Run For Your Life: The American Police State Is Coming To Get You

Authored by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

“We’ve reached the point where state actors can penetrate rectums and vaginas, where judges can order forced catheterizations, and where police and medical personnel can perform scans, enemas and colonoscopies without the suspect’s consent. And these procedures aren’t to nab kingpins or cartels, but people who at worst are hiding an amount of drugs that can fit into a body cavity. In most of these cases, they were suspected only of possession or ingestion. Many of them were innocent... But these tactics aren’t about getting drugs off the street... These tactics are instead about degrading and humiliating a class of people that politicians and law enforcement have deemed the enemy.”—Radley Balko, The Washington Post

Daily, all across America, individuals who dare to resist—or even question—a police order are being subjected to all sorts of government-sanctioned abuse ranging from forced catheterization, forced blood draws, roadside strip searches and cavity searches, and other foul and debasing acts that degrade their bodily integrity and leave them bloodied and bruised.

Americans as young as 4 years old are being leg shackled, handcuffed, tasered and held at gun point for not being quiet, not being orderly and just being childlike—i.e., not being compliant enough.

Government social workers actually subjected a 3-year-old boy to a forced catheterization after he was unable to provide them with a urine sample on demand (the boy still wasn’t potty trained). The boy was held down, screaming in pain, while nurses forcibly inserted a tube into his penis to drain his bladder—all of this done because the boy’s mother’s boyfriend had failed a urine analysis for drugs.

Americans as old as 95 are being beaten, shot and killed for questioning an order, hesitating in the face of a directive, and mistaking a policeman crashing through their door for a criminal breaking into their home—i.e., not being submissive enough.

Consider what happened to David Dao, the United Airlines passenger who was accosted by three police, forcibly wrenched from his seat across the armrest, bloodying his face in the process, and dragged down the aisle by the arms merely for refusing to relinquish his paid seat after the airline chose him randomly to be bumped from the flight—after being checked in and allowed to board—so that airline workers could make a connecting flight.

Those with ADHD, autism, hearing impairments, dementia or some other disability that can hinder communication in the slightest way are in even greater danger of having their actions misconstrued by police. Police shot a 73-year-old-man with dementia seven times after he allegedly failed to respond to orders to stop approaching and remove his hands from his jacket. The man was unarmed and had been holding a crucifix.

Clearly, it no longer matters where you live.

Big city or small town: it’s the same scenario being played out over and over again in which government agents, hyped up on their own authority and the power of their uniform, ride roughshod over the citizenry who—in the eyes of the government—are viewed as having no rights.

Our freedoms—especially the Fourth Amendment—continue to be torn asunder by the prevailing view among government bureaucrats that they have the right to search, seize, strip, scan, spy on, probe, pat down, taser, and arrest any individual at any time and for the slightest provocation.

Forced cavity searches, forced colonoscopies, forced blood draws, forced breath-alcohol tests, forced DNA extractions, forced eye scans, forced inclusion in biometric databases—these are just a few ways in which Americans continue to be reminded that we have no control over what happens to our bodies during an encounter with government officials.

For instance, during a “routine” traffic stop for allegedly “rolling” through a stop sign, Charnesia Corley was thrown to the ground, stripped of her clothes, and forced to spread her legs while Texas police officers subjected her to a roadside cavity probe, all because they claimed to have smelled marijuana in her car.

Angel Dobbs and her 24-year-old niece, Ashley, were pulled over by a Texas state trooper for allegedly flicking cigarette butts out of the car window. Insisting that he smelled marijuana, the trooper proceeded to interrogate them and search the car. Despite the fact that both women denied smoking or possessing any marijuana, the police officer then called in a female trooper, who carried out a roadside cavity search, sticking her fingers into the older woman’s anus and vagina, then performing the same procedure on the younger woman, wearing the same pair of gloves. No marijuana was found.

Leila Tarantino was subjected to two roadside strip searches in plain view of passing traffic during a routine traffic stop, while her two children—ages 1 and 4—waited inside her car. During the second strip search, presumably in an effort to ferret out drugs, a female officer “forcibly removed” a tampon from Tarantino. Nothing illegal was found.

