Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Today’s grave robbers exploit the dead, harm the living

Lou Ann Anderson www.EstateofDenial.com

Inheritance rights are becoming an increasingly contentious issue here in the U.S. as growing numbers of Involuntary Redistribution of Assets (IRA) cases surface. That is, efforts to divert assets (via wills, trusts or guardianships) in a manner contrary to the known wishes of a decedent or disabled/incapacitated person.

This is not a problem confined to the U.S. as evidenced by Diarmuid Hannigan, an Australian businessman, whose book Lawyers or Grave Robbers? describes looting actions perpetrated on his late mother’s estate. These acts are often prompted by a disgruntled family member or wannabe heir, but they can also occur at the hand (or in concert) with an unscrupulous lawyer.

Read it all here=>>

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Retirees Beware

We’ve posted a sickening story out of Oregon about a woman named Connie Gay Cole who, per the story, stole assets valued at approximately $500,000 from her grandparents leaving them in their 90s and penniless. Cole is now in jail while her grandparents live in an assisted living facility at taxpayer expense.

What’s frightening is how many Connie Gay Coles are outside prison and perpetrating similar acts with which they will get away. Welcome to life in the Land of the Gimme-Gimmes and the Home of the I-Want-Mores!

And speaking of heinous situations, EstateofDenial.com applauds our friend Eric Baxter in taking a new approach with regard to the questionable circumstances of his father’s death. At his web site, Eric has posted three polls that describe scenarios related to August C. Baxter’s 2005 death with readers now having an opportunity to weigh in.

One of the polls, Is This Homicide?, is prefaced with a reminder that Natchitoches, LA, the town in which August Baxter died, is often listed as a top U.S. retirement spot. We routinely make the point that retirees and their heirs need to exercise caution when considering residency in a retirement community or other locale that caters to seniors.

Why? Take a look at Boomers to Become “Rich” Targets for Estate Looters, Where the Looters and the Poachers Stalk Prey: Guarding Your Estate in the 21st Century and Your Town,USA – a Great Place to Live, Launch and Loot? for more on predators and seniors.

Here in Texas, we have Georgetown, home to the state’s first Sun City community. With Texas having become the #2 retirement destination behind only Florida and having surpassed California and Arizona, this is an area that should be sensitive to the attraction it poses for estate looters and other predators of the elderly. Natchitoches, like Georgetown, is another well-known retirement mecca. In fact, both have recently been profiled by Where to Retire magazine and as Eric points out,
American communities do not naturally value the lives of the elderly, the disabled or strangers as they do those of their own children and do not equally protect them or lament their loss. For example, Louisiana’s community of Natchitoches promotes itself as “a top retirement town” - “one of the top 10 bargain places to retire in the United States ” - soliciting elder residents forthe revenue they bring.

In exchange for their commerce and taxes, the town owes elders something toward the prevention of neglect and predatory exploitation - particularly while elder abuse looms nationally as the “crime of the 21st century”. Yet, without a body of case law establishing a legal standard of the “equal protection” they are due, disabled elders continue to suffer while crimes against them go largely hidden, unpunished and undeterred.

It’s easy for many people to point fingers and accuse family members of being disgruntled due to inheritance losses or other family ill will (real or contrived), but often times these situations result from calculated efforts involving unethical - even criminal conduct. Communities that aggressively market to retirees and then abdicate responsibility upon the exposure of alleged exploitation or other predatory acts should be considered as aiding and abetting the actual asset looters or property poachers.

Eric Baxter is not looking for a “rush to judgment” with regard to his father’s case. He’s looking for a responsible community reaction in which law enforcement and other elected officials take seriously the questionable circumstances leading up to and including his father’s death. It is a matter of import to the Baxter family, but as bad acts have a way of replicating themselves, this publically recognized yet unchecked potential foul play could also serve as a magnet to the unscrupulous and as a threat to the physical and/or financial well being of other residents.

Law enforcement needs to investigate. If warranted, the local district attorney needs to react accordingly and should the matter ever proceed to trial, any judge should engage him/herself so as to read the motions, study the evidence presented and give consideration to the conduct/presentation of all involved prior to rendering decisions.

These matters can be sensitive as community “pillars” can also be chief poachers. We well understand how power and influence are factors that can drive action or inaction in these cases. The entrenchment of the legal industry within civic and other governmental circles is also a deterrent to justice for more “average” citizens (although their “average” tax dollars are always eagerly lapped up).

People must become vigilant as to what is happening in their own communities. Someone’s life could depend on it.

Meanwhile, this is EstateofDenial.com signing out from the Land of the Gimme-Gimmes and the Home of the I-Want-Mores

Friday, January 16, 2009

I Have a Dream Speech, by Martin Luther King

The purpose of growth is to challenge ourselves and that's what we try to do by featuring writers that have one thing in common, and that it to grow old in a nation that respects the citizens it sworn to protects, by voicing opinions all across the spectrum of human experience we hope to learn from our mistakes and build a better future.

Martin Luther King had a dream and he died for it, but immortalized the rights of every
black, of every , latino of person of every nationality to have a chance at that dream, because America doesn't belong to a few, it belongs to all of us .

It is that chance to collect on the promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "Unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of
Happiness."

" It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this
promissory note."
MLK

Yes once again America is writing us the people bad checks and is time to stand up for our rights, we will not be defrauded, we are the People, We are Americans!




AUTHENTICITY CERTIFIED: Text version below transcribed directly from audio.

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.


This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.
We cannot walk alone.

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.

We cannot turn back.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only." We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.
And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."

This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.
With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:
My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.
Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,
From every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.
And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that:

Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

Free at last! Free at last!

Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

Appointment in Samara - Food for Thought

Art used by permission by Pat Marvenko Smith, copyright 1992. To order prints visit her "Revelation Illustrated" site, http://www.revelationillustrated.com/ .

