Police State USA: Student assaulted and tasered
by police for asking John Kerry the wrong question
by Mike Adams
Andrew Meyer, a 21-year-old student at the University of Florida, was assaulted by police officers
yesterday immediately after asking Sen. John Kerry if he was associated with
the Skull and Bones Society. Uniformed police officers brutally assaulted Meyer
with a taser, jolting him with tens of thousands of
volts of electricity as he screamed, "Help! Help me!" to a room full
of astonished onlookers. The mainstream media is censoring the truth of this story, refusing to report the nature of the question asked
by Meyer immediately preceding his brutal arrest and kidnapping (see below) by
assaulting police officers.
A video of the event, filmed by Kyle Mitchell, is making the rounds on the
internet and is available here now
and at YouTube.com:
The two-minute video shows officers grabbing Meyer's
arms, throwing him to the ground and then, after
Meyer is already secured on the ground, blasting him with a taser.
Here's a blow-by-blow account of what happens in the video. All dialog below is
from Andrew Meyer:
Meyer is at the microphone, asking Sen. John Kerry a question. Police are
standing behind him. "Are you a member of Skull and Bones... are you in
the same secret society?"
Two uniformed police officers step forward and grab his arms.
"Excuse me, what are you arresting me for?"
Officers are holding his arms and begin to march him away from the microphone.
"Woah, woah!
Is anybody watching this?"
Meyer holds his arms in the air, is shouting something to the audience to get
them to pay attention. The audio is difficult to hear. At no point is he
fighting the officers or striking them in any way. He is merely holding his
arms in the air and attempting to stand his ground and be heard.
A large uniformed officer forcefully picks him up by his torso and begins to
carry him away from the room down the center aisle.
"Help! Help! They're arresting me! What have I
done?"
When Meyer reaches the back of the room, he does what any rational human being
would attempt to do when assaulted by someone: He attempts to flee.
"Get away from me, man. Get off of me!"
He tries to run but is grabbed by officers and thrown to the ground. The number
of officers now assaulting Meyer is six: Four white males, one white female and
one black male.
"What did I do? HELP! HELP!"
The six officers pin his arms and legs to the ground and pull out handcuffs.
"HELP ME! HELP! They're arresting me!"
The female officer, with her finger pointed at him, screams at him, "Stop
resisting!"
He relaxes a bit and says, "If you let me go, I'll walk out of here."
The female officer says, "Quiet down! Do it now!"
Then the officers forcefully turn him over and thrust his torso to the ground
so that he's laying flat on his stomach, with his face on the floor.
"Why are they arresting me? Can someone do something here?"
"What did I do? Get off me, man! I didn't do anything!"
He tries to sit up, using his arm to grasp the edge of a seat and pull himself
up. An officer pulls out a taser.
"Don't tase me bro! Don't tase
me!"
The officer tasers the student,
and the taser clicking is clearly heard on the video.
"OWWW! OWWW! OWWW!"
Another girl is heard screaming in the background (unknown at this time who it
is).
"OWWW! OH MY GOD! WHAT DID I DO?"
Someone screams in the background, "Police brutality!"
Someone in the foreground (bearded man) says, "Stay back!"
Police escort Meyer out of the room and the video ends.
Welcome to the new police state
What you have just witnessed in this video is an authentic
scene of police state brutality. The video clearly shows that:
• Meyer was assaulted by six officers, thrown to the ground and attacked with a
violent weapon.
• Meyer volunteered to leave the room if the officers would let him go.
• Meyer did not strike any officer at any time. His hands were always in a
defensive position.
• Meyer attempted to flee his assailants (as any rational person would).
• Meyer committed no crime whatsoever. At no point did any law enforcement
officer accuse Meyer of committing any crime other than "resisting
arrest" (which is not a crime when the arrest is illegal in the first
place, see below).
• Meyer was arrested for merely exercising his Free Speech rights.
It is every citizen's duty to resist false
arrest
There is
no such crime as "resisting arrest." This is a fictitious crime
dreamed up by law enforcement to accuse a citizen of a crime when they refuse
to surrender to the illegal demands of the police.
U.S. courts have ruled on numerous occasions that
resisting a false arrest is not merely a citizen's right, but his duty! In
fact, courts have gone so far as to rule that if a law enforcement officer is
killed as a result of actions stemming from a citizen's attempts to defend
themselves against a false arrest, it is the fault of the officer, not the
citizen.
Here's a short collection of relevant court rulings on false arrest and
resisting arrest:
"When a person, being without fault,
is in a place where he has a right to be, is violently assaulted, he may,
without retreating, repel by force, and if, in the reasonable exercise of his
right of self defense, his assailant is killed, he is justified."Runyan v.
State, 57 Ind. 80; Miller v. State, 74 Ind. 1.
