It comes as a modest victory that the case of State v Garret Ean, relative to a bicycle headlamp violation dating back to June 2011, was closed without a guilty finding on December 18. Judge M. Kristin Spath issued the order which I received on the 20th stating that, “The court is using its discretion pursuant to RSA 262:42 and placing this complaint on file without a finding for a period of six months…” This ‘neither guilty nor not-guilty’ ruling is a legislative creation for New Hampshire courts which reads, “A complaint against a person…may be placed on file at the discretion of the court, if the violation appears to have been unintentional, or if no person or property could have been endangered thereby.” This provision applies most to the ambiguous motor vehicle statutes and some other infractions that do not fall under the more straightforward criminal code. While I complete a summary article on the entire court performance, here is a brief history of the case chronicled with court documents.
The first court appearance I had for this incident was in September 2011, when I received discovery from the state and traded with them my evidence and witness list. The case was continued a number of times while my witness was traveling. When a date of late September 2012 was set for the trial, I was concerned that my witness may not have returned to New Hampshire by this time. Before I had a chance to file another continuance request, I received one from the state’s attorney Heather Flanner, which requested the trial be moved to a date later than October 25. I did not object to the continuance, but apparently it must have been withdrawn by the prosecution, because on September 28, I received a Notice of Fine from the court, claiming that I had been found guilty in abstentia for a trial date that I had missed on September 25. (more…)
November 2011 – I am pulled over for speeding on the way back from some activism in Concord with a car full of activists. Trooper Kelly Healy asks my passengers for ID – I remind her that as passengers they are in no way obligated to show her ID. As I reach for my car registration she asks about my driver’s license and why there was an NH address on a FL license. I decline to answer her probing questions, instead asking her questions of my own, like, “Am I being detained?”. Healy returns to her car and later comes back with a speeding ticket, to which I ask her if she really wants to go to court, and she claims that is my choice. I remind her that it was her choice to aggress against me and tell her I’ll see her in court.
Or, maybe not. Trooper Healy never showed up to a court hearing scheduled for this week and the case was dismissed on my motion to dismiss for failure to appear on the part of the complaining party. I “won”! Here’s video from the pullover and court hearing:
I put quotes around the win because it took many hours of my time, for which I will not be compensated. Allow me to detail the process: (more…)
The best quote in the piece is, “It’s really disturbing to think about what 20,000 of them – assuming they are all serious about coming here – could do to New Hampshire.”
The statists know we are making a difference, and they are frightened to death of more liberty activists coming here. Remember, we’re only just getting started, with only about 1,100 liberty activists here for the FSP.
If it wasn’t obvious that the FSP is the most effective movement for liberty in existence, this article should solidify it. No other liberty migration can claim this success. No other liberty movement can claim this impact. If you love liberty, you need to be here. Please join the Free State Project today and move ASAP.
Aaron Gill sees an inherent contradiction in the Free State Project and what he believes to be its stated mission, which is to get 20,000 people to move to New Hampshire from other states in order to establish a libertarian utopia where limited government exists only to protect individual rights – and little else.
It’s a project that Gill, a Democrat, believes will backfire on the Free State movement and its participants. (more…)
This post was originally published to KeeneCopBlock.org on Dec. 19th, 2012.
Many folks who reside in Keene are aware of the petty harassment doled out by Fred Parsells.
A former Keene police employee, Parsells now claims a “legitimate” right to be a nosy bother to his neighbors due to his occupation as a code enforcer.
Fortunately a lot of thinking individuals have concluded that when the initiation of force or its threat is utilized, whether “officially” sanctioned or not, the person initiating is in the wrong.
There’s much I love about Keene. Yet I could do without the countless iterations of force threatened or initiated by Fred Parsells.
Attorney Knowlton has told me that Assistant US Attorney Emery Hurley is a pretty cool guy, so please remember the things he writes are done on behalf of his client. The man could be a staunch civil libertarian for all we know, but his client happens to be the US of A at the moment.
CBP is hands-down the most powerful of any law enforcement agency in our country because they’re located at the border. No one can film what they do, they “lose” exculpatory video evidence when it suits them, and with officers doing things like this, they deserve some serious enhanced public scrutiny.
If you’d like to share with me your opinions (good or bad), please feel free to do so by emailing me at bbraduma at gmail dot com. If you’d like to do so anonymously you can easily find an anonymous email provider through Google.
Kind donations to fund the litigation can be made to the chip-in… or if you prefer the “super secret squirrel funding method,” through Bitcoin: 19vQDqJzXZWkxHTCtgpoYJwnvGYghHu4AE
Ridley has released the second half of his ambush interview with Department of Homeland Security spokesman Aaron Snipe. Part 2 begins where the first left off, with Snipe denying that US forces tortured a taxi driver in Afghanistan to death. Ridley responds emotively when Snipe repeats, “That’s not true” with, “He wasn’t tortured to death?! He’s dead!” The suited handler, who at this time is walking in advance of Snipe calls over his shoulder, “Do you really want to respond to this?” While Snipe continues to play politician and give fluffy, pro-US policy answers, Ridley lets his frustration show but surprisingly does not cause the spokesman to flee into the camera-free zone. He gets another 90 seconds of dialogue, including a response noting that “President Obama has banned torture, the United States does not torture. That’s core to American foreign policy.” Text flashes on the screen interjecting that if he were thinking on his feet, he would have asked how Obama’s supposed torture ban meshes with the mistreatment of Bradley Manning.
The remainder of the video features polite security guards, and Dave considering on camera whether to conduct a second ambush interview after the closed event or consider the first complete. Walking out, he explains his reasoning. Independent of how Snipe painted roses around the empire, he maintained the utmost professionalism doing it.