David Eckert was forced to undergo an anal cavity search, three enemas, and a colonoscopy after allegedly failing to yield to a stop sign at a Wal-Mart parking lot. Cops justified the searches on the grounds that they suspected Eckert was carrying drugs because his “posture [was] erect” and “he kept his legs together.” No drugs were found.

Meanwhile, four Milwaukee police officers were charged with carrying out rectal searches of suspects on the street and in police district stations over the course of several years. One of the officers was accused of conducting searches of men’s anal and scrotal areas, often inserting his fingers into their rectums and leaving some of his victims with bleeding rectums.

Incidents like these - sanctioned by the courts and conveniently overlooked by the legislatures - teach Americans of every age and skin color the painful lesson that there are no limits to what the government can do in its so-called “pursuit” of law and order.

If this is a war, then “we the people” are the enemy.

As Radley Balko notes in The Washington Post, “When you’re at war, it’s important to dehumanize your enemy. And there’s nothing more dehumanizing than forcibly and painfully invading someone’s body — all the better if you can involve the sex organs.”

The message being beaten, shot, tasered, probed and slammed into our collective consciousness is simply this: it doesn’t matter if you’re in the right, it doesn’t matter if a cop is in the wrong, it doesn’t matter if you’re being treated with less than the respect you deserve or the law demands.

The only thing that matters to the American police state is that you comply, submit, respect authority and generally obey without question whatever a government official (anyone who wears a government uniform, be it a police officer, social worker, petty bureaucrat or zoning official) tells you to do.

This is what happens when you allow the government to call the shots: it becomes a bully.

As history shows, this recipe for disaster works every time: take police officers hyped up on their own authority and the power of the badge, throw in a few court rulings suggesting that security takes precedence over individual rights, set it against a backdrop of endless wars and militarized law enforcement, and then add to the mix a populace distracted by entertainment, out of touch with the workings of their government, and more inclined to let a few sorry souls suffer injustice than to challenge the status quo.

“It is not only under Nazi rule that police excesses are inimical to freedom,” warned former Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter in a 1946 ruling in Davis v. United States: “It is easy to make light of insistence on scrupulous regard for the safeguards of civil liberties when invoked on behalf of the unworthy. It is too easy. History bears testimony that by such disregard are the rights of liberty extinguished, heedlessly at first, then stealthily, and brazenly in the end.”

In other words, if it could happen in Nazi Germany, it can just as easily happen here.

It is happening here.

Unfortunately, we’ve been marching in lockstep with the police state for so long that we’ve forgotten how to march to the tune of our own revolutionary drummer. In fact, we’ve even forgotten the words to the tune.

We’ve learned the lessons of compliance too well.

For too long, “we the people” have allowed the government to ride roughshod over the Constitution, equating patriotism with blind obedience to the government’s dictates, no matter how unconstitutional or immoral those actions might be.

As historian Howard Zinn recognized:

Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is the numbers of people all over the world who have obeyed the dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and millions have been killed because of this obedience… Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world, in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand thieves are running the country. That"s our problem… people are obedient, all these herdlike people.

What can you do?

It’s simple but as I detail in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, the consequences may be deadly.

Stop being so obedient. Stop being so compliant and herdlike. Stop kowtowing to anyone and everyone in uniform. Stop perpetuating the false notion that those who work for the government—the president, Congress, the courts, the military, the police—are in any way superior to the rest of the citizenry. Stop playing politics with your principles. Stop making excuses for the government’s growing list of human rights abuses and crimes. Stop turning a blind eye to the government’s corruption and wrongdoing and theft and murder. Stop tolerating ineptitude and incompetence by government workers. Stop allowing the government to treat you like a second-class citizen. Stop censoring what you say and do for fear that you might be labeled an extremist or worse, unpatriotic. Stop sitting silently on the sidelines while the police state kills, plunders and maims your fellow citizens.

Stop being a slave.

