Dispute Over Land Prompts 13-Hour Standoff Between a Family and Deputies; Two Officers Killed

AP via TBO ^ | December 9,2003 | Jeffrey Collins

[John W]

ABBEVILLE, S.C. (AP) - A father and son angered by a state plan to seize some of their land allegedly shot and killed an officer who went to the home, sparking a 13-hour standoff that ended in a "horrendous gunfight" in which another officer was killed, authorities and neighbors said. At least 100 officers surrounded the rural home of Arthur Bixby in western South Carolina on Monday. Bixby's wife then holed up in an apartment in town and threatened to shoot bystanders if her husband or son were injured; she was promptly arrested, State Law Enforcement Division Chief Robert Stewart said.

It began Monday morning when a magistrate's officer went to the house in a rural part of the state to follow up on an incident from the previous week involving a dispute between Department of Transportation workers and someone from the house, officials said.

When the officer failed to return, two deputies went to the Bixby home looking for him.

What happened next is unclear, but the deputies called for help and law enforcement officials surrounded the home, and the standoff began.

Eleven hours later, officers unsuccessfully tried to storm the home and were shot at with powerful weapons, Stewart said.

"I've never seen so much force," Stewart said. None of the family members tried to negotiate with officers during the standoff.

"This was planned," Stewart said.

The gunfight lasted about 10 minutes and police fired tear gas inside the home. Bixby's son, 36-year-old Steven Bixby, surrendered. Two hours later, officers entered the home and arrested Arthur Bixby, who apparently was wounded in the gunfight. He was hospitalized and his condition was not available early Tuesday.

No formal charges had been filed as of early Tuesday.

At some point during the standoff, the Bixbys destroyed two remote control robots authorities sent into the house to figure out what was happening, Stewart said.

Inside the home, authorities found a dead deputy and what they described as anti-American literature and suicide notes. Similar material also was found inside the apartment in town where Bixby's wife was arrested. Authorities did not say whose apartment it was.

Stewart said the family had prepared for the standoff and fortified the house's doors to make it harder for police to break in.

Authorities identified the two dead officers as Danny Wilson and Donnie M. Ouzts.

Ouzts apparently had been shot from a distance with a rifle, state Public Safety spokesman Sid Gaulden said; Wilson was found inside the home. Authorities would not say which one first went to the house.

Gene Land, Bixby's neighbor who lives about a half-mile away, said Steven Bixby was angry because the state planned to take some of his land to widen the highway. The Bixbys had lived in the house for more than 10 years, Land said.

A dispute Thursday between state transportation workers and someone from the home on Highway 72 precipitated the incident, DOT spokesman Pete Poore said.

AP-ES-12-09-03 0519EST

[ArneFufkin]

Ugh. There's that smell of urine again.

[r9etb]

It doesn't take a degreed engineer (I have two) to determine how close the highway was coming to the house.

I imagine that a doubly-degreed engineer such as yourself would be aware of the "foreshortening effects" of high-powered telephoto lenses. You can't accurately judge distances in shots like this.

The real key is the location of the telephone pole. The road widening is still on "this side" of it.

[Skywalk]

If indeed the government took your father's property for 15 cents on the dollar, that is forcible theft.

And since one of the reasons the Founding Fathers went to war with Britain was over the confiscation of some pine(I think) forests, why not the theft of your dad's property?

I'm not saying he should have ambushed some cops who have no clue about what's going on exactly, or that your father should want to ruin his life---but when does it end?

What about the example I gave earlier where they wanted to take people's land in Maryland to give to a PRIVATE developer? It came down to a vote by the people, and fortunately most of them believed in some measure of liberty. But what if it had gone the other way?

What about the community in New York that was fighting to stop eminent domain from taking their homes to give to IKEA??!?!

When does it end, and how does it end? It seems that even when there's a big uproar the city or state does what it wants--and why should one have to worry about getting the entire populace to your side every time the government wants to steal your property?

[tpaine]

To: Cultural Jihad
This is when the scumsucker element of FR emerge through the sewer holes.
44 posted on 12/09/2003 6:18:39 AM PST by ArneFufkin

____________________________________


Yep, 'fringe' bashers like you & CJ seem to have a real attraction for scumsucking.
78 -tpaine-

___________________________________


ArneFufkin wrote: Ugh. There's that smell of urine again.

