CHP Officer Charles Wilson, ID 17477, Merced Superior Court Judge Hugh M. Flanagan; Suspect Martin Esquivel and Merced County Officer J. Mellow, Merced County California, Merced County Sheriff Sucks, Malfeasance, Laziness, Incompetence, Stupidity, Greed, Outrageous Traffic Fines in California

Merced County California, Merced County Sheriff Sucks, Malfeasance, Laziness, Incompetence, Stupidity and Greed Beyond Measure.

Merced County Sheriff's Office Sucks

How concerned is the citizenry about corruption and general skullduggery in California? This concerned:
California Corruption, CHP, Merced Superior Court

CHP Officer Charles Wilson, ID 17477, Merced Superior Court Judge Hugh M. Flanagan; Suspect Martin Esquivel and Merced County Officer J. Mellow, Merced County California, Merced County Sheriff Sucks, Malfeasance, Laziness, Incompetence, Stupidity, Greed, Outrageous Traffic Fines in California

 

Merced Superior Court "Judge" Hugh M. Flanagan is paid about $179,000 per year.

By whom?

By YOU.

This outrageous wage comes out of your paycheck every single week.

If that isn't an obscenity, nothing is.

I submit that he earns no more than $45,000 and that he would be hard-pressed to hold any job besides this.

 

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This web page details our opinions of and/or experiences with:

 

 

Sheriff Mark Pazin, Merced County Sheriff 700 W 22nd St. Merced, CA 95340

Dept of Motor Vehicles Investigations 2510 S. East St. #100B Fresno, California, 93706-8007

Chief of Police Norm Andrade 611 W. 22nd St Merced, CA 95340

California Superior Court 670 W 22nd St, #6 Merced, CA 95340

California Highway Patrol P.O. Box 942898 Sacramento, CA 94298-0001

 

 

 

Registered receipt: 9405 5036 9930 0220 73-----

Dec. 1, 2012

This editorial letter and complaint contains and includes my opinions.

The purpose of this letter is multi-fold:

(1) Please consider this a formal complaint against Merced County Sheriff's deputy J. Mellow regarding case number 2012-0001----.

(2) Please consider this a formal request to the California Superior court to know the exact amount of the fine regarding traffic infraction # 77304 QM so that it may be paid without delay.

(3) Please consider this a general, generic complaint about CHP traffic-stop procedures re citation # 77--- QM and CHP officer Wilson, badge # [unreadable per citation].

(4) To help all agencies try to understand why the citizenry is more afraid of and disgusted by them than they are of the imminent threat of terrorism.

(5) Please consider this a formal complaint to the CA Dept of Licensing regarding the incompetence of one licensing examiner in the Merced office (see details herein).

(6) To make the Merced City PD aware of the apparent insanity of some past, and probably present, officers and detectives who have made threats to local businesses.

Be advised this letter is now a public website. Google it.

Many years ago I was driving a new Ford Escort, southbound on I-5, just past the bug station near Shasta. Weather was clear, time was noonish, roadbed was dry, traffic was light to medium. I was pulled over for doing 59 in a 55 zone. No citation was issued; just a friendly warning. An hour and a half later I was pulled over for doing 58 in a 55 zone. No citation was issued; just a friendly warning. One hour later I noticed that at a speed of precisely 55mph I was slowly gaining on a CHP vehicle. I had been watching my speedometer more than the road, which was a dangerous way to drive but the only way, apparently, to avoid a ticket in that area. I maintained my speed and finally passed him over the course of about 8-12 minutes. I estimated he was doing 54mph in a 55 zone. As soon as I pulled back into the right lane in front of him he hit his lights and pulled me over. I asked him none too politely what he thought he was doing. By that time I'd had a belly-full of this idiocy. He laughed and said to relax, he knew I wasn't speeding, but he had stopped me because, quote, "We can't have these other people thinking they can pass a police car." I told him that in my opinion he was insane. He laughed and insisted that I remain until several dozen cars had passed the scene, then he let me go. As far as I'm concerned at this late date, that's pretty damned close to unlawful imprisonment, a crime I'd sent a man to hard prison time for, some years before.

I was brought up to respect law enforcement and to believe that it was there to protect us from bad people. It took me most of 60 years to finally realize that more often than not, law enforcement itself is the force we must fear.

When I was a kid I had a 100cc (that's about 8hp) Suzuki trail bike. Its top speed was 53mph, downhill, with a tailwind. Under normal conditions it would top out at 49mph. This was a problem because the freeway in my area was posted with a max speed of 75 and a minimum of 55. I was constantly in danger of being cited for driving under the minimum speed. Fortunately I never was. But one day I left the school parking lot on the bike and travelled 2.5 blocks of the 3 blocks required to get to a convenience store where I intended to buy lunch. I was pulled over by a red-faced city cop who blustered and screamed that he had chased me and that I had refused to stop and that he had clocked me at 87 mph, and that's how he wrote the cite. I argued that the bike couldn't go 87mph. The man blew up at me and told me to shut the F up, that he had been on "these motorcycles" himself, and he knew what they could do or couldn't do. I fought the ticket and won. But I shouldn't have been put to that trouble -- I should have been professionally cited for the speed I was doing, about 35 in a 25, and I wouldn't have fought it.

I worked narcotics enforcement for the Federal Government many years ago. I had a hard time making nice with the dopers so I was eventually transferred to a political corruption unit. I saw the ugliest side of law enforcement and an even uglier side of local government. I quit because of malfeasance, corruption and stupidity in my unit and in the courts.

I drove semi-truck for awhile and I was once flagged at the Truckee scale to pull over, bring papers, and prepare to be inspected. The truck and trailer were brand new, having just been delivered from the Kenworth factory in Tacoma, Washington. I did as instructed and stood at the window inside the scalehouse for 39 minutes, waiting to be processed. Finally an overweight dirty-blond woman turned in her chair, looked me in the eye, and said, "Sorry, I hit the wrong button, you can go." I was now 39 minutes late on my route and I didn't know how to respond to that. Should I thank her? After a few seconds she turned back to me and shouted, "GET OUT!" I noticed one of the officers raising his eyebrows at her. I asked him why these people acted like that because most California scales were manned by people of about that caliber. He said he didn't know. He honestly didn't know. He then proceeded to lament the issue, his voice rising until the entire staff had stopped and were staring at him. He said he had thought about it countless times over the years and he simply did not know why his own people had to act like unmitigated assholes. He just couldn't figure it out. He made no friends that day. I departed and went about my business, albeit 39 minutes late on my route and in trouble with my boss.

A month later I was eastbound and was flagged at a scale just east of Sacramento. The officer met me where I parked and inspected the same brand new truck, and could find no infractions except one. My trailer was placarded with a self-adhesive POISON sign because I was carrying POISON. For those not familiar with any Haz-Mat placard, they look something like this:

  Poison Placard, crooked  Poison Placard

The laws states that any placard shall be affixed to the trailer in an upright manner, so that the points of the diamond are pointing up, and pointing down, and horizontally to the left and to the right, with any text in a horizontal or readable orientation. Obviously if you stuck the self-adhesive placard to the trailer with the text reading bottom to top instead of left to right it would be difficult to read. No one fails to see the logic of this. My placard that day was affixed exactly thus. But the officer took exception to it, stating that my placard wasn't EXACTLY......as mandated. I squinted at it again to be sure I wasn't seeing things, then I looked back to the officer and asked him to explain. He smiled patiently in a fatherly way, which turned into a sneer, and demonstrated that the top tip of the diamond on my placard was on the right side of a rivet, and the bottom point of the diamond was on the left side of the same row of rivets. Each point, the top and the bottom, were actually touching a rivet, but only on one side. The rivets that hold the siding onto a trailer frame have heads that are probably 3/16 of an inch in diameter. That meant that my placard was off-horizontal (or off-vertical if you choose) by no more than 3/8 of one inch, or a fraction of one degree. One image, shown above, has been adjusted to appear off-horizontal by nearly twice what the officer was complaining about on my trailer. One image above is exactly horizontal. You can tell which is which, correct?