As anti-war activist Rosa Luxemburg concluded, “Those who do not move, do not notice their chains.”

You may not realize it yet, but you are not free.

If you believe otherwise, it is only because you have made no real attempt to exercise your freedoms.

Had you attempted to exercise your freedoms before now by questioning a police officer’s authority, challenging an unjust tax or fine, protesting the government’s endless wars, defending your right to privacy against the intrusion of surveillance cameras, or any other effort that challenges the government’s power grabs and the generally lopsided status quo, you would have already learned the hard way that the police state has no appetite for freedom and it does not tolerate resistance.

This is called authoritarianism, a.k.a. totalitarianism, a.k.a. oppression.

As Glenn Greenwald notes for the Guardian:

Oppression is designed to compel obedience and submission to authority. Those who voluntarily put themselves in that state – by believing that their institutions of authority are just and good and should be followed rather than subverted – render oppression redundant, unnecessary. Of course people who think and behave this way encounter no oppression. That"s their reward for good, submissive behavior. They are left alone by institutions of power because they comport with the desired behavior of complacency and obedience without further compulsion. But the fact that good, obedient citizens do not themselves perceive oppression does not mean that oppression does not exist.

Get ready to stand your ground or run for your life, because the American police state is coming to get you.

‘Hero’ Sheriff Clarke Sued for Dehydrating Man to Death as He Begged for Water

Milwaukee, WI — Terrill Thomas’ life gradually slipped away as he languished behind the bars of a solitary confinement cell begging guards for water after they shut it off — a request repeated vociferously by fellow inmates nearby — but for at least six days, at least ten jailers ignored his cries for the most basic human need.

“Prisoners confined near Terrill Thomas’s cell overheard his cries for water for days,” court documents state, “yet correctional, medical and psychological personnel ignored those cries and never gave Terrill Thomas water, presumably as some misguided form of punishment or retribution for the alleged crimes that brought him to the justice facility.”

Thomas eventually succumbed to dehydration — he died because guards in the Milwaukee County jail never bothered to turn the water that had stopped flowing to the 38-year-old’s cell back on.

Now, Thomas’ children — Terrill Barnes, Curtis Piggee, and Amari Thomas-Acosta, a minor, and his mother Michelle Thomas-Acosta — have filed a lawsuit against Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke, Jr., saying their beloved family member endured appalling torture by dying of thirst.

In fact, guards systematically shut off water to Thomas and other inmates, the lawsuit contends, meaning his death was not only preventable, but cruel.

According to the complaint, Sheriff Clarke “was deliberately indifferent to the serious medical needs and Constitutional rights” of Thomas, and “ignored the Justice Facility’s staff’s lack of sufficient training in policies and procedures, both written and unwritten, to adequately address” Thomas and “other inmates in need of medical care.”

Clarke, who did not comment publicly on the lawsuit, has been particularly indurate in discussing the death of Terrill Thomas — despite contention and negative publicity surrounding the case, the sheriff has claimed to the media he doesn’t even know the name of the man who perished in the jail he oversees under horrific, inhumane conditions.

Instead of offering condolences to the family, Clarke arrogantly scolded the press — and suggested the crime Thomas committed was befitting the death penalty.

“I have nearly 1000 inmates. I don’t know all their names but is this the guy who was in custody for shooting up the Potawatomi Casino causing one man to be hit by gunfire while in possession of a firearm by a career convicted felon?” Clarke reportedly stated in an email to the Associated Press, according to Courthouse News Service. “The media never reports that in stories about him. If that is him, then at least I know who you are talking about.”

Milwaukee County, the Milwaukee County Behavioral Health Division, Armor Correctional Health Services Inc., Richard E. Schmidt, inspector for the sheriff’s office, and two corrections officers are also named in the wrongful death lawsuit.

Milwaukee police arrested Terrill Thomas after responding to calls of shots being fired at the Potawatomi Casino on April 14, 2016. Once charged, Thomas was transported to the Milwaukee County jail, where corrections officers immediately placed him in the special housing unit — comprised of one-man cells locked down 24 hours per day — due to both his charges and alleged behavior.

