Small Deer Magic Trip

[Bizarro]

www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-texas-profiling_wittmar10,0,6051682.story

RACE IN AMERICA
Highway robbery? Texas police seize black motorists' cash, cars
Suit says cops force motorists, largely black, to forfeit cash and cars—or be charged with trumped-up crimes

TENAHA, Texas— You can drive into this dusty fleck of a town near the Texas-Louisiana border if you're African-American, but you might not be able to drive out of it—at least not with your car, your cash, your jewelry or other valuables.

That's because the police here allegedly have found a way to strip motorists, many of them black, of their property without ever charging them with a crime. Instead they offer out-of-towners a grim choice: voluntarily sign over your belongings to the town, or face felony charges of money laundering or other serious crimes.

More than 140 people reluctantly accepted that deal from June 2006 to June 2008, according to court records. Among them were a black grandmother from Akron, who surrendered $4,000 in cash after Tenaha police pulled her over, and an interracial couple from Houston, who gave up more than $6,000 after police threatened to seize their children and put them into foster care, the court documents show. Neither the grandmother nor the couple were charged with any crime.

Officials in Tenaha, situated along a heavily traveled highway connecting Houston with popular gambling destinations in Louisiana, say they are engaged in a battle against drug trafficking and call the search-and-seizure practice a legitimate use of the state's asset-forfeiture law. That law permits local police agencies to keep drug money and other property used in the commission of a crime and add the proceeds to their budgets.

"We try to enforce the law here," said George Bowers, mayor of the town of 1,046 residents, where boarded-up businesses outnumber open ones and City Hall sports a broken window. "We're not doing this to raise money. That's all I'm going to say at this point."

But civil rights lawyers call Tenaha's practice something else: highway robbery. The attorneys have filed a federal class-action lawsuit to stop what they contend is an unconstitutional perversion of the law's intent, aimed primarily at blacks who have done nothing wrong.

Tenaha officials "have developed an illegal 'stop and seize' practice of targeting, stopping, detaining, searching and often seizing property from apparently non-white citizens and those traveling with non-white citizens," asserts the lawsuit, which was filed in U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas.

The property seizures are not just happening in Tenaha. In southern parts of Texas near the Mexican border, for example, Hispanics allege that they are being singled out.

According to a prominent state legislator, police agencies across Texas are wielding the asset-forfeiture law more aggressively to supplement their shrinking operating budgets.

"If used properly, it's a good law-enforcement tool to see that crime doesn't pay," said state Sen. John Whitmire, chairman of the Senate's Criminal Justice Committee. "But in this instance, where people are being pulled over and their property is taken with no charges filed and no convictions, I think that's theft."

David Guillory, an attorney in Nacogdoches who filed the federal lawsuit, said he combed through Shelby County court records from 2006 to 2008 and discovered nearly 200 cases in which Tenaha police seized cash and property from motorists. In about 50 of the cases, suspects were charged with drug possession.

But in 147 others, Guillory said the court records showed, police seized cash, jewelry, cell phones and sometimes even automobiles from motorists but never found any contraband or charged them with any crime. Of those, Guillory said he managed to contact 40 of the motorists directly—and discovered all but one of them were black.

"The whole thing is disproportionately targeted toward minorities, particularly African-Americans," Guillory said. "None of these people have been charged with a crime, none were engaged in anything that looked criminal. The sole factor is that they had something that looked valuable."

In some cases, police used the fact that motorists were carrying large amounts of cash as evidence that they must have been involved in laundering drug money, even though Guillory said each of the drivers he contacted could account for where the money had come from and why they were carrying it—such as for a gambling trip to Shreveport, La., or to purchase a used car from a private seller.

Once the motorists were detained, the police and the local Shelby County district attorney quickly drew up legal papers presenting them with an option: waive their rights to their cash and property or face felony charges for crimes such as money laundering—and the prospect of having to hire a lawyer and return to Shelby County multiple times to attend court sessions to contest the charges.