The officer suggested he should write me a citation. I told him that he should most assuredly do that and he should do it right now, without delay. He said maybe he would let it go because his code book was way back in the scalehouse. I offered that I would wait right there for him to go and retrieve it. He then began laughing nervously and saying he was just going to let me go with a warning. I reiterated that he could not let laws go broken without enforcing them, and I began to call the Sacramento Bee on my four pound brick of a cell phone. The officer then became very nervous and advised me that I had to leave right now. Which I did. Encounters like this with CHP were nearly DAILY during the short couple of years that I drove truck in California and it's the same for every driver out there. Nowhere else in the bloody Cosmos is the term "chickenshit" more apropos than in the California government structure. Nowhere..

I sat in my truck one day at the Truckee scale, westbound, in a long line of trucks waiting to be weighed, because apparently one scale was inoperable and all trucks had to funnel down to a single scale. Many semi trucks came and went, including bobtail tractors, 40 foot trailers, 53 foot trailers, and sets of doubles, and not a single truck knocked down a single orange traffic cone that had been set out to route the trucking traffic through the scale. Not one truck hit one cone. At some point during this wait, four CHP cars decided to depart. Perhaps it was a shift change. All four cars, driven by CHP officers, travelled through the lanes that had been marked off by cones for semi-trucks and trailers, and all four cars mowed down some number of cones. One CHP vehicle only ran over one cone; one CHP vehicle ran down four cones. It is precisely this kind of incompetence that slowly erodes away at any and all respect the citizenry have for "authority".

This is true all over the country, but by a wide margin greater in California.

I had a state patrol officer as a friend for a time. After a few beers once, he confided to me that he routinely pretended to be lost when a call went out to all cars in the vicinity to respond to particularly nasty wrecks. He admitted he never wanted to be the first on scene, even though he might have saved lives. I ended up selling this man a car on payments, which he defaulted on, and I had to travel to central Oregon to repossess the car, and I eventually had to sue him to recover for the damage he'd done to the vehicle. These are the experiences that make us all weary to the bone of the mentality of all California government, and we all have these same types of experiences with you folks. All of us.

In 2011 my wife moved to the Central Valley. A couple of months later her neighbor's house was riddled with bullets. I had installed a sophisticated security system on her house and that system nicely caught the shooting in action. I made multiple DVDs of the shooting, which showed five shooters, most of whom were known to the victims, and I also printed stills of the shooters actually in the process of running and pulling the trigger(s). I investigated the matter in the neighborhood and solved it easily within a week -- the shooters were actually targeting a punk kid who lived one house further down from the actual victims but, of course, gang-bangers being what they are, not the brightest bulbs in the effing string, they hit the wrong house. I submitted all that data, along with the video records and the stills, to the Merced County Sheriff's office. I actually gave them the address where the gang-banger shooters lived, and provided names for a few of them. To the date of this writing, late 2012, none of the shooters has even been questioned.

Early in 2012, a wanna-be gang banger punk got into her house and stole a gun I had left for her. Days later he was witnessed trying to sell that gun. A formal complaint was filed and all data, including names and addresses of witnesses, was given to the Merced County sheriff's office. As of this writing, late 2012, I am informed that the thief has not been so much as questioned. This is how California operates. This is status-quo for the state. This is why people do not respect or trust law enforcement, or the judicial system, or the government in general. This is why you folks are the butt of jokes the world over. This is why you are even reviled.
In the summer of 2012 my wife was having trouble with another wanna-be gang-banger who happened to be the brother of the gun thief. This appeared to us to be a drug dealing piece of human feces who partied pretty-much 24/7. One of this imbecile's friends was too lazy to come to his friend's door, so he would sit in his car in front of his friend's house and honk his horn. Repeatedly. Obnoxiously, For as long as it took for his friend, brother of the gun thief, to get his ass out of bed and stumble to the door for what was probably yet another drug deal. Once this punk realized that no one appreciated his horn honking, he, of course, set out to do it even more. He would sit out in his car and honk and honk and honk, often even long after his friend came out to see him. Then they'd both laugh as neighbors glared at them. Finally my wife called the police and I responded to the officer that arrived.

This was a simple situation, one which patrol officers encounter a hundred times a day. Here's how it generally goes down:

Officer arrives and assesses the situation. Officer advises that honking the horn frivolously is against the law and that if it doesn't stop he will cite the offender, and if it still doesn't stop he may impound the offender's car. Offender says "ok", officer departs, and that's the end of that particular problem.

But this was handled by the Merced County Sheriff's office, specifically officer J. Mello, case number 12-16---. Mellow arrived, assessed the situation, and promptly told the offender that it was OK to honk his horn in such a manner. Offender asked Mellow to confirm this, which Mellow did. I confronted Mellow stating that he could easily look up the law, and in fact he could merely refer to the California driver's handbook to see that this use of a horn was never acceptable or legal. Mellow stated that he had specifically looked up the law and that he knew beyond all doubt he was correct. I begged to differ -- Mellow got testy.

Here is the law:

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V C Section 27001 Use of Horns Use of Horns
27001.

(a) The driver of a motor vehicle when reasonably necessary to insure safe operation shall give audible warning with his horn.

(b) The horn shall not otherwise be used, except as a theft alarm system which operates as specified in Article 13 (commencing with Section 28085) of this chapter.

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And here's the text from the California Driver's Handbook:

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Use Your Horn

Only when necessary, to avoid collisions.

To try to get "eye contact" with other drivers. You may tap your horn to alert another driver who might turn in front of you and cause a collision.

On narrow mountain roads, where you cannot see at least 200 feet ahead of your vehicle.

Don't Use Your Horn:

If a driver or bicyclist is going slowly, and you want him or her to drive faster or get out of your way. The driver or bicyclist may not be able to safely go faster, due to illness, being lost, intoxication, or having mechanical problems with the vehicle.

To alert other drivers that they made a mistake. Your honking may cause them to make more mistakes or to become angry and retaliate.

Because you may be angry or upset.

To honk at pedestrians, bicyclists, or motorcyclists unless necessary to avoid a collision.

Remember that your horn sounds much louder outside a vehicle..

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ANY rookie officer knows this -- except Officer Mellow.

During this incident a seven year old girl (a neighbor) was running around with a disposable camera of some kind taking pictures of everything and everyone. She thought it was fun.

The offender called Mellow aside and informed Mellow that he didn't like his picture being taken. Mellow then stepped directly to me and told me to stop taking the man's picture. I countered that,

(1) I had taken no pictures, and that

(2) Mellow should speak to the girl who was taking the pictures whom I had no control over, and

(3) as a professional photographer for 39 years I knew beyond all shadow of a doubt that to take anyone's picture in any public place for any reason or purpose was absolutely within the law and that it was bizarre to think otherwise.

Officer J. Mellow snapped, "No it is not legal. I have explicitly looked up this law and you cannot take pictures of anyone, even in a public place." That's a verbatim quote.

At this point I realized that officer J. Mellow was out there circling Neptune someplace and that there was absolutely zero point in approaching the man with logic, reason, the law, common sense -- There was clearly no point in interacting further with officer J. Mellow. There was none. It has been said that, "Hell.....is the Impossibility of Reason."