Because inmates in the unit never leave their cells, corrections staff must diligently monitor their welfare and ensure no physical, psychiatric, or other issues go unanswered.

But, in the case of Thomas, that didn’t happen.

In fact, as the lawsuit explains, the water to the man’s cell was turned off at some point — leaving him without a drinking source or even water to flush the toilet. Fellow inmate Marcus Berry also yelled for corrections staff to procure water for Thomas — particularly throughout the day before the man died.

“Mr. Berry was in a cell across from Terrill Thomas the last six days of Terrill Thomas’s life. Mr. Berry’s urging and pleas were repeatedly ignored by the defendants,” the 25-page court document states.

A guard discovered Thomas “lying naked on the floor of his cell” — a detail characterized as “normal behavior” by the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office — during a routine check on April 24, ten days after his arrest.

“They found Mr. Thomas at 1:37 in the morning,” said the family’s attorney during a recent press conference, as quoted by the Daily News. “He was in full rigor. That means for at least for to eight hours, this man was dead in that cell.”

READ MORE:  Leaked Video Shows Police Chief Candidate Sadistically Tasering Non-Combative Inmates

Corrections officers observed “dried blood around [Thomas’] groin and trailing down his right leg, which was clearly visible upon inspection of his naked body.”

The Milwaukee County Medical Examiner ruled Thomas’ death by dehydration a homicide — but his children go further, saying in the lawsuit he had been “subjected to a form of torture by being intentionally and/or recklessly denied hydration.”

Notably, the lawsuit contends that — because Thomas had an extensive record, including multiple occasions incarcerated by the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office — authorities “had a well-documented history of medical and psychological issues or disorders,” and thus should have been familiar with the man and prepared to handle him appropriately.

Clarke, in particular, has faced a string of lawsuits related to inexcusable and inexplicable deaths in custody — including that of a newborn baby.

“[I]nmate Shadé Swayzer, who was eight months pregnant, gave birth alone in her maximum-security cell and her baby died hours later as a result of correctional staff’s alleged refusal to provide care,” Courthouse News reports.

Known for unabashed ambivalence to protesters, hatred of criminals, and authoritarianism paralleled only by Arizona’s notorious Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Sheriff David Clarke is an ardent supporter of President Donald Trump and was recently passed over to head the Department of Homeland Security.

But the radical authoritarian naturally finds himself embroiled in controversy time and again, with such incendiary statements as what he told FOX News host, Jeanine Pirro, in 2015, on the subject of protesters:

“This slime needs to be eradicated from American society and American culture.”

READ MORE:  Man Escapes 5 Year Sentence After Dashcam Footage Shows Cops Assaulting Him, Cops Indicted

Thomas’ family seeks compensatory and punitive damages — and emphasize people experience difficulties, but they still have human, civil, and constitutional rights.

“In life you encounter times where you might not be yourself,” Terrill Thomas, Jr., noted during a press conference Friday. “People might judge you; they might think that you’re something that you’re not. This is the case where the people thought that my dad was something that he wasn’t.”

Woman Calls 911 for Help, Serial Rapist Cop Shows Up, Violently Raped Her

MILWAUKEE (CN) – Milwaukee’s failure to remove a rapist from its police force will cost the city $2.5 million in a civil settlement, according to a letter from the city attorney.

Iema Lemons sued the city, the police chief and Ladmarald Cates, a former officer who is now serving a 24-year federal prison term for violently raping her after she called to report vandalism to her home, the 2013 complaint states.

Although Cates was the subject of multiple complaints regarding his on- and off-duty behavior, prior to July 16, 2010, the date of Lemons’ rape, he was not removed from the force and remained in daily contact with the public while performing his duties.

Complaints against Cates included a domestic violence arrest for choking and pushing his girlfriend, who was also a police officer, and accusations of sexual misconduct made in 2005 against Cates by a female inmate.

