Recently by Lawrence A. Hunter: From the Fascist Welfare State ofAmerica
Mr. Jefferson must be turning in his grave.
On August 16 last, a combined militarized strike force of local, state and federal u201Claw enforcementu201D personnel (including local and state Virginia police, Homeland Security, FBI and Secret Service agents) kidnapped, assaulted, unlawfully detained and gratuitously committed former marine Brandon J. Raub of Chesterfield Virginia to a psychiatric ward for Facebook postings he had made that were critical of the government. Mr. Raub was not charged with any crime or wrongdoing beyond a bogus accusation by local police to the press and Raub's family after his kidnapping that he u201Cassaulted an officer of the law and resisted arrestu201D although even these spurious charges never were formally filed against Mr. Raub.
Soon after Raub's kidnapping, a local Virginia magistrate (a government bureaucrat, not a real judge) refused to release him but still did not charge him with any crime nor did he in anyway justify continuing to hold Raub in custody. Instead, the magistrate unlawfully ordered Raub to be held in custody over the weekend at a local mental institution for so-called u201Cpreliminary evaluation.u201D After a hearing on Monday, August 20, a Virginia u201Cspecial justiceu201D (also a bureaucrat lawyer, not a real judge) further ordered Raub detained for an additional month, again without charging him with any crime or wrongdoing, and additionally ordered the Virginia captive to be transferred to a Salem Virginia hospital where he was involuntarily committed to another psych ward.
According to Raub's lawyer, John Whitehead of the Rutherford Institute, which courageously stepped up to defend Raub:
u201C. . .the August 20 detention order was ‘rubber-stamped’ and represents the corrupt system in Virginia…This is the so-called judge – he's a lawyer, not a real judge – it's like what you would see in a bad movie.u201D
Except, in the best u201Cbad movieu201D depicting yahoo justice in America, My Cousin Vinny, there was justice of a sort even in backwater, Podunk Alabama, and most importantly, there was complete transparency in the legal proceedings. Despite his heavy-handed, sometimes tyrannical courtroom presence in the movie, Judge Chamberlain Haller allows the defense complete and unrestricted access to the state's case files against the defendant. As Vinny's girlfriend, Mona Lisa Vito explains:
u201CYou wanna know why [DA] Trotter gave you his files? He has to, by law, you’re entitled. It’s called disclosure…He has to show you everything, otherwise it could be a mistrial. He has to give you a list of all his witnesses, you can talk to all his witnesses, he’s not allowed any surprises.u201D
Not so in Virginia. Disclosure in Virginia is a bad joke, and Commonwealth Attorneys lusting to climb the political ladder to AG and then into the governor's mansion routinely play the surprise-and-gottcha game on defendants by stonewalling, withholding information and refusing to reveal all the evidence they possess, even such basic evidence (or lack thereof) that a crime has actually been committed. This corrupting process leads to constant over-charging of defendants in Virginia so that devious prosecutors can blackmail them into pleading guilty to lesser charges on which prosecutors may not even have sufficient evidence to convict.
And now, evidently, in Virginia you don't even have to commit a crime to be u201Carrested,u201D really kidnapped, and manhandled by u201Cofficers of the lawu201D and unlawfully locked up without charge. Virginia's Attorney General, Kenneth Cuccinelli (who is running for governor in 2013), seems to believe his Commonwealth Attorneys don't even have to charge a person with a crime before Virginia disappears him into its mental-health gulag, what the old Soviet Union used to call the Psihuska. So this is The Virginia Way: GITMO on the Potomac?
Whitehead further exposed how the incestuous old-boys' club rules in the Old Dominion:
u201CI'm friends with the local police; I could call them right now and probably get you committed if you were in Virginia…They can arrive at your door based on somebody's testimony or your Facebook page and take you away to a mental hospital… There's a system here that is corrupt.u201D
But the Virginia Yahoos, egged on and manipulated by the Feds, over reached in the Raub case, and when there was a national outcry to free Brandon Raub, Virginia officials realized on August 23 that they has screwed the pooch. They panicked, and another Virginia judge released Raub toot sweet on the narrow technical grounds that the state's u201Cpetition is so devoid of any factual allegations that it could not be reasonably expected to give rise to a case or controversy.u201D I'm wondering if his pun was intended? Now, one awaits the cover up and the official denials of wrongdoing to begin.
Mr. Jefferson would be appalled and outraged to know his beloved Commonwealth of Virginia has become a weapon of mass tyranny in the hands of unprincipled politicians and bureaucrats; Virginia, a wholly owned subsidiary of the tyrannical national-security state in Washington, DC. So this is “federalism” in 21st-century America.
In the Brandon Raub case, the Commonwealth of Virginia and some of its subdivisions actively participated in a well-coordinated criminal conspiracy with federal officials to unlawfully assault, kidnap, detain and commit Mr. Raub to a psychiatric ward and to deny him his constitutional rights. These horrific actions demand action by the Virginia Attorney General to investigate and bring to justice all individuals involved in these illegal acts, no matter how high the Virginia rot extends.
The Attorney General must not be allowed to put Virginia and federal officials above the law. He must not be allowed to hold government officials to a different standard of justice than he holds ordinary Virginians to everyday. Mr. Cuccinelli must not be allowed to exempt government officials from prosecution and punishment for the criminal acts of kidnapping and assaulting Mr. Raub, nor can he be allowed to ignore Virginia's obscene violation of Mr. Raub's constitutional rights under an abstract, self-serving claim of so-called u201Csovereign immunity.u201D In America, all people are created equal under the law, including local, state and federal officials, and all must be held to account equally before the law no matter who has to go to prison.
The Attorney General also must not be allowed to hide behind dodgy Virginia disclosure practices to lock up information and evidence of wrong doing by government officials. These Orwellian actions and this criminal conspiracy between Virginia and federal officials are so outrageous and so contrary to the precepts of American and Virginian justice that the ramifications of these unlawful acts go far beyond the harm done to Mr. Raub; they undermine the constitutional foundations of the United States of America and the Commonwealth of Virginia. Therefore, all communications related to these incidents that occurred among Virginia agencies and personnel and with federal officials should be released to the public without delay, and the total file of communications should be released to Mr. Raub's lawyers if and when he decides to sue for the wrongs done to him.
Moreover, because it is unambiguously clear that these criminal actions by government authorities were taken as the direct result of an organized criminal conspiracy among Virginia officials, federal officials and hospital personnel, Mr. Cuccinelli should bring racketeering charges under the u201CVirginia Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) Actu201D against all government personnel and private parties involved in the incidents.
The attempts to disappear Mr. Raub into a Virginia Psihuska and strip him of his firearms – which it is clear the legal finding of mental incompetence being sought by the conspirators was intended to do – have appalled and humiliated the people of Virginia in the eyes of the world. The Governor and Attorney General of Virginia should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this to happen on their watch, or heaven forefend, for participating in the conspiracy themselves.
The governor and the attorney general of Virginia owe apologies to Mr. Raub, the people of Virginia and the people of the United States of America all of whom they have grossly offended and egregiously harmed. In addition, they owe to Mr. Raub and the people their immediate personal assurances that none of these incidents will be swept under the rug and that they personally will not rest until all the details of these reprehensible acts are exposed to the light of day and all those people involved, including magistrates and special justices, are brought to justice and held to the same standards as any ordinary Virginian.
Yes Virginia, there is a constitution. Comply with it.
Reprinted with permission from the Social Security Institute. Originally posted at Forbes.com.