As J. Mellow was departing, the offender approached him IN MY YARD and asked Mellow to reiterate once again, for the record, that it was ok to continue honking his horn as he had been doing. Officer Mellow replied, "Yes, sure, within reason." The punk went away happy and emboldened and from that moment on escalated his harassment to such an extent that I was forced to move my wife out of that house within a number of weeks. Indeed, Beachwood remains Beachwood and always will, given this pathetic level of law enforcement intervention, and the preceding paragraphs constitute my formal complaint against Merced County Sheriff's officer J. Mellow. I'm very familiar with polygraphs and have taken numerous tests at my expense and have posted them publicly on the Internet in cases such as this. I make that offer in this case as well, and I suggest that if Mellow's memory of the case differs AT ALL from mine, he take one as well. There were numerous witnesses present. I submit that this officer causes and/or inflames far more trouble than he cures.

Martin Esquivel and Officer J. Mellow, Merced, Ca.
Martin Esquivel and J. Mellow, Merced Co. case #2012-00016---

 

Years ago while driving truck through California I was stopped by CHP. I knew I was speeding and I had no intention of trying to shirk my responsibility and my actions and the resulting fine. My dedicated route took me through mostly 55mph speed zones and so I had taken my brand new Caterpillar-powered Kenworth to the Cat dealer in Sacramento and I had caused them to set the engine's computer such that the truck could never exceed 63mph. This computer is different and separate from any cruise control device. The computer can only be accessed by the dealer itself, using a laptop plugged into the core and with the proper password and the expertise to make or adjust the setting. The regular cruise control feature will still function as designed, except that it can never exceed the speed which has been set into the main computer. Incidentally, this computer keeps track of every shift of the transmission, and every road speed and engine RPM of every shift. And those logs are downloaded from the truck's engine periodically by the dealer and then forwarded to the trucking company for their use in assessing the skills of the driver. My engine logs showed higher scores than any driver in the history of the company, but I digress.

 

I was paid hourly and so my speed was of no concern to me whatsoever. I didn't EVER want to be cited for speeding and since it was simple to avoid by having the main computer set at a speed that wasn't likely to earn me a ticket, that's what I did. The truck could not exceed 63 mph uphill, on the flats, or downhill unless you knocked it out of gear, which would be outrageously dangerous and would be recorded in the engine's logs anyway. Otherwise it was a physical impossibility.

One day I was pulled over. I looked down and saw that my speed was pegged at 63mph. I pulled over and, as is the custom where I come from (Northern Canada and Alaska), I exited the truck and walked back to meet the officer. This is done because, presumably, it's YOUR FAULT for causing the officer to be put to the trouble of pulling you over and it's seen by me and everyone where I come from as just a kind of courtesy to the officer for having caused him grief. It's traditional to walk back, get off the shoulder, shake hands, and ask what the infraction was. In this case I shook hands and cheerfully announced that I knew I had been speeding and was willing to take my lumps. I'd obviously been doing 63mph in a 55mph zone in a moment of inattention. The CHP officer immediately said he had me at 73mph. I figured I must have heard him unclearly and I asked him to clarify. He rudely and loudly reiterated that he had me at 73 in a 55mph. I calmly explained to him that that was impossible, that the truck was limited to 63mph, that it had been set at the Cat dealership and that no one could change it except the Cat dealership.

The guy was unmoved.

I told him that the matter was very easily proven in court. He remained unmoved. I finally gave up and told him to go ahead and write the cite for 73mph and it would be little more than a technicality to have it overturned. All I needed was simple testimony from the Cat dealer stating that they had set the top speed and that they could download the speeds and gear-positions from the computer and provide them in court. The officer's demeanor was SO arrogant and off-putting that I actually WANTED him to write me for 73mph so I could overturn it and then file a complaint against him for lying. The man was documentably lying, and I told him that he and I both knew he was lying. So he wrote the citation for 73mph.

My employers laughed when they saw the citation because they also knew the truck was incapable of anything over 63mph.

I hired an attorney at a cost of $900 and had her fight the case. She collected affidavits from the Cat dealer along with their certified log results from my truck's main computer. As we all knew it would, the factual evidence showed that I had been doing 63mph at the moment I was stopped and no faster at any other time. I eagerly awaited the dismissal of the citation (actually, I agreed in writing that I had, in fact, been doing 63, that I took responsibility for 63, and that I was more than willing to pay the fine for 63 and to have it appear on my record).

I was mystified, then, when my attorney finally contacted me saying she had been to trial and that I had lost and was convicted of doing 73mph in a 55 zone. I asked how on God's earth such a thing could happen. She said the judge had simply refused to allow ANY evidence to be entered at the trial. I asked how this could happen, given that a trial was the one place where you were allowed to prove guilt or innocence by the use and admission of factual evidence. She said she didn't know how the judge expected to get away with it, but that he had indeed decreed as he did, and it would require $2900 more to overturn his decision. That was about two month's wages for a driver at that time and I declined. But I remembered. The CHP officer had blatantly lied and gotten away with it and that is a documented fact. The judge had far exceeded his authority and had broken the law and engaged in corruption to make a conviction and that is a documented fact. THAT IS WHAT CALIFORNIA DOES. And it usually gets away with it.

In 2011 my wife was running a business in Merced. She had taken it over from a corporate franchiser that apparently went broke, and it seems the reason that franchiser went broke was due to incalculably bad choices in hiring. One afternoon she received a call from a man who identified himself as a Merced city police detective (subsequently verified true -- name and address on record, though he is now apparently retired). The "detective" announced that he had just caught a part time employee of this business "doing illegal drugs" with his teenage daughter at some address across town. My wife's first unspoken reaction was probably "then why didn't you shoot him?", or perhaps "then why didn't you arrest him?.

But she went through the prescribed corporate motions of confirming the identity of the employee, and making sure he wasn't on duty at the time, and then to offer to the officer that, in fact, the officer really should have the punk charged with a crime. The detective countered that he wasn't going to bother with any such thing, and that he wanted the employee fired immediately, on the spot, that day or preferably within that hour. My wife countered that, (1) at that time she had NOT verified the identity of the caller, nor (2) had she witnessed any crime, nor (3) could she control what any employee did off-duty and away from the business (in this case on the other side of town), and that it was grossly inappropriate, even legally actionable, even possibly a criminal act for the caller, even if he was a "detective", to make such a command. Corporations, especially in California because of California's uber-liberal laws, are absurdly strict in matters of employee termination, to the extent that many business actually go under because they must carry such a load of bad employees that they cannot survive financially. To fire an employee that she hadn't even personally hired, upon the demands of a man on the phone who only claimed to be a detective, for an offense she didn't witness and which admittedly didn't happen on company grounds or company time, and for which the detective was mysteriously unwilling to charge the offender for, was absurd beyond all comprehension. In fact, it suggested a mental problem on the part of the caller. She related to the called that it was not within her power to fire anyone on such grounds, even though she, personally, was as anti-drug as any human being can get and would have loved to fire such a dolt, and she thought that would cause this irate and insulting detective to wake up and see the light. Clearly, the man must have had some basic training in law, she felt.

But her refusal to fire the employee enraged him more and he began ranting that he was going to "ruin her business" and that he would personally make sure that no Merced city officer would ever again grace her place of business, nor would their families, nor their friends, and that he would use every trick in his power to see to it that she was closed down. The ranting lasted a full 30 minutes, during which time a female voice was heard in the background reiterating the threats of doom and destruction for my wife's business. Clearly, the man and his wife were mentally handicapped.

For a year after this, a female called the business, and every level up the corporate chain, approximately once a week, to complain about drugs in the parking lot. This prompted corporate to install an extensive security system, which I, personally monitor, and I have yet to find the slightest evidence of drugs use or sales in the parking lot. The voice of this caller appears to be the same voice overheard during the call from the Merced City "detective".