The process apparently is so routine in Tenaha that Guillory discovered pre-signed and pre-notarized police affidavits with blank spaces left for an officer to describe the property being seized.

Jennifer Boatright, her husband and two young children—a mixed-race family—were traveling from Houston to visit relatives in east Texas in April 2007 when Tenaha police pulled them over, alleging that they were driving in a left-turn lane.

After searching the car, the officers discovered what Boatright said was a gift for her sister: a small, unused glass pipe made for smoking marijuana. Although they found no drugs or other contraband, the police seized $6,037 that Boatright said the family was carrying to purchase a used car—and then threatened to turn their children, ages 10 and 1, over to Child Protective Services if the couple didn't agree to sign over their right to their cash.

"It was give them the money or they were taking our kids," Boatright said. "They suggested that we never bring it up again. We figured we better give them our cash and get the hell out of there."

Several months later, after Boatright and her husband contacted an attorney, Tenaha officials returned their money but offered no explanation or apology. The couple remain plaintiffs in the federal lawsuit.

Except for Tenaha's mayor, none of the defendants in the lawsuit, including Shelby County District Atty. Linda Russell and two Tenaha police officers, responded to requests from the Tribune for comment about their search-and-seizure practices. Lawyers for the defendants also declined to comment, as did several of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

But Whitmire says he doesn't need to await the suit's outcome to try to fix what he regards as a statewide problem. On Monday he introduced a bill in the state Legislature that would require police to go before a judge before attempting to seize property under the asset-forfeiture law—and ultimately Whitmire hopes to tighten the law further so that law-enforcement officials will be allowed to seize property only after a suspect is charged and convicted in a court.

"The law has gotten away from what was intended, which was to take the profits of a bad guy's crime spree and use it for additional crime-fighting," Whitmire said. "Now it's largely being used to pay police salaries—and it's being abused because you don't even have to be a bad guy to lose your property."

[bebopbalogna]

if a hall and oates concert is still anything close to this gem from 79, then $30 is the steal of a lifetime..

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/ag_UHB8IX-g" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/ag_UHB8IX-g</a>

[Bizarro]

Ricky Gervais meets Elmo

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Kr9_5uZn6ds" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/Kr9_5uZn6ds</a>

[Poop Fresh-Herbed Pickles]

because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss because your kiss your kiss is on my lips because your kiss your kiss I can't resist because your kiss you kiss is what I miss

[Poop Fresh-Herbed Pickles]

Welcome to the song writing contest between Hall & Oats and Loggins & McDonald:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/pLFrzkTHP18" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/pLFrzkTHP18</a>

[Bizarro]

DAMN! I was just going to link to that.

<--defeated

[Bizarro]

.

[Bizarro]

Had to go back and watch Stewart on Crossfire after all of that Cramer stuff. Even more impressive really, as he eviscerates two jackasses on their own show, in front of their own audience.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/aFQFB5YpDZE" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/aFQFB5YpDZE</a>

[captqitn]

Just went on a lil H&O research mission.    I once saw a vid on VH1 classic where they are in crazy full-on prog mode.  Never knew when that era happened.   But I found it.   "War Babies" from 1975, Todd Rundgren produced, Utopia was the backing band.    

Wound up on Amazon used CD listings.   They had three copies.   $6, $82, and $175.    After carefully consideration, I purchased the $6 copy.


Even if its godawful, I have a buddy who's a Rundgren freakazoid.  I'm sure he'll take it in happily to flesh out his collection.

[Poop Fresh-Herbed Pickles]

I was listening to Dianne Rheme (sp?) this morning.  She and her guests were really lauding his interview with Cramer.

[Tripp]

your kiss is on my LIST

of the best things in life...

[Poop Fresh-Herbed Pickles]

Their kiss is on my shit list...because they give so many rim jobs.

