Law Enforcement: Goose Creek Agrees to Pay Up, Change Ways in Settlement of Notoriou

A NEW REEFER MADNESS

December is the season for giving, and no one gives more generously than
the U.S. Congress. Of course Congress has the advantage of doing its
last-minute holiday shopping at someone else's expense, namely yours and mine.

For example, on Dec. 8., the House of Representatives passed a bill that
gives the White House drug czar's office $145 million of taxpayer money to
run anti-marijuana propaganda ads. My personal favorite in this genre is a
television ad in which police rough up a high school student when arresting
him in the school's marijuana-smoke-filled bathroom. This is followed by a
caption reading, "Marijuana: Harmless? Think again." (And no, I did not
make that up).

Yet this bill contains something far more obnoxious than pots of money
for another round of clueless anti-marijuana propaganda. A section of
the bill prohibits any local transit system that receives federal
funding from running privately funded ads that call for marijuana
policy reform. In other words, at the same time that the federal
government is forcing you to spend your money to publicize its
willingness to engage in storm trooper tactics to persecute the tens
of millions Americans who smoke marijuana, it is trying to prohibit
you from having the freedom to spend your money to protest these same
tactics.

If this bill becomes law, it will be illegal for the average American
to buy advertising space on a city bus, or in a subway station,
advocating that doctors be given the right to prescribe marijuana as a
painkiller for their terminally ill patients.

Two words that are thrown around far too loosely in political debate
are "fascism" and "unconstitutional." Nevertheless, this sort of thing
has a distinctly fascist tinge. And if the First Amendment means
anything, it ought to mean that the government cannot take away the
right of citizens to engage in public political protest.

Anyone who has doubts about what the drug war is all about ought to
consider what it tells us that our federal government is trying to
make it illegal to effectively protest that war. Fence sitters might
also want to view the video from the surveillance tape at a Goose
Creek, S.C., high school, which, on Nov. 5, was raided by police
looking for drugs. (A photo from the tape can be viewed at
www.mpp.org).

After an extensive search, the police found no drugs, but they did
terrorize more than 100 students (two-thirds of whom were black, even
though less than 25 percent of the school's student body is
African-American). With guns pointed at their heads, students were
handcuffed and forced to lie on the floor, or to kneel with their
faces to the wall.

One student said he assumed the police "were trying to protect us,
that it was like Columbine, that somebody got in the school that was
crazy or dangerous. But then a police officer pointed a gun at me. It
was really scary."

What's really scary is that incidents such as this seem to stir so
little outrage. What level of government persecution will put a dent
in public apathy about the madness that is the war on drugs? If the
police at the Goose Creek high school had inadvertently shot a student
or two in their zealous search for marijuana cigarettes, would that be
enough to distract people from holiday shopping and channel surfing?
Or would such an incident be shrugged off as another regrettable
accident, of the sort that is inevitable in wartime?

Take a look at that photograph, and consider: This is your government


on drugs.

[Woodman]

Originally Posted by Alfa

A section of the bill prohibits any local transit system that receives federal funding from running privately funded ads that call for marijuana policy reform. In other words, at the same time that the federal government is forcing you to spend your money to publicize its willingness to engage in storm trooper tactics to persecute the tens of millions Americans who smoke marijuana, it is trying to prohibit you from having the freedom to spend your money to protest these same tactics.

Thanks Alfa.

Please post the bills congressional reference number so people can make SPECIFIC reference to the measure when they (we) address this matter when we post our elected officials.

[sands of time]

This is the reason I hate American politics. This is also the reason I think Jessie Ventura kicks ass! He has enough balls to speak out againt this bull shit. No matter what though, no one will be able to change things in the USA for along time. People have been brain washed to the point of no return.

[BA]

it's in the Omnibus Spending Bill

[BA]

(HR 2673).

[old hippie 56]

Law Enforcement: Goose Creek Agrees to Pay Up, Change Ways in Settlement of Notorious High School Drug Raid Case
7/14/06
http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/...ttlement.shtml

A federal judge Tuesday gave final approval to a landmark settlement in the case of the heavy-handed 2003 police drug raid on students at Stratford High School in Goose Creek, South Carolina. Under the terms of the settlement, the Goose Creek Police Department, the City of Goose Creek, and the Berkeley County School District will pay $1.6 million for violating the rights of nearly 150 students caught in the raid. The trio also signed a consent decree barring police from conducting law enforcement activities on school grounds absent a warrant, probable cause, or voluntary consent.



early morning high school raid:
no drugs or guns found
Caught by both school and police surveillance cameras, video of the raid helped make the case a cause celebre. The tapes show students as young as 14 forced to the ground in handcuffs as officers in SWAT team uniforms and bulletproof vests aim guns at their heads and lead a drug dog to tear through their book bags. Authorized by Principal George McCrackin because he suspected a student was dealing marijuana, the raid came up empty: no drugs or weapons were found and none of the students were charged with any crime.

"They hit that school like it was a crack house, like they knew that there were crack dealers in there armed with guns," said 14-year-old Le'Quan Simpson, who was one of the students forced to kneel at gunpoint in the school hallway and whose father served on a SWAT team.

Simpson's father, Elijah Simpson, a local deputy sheriff who has served on SWAT teams, said, "This was clearly a no-shoot situation no matter how you look at it. A school drug raid is not a SWAT situation, but that's how the Goose Creek police handled it." The police raid was unnecessarily dangerous, the older Simpson added. "It was crossfire just waiting to happen. If one door slammed, one student dropped a book or screamed, and then those guns would have gone off all over the place. Did you see the way they were swinging those guns around? That's not how you do it."

Following the raid, the ACLU brought a lawsuit on behalf of students' families charging police and school officials with violating the students' right to be free from unlawful search and seizure and use of excessive force. The lawsuit demanded a court order declaring the raid unconstitutional and blocking the future use of such tactics, as well as damages on behalf of the students. Joined by local attorneys, the lawsuit grew to include 53 of the affected students.

The American Civil Liberties Union represented 20 of them, including Simpson. "Goose Creek students now have a unique place in our nation," said Graham Boyd, Director of the ACLU Drug Law Reform Project. "They are the only students in the nation who have complete protection of their Fourth Amendment rights of search and seizure."

Marlon Kimpson, a lawyer with Motley Rice LLC, the firm that represented most of the students, said students involved in the drug sweep must file claims by July 28. A claims administrator appointed by the court will then evaluate each student's claim and determine which students are eligible for the funds, Kimpson said.

"Any student who was searched and seized on Nov. 5, 2003, is now eligible for compensation and they have received notice of that," Kimpson told the Charleston Post & Courier. "It is now incumbent on the students to take action and have their claim considered."

Under the terms of the settlement, the affected students will divide $1.2 million among themselves, while the lawyers will pocket $400,000. Depending on the number of students who agree to the settlement, each could walk away with between $6,000 and $12,000.

The powers that be have learned a lesson, said Kimpson. "McCrackin is no longer in charge, the police have agreed to additional training and school district has vowed to change its policies with respect to the way they conduct drug raids," Kimpson said. "You must conduct drug searches according to the US Constitution. This settlement and this class-action lawsuit is notice to police officers and school officials across the nation that students don't shed their constitutional rights merely by entering a schoolhouse door."

-- END --

(DRCNet)