In recent months, there have been an increasing number of news stories that reflect the growingly abusive application of anti-recording and anti-photography laws in the United States as the nation slides towards totalitarianism. These laws are frequently being used to protect liars, abusers, and criminals and are seldom applied to protect actual victims. While the recordings are sometimes of civilians like Mel Gibson verbally abusing his ex-girlfriend, other times they are government officials carrying badges and guns who are abusing their power, violating civil rights, or simply showing their true colors they don’t want the world to see.
I ran across the article 6 Completely Legal Ways The Cops Can Screw You while writing another article today and found it quite alarming. It makes it clear that the United States we live in today is by the government, for the government, and against the citizens and US Constitution.
A quick summary:
The police can take your things, sell them, and keep the proceeds. All they have to do is state they suspect your property was used while a crime was committed, even if they don’t think you committed the crime. They don’t have to charge or convict anybody of a crime to do this, just state a suspicion.
Police in Ohio can give you a ticket for speeding and get a conviction against you with no objective speed measurements, only an “expert observation” that you were speeding.
Police in Texas can arrest you for drinking even if you are of legal age in a legally operated bar. This law has reportedly been used to harass gays and Hispanics by rounding them up in bars and arresting them.
Police in Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, New Hampshire, and several other states can arrest you for filming or video recording them and confiscate the films and recordings, even if they are breaking the law and abusing somebody. Nobody seems to have considered how this may make legal surveillance cameras suddenly illegal if the police show up.
In Washington, D.C., police can arrest women who carry more than two condoms. They can legally assume any woman carrying more than two is a prostitute.
In Ohio, police can obtain your identifying information including name, address, and social security number without your permission and then use it just like an identity thief. One woman found this out after the cops used her name, address, and social security number to pay and plant an undercover stripper in her community while other cops watched the performances live and via the Internet. They are under no obligation to clean up the mess they made of your identity.
Recent Comments