Let me rather give you John O'Hara. At the beginning of O'Hara's novel Appointment in Samara, he tells a brief parable, which I'll summarize:

There was a merchant in Baghdad who went to the market with his servant. There they saw Death, who stared at the servant in what seemed a threatening way. Later the servant said "Master, lend me a horse. I shall ride to Samara, and there Death will not find me." The merchant did so, then returned to the market, where he again saw Death, whom he approached and asked why he had stared at his servant in such a threatening way. Death responded, "I wasn't threatening him. I was just very surprised to see him here in Baghdad, since I have an appointment with him in Samara later this afternoon."

Source=>> Foundation of Crisis

I love Pat's Artwork please support her work by ordering your favorite, they are all authentic artwork that will make the conversation piece of any space . Pat's artwork speaks a thousand words and then some and the parable reminds us of our own mortality and that which must be. The combination of Pat's work and the parable made an impact that I wished to share with you.

Thursday, January 15, 2009

First Women Shelter in the USA


First women Shelter in the USA post by Bonnie Jean Smith

Women's Advocates is a safe place where battered women and their children can escape domestic violence. In addition to providing shelter, Women’s Advocates provides advocacy, personalized support (including mental health therapy and aftercare services), education, and resources for nearly 1,000 women and children every year. The first shelter in the nation for battered women and their children, Women’s Advocates opened its doors in 1974. Women's Advocates welcomes women and children of all backgrounds and cultures.

Would you like to receive Women's Advocates new monthly email update? Click here for more information!

Mommy Help Me, Help Me Mommy -Americans Forced to Seek Asylum Overseas

By Barry Nolan January 11 2009 as posted in Children Underground

This is really hard to believe. I am sitting in a room filled with women who were beaten, and violated in terrible ways. The room is not in Bosnia, or some far flung third-world hell-hole. I am in a function room in a hotel in Albany at the Battered Mothers Custody Conference.

Many of the women around me are sobbing now, as a child tells her story. “My father beat me” she begins. Well, she is not a child now actually, but she is a child to me. She is a poised, attractive young woman named Jennifer Collins who is a survivor of child abuse and of a Child and Family Court System that betrayed her and her brother, just as it betrays children across this country every day when it orders children to live full time with an abusive parent.

I know you do not believe me. And that makes me realize that this is the experience that these women who surround me have all had. No one believes them. No one believes this can happen. But it does. Sometimes this happens despite voluminous evidence, eyewitnesses and medical records that the child has been beaten, even raped and sodomized by a parent seeking custody. Sometimes the courts do this even if the parent seeking custody has been convicted of, or admitted to domestic violence or sexual assault. I know you don’t believe me. But you would believe Jennifer if you were here.

It is a strange world in Child and Family court. For instance, even as much energy in the wider world goes into efforts to make certain that sex offenders have no access to children, that they can’t live near a school and walk near a playground, in this odd little corner of our judicial system, courts routinely order children to “reunite” with a sexual predator parent who hurt them. All in the name of “family re-unification”.

I know this sounds impossible. It is against all common sense. This is America after all. But come sit here with me, and listen to this woman/child tell her story. She has “aged out” of the system and is no longer under the thumb of a court that tells her she must be silent. There is a whole group of courageous kids like Jennifer who are old enough now to tell their story to you, face to face. Jennifer’s story is a pip. And it is pretty typical.

Jennifer tells us about her mother Holly and her dad. He was a batterer who beat Holly. And he beat the children. Jennifer moves her story along quickly to the day when her older brother, then about 4, tried to intervene as dad was beating mom. Dad threw the son against the wall and fractured his skull. There is much more. But I will move the story along quickly to what happens when Holly finally decided to leave this man who beat her and the children. She fled that terrible house, only to find herself in house of mirrors. The Child and Family Court system.

It is almost as if none of the people who run the Child and Family Court system ever read about or learned a single thing from sad saga of the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal. It’s like they never heard about how victims of physical or sexual abuse are often silenced by their own sense of shame. How their terrible stories can sometimes finally come pouring out in torrents. It may be years later, but it is no less true. This is not theory. This is fact. We have all watched these sad dramas on the 6 O’clock news.

But, uniquely in Child and Family Court, if allegations of physical or sexual abuse are raised during a divorce where custody is an issue, the allegations are used, not against the perpetrator, but against the victim. There is this invented thing, a bit of junk science called “Parental Alienation Syndrome”. It basically says that any time a woman raises the issue of physical or sexual abuse, of herself or the children in the midst of a custody dispute, she is just trying to make the man look bad and make the children hate him. She must be lying.

Look, I am not a fool. I know people lie. I know some women lie. I know people say awful things about each other in divorces. I have watched Jerry Springer just like you. But I have also watched “To Catch a Predator” and I know “respectable” people can do horrible things. So, do a thought experiment here. Pretend you are a woman who had finally left an abusive relationship, taking your children with you. If your controlling soon-to-be ex-husband sought to get full custody of the children as one last slap at you, what would you say? OK? Sure, that sounds fair? Fat chance.

The thing a real court would do when this happened is to consider all the evidence, and talk to all the witnesses. Witnesses like the children. They were after all, there when “it” happened. This is what a court would do if a stranger were accused of beating them. Or raping them. But this is not what the Child and Family Court system does.

Jennifer, the survivor, tells us of the day the representative of the court came to take her away from her mother and take her to live at her dad’s. How she clung desperately to her mother’s leg, until they pried her fingers loose, lifted her up, carried her away, and compelled her to live with the man who would beat her. Jennifer tells us how her mother, desperate beyond all measure, kidnapped the children, spirited them away to the Netherlands, where they became the first Americans to be granted asylum. How she lived in a refugee camp, with refugees from Somalia and Sierra Leone, people who had to learn how to use toilets and forks. How this was better than “home”. This was a step up. She was with her mom.

Jennifer lived in exile for 14 years. She finally “aged out”. The court has no jurisdiction now. And so Jennifer had the freedom to come home, to America, to this room where I sit, surrounded by women who are now weeping with joy and cheering for Jennifer’s mom for being so brave and for Jennifer for telling her story to this room full of people who know her story is true. Because the same thing happened to them. So they believe her.

