America's Failed Drug War: Georgia Woman Jailed for SpaghettiOs

In another tale of bogus meth madness, Georgia cops arrested and jailed a 23 year old woman because of a suspicion that a residue coated spoon in her car was evidence that she was a drug user. Ashley Gabrielle Huff of Commerce, GA was arrested by Gainesville City police officers during a routine traffic stop after one of the deputy dawgs overreacted in misidentifying the substance on the eating utensil. She was arrested, jailed and then ordered to attend mandatory drug counseling sessions. When she missed a session she was re-arrested and kept in jail for well over a month until the authorities had their Uh Oh SpaghettiOs moment leading to much embarrassment and a likely lawsuit.

Even though the suspected methamphetamine turned out to be one of America's most popular cheap food items, Huff was subjected to a nightmare of legal purgatory of the type that has become commonplace in this once great country. An innocent woman with no criminal record ended up stuck in in jail until  the inept and slower than a glacier crime lab discovered that the mistaken "schedule II substance" was actually dried tomato sauce from a can of Campbell's wonderful pasta treat.

According to the website Police State USA in a story entitled "Woman arrested for possessing spoon covered with dried Spaghettios":

An innocent woman had several months of her life destroyed when she was arrested and charged with a felony because of a spaghetti-encrusted spoon found in her possession.

Ashley Gabrielle Huff, 23, had no criminal history and insisted that “there’s no way in hell” that there could have been any drugs in her possession during a traffic stop in July. Nonetheless, a Gainesville police officer honed in on a spoon that was “on her or near her” in the vehicle in which she was riding as a passenger.

Suspecting that the spoon had drug residue on it, the officer arrested Ms. Huff and charged her with possession of methamphetamines. Even for trace amounts, the charge of possessing “Schedule II substances” Georgia is punishable by 2-15 years in prison.

After her July 2nd arrest, she spend an unconfirmed number of days in jail before she was released and required to attend a number of obligatory drug appointments. When she was unable to make all the appointments, she was rearrested and made to sit in jail from August 2nd until September 18th.

Ms. Huff insisted that she wasn’t a drug user, but had little means with which to defend herself. She relied on a public defender to represent her in court.

Finally in late September, a crime lab analysis revealed that the “residue” on the spoon was not an illegal drug. It was actually tomato sauce from a can of SpaghettiOs, as the woman had claimed all along.

The internet is replete with tales of cops abusing their power in perverse and violent ways these days but the Georgia incident is just rank stupidity as well as an example of Barney Fife style hayseeds who do not belong in the law enforcement profession.

The drug charges against Huff were dismissed according to the story "Meth charge dropped after only spaghetti sauce found on spoon" from the website of The Gainesville Times:

Drug charges have been dropped against a Commerce woman after crime lab analysis confirmed her claim that a spoon she had in a vehicle leading to her arrest did not contain methamphetamine residue but spaghetti sauce.

Ashley Gabrielle Huff, 23, initially was charged with possession of methamphetamine. She maintained the residue on a spoon was spaghetti sauce, not meth.

After the analysis agreed, the charge was dismissed. She was released from the Hall County Jail on Thursday night.

“I think she said it had been SpaghettiOs,” Hall County assistant public defender Chris van Rossem said.

Huff was arrested July 2 by the Gainesville Police Department, suspected of having meth residue on a spoon, van Rossem said.

“From what I understand, she was a passenger in a car and had a spoon on her, near her, and I guess the officer, for whatever reason, thought there was some residue,” he said.

According to the Hall County Comprehensive Justice Information System, Huff had not been charged with any type of felony or drug-related offense prior to the incident.

“She’s maintained all along that there’s no way in hell that’s any sort of drug residue or anything like that,” van Rossem said.

Attempts to obtain the original arrest report from the Gainesville Police were unsuccessful, and van Rossem was unfamiliar with other details related to the arrest. Gainesville Police spokesman Cpl. Kevin Holbrook said the department would defer to the district attorney’s office.

The story also stated that Huff was to have begun  the "process of a plea deal" which speaks to the rampant form of systemic prosecutorial misconduct that is an offshoot of our vast national for profit prison gulag. Chalk up yet another example of the abysmal failure of the war on drugs. The tale of Huff's bogus arrest and imprisonment is now a national story and will hopefully result in the type of shaming that leads to firings of local officials.

You just can't make shit like this up.

Bipartisan Duo Push Criminal Justice Reform With REDEEM Act

Republican Senator Rand Paul has joined forces with Democratic Senator Cory Booker in pushing for reform of the way that the U.S. criminal justice system treats non-violent youthful offenders. It is encouraging in these twisted times of toxic political acrimony to actually see signs of forward thinking senators rise above the trench warfare to advocate for a higher cause. It is a cause that represents the best interests of our shared society in the long-term rather than just the capsule of an election cycle. The duo are working on getting legislation enacted that would remove the lifelong stigma from individuals who make mistakes early in their lives by giving them a chance to redeem themselves. It is neither wise nor compassionate to allow a system to condemn those who have gone awry early in life - in a non-violent manner - to decades of punishment. These youths face a lifetime of being reduced to second class citizens or even worse. Once ensnared, many are then molded into violent offenders through their immersion in a skewed system of criminal injustice where they are then exposed to real bad guys during their formative years.

