Fox34 in Lubbock reported last week (6/12) on an extraordinary case of a mother in Slaton who was allegedly arrested for asking to see an arrest warrant before she let police cart away her 11-year old son. It turned out, no warrant existed so they arrested her instead. Reporter Bailey Miller's story opened:
Slaton police came to this woman's house, who wishes to remain
anonymous, to arrest her son. But by asking one simple question, she
found herself behind bars instead.
"I told him, 'I
will release my son to you upon viewing those orders.' Those were
exactly my words," The complainant said. "He said, 'This is how you want
to play?' He took two steps back, turned around to the officer and
said, 'Take her.' They turned me around, handcuffed me, and took me in."
The
complainant said she was aware police would be coming to apprehend her
11-year-old son based on a criminal complaint, and that she just wanted
to see the warrant. As it turns out, that warrant didn't exist. She
spent the night in jail while her son was left at home.
Jonathon Turley adds:
What is most remarkable to this story is that the family’s lawyer told
the media that the Slaton Police Department was only willing to
apologize if the family waived any right to sue it for the unlawful and
abusive arrest. That demand alone, if true, should result in the
immediate termination of the police chief as well as the disciplining of
any prosecutor who conveyed the demand in my view. Citizens should not
have to trade away legal rights to receive an apology for allegedly
abusive police conduct.
Quite a tale of tuff-guy decision making gone awry. The Slaton police department is small but has recently suffered a rocky history. An officer was
convicted in 2010 of pocketing cash seized in the field as evidence. Another
resigned in 2011 amidst a mysterious Homeland Security investigation in which the department's computers were seized. The same year, another Slaton officer was
indicted by the feds on child pornography charges and
sentenced to 70 months. Earlier this year they
arrested a gunshot victim over traffic warrants. It's always something with that crew! This episode may end up costing the town more than an apology.
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36 comments:
A damages award to be paid by taxpayers wouldn't accomplish anything. This needs to result in a precedent that stops it from happening again, preferably by creating an individual right to sue personally the officers who did it.
State law does not require that an officer have possession of the warrant at the time of an arrest (see CCP 15.26).
Furthermore, the above provision does not even apply in this case, as State law does not require an arrest warrant be issued in order to take a juvenile into custody, so long as a law enforcement officer has probable cause to believe the child has committed a penal or status offence (see Family Code Sec. 52.01 (3)(A-C)).
The mother thus interfered with a lawful arrest and was therefore subject to arrest herself under various provisions of Chapter 38 of the Texas Penal Code.
The real story here (if there is one for this mundane event) is the continuing decline of accountability in our society, the lack of effective parenting in our country, and the increasing sense of entitlement embraced by Americans.
Finally, let's all remember this story was based solely on the (anonymous) mother's account/perspective of what transpired, and the local media required no corroboration of her statements before publicizing her story.
Hey Ofc. "non-story"--
Come to my house and try to arrest me or my child, you will get shot in the face.
You fucking pig.
That should read "try to arrest me or my child without a warrant."
The "you fucking pig" part I stand by.
bull shit 5:57. sure they don't need a warrrant if they see a crime in progress. This was a home. To go into that home unless they have evidence of immediate danger or are in HOT Persuit! They have no legal right to enter. In fact legally that lady had every legal and constitutional right to elimiate two armed indivinduals who were legally attempting to kidnap her child. Pity she didn't exercise that legal option. Sorry two dumb fucks with no warrant busting into my home are just gonna be dead. No matter what silly costume they are wearing.
The fact the chief is trying to blackmail her...another fucking crime to drop the charges tells me he knows it just as much as i do!
As disturbing as this story is, the fact that another officer attempts to defend this is even more disturbing.
Perhaps the real story here is the decline of common sense, decency, and respect for the Constitution and the laws on the part of law enforcement officers in this country.
http://www.juvenilelaw.org/Education/2011/Breakout%20A%20Juvenile%20Law%20101/GarzaFinal.pdf
Let's lay down this whole episode as the LAST moment that anyone will EVER make any comment about folks NOT being properly respectful of law enforcement. Period. Forever. Not one more comment ever. Can we all agree on this?
The problem isn't that law enforcement isn't respected. The problem is that law enforcement made their OWN reputation. They can now live with it.
Nice to see all of the legal experts weighing in...
Fascism and Tyranny has arrived in America wearing kevlar and badges while spouting "Protect and Defend" and quoting bible verses.