I believe her, too.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

12 Year Old Badly Beaten by Police Files Lawsuit

Galveston,Texas USA

Radley Balko, senior editor at Reason, has an update on Dymond Milburn, the 12-year-old girl who was grabbed out of her front yard by three undercover police who accused her of being a prostitute and then beaten so badly she had to go to the hospital to get her head injuries treated.

Balko has learned that the lawsuit is real, not a hoax as some have suggested. Here's a copy (pdf) of the complaint. And here's a record of the filing in federal court.

Source=>>

Related=>> Open letter to the Tens of Thousands of Rogue Cops

Lock Them Up and Trow Away the Key!

Man has spent 14 years in jail for contempt without being charged for a crime.

Posted by Mark Frauenfelder, January 14, 2009

Wall Street Journal reports on a fellow in the United States who has spent 14 years behind bars without being charged for anything.

Consider Mr. Chadwick's case. In 1994, during divorce proceedings, a Delaware County judge held Mr. Chadwick in civil contempt for failing to put $2.5 million in a court-controlled account. He says he lost the money in bad investments; his wife's attorney claimed he had hidden it offshore. In April 1995, Mr. Chadwick was arrested and detained.

Nearly 14 years later, Mr. Chadwick, who suffers from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, is still in jail -- even after a retired judge was hired to help locate the money, and failed.

"The money is gone," says Mr. Chadwick's lawyer, Michael Malloy. "The coercive effect of this order is gone; it has turned into a life sentence."

The judge who held Mr. Chadwick in contempt in 1994 couldn't be reached for comment, but he has said publicly that he doesn't believe Mr. Chadwick lacks the funds.

Source=>>

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Letters to Editor, Help!

Hello I am new to this group. I have an aunt in Vienna, Austria that is being abused emotionally by her daughter. Does anyone out there know of a support group, or help line she can contact?

fluffy_nan@yahoo.com

-------------------------------------------

thank you Bonnie Jean Smith for sending this in.

HELP FOR ABUSE VICTIMS
Is your ex-husband, husband, partner abusing you? Are you or your children experiencing domestic violence? Vienna’s four women’s refuges offer you and your children protection, assistance and temporary accommodation. Your nationality, religion or income is irrelevant.

24-hour emergency line.To reach us round the clockcall the following number :05 77 22

If you are experiencing domestic violence or if you are being threatened by domestic violence but don’t require accommodation: Call the following phone number 01/512 38 39, our council centre (Beratungsstelle) offers advice and assistance in German, English and Turkish.
Women abused by their husbands, partners or boyfriends are not an exception! One out of five women experiences violence through her partner!

WHAT IS DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
The abuser uses physical or psychological abuse to exert power and control over women and children as a means to achieve self-interest. The abuser can use several forms of abuse:

Physical violence:Pushing, shoving, slapping, kicking, punching, hitting, strangling, scratching, burning, pulling hair out, locking in, stabbing, hitting the victim with various objects even causing injury ending in manslaughter, murder.Abusers often destroy furniture for example or other things, which are of personal value to you, besides using physical violence.

Sexual abuse:Molestation, harassment, badgering, imposition;Using force, threats or intimidation to make you perform sexual acts (vaginal, oral or anal sex). Force, threaten or intimidate you into pornographic acting. The abuser may make you strip, make you watch pornos, perform sexual acts with other people.Rape

Every sexual act you do not perform of you own will or are threatened into doing is abuse.Sexual abuse and harassment is wrongand a crime whether you are married or not!

Psychological abuse:Verbal abuse, name calling, shouting, humiliating, mocking, destructive criticism. Not listening or responding when you talk. Insulting you because of the way you look, .... your appearance or the way you behave, ridicule you in front of friends, family or other people, and humiliate you, stating you are stupid and disturbed.Verbally threatening, prohibiting things, terrorising you through continuous telephone calls, sending threatening mail, denying you sleep, threatening to harm the children, your family and friends, torturing your pets, destroying things that are valuable to you. Threatening to kill you or threatening to commit suicide...

Social abuse:Preventing you from contacting relatives, meeting friends, and going out.Deciding when and where you can meet other people, blocking the use of the phone, listening in to the conversation while you are speaking on the phone, spying, following you...

Economic abuse:Taking away money or valuables or selling them, stealing, determining the amount of money you spend, determining what should be bought, prohibiting you to have your own account, sending you to work and taking your income away from you, prohibiting you to work or forcing you to give notice thus preventing you from having an income of your own ...Domestic violence can take many forms among these are various strategies abusers use e.g. expressing their love after abuse, "conciliatory love making", threatening to commit suicide, promises to change his ways, appealing to your conscience. Making you feel sorry for him or emotional blackmail, sulking.Through these tactics it is very difficult to recognize harm caused by abuse and thus draw one's conclusions accordingly.
Remember: you are never to blame for the abuse! Don’t ever believe you "earned" abuse or caused the abuse. Don’t be ashamed of the violence you have experienced and don’t be silent about the violence your partner has caused you.He alone is responsible for his actions!

CERTAIN STEPS YOU CAN TAKE TO ENSURE YOUR SAFETY


WHAT WE CAN DO FOR YOU
In Refuge workers with different mother tongues form a team in our refuges. You may speak openly about the violence you have experienced or been threatened by. Workers offer confidential assistance and advice in your interest in the following:
Forming a safety strategy
Clarifying your situation
Accompaniment to various institutions and courts (reporting assault, divorce, child custody etc.)
Breaking up the relationship with your abusive husband
Problems and questions in connection with your children
Success in accomplishing your rights

LIVING IN A REFUGE
Living in a refuge means living temporarily under one roof with other women and children. These women and children have experienced a similar situation in life like you. Here you have the possibility to think about your future in peace and quiet, without being under pressure. It is up to you whether you decide to make a report to the police; it is up to you whether you want to separate from your husband or whether you want to take legal measures against anyone. The shelter’s workers will support you in your final decision.
Women’s refuges can be reached around the clock and offer specific protection
refuges’ addresses are confidential
Men are not allowed in the refuge
You live independently in the shelter and are responsible for yourself and your children.
If you don’t have an income, costs of staying in the shelter are negotiable
You will not lose custody of the children, or the right to your flat or your mutual property should you leave your husband due to abuse!

