Pete in Austin for the Police Accountability Conference

Cop Block‘s Pete Eyre is on the road on the Cop Block Tour and may be coming to a city near you! His first stop was Austin, TX where he spoke at the Police Accountability Conference with Carlos Miller and other great activists. Here are videos he produced about his weekend at the conference:

Part 1:

It was neat how excited folks were to get out and Copblock in a big group. Unfortunately, many Copblock groups are little more than a few dedicated activists in various areas of the country. The Copblocking during the conference showed how much more effective Copblocking can be when done with larger numbers. This is why the Free State Project is so important. When we concentrate activists, activism becomes more effective. It’s been proven over and over. Imagine 300 active Copblockers living in Manchester. You’d have enough to have 30 Copblockers on the streets every day of the week. Wherever the police might pull someone over – odds are a Copblocker would be nearby to respond.

Part 2:

VIDEO: Secret Police Camera Snatch Revealed

This afternoon, I was happily reunited with my beloved Canon Vixia HFR21, after it had spent nearly two months in the custody of the state police. Since the unsealing of the secret search warrant, it is still unclear what caused judge Edward Burke and trooper Joesph DiRusso to believe that they had a right to conspire to steal property. Their search warrant 2013_07_26_jtdirusso_akpf1lacks anything resembling probable cause of a crime, and the ‘victim’ of the alleged wiretap was royal court jester Tom Mullins, who collects funds from captive taxpayers. Mullins also has an active lawsuit against myself and five friends whom he suspects are behind the filling of parking meters downtown, depriving his organization of their coveted ticket revenue. Even without evidence of any criminal activity, Mullins nearly succeeded in depriving myself of a defensive tool by stealing my camera, a device that I carry with me when Robin Hooding without exception. Thanks to my friend James Cleaveland, I was re-armed with a Sony HDR-CX190 that evening following the shakedown, minimizing the intended damaging effect of the property seizure.

Also retrieved with the camera is the footage of the shakedown, which occurred just out of earshot of my home, while my roommates occupied the porch as I had just bicycled off to go 2013_08_19_reunitedRobin Hooding. At the corner of Leverett and School Street, a car that had earlier been circling my home appeared at a stop sign, and that is where the footage begins. Unfortunately, it appears DiRusso stopped the recording shortly after taking possession of the camera, so not included in this clip is the three to five more minutes I spent on the corner waiting for the receipt for my camera and verbally laying into DiRusso’s subordinate about the morality of their career choice. (more…)

“House of Corrections” is House of Horrors for Mentally Ill

Having been on “R” block in the CCHOC for a couple months, I have had a front row seat to observe the failure of the jail to address or even make a serious effort to address the plight of the mentally ill within its walls. The HOC is rife with mental illness. Many of its prisoners are here because they are mentally ill. Those who are mildly mentally ill on the outside frequently become dangerously so on the inside. The jail seems to be designed to take people who are a little crazy and drive them completely out of their minds.

There is no apparent therapy provided for mentally ill people here, except for a couple of meetings a week for the chemically dependent. There is, as far as I can tell, no psychiatrist. A psychologist, Barnes Peterson, who lacks the training to prescribe, makes the decisions about medication and passes them on to a Physician’s Assistant, who prescribes. These two frequently change people’s medication, then have the medication ground and dissolved in apple sauce. . . even though some of them are time release medications. This is completely irresponsible, as grinding many medications destroys the time release mechanism.     (more…)

How I went from atheist to minister in the Shire Free Church.

Ian_FancyThis lengthy post is basically a partial biography and tells my story in some detail about my path to liberty and spirituality:

I just can’t do it anymore.  I have had enough of paying for this inhumane and insane state system.

It’s more than just a system – “the state” is a belief system and a religion.  It is an evil religion that masquerades as though it is good.

Of course, I didn’t always think like this.

I suppose I should start at the beginning.  Probably like you, I attended state-run school while growing up.  They told me I was “gifted” – a designation that to this day I find ridiculous – so I went to the state school where the other “gifted” students went.  School still sucked, but I had no idea how much worse it was at the other schools as I was insulated at the institution that was generally inhabited by the kids of the elite, though there were exceptions, including me.  My family were middle class Presbyterians. (more…)

Black Sheep Rising – Episode 13

1.  Why does Darryl hate some dogs more than others?

2.  Shelter holds dog for ransom.  Euthanizes after three days for late payment.

3.  City of Keene challenges Robin Hood to duel.

4.  Russian man writes own credit card terms.  Wins in court.

5.  Teen informs dad of lost virginity via mis-text.