What happened to the James Smoak family of North Carolina, as they were driving home from a vacation in Tennessee, is only one of many horror stories of encounters by American citizens with police. Our police and highway patrol officers now act as if they had been trained at the School of the Americas or by a leftover unit of Gestapo officers.
Although no crime had been committed, the Smoak family has returned home traumatized, one of their pet dogs was shot dead by a Tennessee Highway Patrolman, and the Smoaks have now been introduced to the new America, where “nothing has changed” except increased security against terrorists. And police terrorism against American citizens.
Mary Jo Denton, a staff writer for the Cookeville, Tennessee Herald-Citizen, reported the details of the police stop and ensuing episodes, including the shooting of the dog in front of the Smoaks and their two sons. It also included the handcuffing of James Smoak at gunpoint, the horror of being stopped unexpectedly by three Tennessee Highway Patrol cars, removed from the car at gunpoint, and handcuffed. This included James Smoak, his wife Pamela, and their 17-year old son, Brandon.
The Smoaks were released in due time. However, the entire affair apparently started when Mr. Smoak’s wallet, inadvertently left on the hood of the car at a gas stop, flew off the hood and onto the highway. Some passerby reported the incident, which hardly constituted grounds for suspected terrorism or even a “normal” robbery. However, the Tennessee Highway Patrol apparently didn’t even check the Smoaks’ North Carolina license plates to determine the owner of the vehicle or any records pertaining to the vehicle or its owners. Guns drawn, the Smoaks were ordered to their knees, face down, and handcuffed.
Whether they were read their Miranda rights is not reported, it probably isn’t known at this point.
Or maybe there just aren’t any more Miranda rights.
Or any other civil rights. Or any Bill of Rights.
The problem with American citizens is, they think they still live in a country where they are innocent until proven guilty, or that they have rights as citizens to be approached by the law officers and asked for their driver’s license or other form of identification prior to being arrested, handcuffed and shoved into a patrol car – all without a crime having been committed.
We used to read about things like this happening in Nazi Germany, and in Soviet Russia, in Communist China, or some banana republics.
We hear this is how Saddam Hussein treats his Iraqi subjects. And we’re about to go to war to depose this “evil dictator” because our leaders want his land to be as free as America. Apparently, it already is.
If this sounds bitter, it’s because I remember a very different America, I’ve been stopped twice in my lifetime by the police for minor traffic infractions, and not once have I encountered anything like this. However, I will do my best never to again do something to warrant a police stop.
Come to think of it, James Smoak didn’t DO anything to warrant a police stop. In my America, the police would have stopped him and returned his wallet, identification and all, wished him a good day and drive carefully.
That was when this nation was a free country.
When are Americans going to wake up to the fact that all this so-called airport security is a sham, that they have traded their freedom for the illusion of security, and police are now a growing group of “jack boots” who make a terrorist case out of a lost wallet? What else will attract attention? Well, don’t leave your children for one minute in the car (regardless of the cause or the weather) or they might wind up in the hands of the state. Don’t argue too loudly, family fights like we had in the days of a free country now attract the police and everyone could wind up in jail for calling someone else a dotcom.it no good rotten swineface.
You must argue quietly, never strike your children or discipline them in public for any reason, speak only that which is politically correct or wind up charged with a hate crime, and defend every administration and authority or be deemed an enemy of the state.
If your religion is Christianity, be forewarned that it is more and more politically incorrect, while speaking of Allah is very politically correct. It is even taught in schools where Bibles are not allowed, cigarettes are banned, condoms are handed out freely and homosexual practices are taught to children too young to even think about sex.
As many readers know, I live in the Phoenix, Arizona megaplex, a complex of about twenty cities and towns around the state’s capital city. A couple of months ago, a woman was shot to death in her car at a drive-through Walgreen’s pharmacy for trying to get Soma by a forged prescription. The officer who shot the woman – who had a 14-month old baby with her in the car – claimed self-defense because the woman was trying to run over him. However, the medical examiner found she had been shot from an angle to the left and rear of her position in the driver’s seat. Self defense? The officer is under investigation for second-degree murder and has been fired from the Chandler police department. However, a child is motherless, a man has been deprived of his wife and companion, the mother of his child, because his wife tried to get a drug with a phony prescription. Florida Governor Jeb Bush’s daughter did the same thing and got a slap on the wrist.
It seems the law now considers everyone guilty until proven innocent, with people in high places excepted.
The number of horror stories increases daily in Amerika.
You don’t have to do anything except lose your wallet or look like a suspect, as long as you are not the proper hyphenation. It seems our nation goes out of the way to intimidate citizens of European descent, and cater to those of Middle Eastern or Hispanic descent.
And we thought we were all equal.
Think again. Just not out loud.