WHAT YOU SHOULD TAKE TO THE REFUGE
Your documents and the documents of your children. You will need them with all official contacts Clothes, medicine, school things for the children, your child’s favourite small toys Keys to your home Personal items you value .

We can support you in acquiring the most important items after you have come to the refuge, should you be unable to take any of the above from your home.

You have a right to integrity, freedom and safety! GIVE US A CALL!
home

Monday, January 12, 2009

Letter from the Editor of E.A.

by Ray Fernandez

Recently I have gotten many letters and phone calls from people that are concerned because my on line presence has been spotty.

As many of you know when my Dad suffered a stroke in 1999 his wife Clara G. Fernandez, 87 yr old wife of Dr. A.J.Fernandez for 58 years was removed from her home without the benefit of a court order or any thing resembling one , recognizing that when a middle class citizen goes to jail for a bag of pot he gets fined, the bailsman , attorneys, jails gets business and everyone makes money but when an elder gets abused there is simply no money to be made unless the elder is committed so the authorities do the old "Shoulder Shrug."and send you down the road to the folks that do the committing.

We turned to Florida Division of Children and Families who said that in order to Dr. Fernandez to ever see his wife again a Guardianship was needed so we filed for one, little did we know that the guardianship nightmare would take four years of full time fighting to free our mother from the tyrannical hold of those that seek to control us and profit from every aspect of our private lives.

In an effort to protect those without a voice who were being victimized twice . First by financial abuse by the criminals that committed these crimes and then by the authorities in charge of protecting our elders that had not responded to these victims as they needed to, this led to four hard years of endless court hearings during which my mother's estate was billed down to zero, the guardian's attorney first order of the day was to declare war on the "Ward's family and vilify them through insinuations and false accusations.


Special thank you goes out to Judge David J. Audlin who once he realized he had been mislead by trusted 'Officers of the Court" who mis represented the quality of care Clara was receiving in order to prolong the Guardianship even after her assets had been depleted, Judge Audlin had the wisdom to return our mother back to us.

Now that I no longer have to fight the tyrannical over reach of the State into our private lives I have activated my Real Estate Broker License which is a full time job along with working the financial markets, and as a Certified General Contractor jump starting projects that were previously put on hold. Having three (3) full time jobs to make up for lost time and income leaves little time for dallying.

I also want to especially thank attorney Adrian P. Thomas who when everything seem lost never gave up and when my father , Dr. Fernandez said to me " Ray I want to see my wife again, I don't care if you have to spend every dollar I ever made" made this dying man's wish come true.

Also want to thank attorney Samuel Kaufman and all others who worked to free my mother and re establish her most basic of civil rights , the right to travel, the right to her social security income, the right to dental and medical care, right to decide whom and were she want to be with and generally rights that were denied her during the guardianship period re- established .

Sunday, January 11, 2009

“We’re from the Government, and We’re Here to End Your Marriage”

I was curious to see if the Europeans have noticed the USA's undeclared war on it's own people and went on to see one of Europe Best Blogs, No Pasaran and this is so similar to what is happening with the Elder Guardian Abuse Racket of which we are in a constant Estate of Denial that I decided to cross post the article.

G. K. Chesterton once observed that the family serves as the principal check on government power, and he suggested that someday the family and the state would confront one another writes Stephen Baskerville in Touchstone Magazine (read excerpts from his book, Taken Into Custody: The War Against Fathers, Marriage, and the Family).

That day has arrived.

Chesterton was writing about divorce, and despite extensive public attention to almost every other threat to the family, divorce remains the most direct and serious. Michael McManus of Marriage Savers writes that “divorce is a far more grievous blow to marriage than today’s challenge by gays.” Most Americans would be deeply shocked if they knew what goes on today under the name of divorce. Indeed, many are devastated to discover that they can be forced into divorce by procedures entirely beyond their control.

Divorce licenses unprecedented government intrusion into family life, including the power to sunder families, seize children, loot family wealth, and incarcerate parents without trial. Comprised of family courts and vast, federally funded social services bureaucracies that wield what amount to police powers, the divorce machinery has become the most predatory and repressive sector of government ever created in the United States and is today’s greatest threat to constitutional freedom.…

Contrary to common assumptions, divorce today seldom involves two people mutually deciding to part ways. According to Frank Furstenberg and Andrew Cherlin in Divided Families, 80 percent of divorces are unilateral, that is, over the objection of one spouse. Patricia Morgan of London’s Civitas think tank reports that in over half of divorces, there was no recollection of major conflict before the separation.

Under “no-fault,” or what some call “unilateral,” divorce—a legal regime that expunged all considerations of justice from the procedure—divorce becomes a sudden power grab by one spouse, assisted by an army of judicial hangers-on who reward belligerence and profit from the ensuing litigation: judges, lawyers, psychotherapists, counselors, mediators, custody evaluators, social workers, and more.

If marriage is not wholly a private affair, as today’s marriage advocates insist, involuntary divorce by its nature requires constant government supervision over family life. Far more than marriage, divorce mobilizes and expands government power. Marriage creates a private household, which may or may not necessitate signing some legal documents.

Onerous Implications
Few stopped to consider the implications of laws that shifted the breakup of private households from a voluntary to an involuntary process. Unilateral divorce inescapably involves government agents forcibly removing legally innocent people from their homes, seizing their property, and separating them from their children. It inherently abrogates not only the inviolability of marriage but the very concept of private life.

By far the most serious consequences involve children, who have become the principal weapons of the divorce machinery. Invariably the first action of a divorce court, once a divorce is filed, is to separate the children from one of their parents, usually the father. Until this happens, no one in the machinery acquires any power or earnings. The first principle and first action of divorce court therefore: Remove the father.