Are you kidding, they left a scared 11 year old alone all night, probably crying cause his Momma had been arrested. Child Pornography, HELLO THERE, what is really going on here, this is horrible, Lubbock is known for being a Child Trafficking Hub, and the POLICE are arrested with child pornography???? There is a 15 year old boy that has been missing for a year now too from that area I BELIEVE! IT'S TIME TO CALL THE FEDS IN AGAIN!!!
Mark Anthony Ysasaga, 15 years old missing from Lubbock Texas, June 2012, he is still missing. He was supposed to be walking to his Fathers' house to get some clothes and he NEVER made it. When the police are caught with Child Pornography, and Lubbock is known as a Child Trafficking Hub, there needs to be the F.B.I., Feds., called in here, this is very suspicious, any Father, or grown up knows that you cannot leave an eleven year old alone after 11:00 P.M. UNSUPERVISED. This is VERY SUSPICIOUS!
Nationwide, more police officers are convicted of trafficking in child pornography than ALL other professions COMBINED. It's law enforcement's "dirty little secret": https://www.facebook.com/pages/Tribute-to-survivors-of-child-sexual-assault-by-law-enforcement-officers/180584842010594
I'm disappointed with the anonymous sources and unidentified 'victim'. True Grit....please stick to the True part.
Why aren't the abusive police lawyers judges and politicians ever held accountable? It's tyranny. It's bad training of the cops, but the courts usually cover them. They all collude against the people, now. Where's the public servant aspect? They're on the public dole and will do anything to keep their power. I bet they're lucky this wasn't at a home of one of those folk who stockpile ammo. But I bet that day is right around the corner, and those in power HOPE to provoke patriots---to create MORE excuse for abuse.
Cops TRY to upset and provoke people so they'll raise their alleged misdemeanor to felony and so on. It's egregious; it shocks the conscience. You can't complain against judges, etc., because the upper judges just ignore it. IT'S VAST AND SICK CORRUPTION.
Is it war?
It's already gone beyond class war, hasn't it? But they rely on most folks to shrug and give in, acquiescing to slavery.
Fire them, jail them; no pay, no time off. Make it loudly public people are innocent and have rights, and no amount of cop & lawyer TV shows of the rich and famous have any validity.
IF ONLY OUR LEGISLATORS WERE NOT ALSO SOLD OUT TO THE MAN.
And you wonder why an Ed Snowden would run to a commie land? 25 years of CRAP. Mac would say, 'IT'S INSANE.'
And then there's captcha. again, again [you know, some co's now offer readable words]
The problems with Slaton PD go back much farther. A Slaton police chief in the 1990s was the subject if a lot of controversy (including sexually harassing teenage girls and women in the community) and was subsequently indicted and convicted on federal charges.
Oh, another thing. Just because the U.S.A.P.A.T.R.I.O.T.Act let Exec. Branch constitutionally-unauthorized federal police write their own warrants without a judge, does NOT mean it's acceptable or constitutional. It only means we have no oversight because those in high places are sold-out traitors.
All these rules & apparent laws outside the Constituion are crap, like the last 25 years. Plenty stuff Bush, Bush, Clinton and now Hussein did & do were crap.(And previous presidents and so on also much-sucked.) We all know it. Some just like it, because they are making a profit and/or are sociopaths or worse.
Since Pres. Wilson's time AT LEAST, we have been heading down the highway to Hell in a hand basket.
Oversight today is only grandstanding Hollywooding. The rich are in cahoots, and We The Poor People failed to eat them.
It's just like the chance you have of beating captcha---it's a total, mindless, shit gatekeeper. Submit or die. Again.
I agree with 7:23! "Fascism and Tyranny are alive and well in America", but in Texas it has turned into an "cottage industry". It seems as the judicial system and law enforcement create their own rules as they go. For instance Austin refuses to update online records to reflect when someone is off of probation or parole. These "jackboot" tactics are also used in the media aka, "propaganda ministers". If you have dealt with law enforcement in the last 15 years, you will notice the recruiting process begins with lowering of the bar. Excepting substandard recruits whose only job is to apprehend and let the court system sort it out.
It doesn't say that the boy was left at home alone when his mother was arrested, it just says he was left "at home".
You've got the system you've been voting for.
The cops need to be prosecuted for false arrest, kidnapping, and false imprisonment. No doubt they signed documents containing falsehoods; each lie is a separate act of perjury.
So they left an 11 year old at home alone while carting his mother away? Profoundly irresponsible behavior on the part of LE.
Well 7:13 they really didn't have much choice at that point. They now know mama knows some law. If they take the kid in for the so-called crime. ANYTHING they get will go bye-bye once the lawyers get involved. So they now will have tanked a SEX CRIME case. That is one thing they will get them canned.
