A Florida woman has filed a lawsuit over her 2010 arrest and jailing over the purchase of over the counter allergy medication. Mickey Lynn Goodson bought two boxes of Sudafed at a local Winn Dixie in 2010 and was subsequently harassed, humiliated and thrown into the pokey by Gadsden County Sheriff's Department goons. This is thanks to the arbitrary and out of control laws of the failed war on drugs. The most disturbing aspect of this story is that the on duty pharmacist actually recommended that Goodson buy the extra box which put her over the limit and triggered an immediate response by the deputy dawg local law enforcement who must watch the Police Academy films for training purposes.
According to the website Courthouse News Service which provides a synopsis of the events leading to the lawsuit:
Florida sheriff's officers falsely arrested and imprisoned a woman with allergies for buying two boxes of Sudafed at a drug store, she claims in Federal Court.
Mickey Lynn Goodson claims she bought the two boxes of the over-the-counter drug because the pharmacist recommended it. She sued Gadsden County Sheriff Morris Young and the two officers who arrested her, Rodney Moore and William Buckhalt.
Charges of possession of a controlled substance were eventually dropped, Goodson says in the July 18 complaint.
In July 2010, Goodson says, she went to a Winn-Dixie store to get Sudafed "because she has allergy flare-ups." Sudafed contains pseudoephedrine, which can be used as a precursor chemical in some recipes for methamphetamines.
"The pharmacist on duty suggested that plaintiff buy two boxes of Sudafed and she did," the complaint states.
"Almost immediately," defendant Officer Moore drove up in an unmarked police car, Goodson says. Moore blocked her and her husband's car, prevented them from leaving, and asked if she had just bought Sudafed. She said she had. Moore then took the Sudafed and told the Goodsons they had to wait for more officers to arrive, detaining them against their will, they say in the complaint.
Defendant Buckhalt arrived, with other deputies, and searched the Goodsons' car. They were taken to a sheriff's station, where Buckhalt asked if he could search their home. The Goodson said no, "unless there was a search warrant. Buckhalt then said, 'Oh, I'll get a search warrant,'" according to the complaint.
After being held for two to three hours, Goodson says, she left the Sheriff's office.
She was arrested and handcuffed on her front porch, by a deputy who asked her, "What have you gotten rid of?" Goodson says.
She replied, "I don't know what you are talking about," but was taken back to the county jail and booked in, charged with possession of a controlled substance.
"Plaintiff was arrested on her front porch after Buckhalt obtained a search warrant on false and misleading statements and evidence," the complaint states.
The state of Florida which I fondly refer to as "the diseased penis of America" has some of the most regressive and insane anti-drug laws in the nation. This is particularly so when purchasing over the counter allergy medication. Not that the need for such pills is a rarity given the humid climate and the at times nearly intolerable air quality index in regards to allergens and other toxins. Trust me, I live there and buy a good amount of such medicine myself because I need to be able to breathe - not because I am cooking bathtub meth. A few years back, I had a very creepy experience at a local Target store when the pharmacy clerk snatched away my driver’s license before I could object and then quickly disappeared into the back for an uncomfortably long period of time. These low level flunkies have been watching too many episodes of Breaking Bad and it shows. Target employees and the management should spend more fucking protecting their customers from massive banking information hacking operations and less in being the dutiful little Nazis of the anti-drug Gestapo.
Being fully aware of the nature of the nearly fully implemented American police state I more than
half expected to be hauled off by local law-enforcement thugs and summarily jailed once they ran me through their massive database. I like many others am likely a “person of interest” simply because of my anti-government political views, my writing and my activism. In the words of the late writer Hunter S. Thompson: "paranoia is just another word for ignorance". Such thoughts are not just "paranoia", given the times in which we live but rather just an awareness of how far down the rabbit hole that we have gone as a society. I can assure you that there are hundreds if not thousands of similar stories to that of what Mickey Lynn Goodson suffered and far worse. Sadly, since the majority of Americans are just star-spangled sheep who are conditioned to submit to the uniform and the badge rather than to challenge authority they just roll over when it happens to them. How far we have come from our tyranny adverse founders have we not?.
That being said it is nice to see Goodson suing the cops for what was obviously a blatant abuse of power. Granted it was in Gadsden County one of the smallest in the state which is located in the panhandle right on the Georgia state line but the police are running amok everywhere. It brings to mind the scene from the science fiction movie Blade Runner where Captain Bryant makes it clear to Deckard that “if you’re not a cop, you’re little people”. This seems to be the prevailing mentality among a large percentage of the police in the United States these days and they are armed to the teeth with military grade weaponry too.
No matter how little the effort may be in the grand scheme of the U.S. police state if it brings attention to the problem then it is a service to all Americans.
Good for Mickey Lynn Goodson for taking a stand against the bastards. Fuck the Pigs!
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