Family court judges’ contempt for both fathers and constitutional rights was openly expressed by New Jersey municipal court judge Richard Russell: “Your job is not to become concerned about the constitutional rights of the man that you’re violating,” he told his colleagues at a judges’ training seminar in 1994. “Throw him out on the street. . . . We don’t have to worry about the rights.”

Generated Hysteria

…Why do we hear almost nothing about this? Aside from media that sympathize with the divorce revolution, the multi-billion-dollar divorce industry also commands a huge government-funded propaganda machine that has distorted our view of what is happening.

The growth of the divorce machinery(and guardianship racket) during the 1970s and 1980s did not follow but preceded (in other words, it generated) a series of hysterias against parents—especially fathers—so hideous and inflammatory that no one, left or right, dared question them or defend those accused: child abuse and molestation, wife-beating, and nonpayment of “child support.” Each of these hysterias has been propagated largely by feminists, bar associations, and social work bureaucracies, whose federal funding is generously shared with state and local law-enforcement officials.

The parent on the receiving end of such accusations—even in the absence of any formal charge, evidence, or conviction—not only loses his children summarily and often permanently; he also finds himself abandoned by friends and family members, parishioners and pastors, co-workers and employers (and he may well lose his job)—all terrified to be associated with an accused “pedophile,” “batterer,” or “deadbeat dad.”

It is not clear that these nefarious figures are other than bogeymen created by divorce interests, well aware that not only the public generally but conservatives and family advocates in particular are a soft touch when it comes to anything concerning irresponsible behavior or sexual perversion.

…It is also largely credulity and fear that leads Congress by overwhelming majorities to appropriate billions for anti-family programs in response to these hysterias. The massive federal funds devoted to domestic violence, child abuse, and child-support enforcement are little more than what Phyllis Schlafly calls “feminist pork,” taxpayer subsidies on family dissolution that also trample due process protections. Family law may technically be the purview of states, but it is driven by federal policies and funded by a Congress fearful of accusations that it is not doing enough against pedophiles, batterers, and deadbeats.

In fact, each of these figures is largely a hoax, a creation of feminist ideology disseminated at taxpayers’ expense and unchallenged by journalists, academics, civil libertarians, and family advocates who are either unaware of the reality or cowed into silence. Indeed, so diabolical are these hysterias that some family advocates simply accept them as additional evidence of the family crisis.

But while sensational examples can be found of anything, there is simply no evidence that the family and fatherhood crisis is caused primarily or even significantly by fathers abandoning their families, beating their wives, and molesting their children. Irrefutable evidence indicates that it is driven almost entirely by divorce courts forcibly separating parents from their children and using these false accusations as a rationalization.

During the 1980s and 1990s, waves of child abuse hysteria swept America and other countries. Sensational cases in Washington state, California, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Ontario, Saskatchewan, the north of England, and more recently France resulted in torn-apart families, blatantly unjust prison sentences, and ruined lives, while the media and civil libertarians looked the other way.

Today it is not clear that we have learned anything from these miscarriages of justice. If anything, the hysteria has been institutionalized in the divorce courts, where false allegations have become routine.

What is ironic about these witch-hunts is the fact that it is easily demonstrable that the child abuse epidemic—(and guardiaship abuse epidemic) which is very real—is almost entirely the creation of feminism and the welfare bureaucracies themselves. It is well established by scholars that an intact family is the safest place for women and children(and elders) and that very little abuse takes place in married families. Child abuse overwhelmingly occurs in single-parent homes, homes from which the father has been removed. Domestic violence, too, is far more likely during or after the breakup of a marriage than among married couples.

…government logic is marvelously self-justifying and self-perpetuating, since by eliminating the father, officials can present themselves as the solution to the problem they have created. The more child abuse there is—whether by single mothers, boyfriends, or even (as is often the case) by social workers and bureaucrats themselves—the more the proffered solution is to further expand the child abuse bureaucracy.

Waxing indignant about a string of child deaths at the hands of social workers in the District of Columbia, federal judges and the Washington Post found solace in the D.C. government’s solution: to hire more social workers (and lawyers too, for some unspecified reason). “Olivia Golden, the Child and Family Services’ latest director . . . will use her increased budget to recruit more social workers and double the number of lawyers.” Children die at the hands of social workers, so we must hire more social workers.

…A commonplace of political science is that bureaucracies relentlessly expand, often by creating the very problem they exist to address. Appalling as it sounds, the conclusion is inescapable that we have created a massive army of officials with a vested interest in child abuse (and forced guardianships).

Child-Support Racket

The “deadbeat dad” is another figure largely manufactured by the divorce machinery. He is far less likely to have deliberately abandoned offspring he callously sired than to be an involuntarily divorced father who has been, as attorney Jed Abraham writes in From Courtship to Courtroom, “forced to finance the filching of his own children.”

Child support is plagued by the same contradictions as child custody. Like custody, it is awarded ostensibly without reference to “fault,” and yet nonpayment brings swift and severe punishments. Contrary to popular belief, child support today has nothing to do with fathers abandoning their children, reneging on their marital vows, or even agreeing to divorce. It is automatically assessed on all non-custodial parents, even those divorced against their will who lose their children through no legal fault or agreement of their own. It is an entitlement for all single mothers, in other words, regardless of their behavior.

…All this marks a new stage in the evolution of the welfare state: from distributing largesse (I.R.A. Involuntary Redistribution of assets) to raising revenue and, from there, to law enforcement. The result is a self-financing machine, generating profits and expanding the size and scope of government—all by generating single-parent homes and fatherless children. Government has created a perpetual growth machine for destroying families, seizing children from legally blameless parents, and incarcerating parents without trial.

Abridged for E.A. read it all here=>>

Saturday, January 10, 2009

17 Year Old Youth Electrocuted Without a Trial

Martinsville,Virginia,USA

Virginia State Police are investigating the death of a 17-year-old Martinsville boy who died Thursday after a city police officer used a Taser on him.

