Free Republic

ROCKVILLE, MD — Thousands of motorists were brought to a standstill when police conducted a massive roadblock to find three crime suspects. Twelve lanes of traffic were shut down and swarms of armed government agents combed through a giant traffic jam performing warrantless vehicle-to-vehicle searches. The busy Tuesday morning commute was abruptly halted just after 10:00 a.m. on March 11th. One driver told ABC News that traffic stopped and he witnessed 30 police cars pass on the shoulders of I-270 near Rockville. “Then, when I saw a wall of police officers with automatic weapons approaching our cars, it was apparent...

Texas prosecutors are applauding a decision by the State Court of Criminal Appeals which provides police officers a second chance to present evidence which has been gathered contrary to Texas law and the 4th Amendment. The ruling literally offers law enforcement a “do-over;” an opportunity to secure a search warrant AFTER a home has been illegally searched and AFTER evidence has been improperly obtained. In 2010, police in Parker County, Texas received a call from a confidential informant (CI) who claimed that Fred Wehrenberg and a number of associates “were fixin’” to cook meth. Hours after the call–at 12:30 A.M...

I totally see what hubby Richard Blum sees in Dianne - access to the ability to receive multi million dollar no-bid contracts for real estate leases to Fed agencies.   One thing you can say about Democrats. Nothing embarrasses them. Well, it would embarrass them if it could be proved they slipped up and did or said something that could be identified as sensible or honest – but they don't have anything to worry about there. Certainly Senator Dianne Feinstein won't be troubled or see the duplicity inherent in her vociferous complaints against the CIA. NBC News' Katie Hunt...

Largo police have apologized for entering a home without a search warrant and kicking in a bedroom door at a transitional housing property where they believed vagrants had taken over an empty home, according to a Sergeant who was there at the time. The incident happened around noon on Sunday at a home located on 128th Lane N., in Largo, according to dispatch records. "We explained to them why we were there and why we were in the house," said Sgt. Andrew Hill. "(We) immediately told them that we were absolutely sorry for coming into the house." Tenant Keith Montgomery...

KINGSPORT — Tennessee prosecutors want to move the way search warrants are issued out of the 20th century. But, in the 21st century, some state senators who sit on the Tennessee Senate Judiciary Committee are standing in the way. At issue is a bill that would allow a magistrate or judge to issue a search warrant by telephone or “other reliable electronic means.” Sullivan County District Attorney General Barry Staubus said the bill originated from his office, is backed by state district attorneys general and is in response to a 2013 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that does not give law...

In December of last year, members of the Burleson County, Texas SWAT team executed a pre-dawn, no-knock warrant by breaking through the door of Henry Goedrich Magee’s mobile home. Believing criminals to have broken in, Magee picked up a rifle positioned near his bedroom door and fired, killing county Sheriff’s Deputy Adam Sowders. Charged with capital murder, Magee faced the prospect of either life in prison without parole or death by lethal injection. On February 5th, “…the 21st Judicial District Grand Jury returned a No Bill on Capital Murder charges against Henry Goedrick Magee.” That is, the Grand Jury refused...

A Central Texas man who shot and killed a sheriff's deputy entering his home will not be charged with capital murder, attorneys said Thursday. A local grand jury declined Wednesday to indict Henry Goedrich Magee for the December death of Burleson County Sgt. Adam Sowders, who was part of a group of investigators executing a search warrant for Magee's rural home. Sowders and other officers entered the home about 90 miles northwest of Houston without knocking just before 6 a.m. Authorities were looking for guns and marijuana. Magee's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, said his client thought he was the victim of...

The author of the TSA blog "Taking Sense Away" is feeling the pull of capitalism. He's posted scoop on the TSA during and after his employment in the cadre of paid gropers. News media have picked his material on scanners and behavior of employees. Capitalism is calling, and there's a need to promote an upcoming novel based upon the inner workings of the TSA. Jason Edward Harrington is out of the closet. Best of luck to him.

City, county settle NM 'anal probe' lawsuit ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- A city and county in southern New Mexico have settled a lawsuit filed by man taken to two hospitals and forced to have anal probes over suspicion of hiding drugs. Attorney for David Eckert said Monday that Hidalgo County and the city of Deming recently settled their portion of a lawsuit for a total $1.6 million. The lawsuit, filed against police and sheriff's officials in Deming and Hidalgo County, which borders Mexico, alleges Deming police sought a search warrant for Eckert because they thought he appeared to be clenching his...