The REDEEM Act, which stands for"Record Expungement Designed to Enhance Employment" would prevent errant young people from being ruined for life by getting sucked into the far too often indiscriminate conviction and imprisonment mill of the bureaucratic monstrosity that is the American criminal justice system. According to a story in the online version of the  New Jersey Star-Ledger, which is that state that Booker hails from:

Cory Booker and Rand Paul serve very different constituencies, and their political leanings are equally diverse. But the two U.S. senators agree that the federal government’s approach to non-violent offenders has to change.

Booker, a liberal Democrat from New Jersey, and Paul, a libertarian-leaning Republican from Kentucky, plan to announce today their intention to sponsor legislation, which they call the "REDEEM Act", to change the government’s focus from punishing low-level drug offenders to helping them re-enter society.

"I will work with anyone, from any party, to make a difference for the people of New Jersey and this bipartisan legislation does just that," Booker said in a statement. "The REDEEM Act will ensure that our tax dollars are being used in smarter, more productive ways."

The bill would:

• Repeal the ban on federal welfare benefits for those convicted of drug violations.

• Provide states with incentives to raise the age of criminal responsibility when suspects are automatically tried as adults to 18. Under the bill, states that set it at 18 would get an advantage in applying for Community Oriented Policing Services grants.

• Automatically expunge criminal records for children under 15 who have been convicted of non-violent crimes, and seal the records of those 15 to 17, meaning offenders could lawfully claim they do not exist.

• Create the "first broad-based federal path" for adults to petition to seal criminal records, and allow employers who request FBI background checks of applicants to see only "relevant and accurate information."

• Ban solitary confinement of juvenile inmates except "in the most extreme circumstances."

The national media generated political circus will likely spin the joint-effort as nothing more than another cynical self-promotion to smear Paul and Booker as being disingenuous. The truth is that the REDEEM Act is a bill in line with the highest of American values. Redemption and inclusion as well as the ability to contribute economically are virtues that should be embraced as well as offering a helping hand up rather than kicking somebody when they are down. That may be tough for some to wrap their minds around in this dog eat dog, screw your buddy over society but that is the way that things used to be back when we were a kinder, gentler and more humble nation.

The REDEEM Act is not getting much attention in this election year, it doesn't exactly offer up the shovels of bloody red meat that regularly is whipped out to fire up the bases of the parties so it is avoided while sensationalism trumps rational debate. It also faces fierce opposition by the prison industrial complex lobby. One of America's dirty little secrets is that there is a boatload of money to be made off of throwing people into jail and our for profit prison system, one which blows away Stalin's gulags is as shameful as it is lucrative. The trend towards privatizing prisons is growing and the prison lobby is flush with money.

Leading the pack of prison profiteers is Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) of which a "co-founder" was quoted in a Forbes online story as saying: ”the company was founded on the principle that you could sell prisons ‘just like you were selling cars, or real estate, or hamburgers.’” The REDEEM Act would deprive this monstrous incarceration machine of millions of young bodies, each of which would be a revenue stream for decades. Paul and Booker will be subjected to a barrage of negative ad campaigns and their opponents will be showered with campaign contributions to help derail REDEEM. That is just the way that the system works when government officials put themselves up for sale to the highest bidders and this is why the efforts of Rand Paul and Cory Booker are as commendable as they are rare for U.S. politicians.

LINK: Video Interview with Senators Paul and Booker discussing the REDEEM Act.

The Police State Strikes Back as Occupy Activist Hammered by Law

“If you're not a cop, you're "little people"

 -Captain Bryant

The hammer of the police state slammed down on the head of Cecily McMillan as if it were a sledge, convicting the Occupy Wall Street activist of assaulting a New York police officer. Not that the cop grabbed her breast during a protest, the men in black are the alpha level predators in the soft fascist (soft for now) place that is The Homeland. McMillan hit the cop in the face with an elbow, likely more of a reflexive action than anything else but it didn’t matter when it came time to feeding her into the big industrial meat grinder of the American injustice system. McMillan faces up to seven years in prison for her act where she will be in danger of being raped and beaten by other inmates, the pigs will probably even egg them on. She can probably consider herself lucky considering the less fortunate victims of our militarized police and their increasingly disconcerting view of the citizenry as the enemy.

According to a story in The Guardian that cites one of the jurors at expressing being shocked at the prison term that the "terrified" McMillan now faces:

McMillan’s attorney, Martin Stolar, argued in court that the video clip was not clear enough to prove anything. Afterwards, he blamed it for the conviction. “I think that is the only piece of evidence that a jury could hang its hat on,” he said. “On a quick glance without analysis, it looks like an assault. But it does not show what happened to Cecily.”

