—After he left, according to the police report, zoo staff told the officers that Magenheimer’s attitude was intimidating —
Was that before or after the staff and police told him to stop doing something that he had every right to do. Were they intimidating him first?
Likely a shallow phony attempt to justify their illegal actions. Good luck with that claim.
LAW OFFICES OF GUY A. RELFORD
September 27, 2011
An Open Letter from Guy A. Relford,
Attorney for Benjamin A. Magenheimer
A lot has been said and written about my client, Ben Magenheimer, since he was physically thrown out of the Mesker Park Zoo in Evansville on September 10, 2011.
The City of Evansville, through the mayor’s office and the City Attorney, has certainly said a lot about
Ben and the circumstances that led to his ejection from the park. The purpose of this letter is not to argue the merits of our lawsuit against the City of Evansville and the Department of Parks & Recreation – those issues will be resolved in the Circuit Court of Vanderburgh County. I write this letter only in an attempt to bring things into perspective and correct some rather dramatic misperceptions that exist about Ben and the events of September 10.
The list of insults that have been hurled at Ben by people who have no idea of who he is or what happened at the zoo is long. Words like “idiot,” “paranoid,” “irresponsible,” “disorderly,” and “combative” have been used to describe Ben with a lot of frequency. I can tell you that anyone who knows Ben, myself included, can only laugh at those comments, because they certainly don’t apply to him in any way. Ben is very intelligent, he has a great job, and he is a devoted husband and a loving father to his four-month-old son. He is very calm, very rational and very respectful of everyone around him.
Ben has also made the decision and the commitment to enable himself to protect his family and himself at all times. For that reason, Ben owns firearms. But he didn’t just “go buy a gun.” He has invested a tremendous amount of time and expense to train and educate himself in the use of firearms. The list of Ben’s firearm training experiences is long, but he has earned the designation of “Marksman” in two pistol categories with the International Defensive Pistol Association and he has completed private training courses with the former firearms training coordinator of the Evansville Police Department.
Ben has also intently studied the laws of the United States and the State of Indiana that relate to the ownership and possession of firearms. He has always recognized the need to be a law-abiding gun owner.
(In fact, I can tell you that Ben Magenheimer understands the gun laws of Indiana much better than the Evansville police officers who were involved in the incident on September 10.)
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Under any rational description, Ben is a responsible gun owner. And for that reason, no one on this planet needs to fear Ben Magenheimer or a gun in Ben’s possession except a criminal attempting to harm Ben, Ben’s family or an innocent third party.
So what happened at the zoo on September 10? Only Ben and the other people who were actually there know for sure.
I wasn’t there, but I know two things: I believe my client, and I have personally confirmed that there are security cameras at the zoo that likely captured all of the events that are now in dispute. I also know that EPD should have recorded the original call to EPD from the zoo manager that led to multiple officers being dispatched to the zoo. And if any EPD officer had an open microphone during their confrontation with Ben, that audio should have been recorded as well.
So I won’t argue with anyone about what happened in Mesker Park Zoo on September 10 –
those facts will be proven in court. But I will ask a question: Why hasn’t the City of Evansville or the Evansville Police Department publicly released the security video of the incident, or the EPD audio tapes? If my client was truly ejected from the park for being “disorderly” or “causing a scene” as alleged by the City (instead of simply exercising his legal right to carry a firearm to protect himself and his family) that should be clearly visible and audible in the security video and EPD tapes that are in the City’s possession right now.
I have formally demanded that the Evansville City Attorney take steps to preserve all of that evidence, but I won’t have access to it until the discovery phase of the litigation commences.
But it is all public information, and the City can release it any time it wants.
So, let’s see it.
Guy A. Relford
Attorney at Law