Cates was again accused of sexual misconduct in 2007 after a woman arrested for theft claimed he had sex with her in a jail cell after promising he would get her released if she complied. Her case was eventually closed without proper investigation, Lemons claims in her suit.

Lemons asserts in her lawsuit that Cates qualified as a sexual predator, since the first allegation involved a female inmate who was severely intoxicated and the second involved one who was clearly mentally ill, and that “Sex with a prisoner constitutes criminal sexual assault.”

Also in 2007, Cates was accused of sexual misconduct while on duty, this time with a minor, but again the witness was considered unreliable. Police Chief Edward Flynn, who had by then replaced the former chief, admitted while being deposed that the allegations against Cates were “disturbing,” but did nothing to discipline him.

READ MORE:  Drug War Blowback: Vegas Murderers were Police Informants

When officers responded to Lemons’ call in 2010, they did not address her complaints of bricks being thrown through her window, the complaint states. Instead, they arrested her brother, and while he and Cates’ partner was in the squad car, Cates cornered Lemons in her bathroom.

Cates was armed when he repeatedly ordered Lemons to perform oral sex on him.

“She was afraid he would kill her if she did not comply with his demand and that, as a police officer any story he invented to cover such use of force would be believed,” the complaint states.

While he forced Lemons to perform oral sex, Cates “shov[ed] his fingers into her vagina,” then strangled her as he forced his penis inside her vagina, according to the complaint.

After she collapsed on the porch following the rape, the officers arrested her, falsely claiming she had assaulted Cates’ partner. On the way to the police station, officers ignored her repeated requests for help and claims she had been raped.

When she arrived, Lemons was handcuffed to a table, and Cates was allowed to enter the room, according to the complaint.

“Cates threatened Iema that other police officers would attack her if she continued to claim she had been raped,” the complaint states. “He also told her that, if she withdrew her claim, she would only get a ticket for her alleged criminal conduct…Cates told her that, even if she continued to say he raped her, he would only get suspended.”

Though that had been the case in the past, this time Flynn fired Cates for his sexual misconduct, albeit five months after the rape.

READ MORE:  Innocent Unarmed Man Shot in the Head While Asking Cops for Help has to Sue to Get Justice

During an internal affairs investigation that followed Lemons’ rape accusation, Cates lied and said he had no sexual contact with Lemons, but later changed his story and admitted to on-duty sexual contact, claiming it was consensual.

Though the Milwaukee County district attorney declined to pursue charges, the U.S. Department of Justice took up the case, resulting in a 24-year prison sentence for Cates in 2012.

Deputy City Attorney Miriam Horwitz, who frequently handles police misconduct claims against the city, has asked the Milwaukee Common Council to approve a $2.5 million settlement in Lemons’ civil suit, which will absolve all parties in the case.

“As the matter proceeded to the January 9, 2017 trial date, mediation resulted in a proposed settlement of 2.5 million dollars, inclusive of all claims for damages against all parties, and inclusive of attorney fees and costs,” Horwitz’ Jan. 13 letter states. “The City Attorney now recommends settlement of this matter for the total sum of $2.5 million as recommended by the magistrate judge.”

A voicemail left with the Office of the City Attorney before business hours Tuesday was not immediately returned.

Lemons’ attorneys declined to comment.

Milwaukee Cop Who Killed Sylville Smith, Just Arrested for Raping Another Man

Milwaukee, WI — When Sylville Smith, 23,  was shot and killed at a traffic stop by police on Aug. 16^th in broad daylight in Milwaukee, WI, his homicide set off violent riots which lasted for days, destroying property, and injuring several other police officers in the process. Dozens were arrested, and the National Guard was called in before order was eventually restored.

At the time of the killing, Sherelle Smith (sister), questioned her brother’s slaying, and openly wondered if the police officer who killed her brother, Dominique Heaggan-Brown, 24, had killed her brother out of jealousy, as the two personally knew each other having grown up attending the same high school.

Smith’s claim her brother was killed by a jealous peace officer, will now have to be revisited, as the man responsible for killing her brother, Heaggan-Brown, has been arrested, but not for Smith’s death. On the contrary, Heaggan-Brown was arrested and charged with felony rape of another man.

