Posted on 09/22/2005 2:42:37 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Two of the Moss Landing Harbor residents who were the subjects of random boat searches during Labor Day Weekend say their experiences were closer to armed invasions than the friendly "safety inspections" characterized by U.S. Coast Guard officials.
Both residents said search crews entered the harbor in inflatable boats with machine guns mounted on their bows. Then, carrying M-16 rifles, they approached residents and boarded and searched their boats in the name of safety and "homeland security."
One resident, who asked not to be identified for fear or retribution, said his experience was "very intimidating, very frightening."
"To me it reeks of Nazi Germany and the death squads in Argentina," he said. "I don't want my name on their list."
Scott Jones, a live-aboard resident who was searched, said there has been talk in the harbor about contacting the American Civil Liberties Union, but he first wants to hear further from the Coast Guard about its future intentions.
Lt. Mark Warren of the Monterey Coast Guard Station said he has heard mostly positive response to the operation, but may rethink future actions given current criticisms.
"We take lessons and learn from these types of operations. If the public is genuinely distasteful of it, we might not do it," he said. "I'm not saying we won't, but I'm not saying we will."
In addition to trying to ensure the safety of boats on the bay during the holiday weekend, Warren said, the operation was part of an effort to increase the public's awareness of the Coast Guard's role as a law enforcement agency under the Department of Homeland Security. He said the public might have been surprised to see weaponry that is now standard issue to all Homeland Security forces.
"I, as a U.S. citizen, am highly offended by that," said Jones, who is accustomed to Coast Guard boardings when he sails. "When a sheriff's deputy drives down the road or a CHP officer drives down the road and I see them, I'm aware of his job, and not because he's pulled me over and put a gun to my head.
"The Coast Guard's needs would be better served by an advertising campaign," he said, "rather than bullying people in their bedrooms at 10:30 at night."
Jones said he and his wife were sleeping when they were awakened by knocking on the side of the boat.
He went to the deck and was confronted by two armed officers asking if they could come aboard. Thinking something had happened in the harbor that the officers needed to talk to him about, Jones acquiesced.
"It seemed a little unreasonable at 10:30 at night," he said, "but it was the middle of the night and I was half asleep, so I said 'OK.' At this point, I looked out and saw six to eight officers (on the dock) and all appeared armed."
The officers boarded his boat and quickly spread out beyond the immediate deck without invitation, saying they were conducting a safety inspection.
"I can say with all certainly that what they did was not a safety inspection or in any way related to a safety inspection," he said. The officers demanded access to the bilge, saying they wanted to make sure the boat wasn't taking on water.
"This was highly suspect," Jones said. "If you're on board, you'd know if you were taking on water."
When Jones showed them the bilge, the officers repeatedly, and with increasing forcefulness, demanded to know if there were other accesses to the bilge. They also "demanded" the driver's licenses of everyone on board.
Increasingly upset by the nature of the search, Jones asked for the officers' authority and justification. One officer read to him from a federal code authorizing the search.
"It was either the Patriot Act or homeland security,"Jones said.
Warren said the officers would not have cited the Patriot Act because it affords the Coast Guard no additional authority.
Jones conceded he may have heard "homeland security" and registered "Patriot Act," but still feels the search was unwarranted and in a gray area of the law at best.
"I wouldn't question their professionalism, but I do question their motive and their authority," he said. "To me, it sounds like something that an ACLU lawyer would just tear apart."
Coast Guard officials say they are authorized by maritime law to board and search vessels on U.S. waters, including waters that lead to U.S. waters, to enforce federal laws.
Warren said the officers were attempting to ensure the safety and compliance of docked boats by checking for oily water in their bilges and that their sanitation devices were in locked position. Some searches were conducted at night in an effort to catch boats before they went onto the bay for the weekend.
The second boat owner who spoke to The Herald said his boat was searched after he challenged officers who were searching other boats, at 10:30 p.m. Sept. 2, and during the morning on following days. Told they were acting as Homeland Security officers, he asked what they were protecting the harbor from.
"Terrorists," he said he was told by the officers, who exhorted him to "remember the Cole," referring to the October 2000 attack by terrorists on the USS Cole that killed 17 sailors.
"The only terrorists down here are you guys," he told them. "You're scaring the hell out of me with that machine gun."
While Warren was noncommittal about future searches, he said it is important for the public to know the Coast Guard's presence will be increased.
"The Coast Guard's focus on homeland security has increased our presence on the water and will continue to increase our presence simply because that's what Congress is wanting us to do right now," he said. "The concern at the congressional level about the security of ports is pretty high."
Unless they happen to be a minority-American.
One small correction, the USCG can board any vessel in international waters no matter the nationality to verify paperwork and to ensure the vessel is not stateless. However the boarding stops when this has been completed and there is not any searching of the vessel allowed. However this means that if you run and ignore orders to stop you can be stopped by force. Now mind you this is not done very often with foreign flagged vessels but the right to do so is there.
Well put!
The second boat owner who spoke to The Herald said his boat was searched after he challenged officers who were searching other boats, at 10:30 p.m. Sept. 2, and during the morning on following days. Told they were acting as Homeland Security officers, he asked what they were protecting the harbor from.
"Terrorists," he said he was told by the officers, who exhorted him to "remember the Cole," referring to the October 2000 attack by terrorists on the USS Cole that killed 17 sailors.
"The only terrorists down here are you guys," he told them
Oh Ya! this guy really has his act together. Smart move bozo. You don't suppose they took down the name of the boat?....nah, didn't think so either.