[matthew]

The two main arguments you hear about Roma are:

1) They're a culturally unique people with much to offer the world in art and heritage, who are constantly the victims of prejudice and discrimination. Most of them are law-abiding citizens who do not deserve this.
2) They are disproportionately prone to crime. In fact, a nomadic thief/con artist existence is written into the history of their culture. Despite being a small minority, they are largely responsible for much of Romania's problems with property crime, gang activity, and fraud.

The problem is that both of these arguments are true.

The problem with these arguments is that you here them in any country you go. Even if the latter is statistically accurate (many claim the same about blacks and latinos in the U.S.), it only exists as a rationale for racial prejudice and violence.

While progress has been made, and  the climb has been long from the depths of WWII and the reign of Nicolae Ceausecu, many of these problems they engendered and represent still echo through to the present. Nationalists scare the piss out of me.

[Bizarro]

The problem with these arguments is that you here them in any country you go. Even if the latter is statistically accurate (many claim the same about blacks and latinos in the U.S.), it only exists as a rationale for racial prejudice and violence.

While progress has been made, and  the climb has been long from the depths of WWII and the reign of Nicolae Ceausecu, many of these problems they engendered and represent still echo through to the present. Nationalists scare the piss out of me.

M______'s family is probably a bit more sympathetic to the Roma than many because the same nationalists who spew hate at gypsies usually have it in for the Hungarian minority as well. Her hometown, Cluj, only 2 years ago ousted their openly anti-Hungarian mayor Funar. He'd kept himself busy renaming landmarks that honored Transylvanian (i.e. largely Hungarian heritage) with Romanian names, erecting statues of Romanian "heroes" who'd mostly made their names slaughtering Hungarians, etc.

Even the name of M______'s hometown has been revised to reflect this nationalist bent. Once called simply "Cluj" it is now known formally as "Cluj-Napoca," the "Napoca" being the name of a nearby ancient Roman settlement the nationalists like to claim Cluj developed from. Simply put, they're saying they were there first. (Kind of fanciful thinking... the records of the founding of the Hungarian city "Kolosvar"--still what M_____'s Mama calls it--are pretty clear.)

Obviously racism plays a big part in the vilification of gypsies. But their effect on crime cannot be overstated. They also spearhead rings of beggars, in many cases using children who have been hobbled or blindfolded to make them better earners. It's pretty horrible. The problem is that while the crime and the panhandling may be facts, so is it a fact that most Roma are just regular people with nothing to do with any of that.

[Doctor Rock]

Matthew, that article about "Romanian" crime in Italy was just batshit insane.

The way that writer cheerfully uses the terms Romanian and Roma as interchangeable is demented and ignorant. They're completely ethnically separate groups, the former originating from the Roman empire, the latter from the Indian subcontinent. That the names sound similar is a coincidence; each is derived from different languages and different root words. Romani are less than 2% of the Romanian population. That's enough to be the second-highest population of Romani in Europe, but Spain has substantially more and Turkey has nearly as many.

Romanians are commonly identified with Roma

There are Romani who are Romanian, but they're about as common as Scottish-Americans or French-Americans. Conflating your average immigrant from Bucuresti with the gypsy  minority is an explosively stupid thing to do. Note also, how in the article they talk about how Italians feel when they "see a Romanian." Since ethnic Romanians come from largely the same ethnic stock as Italians, I'm pretty sure they talking about how they feel when they see Romani.

That writer really doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground.

Or the damn thing was badly translated, or the idiot who wrote that has a general anti-immigrant outlook, so he decided to amalgamate Romanians and Romani. 

Hostility towards gypsies is quite widespread in Europe, I would even say that now that anti-semitism is a no-no, racism towards gypsies is the new fashionable pan-European ethnic hatred.   In Portugal, there was, a few years back, a lot of hoopla surrounding the decision of a small town mayor to ban all gypsies from his town territory.  I was surprised at the mount of support his bullshit got.