"These principles apply as well to
an officer attempting to make an arrest, who abuses
his authority and transcends the bounds thereof by the use of unnecessary force
and violence, as they do to a private individual who unlawfully uses such force
and violence."Jones v. State, 26 Tex. App.I; Beaverts v. State, 4 Tex. App. 1 75;
Skidmore v. State, 43 Tex. 93, 903.
"An illegal arrest is an assault and
battery. The person so attempted to be restrained of his liberty has the same
right to use force in defending himself as he would in repelling any other
assault and battery." (State v. Robinson, 145 ME. 77, 72 ATL.
260).
In other words, Andrew Meyer would have been justified in using whatever
reasonable means necessary to defend his life against his assailants. The
gang of six individuals who assaulted Meyer, regardless of what clothing and
badges they were wearing, were threatening his safety
and his life. They assaulted him with a dangerous and potentially deadly
weapon, and they kidnapped him by forcefully removing him from the room against
his will.
Was Meyer being annoying to others by taking up air time at the microphone? Perhaps so. But being annoying is not a crime. If it were,
John Kerry, President Bush and practically elected official in the country
should be arrested. They're all far more annoying than Meyer.
Additional information from the courts:
"Each person has the right to resist
an unlawful arrest. In such a case, the person attempting the arrest stands in
the position of a wrongdoer and may be resisted by the use of force, as in
self- defense."(State v. Mobley, 240 N.C. 476,
83 S.E. 2d 100).
Why did the bystanders not assist Meyer?
The most astonishing thing about this video is not merely
the fact that six police officers brutally assaulted and arrested Meyer for his
"Free Speech crimes," but that this room full of onlookers did
nothing while Meyer screamed for help.
In 1964, a New York resident named Kitty Genovese was
stabbed to death, screaming for help, while hundreds of her neighbors watched
and did nothing. No one called the police. The case of Kitty Genovese became a
lightning rod for psychological research that attempted to understand the
madness of crowds and why a group of people would do nothing to help an
innocent bystander.
Today, in Florida, a room full of fellow students
looked on and did nothing while their classmate, Andrew Meyer, was brutally
attacked by an armed gang, right on the floor in front of them. They watched
and did nothing. Not one person attempted to rush to the aid of Meyer who was
screaming "HELP! HELP ME!"
Do individuals have the right to come to the aid of another citizen being
falsely arrested? You bet they do. As another court case ruled:
"One may come to the aid of another
being unlawfully arrested, just as he may where one is being assaulted,
molested, raped or kidnapped. Thus it is not an offense to liberate one from
the unlawful custody of an officer, even though he may have submitted to such
custody, without resistance."(Adams v. State, 121 Ga. 16, 48 S.E.
910).
And on the issue of actually killing an arresting officer in self defense:
"Citizens may resist unlawful arrest
to the point of taking an arresting officer's life if necessary."Plummer v. State, 136 Ind. 306. This premise was
upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case: John Bad Elk v. U.S., 177 U.S. 529.
Why onlookers did nothing
The sad fact of this matter is that the onlookers did
nothing because Americans have been terrorized by their own government to
fear authority and follow orders. Americans fear their government. That
alone is a dangerous situation, since the balance of power in a free society
actually depends on a government fearing the people!
When the people fear their government, that government has complete power over
the people. And our government in particular has used fear as a weapon of mass
terror against the American people for several decades now. The U.S. government now has Americans so
scared of fictitious threats that the citizens have submitted to the most
insane security processes, such as surrendering bottles of water at the airport
before boarding an airplane, or submitting to random searches of vehicles at
roadside checkpoints.
In this particular video, we are watching a group of terrorized onlookers
sit in their chairs and do nothing while a fellow citizen is arrested and assaulted
for committing no crime. If all this sounds familiar, it should: You
probably read it in the novel 1984
by George Orwell.
In a police state society, the citizens are turned against each other. Each
looks out for only his own survival, ignoring cries for help by fellow citizens
who are being assaulted or killed by the state-run police forces. No one comes
to the aid of another because they, too, would then be arrested for
"resisting arrest" and charged with some bogus crime (or simply locked
away and "disappeared").
Don't think this could happen in the USA? You just watched it happen. You
are witnessing the reaction of a nation of citizens who live in fear. There
is no more rational reaction to police brutality in this country. Everyone
simply watches it, tolerates it, and says nothing.
From this point there is no limit to the degree of police powers abuse that can
now be perpetrated against the citizens of this nation. The sheeple
have surrendered to fear and submitted to the false authority of so-called
"law enforcement" gangs who actually have no respect whatsoever for
laws.
Andrew Meyer deserves to be seen as a hero for his courageous actions in the
face of police brutality and complete abandonment by his fellow students. His
video serves as a powerful reminder that the citizens of this nation have
already lost their freedoms, and if they do not wake up and start to protest,
exercise free speech and fight against police brutality, they will never regain
the rights and freedoms that once existed in this nation.
