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STATEMENT BY KENNETH WHITE JULY 14, 2009

TO NELSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS

Mr. Chairman and members of the Board, my name is Kenneth White, 93 Shields Gap Road, Roseland, and I am President of the Virginia Taxpayers Association. After your June 9, 2009 Board meeting, Commonwealth’s Attorney Phillip Payne wrote me a letter dated June 12, 2009 confirming his phone call to me June 4, 2009 that he would not send the matter of your violations of oath of office to the Nelson County Grand Jury.

I call your attention to the fact that my June 9, 2009 Statement in your official meeting minutes was entirely correct when I said Payne “never did” reply before that time. I strongly doubt Payne would have ever written his letter to me had I not put that wording in my prepared Statement handed to your Board members, and to Payne. Thus I COMPELLED Payne to write that letter, in case anyone thinks I have NO influence.

You should further be informed that in his letter Payne did not deny that I was correct when I said in my Statement that Payne did not even want to take a look at the overwhelming 178-packet of documents I sent to the Grand Jury foreperson.

You should further be informed that Payne did not DARE MENTION Posse Comitatus Act or try to discuss why that law is, or may, not be applicable to the present situation. He said merely (QUOTE) “The matters of which you complain are not criminal, but rather political and can be addressed at the ballot box.” (UNQUOTE)

Your attention is directed to the fact that Posse Comitatus Act is included in U. S. Code, Title 18, Crimes and Criminal Procedure, as Section 1385. Murder is included in U. S. Code, Title 18, Crimes and Criminal Procedure, as Section 1111.

My conclusion is that unless Payne states publicly and specifically why the Posse Comitatus Act and Murder, both in Title 18, are in different categories, he is saying Murder also is only a political matter.

And 24th Circuit Court Judge Michael Gamble’s refusal to allow the Grand Jury to take up this matter indicates he shares Payne’s indefensible opinion that the Posse Comitatus Act is only a “political matter.” In other words, both the top Nelson County judge and commonwealth’s attorney are OPENLY ENDORSING VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW!

Attached is a report of just another police state incident encouraged by the kind of unlawful federal Department of Homeland Security action which you Board members, Judge Michael Gamble and Commonwealth’s Attorney Phillip Payne are deliberately supporting.

I can promise you that we in VTA are going to tell this alarming story to an ever-increasing number of citizens and will COMPEL attitudes to be changed by alert people in Nelson County who refuse to live under martial law, where a dictator decides by himself what is a crime and who can be fined, imprisoned or worse for any reason whatever.

And this tyranny IS going to be LAWFULLY CORRECTED, for the safety of citizens all across Virginia as well as in Nelson County!

That concludes my Statement.

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Shreveport Citizens Disarmed By Police For 2nd Amendment Bumper Stickers

Argue With Everyone
July 7, 2009

Welcome to Shreveport: Your rights are now suspended. According to Cedric Glover, mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, his cops “have a power that [. . .] the President of these Unites States does not have”: His cops can take away your rights.

Cedric Glover, mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, claims to have the authority to suspend the Constitution.

And would you like to guess which rights he has in mind?

Just ask Shreveport resident Robert Baillio, who got pulled over for having two pro-gun bumper stickers on the back of his truck — and had his gun confiscated.

While the officer who pulled him over says Baillio failed to use his turn signal, the only questions he had for Baillio concerned guns: Whether he had a gun, where the gun was, and if he was a member of the NRA. No requests for a driver’s licenSe, proof of insurance, or vehicle registration — and no discussion of a turn signal.

Accordingly, Baillio told the officer the truth, which led the police officer to search his car without permission and confiscate his gun.

However, not only does Louisiana law allow residents to drive with loaded weapons in their vehicles, but Mr. Baillio possessed a concealed carry license!

What does such behavior demonstrate, other than transparent political profiling — going so far as to use the infamous Department of Homeland Security report on “Americans of a rightwing persuasion” as a how-to guidebook, no less?

Mr. Baillio made no secret of his political affiliations: An American flag centers a wide flourish of pro-freedom stickers and decals on his back windshield.

In fact, when Baillio asked the officer if everyone he pulls over gets the same treatment, the officer said no and pointed to the back of his truck.

Baillio phoned Mayor Glover to complain about this “suspension of rights” only to find that his city’s morbidly obese “commander in chief” was elated at the story: consideration that maybe [he] should not have gotten.”

Thankfully, Mr. Baillio recorded a good bit of that phone call. You can watch a video with the transcriptions here. I’ve reproduced a chunk of the call below:

Baillio: (in the context of being asked about the presence of a gun) Well, I answered that question honestly, and he disarmed me.

Glover: Which would be an appropriate and proper action, sir. The fact that you gave the correct answer — it simply means that you did what it is you were supposed to have done, and that is to give that weapon to the police officer so he could appropriately place it in a place where it would not be a threat to you, to him, or to anyone in the general public.

Glover: My direction to you is that, had you chosen not to properly identify the fact that you had a weapon and directed that officer to where that weapon was located; had you been taken from the vehicle, and the officer, in the interest of his safety, chose to secure you in a safe position, and then looked, found, and determined that you did, in fact, have a weapon…then, sir, you would have faced additional, [inaudible], and more severe criminal sanctions.

Baillio: So what you’re saying is: I give up all my rights to keep and bear arms if I’m stopped by the police: Is that correct?

Glover: Sir, you have no right, when you have been pulled over by a police officer for a potential criminal offense [which would be what?! - DB] to stand there with your weapon at your side in your hand [Baillio's weapon was nowhere near his side or his hand, and Glover knew that. -- DB] because of your second amendment rights, sir. That does not mean at that point your second amendment right has been taken away; it means at that particular point in time, it has been suspended.

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Will Grigg from ProLibertate, an excellent freedom blog, has this to say:

According to Glover, a police officer may properly disarm any civilian at any time, and the civilian’s duty is to surrender his gun — willingly, readily, cheerfully, without cavil or question.

From Glover’s perspective, it is only when firearms are in the hands of people other than the state’s uniformed enforcers/oppressors that they constitute a threat, not only to the public and those in charge of exercising official violence but also to the private gun owner himself.

NAGR spoke with Mr. Baillio, and he told us that he’s in the process of securing the official procedures and codes for firearm handling and private property confiscation for the Shreveport police department.

So far, the city has been half-heartedly cooperating with him.

“I felt sick,” Baillio told NAGR. “My uncles didn’t die for this country so I could surrender my rights like a wimp. I felt terrible. I was just thinking of all that my family has done for freedom in this nation — including dying — and here they are disarming me at a traffic stop.

What to do?

1. Read Luke’s commentary here, and participate in the discussion by leaving a comment.

2. Send this around. This kind of behavior cannot go unchecked.

3. Call Mayor Glover’s office to complain: (318) 673-5050.

I’ll leave you with one last consideration. As a licensed firearms instructor in charge of a hundred different students every month, I’m often asked if citizens should voluntarily inform police officers of the presence of a firearm during a routine traffic stop.

While different states have different laws, my answer for Colorado citizens is an emphatic “No”: Colorado law doesn’t require you to volunteer that kind of information, and this case in Louisiana proves why, if at all possible, you should never invite trouble by doing so.

In liberty,

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Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights

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