The juror confirmed Stolar’s fears. “For most of the jury, the video said it all,” the juror said. The juror said that an immediate vote after the 12 were sent out for deliberation found they were split 9-3 in favour of convicting. After everyone watched the clip again in the jury room, the juror said, two of the three hold-outs switched to the majority, leaving only the juror who approached the Guardian in favour of acquitting the 25-year-old. Sensing “a losing battle”, the juror agreed to join them in a unanimous verdict. “I’m very remorseful about it,” the juror said a few hours later, having learned of McMillan’s potential punishment.

Neither was the panel persuaded by McMillan’s account of suffering bruising to her chest from being grabbed and enduring a seizure after being forcefully arrested by Bovell and his colleagues. Ultimately, the 12 – including a former nurse who said during selection that she treated victims of police brutality during the Columbia University riots of 1968 – were unmoved by photographs of bruises and by testimony that McMillan was seen convulsing on the pavement. Medical notes from two hospital visits on the night of the incident were seen to support the state’s allegation that McMillan had invented her injuries, the juror said.

This is so illustrative of what has happened in American circa 2014 where vengeance reigns supreme over whatever vestiges remain of the law and any potential jury pool is tainted by the constant exposure to non-stop television and movie depictions that glorify police and particularly the cop that pushes the boundaries to overcome a system that is held back by such trivialities as due process, civil liberties and Constitutional rights. How much longer until we start having public executions as a spectacle for the masses? The increasing degree of violence practiced by the police as well as the focus of the judicial system on convictions combined with a nation of sheep who wallow in a dream of blissful ignorance until the day that they themselves are led to the steel chutes where the hammer of the law will fall upon their heads as well has set this once great country on a collision course with the inevitable fascism, some may see that it is already here only not omnipresent and omnipotent just yet.

I always read the work of John Rutherford of The Whitehead Institute when it comes to warnings of the police state and his latest piece which is entitled “Martial Law, Detention Camps and Kangaroo Courts: Are We Recreating the Third Reich?” is a must read from which I excerpt:

Despite what some may think, the Constitution is no magical incantation against government wrongdoing. Indeed, it’s only as effective as those who abide by it. However, without courts willing to uphold the Constitution’s provisions when government officials disregard it and a citizenry knowledgeable enough to be outraged when those provisions are undermined, it provides little to no protection against SWAT team raids, domestic surveillance, police shootings of unarmed citizens, indefinite detentions, and the like.

Unfortunately, the courts and the police have meshed in their thinking to such an extent that anything goes when it’s done in the name of national security, crime fighting and terrorism. Consequently, America no longer operates under a system of justice characterized by due process, an assumption of innocence, probable cause and clear prohibitions on government overreach and police abuse. Instead, our courts of justice have been transformed into courts of order, advocating for the government’s interests, rather than championing the rights of the citizenry, as enshrined in the Constitution.

Just recently, for example, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in U.S. v. Westhoven that driving too carefully, with a rigid posture, taking a scenic route, and having acne are sufficient reasons for a police officer to suspect you of doing something illegal, detain you, search your car, and arrest you—even if you’ve done nothing illegal to warrant the stop in the first place.

In that same vein, the U.S. Supreme Court declared in a 5-4 ruling in Navarette v. California that police officers can, under the guise of “reasonable suspicion,” stop cars and question drivers based solely on anonymous tips, no matter how dubious, and whether or not they themselves witnessed any troubling behavior.

And then you have the Supreme Court’s refusal to hear Hedges v. Obama, a legal challenge to the indefinite detention provision of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 (NDAA), thereby affirming that the President and the U.S. military can arrest and indefinitely detain individuals, including American citizens, based on a suspicion that they might be associated with or aiding terrorist organizations.

All three cases reflect a mindset in which the rule of law, the U.S. Constitution, once the map by which we navigated sometimes hostile terrain, has been unceremoniously booted out of the runaway car that is our government, driven over and left for road kill on the side of the road. All that can be seen in the rear view mirror are the tire marks on its ragged frame.

Mr. Whitehead in his piece goes on to elaborate on detention camps for American political dissidents as well as the similarities (although refined) to that most infamous historic regime in Germany but that is a story for another time, he has far too many valid observations to do them justice here without the benefit of a further discussion that does include US history as well. You can read his piece in its entirety here and please support his work at The Rutherford Institute, you don't have to agree with them on everything but they are spot on concerning the police state and deterioration of the American judicial system.

Few outside of those who run this system of oppression understand just how far that we have now departed from our once cherished Constitutional values which have now become nothing more than punchlines for comics and fodder for those who run the machine to denigrate critics. Each and every day brings another outrage but to those who are still sleeping blissfully within their cocoons of willful ignorance they continue their hero worship of the cops and pay lip service to that quaint and long gone system of "checks and balances"

George W. Bush may have referred to The Constitution as a "goddamned piece of paper" but Barack Obama is the one who has wiped his ass with it.