Indeed, you people, meaning law enforcement, the judicial branch, and all other forms of California government, appear to logical, thinking, rational people to be quite simply insane. We call it the "CPHS" (the California Pot-Head Syndrome). We believe that with very few exceptions, you people are on drugs. We can find no other reasonable explanation for your behavior.

My wife went to the California Driver's Licensing office in Merced when she first moved here, to obtain her California license. Here's how it went. Note that YOUR OWN PEOPLE don't even know the answers to the questions:

California Driver's License Test
Note answer #35 above, marked incorrect.

 

Note answer # 3, below, marked correct by the same examiner. Who knows what else this woman screwed up and screws up daily!
California Driver's License Test

Last week my wife seemed to be suffering from acute bronchitis. She couldn't catch her breath, was experiencing a rapid heartbeat and was in extreme distress. This had been ongoing for about a week but had become so intense that I rushed her to our provider's emergency room in Modesto. There she was diagnosed with a huge tumor in her chest, and it is now confirmed cancerous. She spent a couple of days in the ER in Modesto, where she was bombarded with all manner of nasty drugs and, sick as a dog, she was discharged to go home. On the way home she was repeatedly ill, suffering from fever and chills, crying inconsolably, and she expected to die very soon. That may actually turn out to be the case, which is a damned shame for a hard-working, 50 year old woman.

About a mile from home, on an empty, straight and level county road, with zero traffic and clears skies with unlimited visibility, I eased the speed upward because she was feeling faint again. The road is posted 55. I was doing 73 in a safe and fairly new car. It was an eminently safe speed (Montana posts NO speed limits on the exact same roads, for instance) but of course a CHP patrol car was half a mile ahead, presumably parked in a radar trap.

As I passed the CHP car at about 10mph due to a stop sign, he did a u-turn behind me and flashed his lights and I immediately pulled over. I grabbed my registration and proof of insurance and opened the door with papers in hand to meet the officer halfway and explain why I was in a hurry. Unfortunately I was COMMANDED several times through the bullhorn to STAY IN YOUR CAR. I'd never been asked to do this in my life, but whatever. It seems to me the man (i.e. the state) could deign to offer just a modicum of manners, such as, "Please stay in your car, Sir", but we all realize this is California and these things don't occur to you folks.

The officer approached the car and asked for the usual papers, which I provided, and he asked where I was headed. I told him about a mile ahead, to our home, as I was bringing my wife home from the hospital, and I began to explain that she was deathly ill -- but this guy would have absolutely none of that crap. No explanations were to be tolerated. He interrupted me, commanded me once again for good measure to stay in the car, and went back to his car to leave my wife shivering and gasping in the front seat, because it was difficult for her to breath sitting up.

Presently this guy came back and issued citation # 77304 QM for 73mph in a 55 zone, my first ticket in eight years.

Honestly, I was beyond caring. I was only concerned with providing some small measure of comfort for my partner of 39 years. I drove her home and did just that.

The following day I set out to mail in a check for the citation. Unfortunately and mysteriously, there was no fine amount marked on the cite. Good old California, anything to make things harder for the people who pay your wages.

I then set out to try to look up the fine amount on the Internet. No such luck. It seems that the moronic powers that be have all struggled so hard to cash in on any possible revenue that might be gained, that every county adds a little something to the fine, and no one seems to know what that's going to be until someone "feels" like telling the offender.

The officer did tell me to wait six weeks for a letter from the state which would provide "further instructions", but you folks know and we know as well that you will simply screw that up and the letter will never arrive, having been mislabelled by one of your pot-head civil servant secretaries, and then you will be able to claim that I didn't appear or otherwise didn't pay the fine, and then you can issue a bench warrant for FTA, and then you can really get your hooks into me. So, having dealt with the likes of you people before, I am writing to ask the exact amount of the fine so that I can pay it. I do understand that I have the right to bring the matter to court in order to explain to the judge why it was "ok" for me to exceed the posted limit on a clear evening with no traffic, on a straight, flat road with no access, and a deteriorating medical situation but, honestly, I've seen what California judges are made of, and after all, I'm fighting for this woman's life and I do not have the patience or the time to come to court to explain a logical and reasonable series of events, only to have you people make fools of yourselves by bending over backwards to collect these few dollars anyway. I've simply had enough of you.

For the record, and this comes to you via registered mail so you cannot claim you didn't receive it, I am asking for the amount of the fine on citation number 77304QM so that I may pay it immediately and by so doing separate myself as much as possible from the insanity of the California government, until such time as I can simply leave the country and never be pestered by you miserable sons of bitches again.

Incidentally, this document details ALL of the interactions I have ever had with the California Highway Patrol, the Merced County Sheriff's office, the California DMV, and the Merced City police, or any other aspect of any branch of the California government, to date. Note that NOT ONE experience has been positive -- in fact, most or all have reflected a peculiar insanity on the part of these agencies that leaves me, and all other citizens who go through this unbelievable crap with you day in and day out, more terrified of you than of any specter of terrorism from the crazies in the Middle East.

There. Is. Something. Wrong. With. You. People.

Of you and your insanity, we, the people, are truly afraid.

 

[signature]

Temporary contact point:

[address] Merced, California 95348

12-3-2012

CC: Public Internet Post, All area newspapers, attorney BCC:

 

 

UPDATE:

California allows a thing called "Trial by Declaration". The defendant may send a written testimony to the court and allow the court, in its spare time, to adjudicate and decide your case. We imagine that in virtually every single case the court will simply skim your testimony and then decide against you as a matter of standard operating procedure. That's the morality of these people. But we did decide to use that option, mostly as a means of showing just how whacked the state of California is because we know, and you, the reader knows, that they will not reduce this fine by any appreciable amount, or by any amount at all, because they're motivated by greed almost to the level of criminality, and that's all there is to it. Here's our written testimony to the court. As of 2-4-2013 we've received NO REPLY to any of the above letters, nor to the one below, except to have the state respond and say they had no record of the citation, until we wrote back and told them to FIND IT -- which they eventually did. We'll append an update if or when we ever receive a reply. Note that the state of California cashed our check for $366 immediately upon receiving it:

 

 

Superior Courts Bldg.
670 W 22nd St.., Room 6
Merced, CA., 95340

Trial by Written Declaration under VCS 40902, DECLARATION and STATEMENT

RE: Case # TRM132267  RE: Citation # 77304 QM

On the evening in question I was returning from the Kaiser emergency room in Modesto. My passenger was my wife of 39 years, who was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer (SCLC) the day before. She was admitted to the ER, then kept overnight pending scans, and was heavily medicated with various painkillers including morphine, the combination of which, including the stress and shock of the diagnosis, left her violently ill. As we neared home she was beginning to vomit and cry. I speeded up in order to get her home a little more quickly.

The road in question (see photo) was straight, long, clear, with no access from other traffic. Weather was clear and dry. There was no other traffic. The car is relatively new with fine handling and braking capabilities. I am a long-time Class-A driver and I worked law enforcement in the 1970s for the Federal government (narcotics and political corruption). My training and experience exceeds that of most officers on the road today.

At the stop I was COMMANDED to stay in the car. I had wanted to explain the circumstances to the officer out of my wife's hearing. The officer approached the car and again commanded me to stay inside. I handed him my papers and was considering how to get him to step aside so that I could explain the situation to him privately without incurring another bout of sobbing and retching, but this officer seemed as though he was determined to prevent any conversation at all except to continue commanding me to stay in the car. I did not perceive his repeated commands as anything even marginally approaching polite or courteous. He issued the cite and departed. I did not dispute his estimate of speed because I realized it was probably close to the fact.