<p>TRENTON — In a ruling that strengthens "the right to walk freely on the streets of a city," the New Jersey Supreme Court said today that police were wrong to arrest a man for leaning on a private porch in a high-crime area.</p>

Texas courts have ruled that because legally owned firearms represent “a threat of physical violence” to police, officers may ignore the 4th Amendment rights of Texas residents by treating ALL legally issued warrants as “No Knock” warrants, even if the issuing judge has made it clear that officers “…must knock on the door and announce their identity and purpose before attempting a forcible entry.” In August of 2006, police in Collin County, Texas obtained a warrant to search the home of John Quinn based on information that Quinn’s son might be keeping a controlled substance on the premises. Although the...

NOVI (AP) - A Christmastime turf battle is being waged in suburban Detroit. A Novi family has been ordered to remove a seven-piece nativity scene from the front yard of their home, or face possible fines of $25 to $100 per week. The order given to Joe and Betty Samona didn't come from the government. It came from their subdivision association, which said they should have sought permission from the board of directors to place the figures outside their home. Michigan courts have said homeowners who join neighborhood or condominium associations must follow the rules set by the group. Dean...

On December 19th, a sheriff’s deputy was shot and killed during an attempt to serve a “no knock” warrant near Sommerville, Texas. Just before 6:00 A.M. an 8 member SWAT team broke through the door of Henry Goedrich Magee to serve a warrant which would permit the team to search the mobile home in which Magee and his pregnant girlfriend were living. Reacting to the pre-dawn, forced entry Magee grabbed a rifle propped against a bedroom door frame and fired at the unidentified intruders, killing 31 year old sheriff’s deputy Adam Sowders. No one else was injured and Magee was...

“Almost Orwellian” -- that’s the description a federal judge gave earlier this week to the massive spying by the National Security Agency (NSA) on virtually all 380 million cellphones in the United States. In the first meaningful and jurisdictionally grounded judicial review of the NSA cellphone spying program, U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon, a George W. Bush appointee sitting in Washington, D.C., ruled that the scheme of asking a secret judge on a secret court for a general warrant to spy on all American cellphone users without providing evidence of probable cause of criminal behavior against any of them...

Received a note on our door from the county tax assessors office "informing us that they required access to our home. Never heard of this before. Is that legal? Not sure if I want a government tax agent snooping around my home. Not in the current climate here in WI. Any serious advice?

Newspaper accuses feds of unlawful search and seizure The Washington Times and one of its former journalists have sued the Department of Homeland Security, accusing federal agents of illegally seizing the newspaper’s reporting materials during the execution of a search warrant in an unrelated case. In a motion filed in federal court in Greenbelt, Md., The Times and reporter Audrey Hudson asked a judge to force the federal agency to return all reporting files and documents it seized from Ms. Hudson’s home office during a raid in early August. • Click here to view a PDF file of the motion...

Selectman Barry Greenfield would like to give police the authority to inspect gun safety at people's homes. The problem, he said, is that police do not have the authority, granted by a local ordinance, to enforce the law and inspect the safeguarding of guns at the homes of the 600 registered gun owners in town.

Rogue police officers and sheriff’s deputies in a Southern New Mexico county are guilty of the sort of malevolent abuse of authority which has come to typify the lust for power exhibited by far too many police officials and departments across the nation. Officers Bobby Orosco, Robert Chavez and Officer Hernandez subjected law abiding resident David Eckert to 14 hours of accusation and physical abuse as the “suspect” was forced to undergo X-Rays, 2 anal cavity searches, 3 enemas and a colonoscopy, all performed at the Gila Regional Medical Center without Eckert’s consent. The officers claim of probable cause for...

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - Retired Marine colonel and Iran-Contra figure Oliver North said in Huntsville Friday that that he is "deeply concerned" about the data being collected on American citizens by American intelligence agencies. "I think the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution has been trod on," North told a press conference before addressing a crowd of 350 at a young Republicans' dinner at the Davidson Center for Space Technology. North added that "the Republicans in Congress are complicit by not insisting on a select committee to investigate not just NSA, but Benghazi, the IRS, the spying on Americans, enemies' lists being...

Maryland state police and federal agents used a search warrant in an unrelated criminal investigation to seize the private reporting files of an award-winning former investigative journalist for The Washington Times who had exposed problems in the Homeland Security Department’s Federal Air Marshal Service. Reporter Audrey Hudson said the investigators, who included an agent for Homeland’s Coast Guard service, took her private notes and government documents that she had obtained under the Freedom of Information Act during a predawn raid of her family home on Aug. 6. The documents, some which chronicled her sources and her work at the Times...