A 17-year-old boy died in the hospital after being Tasered by a Martinsville police officer during an incident Thursday night, the city says.

By Candice Nelson WSLS10 Reporter Published: January 9, 2009

Source=>>

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We are now living under the early stages of a de facto martial law, extra-judicial killings and beatings are now reported often and perpetrated upon the the American people who are afraid almost on a daily basis. Police have modeled themselves on the worst components of thugs . Police have copied the Nazi SS in manner, in demeanor and now in their public behavior toward the American people.

In closing we sure miss the old days where no officer was allowed to become judge, jury and executioner; much less without first arresting the individual that might be suspected of a crime.

When crimes are committed by civilians they are summarily arrested and charged, often within hours. But when an "officer" kills someone whether with bullets or by Taser no action against the police is taken for an extended period of time. That practice compounds the original crime and is far more serious because it means that those who are responsible for enforcement do not face the same consequences as do the citizens. that these 'officers' are supposedly charged with protecting the public from, but also from the government as well!

Since The Doctrines of 2002 went into effect, America has been living as a nation without laws. Those wearing a uniform in this country have become a major part in a lawless society unto themselves, and this must be ended if we are to have a country that has any authority to function as a nation of laws instead of as the outlaw State that the USA has now become.

The execution of an unarmed and thoroughly contained individual constitutes a crime against society, as well as murder.

ref. 1) Stealing the Dream

3) Open letter to the Tens of Thousands of Rogue Cops

* This does not reflect upon the thousand of polite,caring and professional police officers that are proud of what they do but the action of some rougue cops that believe that they are above the law.

Extra Judicial Killing by Police Sparks Civil Unrest

San Franscisco USA January 8th 2009

Recently we predicted civil unrest in major US Cities in a recent post under Ten Predictions for 2009. what we din't know that the prediction would happen so quickly.

An extra judicial killing of a youth caught on tape and witness by thousands sparked outraged, police ought to take some lessons from Fidel Castro who at least had the common sense to march the people behind a wall out of plain sight, however it seems the authorities no longer fear the citizens they are sworn to protect and and feel blazen to act whenever they like and wherever they like.

According to witnesses the execution went down like this: Grant was returning home to the East Bay on a BART train in the early hours of Jan. 1, after celebrating New Year's Eve in San Francisco. A fight broke out between two groups of riders on the train about 2 a.m.

Police met the train at Oakland's Fruitvale station and ordered passengers onto the platform. Grainy cellphone videos broadcast on television and viewed thousands of times on the Internet show Grant lying facedown on the platform.

Police Officer Johannes Mehserle stands over the young man. He reaches for his weapon and shoots Grant point-blank in the back. Grant was unarmed.

Grant, who has a 4-year-old daughter, was buried Wednesday morning.
Source=>>L.A. Times

DCF Supervisor Accused Of Stealing $24K In State Funds

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - A supervisor in the program that distributes food stamps and other funds to needy families is accused of stealing $24,000 in state funds.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement said Susan Curry Wolfe, 47, was arrested Thursday morning at her office at the Department of Children and Families. She was charged with grand theft, criminal use of personal information, and scheme to defraud and booked into the Duval County jail.

MSNBC News =>

Some Guardians Can Bankrupt The 'Wards' And Subject Their Families to Extreme Stress

Lou Kilzer and Sue Lindsay, News Staff Writers
The Rocky Mountain News as Reported in Estate of Denial

At first his professional guardian seemed like “a savior” to David Kleck.

His family was struggling with the upheaval of relocating to Denver at the same time he was entering a nursing home. But when the crisis passed and the Klecks decided David no longer needed an outsider’s help, the guardian disagreed.

Only after a costly legal battle did she resign. Then she went back to court to try to force the Klecks to pay the legal bills she had run up in her fight against them.

David Kleck was a powerhouse in Louisiana public life for more than 35, a man whose public relations firm brought the Saints expansion football team to New Orleans and helped elect politicians, including New Orleans’ first black mayor.

His sharp mind betrayed him, though, and in 1993 at age 72 he was diagnosed with “mild to moderate dementia of the Alzheimer’s type.” His condition slowly worsened over the next two years until his wife, Cynthia, felt she could no longer care for him.

The crisis came just as the family was planning a move to Colorado, where daughter Suzie was to attend graduate school.

Rather than settling David in one facility and then uprooting him a few months later, Cynthia placed her husband in a Lakewood nursing home in November 1995 intending to join him in the Denver area as soon as the family’s house sold. But David resented the move.

“Here was a man who had always been able to live and do exactly as he wanted, and all of a sudden doctors were saying he had to stay in this care facility,” daughter Suzie told the News. “He was not happy.”

Being in a nursing home was “agony,” said another daughter, Nancy Kleck. He felt lonely over the holidays. Cynthia and Suzie Kleck relocated to Colorado in March 1996, and Cynthia moved to take full control of her husband’s affairs. She hired Susan Haines’ law firm, petitioned probate court in Jefferson County and was appointed temporary guardian and conservator for David on June 20, 1996.

Things went downhill from there.

David hired his own lawyer, Steve Warden, and when Cynthia petitioned the court to make her appointment permanent, Warden objected.
The parties turned to Stephanie Conrardy to assist.

Both lawyers had, in the past, worked with Conrardy, whose company, Conrardy Case Management, provided professional services in probate cases. Conrardy was hired to manage David’s case.

“I looked upon her as sort of a savior at first,” said David, who was lucid and articulate during a recent interview with the News. “My wife was the first to come across the friction that eventually ensued.”

Beginning with her first report that August, Conrardy was critical of Cynthia’s treatment of David.

“It is unfortunate that now that David has needs, his lifetime companion is no longer available for him,” Conrardy wrote. “David is extremely sad about the loss of companionship and the intimate relationship he once shared with his wife, his mental and physical deterioration and loss of independence and autonomy.”