Had this fine been commensurate with the fines for similar infractions in just about any other state I probably would have paid it and moved on. I anticipated a fine of perhaps $75. In many states this infraction would not even be considered an infraction. But I realized we were temporarily in California and so I raised my expectation to include a possible fine of $125. That would have stung in our newly disastrous financial situation due to the diagnosis. However the fine of $366 is so far over the top that regardless of the outcome of this case we have decided to vacate any state where this kind of outrageousness is even attempted. To pay this fine we have been required to sell off some of my wife's musical instruments -- which is a double kick in the stomach given her recent diagnosis. You people really know how to kick folks when they're down. You are masters at it.

I have heard all my life from low-lifes and left-wing whiners that various state governments use the mechanism of traffic fines merely as a device to raise capital. Of course this is utter nonsense and I've so advised those idiots, sometimes none-too politely. But in this case, facing a fine of this absurd magnitude, I have to agree with the conspiracy theorists. A fine this high for an infraction which endangered NO ONE is beyond the pale. It is merely theft by a state government which is much more akin a greedy gang, than it could ever be considered the friend and protector of society. In short, the people now fear YOU more than they fear the terrorists. Our respect for California law enforcement and the judicial system is gone and we believe this sentiment speaks for most Californians, and you have earned it by outrageous fees, fines and penalties like the one discussed herein.

I'm enclosing a letter that I've posted to the Internet explaining my previous experiences with California law enforcement. It does not pertain to this case. I suggest you read it only if you have a personal interest in knowing why your citizenry's respect for law enforcement in California has eroded to the pathetic levels it has. If you don't care, then by all means, skip it. The finding of guilty in this case means that I will have even more trouble finding a Class-A job to pay medical bills, than I would under just the handicap of being 60 years old. Even with no other infractions for 8 years on my WA. license, this one will make finding a job very hard.

I declare under penalty of perjury that this statement is true and correct.

[signature]
(Temp address)                                             1-1-2013
Merced, California,  95347

 

Enc.: Photo, hospital records, declaration, citation, TWD form TR-205, letter. 
CC: Attorney, WWW public post   BCC:

What a dangerous place to speed!

 

UPDATE:

I had forgotten a particularly egregious stunt perpetrated by CHP upon a trucker some years ago, so I'll detail that encounter before I summarize with my opinions and findings regarding California Highway Patrol Officer Charles Wilson, ID 17477, and Merced Superior Court Judge Hugh M. Flanagan.

Some years ago I was driving semi trucks out of Reno making a round trip to the San Francisco Bay area every day across Donner Pass. One day I needed to use Highway 50 instead and ultimately found myself westbound at the Meyers agricultural inspection station just west of the Nevada/California border. There was some sort of hold-up in the truck line so I exited the truck and strolled around, stretching my legs and waiting to move through the station.

Off on the shoulder, also westbound into California, was a tractor-trailer 40' flatbed. The flatbed was empty save for a tiny dash of furniture in the middle of the bed. It had been tarped over but was now exposed to the light drizzle. The entire load took up a space of about ten feet by eight and consisted of what looked like a kid's desk, a dresser, a couple of end tables, some lamps, etc. It was clearly someone's household furniture, all of low quality, and becoming of even poorer quality by the minute in the rain. The driver stood next to his tractor looking dejected. I asked him what was up.

He declared that he had been dead-heading from the Florida to pick up a paying load in California. His daughter was also moving to California so she had asked him to take her meager belongings, thereby saving her the cost of a small rental truck. He'd strapped, secured and tarped the load as though it was valuable which, of course, it was to his daughter. He had come through every single state from Florida without the slightest problem, through every scale, past every cop, and no one had so much as glanced at his tiny load. It couldn't have weighed more than 400 pounds total.

But of course California was different.

He'd been flagged at the Meyers bug station and told to pull over, which he did. They asked him what he had under the tarp and he told them. They asked to see the load and he obliged. The original officials were ag station employees but a small herd of CHP officers soon gathered around, rather like house flies, sniffing for rotting meat. The CHP officers soon asked the man to see his bill of lading for the load. Of course he had none since it was owned by his own daughter who was paying him nothing. The CHP officers then declared that he couldn't proceed without proper documentation showing what he was hauling. He asked how he was supposed to obtain that and they kindly allowed that he should use their fax machine in the office. For a small fee.

So the driver called his daughter and advised her of the problem and asked her to hoof it to the nearest place that had a fax machine and fax him some sort of document stating that he was carrying her stuff. The driver had been through this kind of stupid nonsense with California CHP before -- every trucker has. So he just sucked it up, as you would bow to any Nazi Gestapo with an attitude and not show anything but respect and admiration, just hoping to get beyond the insanity and back to your life. Going to California was always like going down the rabbit hole -- you just wanted to get through it as unmolested as possible.

The daughter had agreed to supply the document and that's where things stood when I met him. I offered to help him re-tarp the load and he agreed and we jumped up onto the bed and began covering it again. A haughty CHP jerk saw what we were doing and told us to stop right there -- that load was still being inspected. So we stopped and left the stuff to the rain. I had to be on my way and so I bid him good luck and continued on into Sacramento and then the Bay area, and ran my route, made all my deliveries and pickups, hooked up a container full of paint at the port facilities and then after another stop south of Sacramento, climbed back up the hill on highway 50, headed for home south of Carson City.

As I passed the Meyers bug station, eastbound on 50, I glanced over and was shocked to see the same flatbed sitting in the same place with the same dab of furniture exposed to the drizzle in the middle of the deck. I pulled over and walked across to the westbound side and asked the driver what the hell he was still doing there.

At first he didn't even reply -- just looked at me through half-open eyelids, then he slowly shook his head.

It seemed his daughter had complied and had indeed faxed the required document to the CHP at the bug station. They had brought it out to him at his truck and promptly informed him that he couldn't go because the document didn't jive with what he had verbally told them he was carrying. He was stunned of course and looked at the paper which clearly listed all of the items on the flatbed -- tables, dresser, desk, personal items, etc. The driver asked what was going on.

One CHP officer advised him that he had verbally told them he was carrying furniture, but his faxed document didn't list the word "furniture" anywhere on it.

The driver knew at that moment what he was in for. This was California CHP chickenshitedness at its best.

They told him he was free to try again, so he did. He called his daughter and told her what he needed and she complied. But every time the driver went into the station to inquire about the incoming fax he was told the fax machine was down, or out of paper, or offline, or might need repairs, or that it was their lunch hour, or that they needed exact change for his payment to receive a fax, or that other, more important faxes were due, or that they were no longer sure he was authorized to use their fax machine. And this criminal Goddamned bullshit had continued for the eight hours I'd been in San Francisco.

Now it could be that the driver had been surly and disrespectful to these "officers of the law" but I doubt it. He was old as the hills, quiet and slow and soft spoken. He never once swore about his situation while I was there. He was respectful and deferential to the "officers". They were simply having fun. That is, after all, at the very core of their mentality. That is who they are.

I hung around for another half hour but needed to get home and so I left him there, alone, sad, defeated, wondering when these little banty-rooster pricks would ever get tired of burning his wings under their magnifying glass. I didn't use that route for months after that so I don't know when he ever got released. Maybe it was days. Probably it was late that night -- just late enough to make sure he had no hours left on his log book and couldn't continue until the next day. Chickenshit. Remember that word. CHP will show you what it means time and time again..

You can only witness or endure so many of these experiences with California "officials" before you lose all respect whatsoever for these people. In my experience, decent and moral human beings don't work in California government more often than about 1 in 400 employees. The other 399 are simply the scum of the earth. And the one decent man or woman becomes so disgusted by what they see that they leave in contempt and find other vocations.