_____________________________________


Arnie, either your breath is backing up on you, or you're still in that sewer hole.

[Joe Hadenuf]

Take? Doesn't the State offer market value?

I'm sure he felt his property was worth much more. Maybe 10,000 times more. If the state wanted it that bad, they should have paid the price. After all, was it not his property?

[Blood of Tyrants]

Yep. While the left equates hating Bush as patriotism, they equate hating government with being anti-American.

[visualops]

The local news (this is local, I'm in Greenville) said "anti-gov", AP says anti-American. I'll go with the local guy. And to some people, I imagine "anti-gov't" is not the same as anti-American.

[visualops]

I agree. If you truly want to be left alone, don't get a house next to a main road. If the story is that this is family land going way back- perhaps this guy (the old man) had an old grudge regarding his land and roads, etc. It isn't clear what the whole story is. No excuse/rational reason to shoot anyone.

[Joe Hadenuf]

Anti-American literature? A copy of the Constitution?

Maybe the government doesn't quite understand that there are many people out there that are really upset at their brutal, offensive taxes, and the fact that the government is now in just about every aspect of our lives. It's become all controlling and very intrusive.

Compounded by the fact that the government has chosen to ignore, and in many cases, aid and abet the invasion of our country by millions of illegal aliens. It's created nationwide fraud and epic lawlessness.

It seems the government simply picks and chooses which laws to enforce.

I'm not saying what these guys did was right, but I also understand that there are a lot of folks out there that are tired of being pushed and slapped around by an ever growing, very intrusive government. A government that has intentionally neglected is sworn constitutional duty. Too bad two officers died, as most of them are regular guys, at the lower end of the government food chain. Very small bricks in a massive wall.

Another sad story.....

[sauropod]

True enough.

But as I have been saying all along, we do not have the full story yet.

[sauropod]

"There are people here that would actually say "Well, the cops deserved to get blown away" over a freaking construction easement?"

Show me one.

[sauropod]

How the government treats the individual's property rights defines everything else about the interaction of the government and the individual.

[sauropod]

Anti-gov is NOT the same as anti-American. At least not to me.

[Travis McGee]

Paging Vin Suprowuicz.

[Travis McGee]

Maybe they would.

But nobody should die over a highway widening.

[jim_trent]

So you don't think that the taxpayers deserve any protection, either from unreasonable monetary demands or unsafe driving conditions? Your choice is either take it in the shorts (from a money standpoint) or die.

Whether or not you want to believe this, the taxpayers wanted that road widened. That is shown by the people they elected and re-elected. If they did not want it widened, they would have turned out anyone who voted for it.

Unfortunately, you have never read the Federal Aid policy on condemnation or attended any International Right-of-Way Association courses on applying them. People routinely get paid MORE than fair market value. I know that you don't want to believe this or want to argue the point, but it is true. The people who want more usually want to retire in luxury on your dollar. So far, voters have not authorized that.

[archy]

Conservatives repudicate your whackjob idea that gunplay can resolve disputes.

As they refute your bootlicking attitude that the state has the right to kill its citizens so it sieze their property for its own purposes.

[archy]

Conservatives repudicate your whackjob idea that gunplay can resolve disputes.

As they refute your bootlicking attitude that the state has the right to kill its citizens so it sieze their property for its own purposes.

[archy]

"There are people here that would actually say "Well, the cops deserved to get blown away" over a freaking construction easement?"

Show me one.

Not at all. But cops who would come to murder a citizen in his own home, or stel his home via one-sided *due process* sometimes get exactly what they deserve.

-archy-/-

[djf]

Problem is, even if the government was making an unfair, unjust offer, even if they used illegal and paramilitary tactics, if an officer got killed, someone will rot in jail for it.

They may have to try the person in multiple jurisdictions, they may have to use trumped up charges, they may even resort to double jeopardy.

But they will get their pound of flesh. There are no checks and balances against this kind of problem.

Remember all those folks at Waco?