Conrardy remained critical of Cynthia Kleck in the case summaries that followed.

But none of the Klecks saw the reports until many months later.
So in October 1996, David and Cynthia agreed that Conrardy should be appointed David’s guardian to “serve as a buffer” between family members and to oversee his care. Jefferson County District Judge Michael Villano made the appointment official on Nov. 4, 1996.A few months later, David’s longtime friend in Louisiana, accountant Allen Ritchey, was appointed conservator.
He soon expressed concern over the state of affairs.
In a financial plan filed in March 1997, he said he was troubled by duplication of services to David and confusion over duties:
“There is much resentment and tension between Mrs. Kleck, Mr. Kleck and Ms. Conrardy concerning who is to do what. Mrs. Kleck wants to take her husband to the doctor, . . . and take him out for social occasions. The court has ordered Ms. Conrardy to also provide these services.”
He said the staff of Myrick House, David’s nursing home, also could perform many of the services Conrardy was providing.
He suggested that “one of the children could act as guardian and conservator with proper court supervision.”
Conrardy objected vigorously to that idea.

“It is important for you to know that . . . David’s wife, Mrs. Kleck, and his daughter Suzie Kleck, have not advocated in his best interest and they are preoccupied with his money, and quite frankly rarely visit him. Neither of these women have made any positive comments to me about David, only angry and bitter comments which seem to distort their ability to treat David with dignity,” she wrote Ritchey.

But as the Klecks became more established in Colorado and David grew to like Myrick House, family discord eased, while the “friction” with Conrardy mounted.

Then in March 1998 — when the Klecks say the conservator first gave them copies of Conrardy’s bills — the tension burst into the open.
Daughter Nancy, who lived in Kentucky, wrote the court saying she was shocked to learn that Conrardy’s charges totaled $17,000 as of February 1998:

“For what? What does $17,000 buy a person who is generally confined to a house? What does Ms. Conrardy or her staff do to warrant these obscenely excessive charges?”

She expressed particular outrage that after Conrardy had brought holiday treats to David and taken him to a Christmas party, Conrardy charged him for the treats and the time involved in taking him to the party.
David recalled the issue saying, “For someone who came from Louisiana, I shouldn’t be shocked, but I was.”

The family decided that Suzie, who had a master’s degree in family counseling, should take over as guardian.

David hired attorney Debra Knapp to petition the court for Conrardy’s removal. Conrardy hired attorney Laura Vogelgesang to respond.

The guardian said she did not believe David understood his situation and she thought it would be inappropriate for her to resign unless a guardian ad litem were appointed to ensure his well-being.

A bitter legal fight ensued.Conrardy contended that David was concerned that his daughter might drug him and take him to Mexico.
The Klecks’ attorney argued that the guardian was using unjustified personal attacks in a campaign to hold on to the job.
Finally, on June 9, 1998 — just before a hearing on her removal was set to begin — Conrardy asked the court to accept her resignation, which it did.
The fight over fees continued.

In motions and hearings through the rest of 1998, Knapp and co-counsel Benjamin Sachs outlined the family’s objections to Conrardy’s fees during her guardianship, alleging that:

David rarely saw Conrardy during the year and a half in which she acted as his guardian. Instead, Conrardy sent her employee, Karen Buchanan. Still, David was billed at Conrardy’s own rate of pay — $75 to $85 an hour — while Buchanan was paid $25 to $35 an hour. Then Conrardy billed $85 an hour for the time they spent talking to each other about the case.
Conrardy assigned management of the case to her own employee without telling the Klecks that the same services were available elsewhere at lower prices. In effect, she used her public appointment to hire her own for-profit company instead of less expensive, competent alternatives.

Conrardy “over-guardianed” the case, charging unnecessary fees — such as $180 to manage a checking account with $200 in it — and running up $18,416 in fees for services plus $46,000 in legal fees in her fight to stay on.

“This case presents a classic example of the depletion of funds of an elderly and disabled man by a professional guardian who derives personal financial benefits from selling case management and other services to her wards at top-dollar prices,” attorney Knapp said.

Conrardy — who would not speak to the News about this story or others — defended her fees in the court record as reasonable for the high quality service she provided.

She said it was standard for case managers to conduct, on behalf of guardians, the routine visits with wards.
She also said in a deposition that her business did not make a profit, although Knapp obtained tax records showing Conrardy earned $250,000 a year and more from it.
Conrardy’s lawyers accused Knapp and co-counsel Sachs of targeting her for a “personal witch hunt” to put her out of business.
“Neither Sachs nor Knapp have ever threatened to put Ms. Conrardy out of business,” Knapp answered in a Dec. 10, 1998, motion. “They have done nothing except act as zealous advocates for their client, within the bounds of the law.”

In an order on Feb. 3, 1999, Senior District Judge William Jones refused to order Kleck’s estate to pay for Conrardy’s attorney’s fees, saying her “refusal to resign when requested was unreasonable, unjustified and inappropriate.”

But Jones let most of Conrardy’s guardianship fees stand, noting that “although the fees were higher than average in the area,” formal objections to them weren’t filed until Knapp got on the case in March 1998.
The judge also chided Knapp for being “unnecessarily aggressive” in pursuing David’s interests.

After the ruling, Conrardy filed further petitions to force the Klecks to pay her attorney’s fees. But on April 15, 1999, Conrardy was again turned down, this time by Jefferson County District Judge James Zimmerman.
As the fight drew to a close, the family found itself at odds with David’s conservator as well. That dispute — which included another battle other legal bills — continued into this year and resulted in conservator Ritchey’s resignation.

Today, David still lives in Myrick House, his care overseen by his daughter and wife. Dolly Stuart, manager of the nursing home, told the News she believed the concerns Conrardy expressed about David’s family were unjustified.

“I’ve seen families where all they care about is the money, and this is not the family. They have always been right there, visiting him, bringing him things, taking him to doctors’ appointments and to dinner,” she said. “If this isn’t an involved family, I don’t know who is.”