 

Years ago I had a friend I'll call Fred who was the official gunsmith for his local sheriff's office -- a large office in a populated area. Nearby lived a man I'll call Bob, who was fighting a long battle with local hippies stealing his stuff. One day the hippies showed up at Bob's door and began berating him and threatening to come inside to "kick Bob's ass" (hippies like this kind of talk but seldom back it up). Bob had had enough though. Bob excused himself and came back to the door a minute later with a loaded 12 gauge shotgun. Without further ado he shot the mouthiest hippie in the shoulder. The punk fell to the ground and began writhing around. Bob told the other punks and thieves not to worry, that their friend was only wounded, and to get the hell off his property once and for all. Unfortunately the thief on the ground died.

Bob was arrested and charged with murder. His new pump shotgun was confiscated as evidence. A few weeks later the shotgun was brought to my friend, Fred, to be "checked out" on the Sheriff's dime. The Sheriff (and the two deputies who brought it to Fred) wanted to be absolutely sure the gun was in perfect working order as they feared Bob might try to claim the gun was faulty and went off on its own. Fred said he'd find what he'd find and he wasn't about to be swayed by the desires of the Sheriff or the deputies or anyone else. The deputies told Fred to "think hard" about that decision and left.

A week later the deputies were back, and they informed Fred that they really wanted him to find that the gun was faulty and that it probably HAD gone off without the intent of the shooter because, they explained, they had been talking to the shooter, Bob, in jail and as it turned out he really was a pretty good guy who was just tired of being stolen-blind by the hippies. They wanted Bob to get off. Now exasperated, Fred told them that he'd find whatever he found and that he wasn't about to be swayed by their desires or anyone else's The deputies told Fred to "think hard" about that decision and they left.

Fred found that the gun was in perfect working order, which pissed off the Sheriff's office, who now liked Bob. Bob was convicted and did 6 years. The deputies treated Fred like crap until his death a few years ago. Fred had made me promise never to tell this story while he was alive, and I didn't. I have firsthand knowledge of this series of events and I know the story is true.

In Russia, now, virtually every single vehicle carries a camcorder. It's because Russia is about a decade ahead of the US in terms of law enforcement turning criminal and they no longer have any choice but to film and record every single interaction with every single officer. Unfortunately, Russians are learning that even that doesn't help them. Even in the US, you need only search YouTube for things like "corrupt cop" to see that all semblance of law and order, honor, professionalism, logic, rationality and decency is already gone from law enforcement officers and that exposing their corruption and putrid attitudes does no good whatsoever anyway. The judges who would prosecute cops are exactly as corrupt and counter-productive. And prosecutors simply refuse to file the charges anyway against law enforcement because, after all, it's one big brotherhood of skullduggery. Police chiefs ignore all complaints against all officers for all offenses.

In Seattle before I left, a cop spotted a woodcarving bum crossing lawfully in the crosswalk. The officer stopped his car, told the bum to drop the open pocket knife he was using to whittle a stick, and when the clinically deaf bum didn't respond from 30 feet away the officer simply drew his weapon and shot the man four times in the back. There was no one around the victim. He was walking slowly away from the officer because he hadn't heard the officer. The knife was two inches long (and about as sharp as an eraser it later turned out). Every witness testified that the bum posed no threat to anyone. The cop was fired but not prosecuted despite the demands of thousands in the streets. This kind of bullshit happens almost every day in almost every city. I always figured any president ought to stop worry about how many Muslims he's feeding around the world, and tackle problems like this that affect every single American citizen. But of course that would be ridiculous -- just ask any politician.

It. Does. No. Good. To. Complain.

To anyone.

This is where we are today. On a 1-10 scale we fear the terrorists a 1. On a 1-10 scale we fear our own law enforcement and judicial system a 5.

CHP officer Charles Wilson, ID 17477, stopped my wife and I on our way home from the emergency room on the night in question and didn't act in any manner that could be documented to be overtly unprofessional, but his attitude, it seemed to me, was that he could barely tolerate having to interact with us, that he was angry about "something", that he was irritable, that he preferred not to have to be civil at all but was maintaining the lowest possible level of manners only to avoid a formal complaint. He was a jackass in my view. He was the kind of man I'd left law enforcement because of. CHP officer Charles Wilson knew roughly what his stop was going to cost us. I think he delighted in that knowledge because, I think, he really doesn't much like ANY people. He was white, we were white, we were in a newer car, we were well dressed, we gave him no grief whatsoever. I did comment to CHP officer Charles Wilson that I'd never in my long life been so rudely COMMANDED, repeatedly, to stay in the car. He shrugged, as if to say, "who the fuck cares?" He could have said, "Sorry, that's our standard procedure here in California." But he couldn't even manage that tiny courtesy. He simply shrugged like some stupid smart ass punk. He didn't ask what our situation was; he didn't want to KNOW what our situation was. He knew there was no other traffic on that road. He knew the road was deserted and with no other access to it in that area. He simply didn't care. A cite is a cite is a cite. He could have helped me get my wife home quickly but HE DIDN'T CARE. Every cite helps him keep his job. Some citations actually do improve traffic safety. Most don't. But these guys (cops today) are, for the most part, simply too unintelligent to know the difference and too amoral to care.

Cops and judges can use the time-honored excuse, "I was only doing my job." Glance through history to see how many times that's not a viable excuse. You must also THINK. Granted, law enforcement agencies look high and low for employees who are loathe to THINK. That serves a purpose. But it also causes a problem.

With regard to California's SOP to keep people in their cars during a stop, I submit that I'd rather have the driver get out where I can see his hands clearly, and where he has no cover from the car, and from where it will be more difficult for him to stomp on the gas and possibly get away. I want to see his demeanor and gauge his intent. I want to see clearly what he's reaching for, what he has between his knees on the seat. I want to see if he can even stand up straight, if I'm dealing with a mental case, how he's dressed. I want to see where his eyes go. I want to scan his pants pockets and shirt for bulges. Seated in the car the stoppee has the distinct advantage. He can snipe at you with his right hand and duck down and punch it, leaving you in a spray of gravel, all before you can even draw. I don't want the driver sitting behind the wheel where a passenger and goad him or her into some foolish action. I don't want the driver in a position where a passenger can slip them a gun or help them destroy evidence. I don't want to be worrying about the driver and what he's fishing for while I'm running his data -- I want him where I can see him clearly. I suspect it was some academic CHP administrator with an advanced degree in "criminal science" that decreed this odd policy. I doubt it saves lives and I know that it pisses people off. My advice is to try being decent FIRST. If all else fails, shoot the stupid fool. But try being polite and courteous FIRST. You might be amazed at how far it will get you, at the time of the stop, and far into the future. Do you really need to be eroding the already abysmally low level of respect that the people who pay your wages have for you? Really? Are you completely sure about that? No, I don't believe you are.

And besides, it's damned dangerous to force people to stay in their cars, stopped along ANY stretch of road, when about one in five of the imbeciles out there driving by you are drunk or high. I want to be out of the vehicle and far off the shoulder, preferably on the off side of a barrier. I won't be a sitting duck in a vehicle again and if CHP doesn't like it I guess they can shoot me -- and I expect they probably will.

Honestly, CHP, if you're so afraid of people, find another occupation. Or start treating them with respect.

On 2-1-2013 we were informed by the Merced Superior court that Merced Superior Court Judge Hugh M. Flanagan had decided to rule "guilty" in this case and not reduce the fine by even one dollar. A cursory search of this guy, Flanagan, reveals that he's one interesting piece of work indeed, being publicly accused of fraud and corruption and who knows what else. This was an almost guaranteed finding of course, because this is, after all, California, land of the idiot, the moral midget and the corrupt and it looks to us as though Flanagan fits right into this cesspool like a slippery turd in a dilated anus.

