, that even if you think DUI should be illegal, checkpoints are not effective and the money spent on this type of enforcement is mostly wasted.  In fact, checkpoints are so ineffective that the intrusion on our right to be secure in our person and papers cannot be justified and neither can the cost.

Based on self-reporting surveys, there are 147 million incidents of driving while impaired by alcohol every year.  That is over 400,000 incidents of alcohol impaired driving every day. Of these incidents, 0.00007% (30 per day) result in death.  The overwhelming majority of alcohol-impaired drivers make it home safely.  The number of drunk drivers who will actually cause  fatal accidents is so low, that it is unlikely that taking the 1.7 million arrested every year off the road would have much of an impact on the number of fatalities.  It is even more unlikely that an alcohol-impaired driver who would have caused a fatal accident will be caught during a checkpoint.  Despite this fact, millions of dollars are spent to enforce DUI laws utilizing checkpoints. Knowing these numbers, would you voluntarily write out a check to support enforcement using checkpoints?

Some of you would no doubt say yes, you are willing to fund the millions that are spent on enforcement because you think it would be worth it if it saved even one of those 30 people a day.  You should still be very skeptical of the usefulness of checkpoints.  Saturation patrols, where officers saturate an area known to have a high rate of alcohol-related accidents, have been shown to be more effective in catching drunk drivers.  The officers on these patrols look for signs of impaired driving, such as crossing over the middle line, and then make a stop.  Instead of just herding every vehicle on a particular street into a line and demanding “your papers, please”, they actually make stops based on the suspicion that someone is impaired.  Also, since they are looking for obvious signs of impaired driving, they are more likely to catch the drivers who are the most drunk and therefore the most dangerous (67% of drunk drivers involved in fatal accidents have a BAC greater than 0.15.)

Saturation patrols are not just less intrusive and more effective than checkpoints, they are also  less expensive.   Between 2006 and 2007, for example, Independence, MO, which is a suburb of Kansas City, spent $247.09 per arrest using checkpoints, and only $31.79 per arrest using saturation patrols.

Should we continue to put up with the intrusiveness of DUI checkpoints when they are unlikely to save lives?  Should we tolerate their intrusiveness when there are less meddlesome and less expensive alternatives?

 

 

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Ziggy Marley: Why Marijuana Should Be Legal

Ziggy Marley: Why Marijuana Should Be Legal

ziggymarley 2 Ziggy Marley: Why Marijuana Should Be Legal

Ziggy Marley recently did an interview with US Magazine with the release of his fourth solo album on the horizon. They talked about the new album, his family, the 30th anniversary of his fathers death, and of course his views on marijuana. Here is an excerpt of the interview:

US: Marijuana is also a topic on the album and your new comic book, Marijuana Man. Why do you think it should be legalized in America?

ZM: Alcohol, tobacco, and pharmaceutical drugs are legal but they can hurt a lot of people. People get high from cough syrup that they can easily purchase at the pharmacy. Marijuana has a lot of benefits that we should utilize. People shouldn’t go to jail for smoking marijuana in the privacy of their homes or be criminalized or demonized by that. I don’t think it is as detrimental as alcohol in terms of the effects it has on society and people’s lives. Anything can be abused and overdosed so you have to be responsible. Plus, the industrial aspect of marijuana has had a bigger impact on society than even the recreation or medicinal uses. If people can utilize a natural resource properly, the impact it would have on the environment and the economy would be great. The argument against marijuana is confusing and hypocritical and stupid. It is a natural resource that we should use.

Ziggy nails it on the head, it’s absolutely disgusting that people think they can rule over your own body, that they know what’s best for you. People got upset over the NYPD confiscating 2.5 tons of illegal fireworks and blowing them up, claiming freedom this and that. But a plant? No, no, no, confiscate that shit, we can’t have people making their own decision there, that’s dangerous. Ziggy also spoke about his comic book

US: Why did you launch the comic book?
ZM: It was a creative outlet for me since I had a lot of ideas my head. I grew up in the comic book world and I used to read comics all the time. It was just a way for me to express the ideas I have about hemp. I have also always wanted to have a superhero. The superhero in my book is just like a kin to Superman and the Green Lantern guys, a superhero for the next generation.

ziggymarleymarijunamanfull Ziggy Marley: Why Marijuana Should Be Legal

Enforcement of the Drug War in the United States has resulted in 32 deaths so far in 2011, the latest being Nelson Reeves, a 17 year old in the Bronx who was shot by a NYPD narcotics officer when a drug deal went awry. Whenever you outlaw something, the demand does not go away and the supply, manufacture and selling goes underground to the black market, which attracts many shady people.

