Posted on 01/27/2007 1:36:11 PM PST by tpaine
By Vin Suprynowicz
For years, Garry Watson, 49, of little Bunker, Mo., (population 390) had been squabbling with town officials over the sewage line easement which ran across his property to the adjoining, town-operated sewage lagoon.
Residents say officials grew dissatisfied with their existing easement, and announced they were going to excavate a new sewer line across the landowner's property. Capt. Chris Ricks of the Missouri Highway Patrol reports Watson's wife, Linda, was served with "easement right-of-way papers" on Sept. 6. She gave the papers to Watson when he got home at 5 a.m. the next morning from his job at a car battery recycling plant northeast of Bunker. Watson reportedly went to bed for a short time, but arose about 7 a.m. when the city work crew arrived.
"He told them 'If you come on my land, I'll kill you,' " Bunker resident Gregg Tivnan told me last week. "Then the three city workers showed up with a backhoe, plus a police officer. They'd sent along a cop in a cop car to guard the workers, because they were afraid there might be trouble. Watson had gone inside for a little while, but then he came out and pulled his SKS (semi-automatic rifle) out of his truck, steadied it against the truck, and he shot them."
Killed in the September 7 incident, from a range of about 85 yards, were Rocky B. Gordon, 34, a city maintenance man, and David Thompson, 44, an alderman who supervised public works. City maintenance worker Delmar Eugene Dunn, 51, remained in serious but stable condition the following weekend.
Bunker police Officer Steve Stoops, who drove away from the scene after being shot, was treated and released from a hospital for a bullet wound to his arm and a graze to the neck.
Watson thereupon kissed his wife goodbye, took his rifle, and disappeared into the woods, where his body was found two days later -- dead of an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Following such incidents, the local papers are inevitably filled with well-meaning but mawkish doggerel about the townsfolk "pulling together" and attempting to "heal" following the "tragedy." There are endless expressions of frustration, pretending to ask how such an otherwise peaceful member of the community could "just snap like that."
In fact, the supposedly elusive explanation is right before our eyes.
"He was pushed," Clarence Rosemann -- manager of the local Bunker convenience store, who'd done some excavation work for Watson -- told the big-city reporters from St. Louis. Another area resident, who didn't want to be identified, told the visiting newsmen, "Most people are understanding why Garry Watson was upset. They are wishing he didn't do it, but they are understanding why he did it."
You see, to most of the people who work in government and the media these days -- especially in our urban centers -- "private property" is a concept out of some dusty, 18th century history book. Oh, sure, "property owners" are allowed to live on their land, so long as they pay rent to the state in the form of "property taxes."
But an actual "right" to be let alone on our land to do whatever we please -- always providing we don't actually endanger the lives or health of our neighbors?
Heavens! If we allowed that, how would we enforce all our wonderful new "environmental protection" laws, or the "zoning codes," or the laws against growing hemp or tobacco or distilling whisky without a license, or any of the endless parade of other malum prohibitum decrees which have multiplied like swarms of flying ants in this nation over the past 87 years?
What does it mean to say we have any "rights" or "freedoms" at all, if we cannot peacefully enjoy that property which we buy with the fruits of our labors?
In his 1985 book "Takings," University of Chicago Law Professor Richard Epstein wrote that, "Private property gives the right to exclude others without the need for any justification.
Indeed, it is the ability to act at will and without need for justification within some domain which is the essence of freedom, be it of speech or of property."
"Unfortunately," replies James Bovard, author of the book "Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen," "federal law enforcement agents and prosecutors are making private property much less private. ...
Park Forest, Ill. in 1994 enacted an ordinance that authorizes warrantless searches of every single-family rental home by a city inspector or police officer, who are authorized to invade rental units 'at all reasonable times.' ... Federal Judge Joan Gottschall struck down the searches as unconstitutional in 1998, but her decision will have little or no effect on the numerous other localities that authorize similar invasions of privacy."