It is no coincidence that the police made an
example of Andrew Meyer
One more
thing worth remembering here: In a police state society, the state must, from
time to time, remind the citizens who's in charge. This incident serves as a
powerful reminder to those who might dare to exercise their Free Speech rights
and ask tough questions of Senators or Presidents: Those who refuse to follow
the propaganda will be assaulted and arrested!
The wild popularity of this video on YouTube only
serves to remind millions of viewers of what might happen to them if they, too,
decide to speak out and actually tell the truth at a public gathering.
Remember, the first rule of tyranny is that you've got to stop people from
speaking the truth. The second rule is to punish anyone who dares to speak the
truth, and the third rule is to make sure the people don't help each other
resist false authority.
Thankfully, we're not yet in a full-on police state, or else you wouldn't be
able to read this article. We still have some time to reverse this situation
and take back our freedoms. I encourage you to do so in every non-violent way
possible. Speak out! Protest! Tell the truth in an auditorium! Refuse to remain
silent. Refuse to submit to fear and false authority.
Remember: The only way to protect Free Speech is to exercise it. Use it or lose
it.
Why Did Senator John Kerry Stand Idly By?
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Naïve Americans who think they live
in a free society should watch the video filmed by students at a John Kerry
speech September 17, Constitution Day, at the University of Florida in Gainesville.
At the conclusion of
Kerry's speech, Andrew Meyer, a 21-year old journalism student was selected by
Senator Kerry to ask a question. Meyer held up a copy of BBC
investigative reporter Greg Palast's book, Armed
Madhouse, and asked if Kerry was aware that Palast's
investigations determined that Kerry had actually won the election. Why,
Meyer asked, had Kerry conceded the election so quickly when there were so many
obvious examples of vote fraud? Why, Meyer, went on to ask, was Kerry
refusing to consider Bush's impeachment when Bush was about to initiate another
act of military aggression, this time against Iran?
At this point the
public's protectors—the police—decided that Meyer had said too much. They
grabbed Meyer and began dragging him off. Meyer said repeatedly, "I
have done nothing wrong," which under our laws he had not. He
threatened no one and assaulted no one.
But the police decided
that Meyer, an American citizen, had no right to free speech and no
constitutional protection. They threw him to the floor and tasered him right in front of Senator Kerry and the large
student audience, who captured on video the unquestionable act of police
brutality. Meyer was carted off and jailed on a phony charge
of "disrupting a public event."
The question we should
all ask is why did a United States Senator just stand there while Gestapo goons
violated the constitutional rights of a student participating in a public
event, brutalized him in full view of everyone, and then took him off to jail
on phony charges?
Kerry's meekness not only
in the face of electoral fraud, not only in the face of Bush's wars that are
crimes under the Nuremberg standard, but also in the face of police goons
trampling the constitutional rights of American citizens makes it completely
clear that he was not fit to be president, and he is not fit to be a US
senator.
Usually when police
violate constitutional rights and commit acts of police brutality they do it
when they believe no one is watching, not in front of a large audience.
Clearly, the police have become more audacious in their abuse of rights and
citizens. What explains the new fearlessness of police to violate rights
and brutalize citizens without cause?
The answer is that
police, most of whom have authoritarian personalities, have seen that
constitutional rights are no longer protected. President Bush does not
protect our constitutional rights. Neither does Vice President Cheney,
nor the Attorney General, nor the US Congress. Just as Kerry allowed Meyer's
rights to be tasered out of him, Congress has enabled
Bush to strip people, including American citizens, of constitutional protection
and incarcerate them without presenting evidence.
How long before Kerry
himself or some other senator will be dragged from his podium and tasered?
The Bush Republicans with
complicit Democrats have essentially brought government accountability to an
end in the US. The US government has 80,000 people,
including ordinary American citizens, on its "no-fly list." No
one knows why they are on the list, and no one on the list can find out how to
get off it. An unaccountable act by the Bush administration put them there.
Airport Security harasses
and abuses people who do not fit any known definition of terrorist. NaliniGhuman, a British-born
citizen and music professor at MillsCollege in California was met on her return from a trip
to England by armed guards at the airplane
door and escorted away. A Gestapo goon squad tore up her US visa, defaced her British
passport, body searched her, and told her she could leave immediately for England or be sent to a detention center.
Professor Ghuman, an OxfordUniversity graduate with a Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley, says she feels like the
character in Kafka's book, The Trial. "I don't know why it's
happened, what I'm accused of. There's no opportunity to defend myself.
One is just completely powerless." Over one year later there is
still no answer.
The Bush Republicans and
their Democratic toadies have, in the name of "security," made all of
us powerless. While Senator John Kerry and his Democratic colleagues
stand silently, the Bush administration has stolen our country from us and
turned us into subjects.
Paul Craig
Roberts was
Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was
Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing
Editor of National Review. He is coauthor of The
Tyranny of Good Intentions.He can be reached at: PaulCraigRoberts@yahoo.com