So. CHP officer Charles Wilson and Merced Superior Court Judge Hugh M. Flanagan have successfully worked together to take from us the sum of $366. Congratulations to them. We were supposed to receive Wilson's statement and rebuttal re this case but of course it was mysteriously missing from the documents that were sent to us so we'll do a FOIA request and obtain those at a later date. What do you suppose the odds are that they'll come up "missing"? -Probably 100%. And we'll do a FOIA for the records and backgrounds of both these men and reveal them here.

But what have Wilson and Flanagan lost? They've lost our respect and our trust. That may not seem like much at first glance but you just never know. Years ago, while driving truck in Washington, I passed a WSP officer who was wrestling with the driver of a car over a gun. They were stalemated. I called it in and never knew how it turned out until a year later. A WSP officer was citing me for following too closely (an Asian woman had cut me off and of course the officer only looked up in time to see me closely behind her, on my horn, trailer tires locked up and sliding). While he was writing me the cite I was asking him how it was, exactly, that he had only seen me too close behind the Asian idiot, while four tenths of a second before she had been in the lane next to me). He asked if I thought he had something against truckers. I replied that I didn't know, did he? He replied that he did not, and that, in fact, a year prior, a trucker had saved his life. I asked him to describe the incident and he did and it was my call that got backup to him and saved his life. He wrote me the citation anyway, and my respect for law enforcement degraded another four levels.

The state of California has gained a whopping $366 from this encounter.

But.

It has lost the 13% it was scalping from my wife's wages every year. Now, as it happens, that's not much. She only makes $49,000 a year. 13% of her annual salary is only $6370. She's had enough of the insanity here and she's decided to relocate. Of course that takes 34 employees from the state too, so maybe this wasn't such a good deal for California after all.

My son has relocated his business already, the business I gave him, to Wyoming. He only netted $92,000 last year, so the state has lost that. That's $11,960 the state of California has forfeit with this unspeakable greed and corruption. And of course there are his three employees to consider. But of course Flanagan and Wilson collected three hundred and sixty six dollars so, well, that makes up for it, right? Sure it does.

My son's girlfriend, born and raised in California, has also had a Goddamned bellyfull of this insanity and has of course relocated with my son. She made $81,000 last year. That's $10,530 California lost. Penny wise, and dollar fucking stupid -- that's what California has always been.

Total: $28,860. A direct and documentable loss of $28,860, lost by the greedy state of California simply because it has gouged its citizenry to the breaking point and beyond. Not only are the rats leaving the sinking ship, the paying passengers are too. Congratulations, California, you've shown us all just how effing smart you are.

Would I ever, ever make a call to save another officer's life again? No. I simply would not. I simply will not do it. I would never do anything to help along their misfortune, but I will no longer solve it for them either. Those people have proven to me time and time and time again that they are not the protectors of decent society, they are the tormenters of decent society. Give me a good cop, an intelligent and fair judge, a legislator with one frigging gram of common sense and I'll put my life on the line for them every hour of every day. Give me scumbags and I'll simply turn away.

I watched in a mall in Seattle as an officer struggled to subdue a mentally handicapped shoplifter one day. When the 6'6" crazy fool was getting the better of the cop I stepped in and straightened it out. I would never do it again. When a cop inside a supermarket on Queen Anne Hill in Seattle was being bested by another mental case and the officer called repeatedly to the crowd for help and not a single person lifted a finger (in fact they taunted the cop) I helped. Would I ever, ever do that again? Not on your life. I will absolutely overcome my training and my instinct and walk away. I positively will do that..

If a cop and his family were overturned in a boat at sea would I throw them lifejackets? No. I've performed 321 rescues in the northeast Pacific. I would never rescue a law enforcement officer, a judge, or a government employee again. Not knowingly. Not ever again.

Would I want one of these people as a neighbor? Listen carefully: Every cop I've ever known, every single one, and that includes relatives and partners when I worked for the Feds, has caused at least one accidental discharge of his or her firearm. Every single one I've ever known personally, except me. Too often these are simply stupid people. No, I would not want any of these people as a neighbor.

If I had a cop or a judge as a neighbor and I saw their house being broken into would I stop it or even call it in? No sir, I would not. Not anymore. Enough is enough. I will not help people I do not respect and I will not help people who screw me over.

I've been hit three times by drunk drivers. One cop friend from New Mexico lamented to me that drunk driving laws were far too strict and that anyone who'd only had a few beers should be let go to continue on their way. This was his SOP. He was a lousy beer-drunk.

I was at a Seattle Center activity one night many years ago. There was a dance hall which consisted of one large room, with very large windows all around it. It was night, the windows were mildly tinted, and so to look inside to see people dancing one had to look closely through the glass. A friend and I did so. A few feet away several other interested parties looked through the adjacent window. No one said anything -- we were all just mildly curious and we were watching people dance. Both windows looked exactly into the same room and both windows were no more than 4 feet apart. A cop approached us and told us to stop looking through the window. We said, "Oh, sorry, are we not supposed to look through there?" We were perfectly willing to stop and at first we naturally assumed there was some rational reason for the directive. The cop answered no. Then we noticed the other people looking through the adjacent window into the same room. We asked why he was allowing them to look inside. He refused to reply. We asked if there was a sign advising that looking through our window was prohibited. He said no. We started looking through the window again. The cop then stated to us to stop or he would arrest us. We asked for what. He didn't reply. We told him to arrest us. He refused to. We left. The point is this: These people are not only usually corrupt and greedy and amoral and stupid, they are very often absolutely insane as well. The records bear this out.

Traffic fines are absolutely necessary. Without them our streets would be chaos, a macabre circus of murder and mayhem. They're nearly to that point now. But they must be REASONABLE fines. A fine of $75 or $125 would have conveyed the message to me exactly as effectively as would a fine of ten thousand dollars -- except that an exorbitant fine, like this one, has many negative consequences as well, not the least of which is a significant loss of the state's revenue as an unintended consequence. Fines like this are NOT morally acceptable deterrents. They are in my view simply theft.....theft by small, stupid, greedy people who refuse to think or, more likely, are genetically incapable of it.

Read my editorial review of one of Washington state's drunken judges if you need confirmation. These people (judges and cops) are not our friends. They are our liabilities, nearly to the extent that the criminal element is our liability. Inherently, intrinsically moral human beings do the job of enforcing our laws and adjudicating our criminal system fairly well. The point I'm making in this editorial is that the nation is fresh out of those types of people. To a great degree, all we have left are the leftovers, the rejects, the moral midgets, the moral misfits, those who cannot think past their own Goddamned noses, the greedy punks, the smart mouth jackasses, the attitudes with capital "A"s, the butt holes, the corrupt, the losers, those who if not for the lucky happenstance of getting a government job would be just another effing criminal in an institution somewhere. Or a short-order cook constantly on the verge of termination for incompetence.

I don't truly fear much. I've been shot at numerous times. I've been pronounced dead twice -- once from freezing and once from drowning. I've been in every kind of fight with every kind of loser and mental case. I've survived three shipboard fires at sea. I've sunk twice. I've rescued the US Coast Guard twice. I've survived one helicopter crash and one that crashed directly on top of me. I've put more damned dope-heads and corrupt politicians in jail than I can count or remember. I've been robbed at gunpoint once and held at gunpoint another time for half a day (one got away, the other went to prison, respectively). I've raised 131 shipwrecks. I've survived three engine failures in airplanes. I once lost the entire propeller off an airplane and landed on a herd of cows (while hiking out for help the cows ate the fabric off the wings). I was once backed down for half a mile by a bear (I had no gun or knife). I rescued a young girl from kidnappers (and married her). I've been mildly scared and moderately scared and really scared ten thousand times and after awhile you stop caring because it takes too much energy to be scared. But the level of abject terror I feel at the hands of corrupt, stupid and greedy cops and government employees transcends all that cumulative fear by a factor of ten.