Some people are block-headed enough to think that drugs need to be illegal because of all the violence associated with people who use or sell them. They aren’t with it enough to realize it’s the illegality that leads to all the violence. Before alcohol prohibition you never had gangs running around and killing each other over alcohol, and you don’t have it now that it’s legal. Without alcohol prohibition you never would have had Al Capone and events like the St. Valentines Day Massacre.

Alcohol prohibition brought us bathtub gin, gin made by amateurs in their bathtubs and contaminated with god knows what. Just the same, drug prohibition has brought us amateurs cooking meth in their kitchens and lacing other drugs with deadly chemicals whether on purpose or by accident, leading to medical related deaths. Deaths that most likely would not happen if all drugs were legal and able to be made in controlled environments by professionals.

Drug prohibition, just like alcohol prohibition, leads to a number of cops becoming corrupt. Drug dealers are always looking for ways to get their products past law enforcement in order to meet their customers demand, so they buy off easily corruptible cops to look the other way as they move their merchandise. The more the government cracks down, the more expensive the drugs become and the more they have to pay the cops to allow them to continue business. The police are even sometimes just as bad as the drug dealing gang members they vow to fight, as one teenager in Pakistan just found out when he reported on some local cops dealing drugs.

The insane Drug War has caused a lot of damage to cops reputations across the United States and around the world as well. With so much money to be made due to the black market aspect, some cops will become drug dealers themselves, often selling drugs confiscated during raids of other dealers homes. Three Philadelphia police officers were arrested for this very thing last summer. And two years ago a undercover cop in North Carolina was caught selling drugs to another undercover cop. I could go on and on, or you could look it up for yourself. I googled  ”Cops Dealing Drugs” and received over 62 million results.

There is more to the rise in crime than just selling drugs. As the prices continue to rise with every crackdown, a drug users habit becomes more and more expensive and they get more desperate. They begin robbing places like convenience stores and banks and break into homes, and some even kill during the robberies. And nothing highlights the governments failure in the War on Drugs better than their inability to keep drugs out of their own prison. Prison guards are arrested constantly for smuggling drugs into prison, and why not, it pays well and they have a family to feed during a recession.

And then there is the jails where they keep all these drug offenders. In what is always labeled as the Land of the Free, prisons are constantly overcrowded as some holler for more prisons to be built to house all these lawbreakers. The “Land of the Free”(sic) over 2.5 million people were in jail as of 2006, the number of people in prison in the entire world at that time was estimated at 9.25 million. If you do the math it comes out to 27% of the worlds prison population(The US has less than 5% of the worlds total population), many of them peaceful people who chose to put something into their body the government decided to say they couldn’t.

To better put those numbers into perspective, nations generally regarded as being totalitarian and oppressive like Russia and China have far less people in prison. Russia’s prison population was just under 870,000 in October of 2006, down from over 1 million in 2002. China’s prison population was estimated at 2 million in 2005. But as you can see in the map below, China only had between 100-150 people per 100,000 in prison in 2008. Russia has nearly 600 per 100,000 people. The “Land of the Free” is the only country with over 700 people per 100,000 in prison.

 Ziggy Marley: Why Marijuana Should Be Legal

 

You might think that we just have a lot of violent people who are doing terrible things, except that of the over 2.5 million people in US prisons, nearly half of them are drug users. According to Drug Sense, over 967,000 people have been arrested in the United States so far in 2011 for Drug War offenses. That number is expected to exceed the 1,663, 582 arrests in 2009.  And that budget crisis everyone is worried about, well the Feds spent $15 billion last year on the Drug War alone, or $500 a second. So far they have spent $8.75 billion this year. The prison population in this country has grown by more than 43,000 prisoners a year on average since December 31,1995. Twenty-five percent of that are people who violated some form of drug law. The number of people in state prisons for drug offenses has increased 550 percent over the last 20 years. (A Salon article last year put the number in federal prison at half the total population

If you support the drug war, you are supporting gangs, corrupt police, robbery, murder and overcrowded prisons. So don’t blame us when we judge you for it.