In a recent interview, David’s lawyer, Knapp, said the system should have recognized the Klecks as a family in crisis and offered help, not divisive legal tactics.

“This case cried out for family reconciliation and support, but instead got over-lawyered and over- case-managed,” she said.
Cynthia Kleck describes the ordeal as “a living, breathing nightmare.”

“We thought we were doing the best thing for Dad,” daughter Suzie said.

“But through our best intentions we created this monster and couldn’t get out of the system. Once you get into the system, we had to pay thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars to get out.”

David, himself, seems stunned by the process.

“I haven’t seen this kind of skulduggery since I left Louisiana,” he said. “Every time I turned around, someone else was coming around doing something I didn’t want them to do and expecting me to foot the bill.”

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

U.S.A.'s War on The Middle Class


The United states War on the elderly, the afflicted, the middle class is going well and the dice-throwers that govern our nation the elderly, the afflicted, the middle class has become what were once called "useless eaters" this class is now effectively priced out of health care, higher education and justice which due to the prohibitive cost of civil action have been effectively priced out of "justice for the rich and affluent."

Our Jails and prisons are overflowing and the Sunshine State the Flim Flam Capital of the World is now claiming a new milestone Florida is proud to claim for the first time our prison population turns over 100,000, only California and New York have more inmates. There will be new tent cities to house all the inmates, Fema holding camps under Blackwater is a far more likely scenario.

At 100,000, Florida's prison population roughly equals incarcerating one out of every four residents of Miami

Florida Department of Corrections Secretary Walter McNeil said that Florida will need 19 new prisons and the DOC budget to double to $4 billion. Building more prisons will cost Florida Taxpayers a once time investment of $76,923 per prisoner to that add $20,000 per year to to keep each prisoner locked up.

The USA's war on it's citizens is not only filling up its jails past the bursting point but it's claiming many lives and no one is safe, not the mayor, not judges, but as long as the populace believes this are isolated cases and that it can not happen to them the war will continue to gain momentum until it's too late and the civil rights and means to fight back are all a foregone conclusion as the immigrants of communist countries know all too well.

Since I don't like to talk in generalities I will give you a few actual examples of well documented cases which are easy to confirm of what is quietly going on in our country while just as quietly freedom slips through our fingers like sands through an hourglass.

You're the mayor of a small town. You come home after a day at work, find a UPS package on your front step and bring it in.

Moments later, gun-toting officers from the County Sheriff's Department burst into your home without knocking and shoot your two Labrador Retrievers. Then, they handcuff you and force you to sit and watch your beloved dogs bleed to death.

It turns out that the package, unbeknownst to Mayor Cheye Calvo of Berwyn Heights, Maryland, contained marijuana. He and his wife were the victims of a drug-smuggling scheme that singled out innocent customers in the UPS system.

How American People are Being Terrorized From Within


Last January, Tarika Wilson, a 26-year-old mother living in Lima, Ohio, was shot and killed by police while she held her 13-month-old baby in her arms. The police had burst into her house in search of her boyfriend, who was wanted on drug charges. There were toys on her front porch, making clear to the police that children were home, yet they fired away indiscriminately.

Kathryn Johnston was a 92-year-old African-American woman living in a dangerous Atlanta neighborhood. In the middle of the night, she heard the sound of someone prying off the burglar bars that covered her door. Thinking a criminal was breaking into her house, she got out her gun and fired shots after the door was broken down.

But it wasn't burglars. It was the police, armed with a no-knock warrant. They never identified themselves. Instead, they shot at her 39 times. That's right, a 92-year-old woman was shot at 39 times. Then she was handcuffed and left to die.

Just two months earlier, Pam and Frank Myers were watching a movie in their home on a Friday night. All of a sudden, police officers -- members of the same Prince George's County, Maryland Sheriff's Department that killed the Calvos' dogs -- barged into their house.

Though it was immediately clear that the police had broken into the wrong home, they held the Myers hostage for 45 minutes. For good measure, the police shot and killed their five-year-old Boxer.

Last summer, Round Lake Beach, Illinois police got a no-knock warrant and smashed down the door to Robert Tomasetti's apartment following an anonymous -- and erroneous -- tip that drugs were being sold there. They, too, shot his dog dead.

Several years ago, Alberta Spruill, a church volunteer and city worker in Harlem, was just waking up. It was 6:00 am. Without warning, a battering ram broke down her door and police tossed a flash grenade inside. The trauma and the smoke caused her to have a heart attack. She died on the way to the hospital. And the police never found the drugs they were looking for because there were none to be found. The police were operating on bad information.

Even police are being harmed. During a no-knock drug raid in Inkster, Michigan, two officers were injured when bullets fired at a dog ripped through the animal, ricocheted off the floor and struck them. And during a Paterson, New Jersey, drug raid, as a police officer on the second floor of a house shot a dog, the bullet passed through the floor and hit another officer below.

Police departments have instituted arbitrary arrest quotas with promotions and raises hanging in the balance they then hold press conferences bragging about their big hauls and the number of people arrested.

Last summer, Round Lake Beach, Illinois police got a no-knock warrant and smashed down the door to Robert Tomasetti's apartment following an anonymous -- and erroneous -- tip that drugs were being sold there. They, too, shot his dog dead.

The horror stories we have shared with you of elders isolated drugged and killed for their money, children with ailments separated from their parents and if a mayor's home is invaded and his dogs are killed or a 92-year-old woman is shot at 39 times by the police, it makes the news. But for every incident like this, there are hundreds -- even thousands -- that never get reported. This is only the tip of the iceberg.

How can this happen in America? Whatever happened to our constitutional protection against unreasonable searches and seizures? Whatever happened to "A Nation of laws" the notion that the police are there to protect us, not kill us?

The War on the Middle Class ,The Elderly,The Infirm, the War on Drugs is destroying the lives of far too many people . Even family pets are being killed in the crossfire. Just as ominously, this misguided war is unraveling the very fabric of our society and our civil liberties. It must end now!