The alleged rape occurred on Sunday, the day after Heaggan-Brown had been placed on mandatory leave of duty, pursuant to the officer-involved shooting investigation. Heaggan-Brown met up with the victim, who said he met through Facebook. The two had for drinks at a bar and watched television news coverage of the riots for which the officer’s actions were responsible. According to The Washington Post, the victim said the officer of the peace was, bragging, “about being able to do whatever [he] wanted without repercussions.” After drinking for about an hour-and-a-half, the two men left together, according to the criminal complaint’s citation of security footage.

The victim alleges that Heaggan-Brown must have drugged him, because what he remembers is waking up to the police officer sodomizing him. After attempting to move away, he was reportedly told “no” and wasn’t allowed to do so.

After the rape concluded, the police officer then drove the victim to the hospital at 4:16 am, and reportedly told hospital staff the victim “began to act weird and unresponsive” while the two were at the bar. After staying only 20 minutes, Heaggan-Brown then left the hospital and the victim in the care of the emergency room personnel.

According to the police investigation into the rape allegations, the victim “exhibited signs of trauma” during the police detective’s interview. As a result, a criminal investigation of officer Heaggan-Brown was launched and turned up some very incriminating evidence.

Apparently knowing he was guilty of rape, the alleged rapist then texted Sgt. Joseph Hall, his police mentor, describing his involvement into, “a separate situation” and saying he had goofed up, “big time.” He asked his mentor to help him “handle this [situation in] the most secret and right way possible.” Heaggan-Brown met Hall to discuss the situation in which he described having “consensual sex” with the victim but stated, the victim “was drunk and had ‘medical issues.’”

A week went by before investigators contacted Heaggan-Brown, but when they did they confiscated his phone and searched his home, turning up photos of other sex acts with other men (on the phone) and locating the victim’s shirt, belt, and cell phone in the officer’s car. According to the Post, “While searching Heaggan-Brown’s phone after the initial complaint, authorities then said they discovered evidence he had tried to offer two other people money for sex. They also found images of what the complaint stated were nude photos of another person, some showing sexual contact. This person told police they did not consent to any sexual contact or the nude photos, the complaint stated.”

Heaggan-Brown, Sylville Smith’s killer and now alleged rapist, faces up to 40 years in prison and 100,000 dollars in fines. “In addition to the assault charges, Heaggan-Brown has also been charged with two counts of prostitution, a misdemeanor, and a felony count of taking a nude photo of someone without their consent,” according to the Post. He pleaded not guilty in court Thursday, to the misdemeanors, and has been suspended with pay, even though he has also been charged internally by police for having violated the department’s code of conduct.

The investigation into Smith’s murder, and Heaggan-Brown’s rape charges, are being treated as two separate investigations.

Sylville Smith’s killing was vehemently justified by Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke who claimed Smith would likely still be alive had he been in jail where he belonged. Clarke said Smith was given “light sanctions” for his lengthy criminal record.

But Smith’s cousin says he was constantly being profiled by police, and even more so after Smith won a harassment lawsuit against the police. His family contends Smith was a lawful concealed carry permit holder, who was shot in the back as he ran from authorities. They also maintain he ran from police because he had already spent 10 months in jail for a crime which they say was later dismissed. “He is not a felon. If he was a felon, he would never have been able to get the CCW,” his cousin stated.

And now it’s too late. Smith is dead, and the police officer involved in his homicide is now behind bars, awaiting trial, not for killing another black man, but for the felonious rape of another man, prostitution, and felony possession of nude photos taken without the victim’s consent.

When will the police start to listen to the community? Smith’s sister Sherelle knew something was wrong. She knew the man who killed her brother had a beef that went all the way back to high school.

Maybe if they’ll start to listen and open a dialog, instead of immediately defending their boys in blue, printing out the victim’s rap sheet, and cranking up their public relation’s spin machine, something could be done to change the fear currently being felt in communities across the country.