To be clear, when you click through to the article there was somebody at home with the kid all night - another family member. The cops may be faulted for other aspects of this episode, IMO, but as I understand the facts from the press reports, they didn't leave the boy by himself.
Get facts straight before glorifying criminals. Asdk for offense reports on mother, her history, and check out juvenile law.
Yea take that. Don't glorify criminals until you check the facts. (don't bother checking the date of the fake warrant's implementation against the actual date it was signed).
Wait, exactly which set of criminals are we talking about over-here?
While we are at it, lets check to see if she has any warts.
When Offense Reports are created by bad cops & signed off on by their good ol buddies (supervisors), you get what they want you to get. But, you are 100% correct on this, because the entire thing will be vetted to the very tiniest infraction.
Bring on the reports / histories and lets start with her's and end with the arresting officers' entire histories. We have to find out if this was an isolated incident or simply routine and acceptable county-wide? The dumb-ass taxpayers deserve to be invoiced to the point of bankruptcy due to thier participation.
Factiod - The Harris County Sheriff's Department created & implemented the Art of Utilizing the 'Fake' Outstanding Traffic Warrant / Arrest Warrant in the early 80s in conjunction with the D.A's. office.
When the deputies & ADAs scattered across the state and spread their dirty lil tool, it resulted in state-wide jail / prison overcrowding.
It also revealed that the so-called Criminal Defense niche had obviously teamed up with the D.A's. offices resulting in fake warrants that lead to a 97% plea bargain rate.
A good cop is a dead cop! Mess with my kids and you and your family will die.
WOW!!!!! Read the family code. No wrong was done by the police department in attempting to arrest the child. Maybe a little compasion was needed with the mother.
no offense 4:48 but i'll trump your so-called "family code" with the United States Constitution.
if your family code violates that document it's DONE! it's as if it does not exist!
Why would anyone think if it's not legal to arrest an adult without a warrant in the home. You can then walk in and pass the parent to arrest the child?
That's just retarded! Since any real american parent would then shoot your ass in the act!
That is right up there with that criminal stupidity from the indiana Supreme Court last year that basically said that even though the United States Constitution says it's legal and so has the United States Supreme Court on at least 4 occasions has as well. Announced that it was now illegal to resist an illegal arrest. That you could take it to court! yea right!
Sorry but that right is one of the last checks on our govt! If it gets to crazy we have the right to remove it even if it takes violence!
Which is pretty much the reason the United States Supreme Court as ruled over and over and over that we not only have the RIGHT but the DUTY to resist an illegal arrest even if it results in harm or death to the govt official!
There is no legal protection from the citizen employers for govt officials if they step outside thier jobs!
That came from a buch of gutless nazi wannabee lawyers turned judges and politicians!
Unfortunately, we can't judge the officers until we know that they actively saw the child commit the "crime." I read the document one replier posted about the police arresting children laws in Texas. They can be "taken into custody" with or without a warrant, but the following sections were a bunch of legal mumbo jumbo.
All I can say is that the contemporary police reputation, and the way civilians react to them, is solely the fault of them, the Leviathan. They brought this on themselves, and while I'm 80% for non-violence, some of these pigs need to be blown away with shotguns when they pull shit like this. That'll teach 'em.
note: in the five weeks of criminal justice I took, I was pretty sure that the professor stated that warrants are mandatory. I can understand why any educated individual would demand to see a warrant; whether one is needed or not, it's NOT legal to arrest someone for demanding to view it. There is something called due process of law, you know.
actualy dirty liberal your wrong about this!
"Unfortunately, we can't judge the officers until we know that they actively saw the child commit the "crime."
IF they have saw the child comit a crime that required arrest. They should have arrested him then. Once they decided to wait till so much later that even mom know it was coming. It was too late legally absent a LEGAL arrest order!
Sorry you don't get to say. Hey i saw you comitt a crime two weeks ago so i'm placing you under arrest.
The individual would have ever legal and constitutional right to resist with whatever force was necessary.
Seems like the toughest job in the world is to be a cop as properly restricted by the rights and liberties of the citizenry. Any lowbrow brute can be a thug with a badge, but a real cop walks the harder line of being a true officer of the law.
You hit it right on the head 2:47. Being a law enforcment officer is dity nasty job that takes brains and brawn and guts. Being a thug in a costume not much of any.
Unfotunatelly we have far too many of the later and not enough of the former.
Which is compoundd when the former stand by and say nothing when the thugs act. They become thugs by association.
I know plenty of cops who think the same thing i do. i also know some it's not worth the bullet to get rid of them.
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