We are now involved in a war in this nation, a last-ditch struggle in which the other side contends only the king's men are allowed to use force or the threat of force to push their way in wherever they please, and that any peasant finally rendered so desperate as to employ the same kind of force routinely employed by our oppressors must surely be a "lone madman" who "snapped for no reason." No, we should not and do not endorse or approve the individual choices of folks like Garry Watson. But we are still obliged to honor their memories and the personal courage it takes to fight and die for a principle, even as we lament both their desperate, misguided actions ... and the systematic erosion of our liberties which gave them rise.
This is a very old article. 1999 - 2000 maybe?
--I take it you would approve of the GA. law proposed?--
At first glance, yes, but I have not researched it.
--You're gettin old. Don't post to me anymore.
Have a nice life.--
If you wish, I will not cc you when I reference your posts. OTOH, I usually don't keep track of names on so if I post to you on another thread sometime in the future, it is because I just don't really take these things personal enough to remember the personal desires of every poster.
Just out of curiosity, why did you post a column written in October, 2000?
I also know that they may not leave it as pretty as it is currently. At that point, I may have to pay to do some clean-up landscaping, since it probably wouldn't be worth it to sue.
But you know what, we need storm drains and flood control, and we sure as hell need sewers, and if I have to pay to do a little maintenance on my yard, it's part of the cost of living in a 1st World country.
The guy in the story was a jackass, and a murderer.
If I get caught with a gun in my car in our parking lot and I not only lose my job, but I lose my access to any future jobs as soon as they ask why I left my previous job.
Sad comment on 'where we are' on carrying arms in a vehicle.
I take it you would approve of the GA. law proposed?
As of now, they don't do random vehicle searches of cars coming onto company property. But if you forget and leave one in your briefcase as you go through the metal detector ....
I think that if the parking lot is open to the general public, then the employer has a harder case to make. OTOH, he is your boss! If you don't like his policies, work to convince him otherwise or go find another job.
So you approve of his 'right' to prohibit arms in vehicles?
Which is it? Do you have a right to carry in your vehicle, or not?
I have the right to carry a gun in my vehicle. I do not have the right to tresspass another's premises with my gun in my vehicle.
Clever non-answer. -- You are not trespassing - you are an employee with a right to carry a gun in your vehicle, -- as you admit.
-- The question remains, does your employers attempt to prohibit arms in vehicles meet with you approval?
Some homeowners are finding out that they are even responsible for the condition of the sidewalks in front of their house.
--Clever non-answer. -- You are not trespassing - you are an employee with a right to carry a gun in your vehicle, -- as you admit.--
I AM trespassing. He has clearly posted "NO WEAPON" on entry to the site. If I choose to carry a weapon, I am not abiding by his rules for allowed use of his property.
So you think that the only options are to be a "mouse" or to be a homicidal maniac?
A civilized person finds other ways of dealing with disagreements besides murder-suicide. I fear however that any reasonable words are lost on someone who apparently supports a cold-blooded killer.
Some also find out that they must pay for the operation of streetlights, on public streets, in front of and adjacent to their homes.
Yada yada, -- you won't last long with that attitude. Trust me.
---- The question remains, does your employers attempt to prohibit arms in vehicles meet with you approval?--
I don't understand your question.
Do you agree with the proposed GA bill that you pointed me to?
They'll sure find out when someone trips and falls if it's broken.
I never said I supported him - - I said I "understand" why he did what he did (at least, so far as it goes given the incomplete information in the story). Meanwhile, work on that reading comprehension problem and practice grabbing your ankles.
It comes even early. In one community, the officials sent out inspectors that gave notices to the homeowners to repair "their" broken sidewalks.
Lancey: I never said I supported him - - I said I "understand" why he did what he did
Lancey said that the country needs more like him.
The man who did the shooting worked at a battery recycling plant. Some of the by-products in that industry can damage the central nervous system and body organs if they accumulate in them. Brain damage can be one result.
His wife should have had that looked into.
His actions were not those of a rational man.
I was researching for 'property right abuse' info.
Just out of curiosity, do you object to me posting a column written in October, 2000?
Easement right of way papers are legal notice of an existing easement. Condemnation notice would be required to modify the existing easement or obtain a new one, and you're right, THAT process would require time for a response from the landowner. Why would the need a new easement just to put in a new sewer line? They already had one.
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