Wonder if this had anything to do with the major marijuana busts that recently went down locally. Especially since they wanted access to the bilges.
I've read the article. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't it state that the USCG did their stunt over the entire Monterey Bay?
So, how come we haven't heard anything from the tree huggers in Santa Cruz harbor or the hot heads in Monterey harbor? Santa Cruz has folks that stay on their boats and so does Monterey.
Interesting that the Coasties ran their RIBs across the bay in the dark. Moss Landing isn't exactly twenty minutes away from the station in Monterey and the mouth of the harbor isn't really fun to navigate at night.
It's starting to sound like they were after something...
Which is the problem with most LEA abuses.
I've been boarded about a dozen times, and in almost every case the Coasties have been terrific. Polite, professional. Don't get an attitude with them, and no problem.
Basically good advice whenever you;re dealing with LEOs
It never hurts to be nice.
I used to be one of those jackbooted bording officers. Yeah they would whine about how intimidated they were until we pulled a couple of bails of BC Bud out of the engine hold of their sailboat.
Another bleeding heart had $350M in cocaine on their sport fishing boat.
We had others with illegals aboard.
The CG has the widest jurisdiction of any law enforcement body in the US. They can stop a US flag vessel anywhere in the world.
You want your borders protected, that means your ports and the navigable waters.
There are no "regular people". There are samuri, peasants, and outlaws. Only one of those groups has freedom. Get with the program!
I've been on the phone today with my buddy from Key West with the Hylas 51.
Winds were 100-110 and he was aboard and had her cross springed and bow and stern lined every which a way and chained to two 14 inch creosote pilings which subsequently snapped and set her partially adrift tangled in flotsam and lines in Florida bay.
He expects damage at 25-50K to masts, rigging and deck and trim and paint etc
he said he's gpoing to fix it all with the insurance and sell her and move back to Maryland to work for his dad.
he's done.
i am hearing from bankers and real estate folks here that they are getting a lot of calls from folks in FL, MS, AL and LA coastal areas that are done for and are looking for the country squire life in middle TN with a nice little horse farm or the like within 100 miles of Nashville...middle aged folks with some cash that are burned out on evacs, downed trees, insurance hikes, no power for weeks etc.
Roger that.
I'll own up. I *was* once that coastie *doing* those boardings some (now many) years ago. I boarded hundreds and hundreds of different boats over the time I was in. I was enlisted, but I'd done so many boardings that I had worked my way into being the lead Boarding Officer or Assistant Boarding Officer on many boardings.
I grew up on boats. I understand and fully identify with the boating community. Most people in the CG have the same story. That's why I joined the Coast Guard and it is the overriding reason why most people do. Nothing I did while I was there was in any way a violation of that.
The thing that ticks me off about this story us that it seems to just leave unchecked this idea that there's coasties just sitting around waiting for the chance to go hassle mom and pop boater.
As if.
Stuff like this doesn't happen for no reason. There just isn't time for playgames. There's lots better stuff to do.
Because we apparently want safety more than freedom. And in the end will have neither.
Piffle.
Just plain not true. Makes for a cute tagline, but that's about all.
Funny how the "seal the border" crowd and the "CG are Jackbooted thugs" crowd... are all the same people.
It's "almost" funny.
I am very close to a WWII Navy vet who spent alot of his time chasing U-Boats off the East Coast. One can find old U-Boat lookout towers along the beaches.
IF, you know what you're looking at, that is.
These historical stories weren't incorporated into history books used by American public schools, for some reason.
There is quite a bit of information here:
www.battlebelow.com/viddoc.htm
WAR ZONE: WW II OFF NORTH CAROLINA'S OUTER BANKS (PART I)
VHS
WAR ZONE, by North Carolina filmmaker Kevin Duffus, is two 90 minute videos of archival footage and contemporary interviews showing Outer Banks people and scenes, war action at sea and the personal stories of witnesses and victims of the German U-boat assault along the East coast of the United States in 1942 with its epicenter at Cape Hatteras.
The United States suffered one of its worst defeats of WWII not in Europe or the Pacific but along the nation's eastern seaboard. Three hundred ninety-seven ships were sunk or damaged and nearly 5,000 people were killed. The loss of lives, ships and raw resources represents one of the greatest maritime disasters in history.
For six months, sixty-five German U-boats hunted Allied merchant vessels practically unopposed within view of American coastal communities. The greatest concentration of these attacks occurred off North Carolina's Outer Banks. War Zone is a story of infamy, irony and innocence lost.
Featured in Part One are the heart-rending stories of torpedoed Merchant sailors and young Coast Guard lifesavers unable to come to their rescue. Viewers will marvel at the courage of a young mother who delivered her newborn son in a lifeboat on the storm tossed waves of the Graveyard of the Atlantic. Learn how Germany surprised America's defenses despite Britain's warnings.
"Terrorists," he said he was told by the officers, who exhorted him to "remember the Cole," referring to the October 2000 attack by terrorists on the USS Cole that killed 17 sailors."
I didn't know the Cole was attacked in Monterey.
I don't know about that...I've seen alot of them on this thread. Thanks for the ping.
Only because they didn't think of it first. Ever been to Monterey? They would have if they could have. It's sorta like Yemen. Only with higher rent. Their loyalties are the same, however. Anything AntiAmerican is a good sell, must like most of California.
If I didn't already have a tagline, I think I'd glom onto that one!
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