Supporting the drug war means supporting innocent deaths at the hands of police, who sometimes get the wrong addresses. Some of those stories have been covered here at Cop Block (see here, here, and here)

There are many brutal consequences to this War on Drugs and it’s time to end this abject failure. Some state governments are beginning to realize this, my state of Indiana being the latest.

Ziggy Marley is the man for speaking out and for that we should all support this man

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Alyona Show: How to cop proof your cell phone

This video gives some helpful tips for keeping personal information stored on your cell phone private in the event that it is seized by the police:

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Indiana No Longer The Hoosier State, Now The Police State

Indiana No Longer The Hoosier State, Now The Police State

The NorthWest Indiana Times reports on an unfortunate ruling by the Indiana Supreme Court. The great state of Indiana, where I have lived my entire life, is no longer the Hoosier state, but the Police State. Hoosiers no longer have the right to resist unlawful entries into their homes by police officers.

It reminds me of the speech V gave on TV in V for Vendetta

Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, think, and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillence coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who’s to blame? Well, certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you’re looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn’t be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to the now High Chancellor, Adam Sutler. He promised you order, he promised you peace, and all he demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent.

police state Indiana No Longer The Hoosier State, Now The Police State

Just read this disgusting ruling as reported by the Times.

Overturning a common law dating back to the English Magna Carta of 1215, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Hoosiers have no right to resist unlawful police entry into their homes.

In a 3-2 decision, Justice Steven David writing for the court said if a police officer wants to enter a home for any reason or no reason at all, a homeowner cannot do anything to block the officer’s entry.

“We believe … a right to resist an unlawful police entry into a home is against public policy and is incompatible with modern Fourth Amendment jurisprudence,” David said. “We also find that allowing resistance unnecessarily escalates the level of violence and therefore the risk of injuries to all parties involved without preventing the arrest.”

David said a person arrested following an unlawful entry by police still can be released on bail and has plenty of opportunities to protest the illegal entry through the court system.

The court’s decision stems from a Vanderburgh County case in which police were called to investigate a husband and wife arguing outside their apartment.

When the couple went back inside their apartment, the husband told police they were not needed and blocked the doorway so they could not enter. When an officer entered anyway, the husband shoved the officer against a wall. A second officer then used a stun gun on the husband and arrested him.

Professor Ivan Bodensteiner, of Valparaiso University School of Law, said the court’s decision is consistent with the idea of preventing violence.

“It’s not surprising that they would say there’s no right to beat the hell out of the officer,” Bodensteiner said. “(The court is saying) we would rather opt on the side of saying if the police act wrongfully in entering your house your remedy is under law, to bring a civil action against the officer.”

Justice Robert Rucker, a Gary native, and Justice Brent Dickson, a Hobart native, dissented from the ruling, saying the court’s decision runs afoul of the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

“In my view the majority sweeps with far too broad a brush by essentially telling Indiana citizens that government agents may now enter their homes illegally – that is, without the necessity of a warrant, consent or exigent circumstances,” Rucker said. “I disagree.”

Rucker and Dickson suggested if the court had limited its permission for police entry to domestic violence situations they would have supported the ruling.

But Dickson said, “The wholesale abrogation of the historic right of a person to reasonably resist unlawful police entry into his dwelling is unwarranted and unnecessarily broad.”

This is the second major Indiana Supreme Court ruling this week involving police entry into a home.

On Tuesday, the court said police serving a warrant may enter a home without knocking if officers decide circumstances justify it. Prior to that ruling, police serving a warrant would have to obtain a judge’s permission to enter without knocking.

The state I have called home all 28 years of my life is now officially a police state, and there’s no hiding it anymore. The law does not apply to cops and that is tyranny, that is oppression, that is what fascist regimes do, not free countries. Sadly, most people will never know about this ruling or they will be to afraid to speak out against it.

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