(Incidentally, as of mid-2013, we've never received a single reply from a single agency to whom this complaint was sent. Welcome to California).

 

 

 

Merced Cops Gone Wild

 

UPDATE: 04-06-2014;
This editorial page contains and includes my opinions:

We all did leave California and moved to another state. We sighed relief when we left the border for the last time. California is truly the land of the outrageous punk, the corrupt cop, the incompetent, thieving government. It's a write-off. But so be it. We were done with the place forever. Thank God the US has 50 states.

But a death mandated that I come back briefly to clear up that person's affairs that had been neglected. While I was back in Merced, I had an opportunity to buy a cool little Honda scooter, which I thought would be fun to run around on the estate where we moved to. I have a collection of motorcycles, including cruisers and superbikes capable of well over 200mph. But this tiny Honda scooter is FUN. It's a 50cc, 4-stroke, water cooled little engine. It is supposed to top out around 30 mph with my weight. I can only get about 24mph out of it, and it takes two full blocks to ramp up to that dizzying speed.

A few hours after I bought it, I took it out to buzz around a neighborhood in the north end of Merced (Barclay Ave). I'd been cruising about five minutes when a car came through a stop sign without looking. I skidded to a stop, and the car hit his brakes, and no one was crunched. Okay, so, as a motorcycle racer for forty years, I know these things happen. Car drivers are often just plain stupid. Motorcyclists must ride as though we are invisible because, in effect, to car drivers, we are. They simply Do. Not. Look. They should. But they don't, and DMV steadfastly refuses to administer driver tests that cull out these losers. Many drivers who do not look, also do not CARE to look. The result is that we get hit. A lot. Often. We grudgingly accept this reality as part of the fun of riding. So when these things happen, we might curse and swear, and then we go on about our business. We are so accustomed to this happening that we just let it go. If we made an issue out of every single incident, we'd never have time to ride. This crap happens that often to motorcycles, because there are that many incompetent drivers on the roads. We wish that law enforcement would cull these dangerous fools, but they don't.

But there is one situation that will make us stop and take issue, and that is when some idiot makes a blatant mistake, and then
gives US the "hand gesture". And that's what happened here. I always wear a helmet cam, as many riders do now, and it records
in stunning 1080P. The video file for this incident is a whopping 5 gigs (not megs, gigs) and I have yet to figure out how to reduce
it to an appropriate web size while still retaining any degree of quality. For the time being, screen shots will have to suffice, as follows:

Merced Cop
Left the stop sign without even looking.

Merced Cop
Even though this imbecile is clearly and documentably in the wrong, he honks at me and hits me with "the hand gesture".
So ok. That's enough. Now I want his effing plate number. I'll file a complaint and force it through the court. I stop and
get off the scooter and ask, "What the fuck is the matter with you?" The guy answers, "Oh, so you think you bad?"
It's a banty-rooster type black man and he is itching for a fight like no one I have ever seen. I have half a head on him
and probably 75 pounds and the notion is absurd. But he dances around, butts me in the chest with his chest, tells me
he is "a cop on duty" (transcribed from the tape), and threatens to kick my ass. Among other choice comments from
this piece of human garbage are, "You're a fuckin' bitch", and "Slimy bitch", and "Try me". At this point the guy had
so worked himself up that the adrenalin was making his lips quiver as he struggled to think up more and more insults
and threats. It was pure Don Knots.

 

Below: The guy is now butting his chest against me, trying to get me to hit him, actually TELLING me to hit him. He's
clearly no cop. He's just another garden variety, smart-mouth, loud-mouth California punk, and I tell him so. I am trying
to get to the back of his car to snap his plate, but he goes into a basketball player's crouch and dances sideways in
front of me, trying to block me from seeing his plate. I finally do get it, and it's a cutesy vanity plate -- easy to remember.
Merced Cop

At one point I flipped my faceplate with camera attached, down, so I could get decent pictures of this punk. He exclaimed, "Yeah,
you better put that faceplate down mutherfucker!" He really thought he was something. And in fact he was, indeed,
"something". He's the worst possible advertisement for his race, because too many people have come to expect exactly
this behavior from his race, and he just confirms what everyone fears. I have only seen one other human being act like this;
that was a black homeless man, clearly severely insane, on Main street in Merced, California.

Merced Cop
Above, the insults continue with, "You're a little bitch", and, "get your fucking ass outta here -- get your ass outta here"
and this leads to more chest butting to try to make me hit him. I've seen every kind of mental case there is, and
while working narco for the Federal Government I put every kind of prancing fool that exists in jail. But this guy is
like nothing I have ever encountered. I have never witnessed such belligerence, such stupidity, such rank arrogance,
such counter-productivity, and if he HAD been a real cop, I could say I had never witnessed such unprofessionalism.
This would be, had he been a real cop, the kind of behavior that gets him, or his partner(s), killed, because there
are, at any given time, in any given city, nut-jobs who, when confronted with this level of lunacy, would simply put
three bullets in his face and walk away. My estimate is that in any large city across the US there are between 100
and 200 mental cases who would simply kill this man without a second thought, provoked by his outrageous behavior.
I predict that he will run into one, sooner or later. I would never accept a partner that was likely to get me into a shootout.
This is the exact opposite of what any force would want as an officer, and thank God he's only an impersonator.
Not even Merced would hire a mental case like this.

The slurs and comments continued for about five minutes, with, "You don't know who you're dealing with", and "Get
your goofy ass outta here", and "I'm not going to jeopardize my career (as a cop) to hit you", and all the while he's
blocking me so I can't get his plate on camera. He continues on and on and on with, "You little bitch, get you ass outta
here", "Get on your stupid little motorcycle and leave", on and on and on and on. I did demonstrate super-human restraint
in not simply taking him down. I truly did. I would have made my trainers proud by resisting this blatant provocation.

As I am getting on the bike, he is behind me, bumping me with his chest, yelling, "I'll beat you ass you little wuss."
Remember, this is transcribed from the security cam on my helmet. "Why don't you take a swing, you little ass", as I
am riding away. I'm 6'3 and 245, so it became, at some point, laughable. It always amazes me that these punks
get braver and braver, and mouthier and mouthier, once you're leaving. It's the same with every single one of them.

Merced Cop
Above: It's clear he's never going to swing at me. It's clear that if I stay and wait for the real police, he will continue
assaulting me with his chest and trying to provoke me to fight him. So I simply depart. I plan to use a different bike to
go down to the station and fill out a complaint, later that evening. At that moment, all I wanted to do was continue
checking out this pretty little scooter, in peace. I ride away, and tool through some residential backstreets, and within
only a few moments, the incident is forgotten. I'll deal with it later. I know nothing will come of my complaint, because
this is, after all, California, but I can make sure it goes on this hot-head's record. I'll only be in town another week or two
anyway, and California is welcome to this waste of flesh.

.

Below: Incident forgotten now. Just breezing through the hood at a whopping 20 miles an hour top speed between
blocks; the sun is warm; the day is bright. There are assholes in the world but who cares.
Merced Cop

 

I turned right at this corner and proceeded about another half block. Suddenly I see a car bearing down on me from
behind. He's going to read-end me! I jerk to the shoulder between other cars and stop. And this car stops too!
And someone rolls down the passenger side window and yells some kind of bullshit out to me. I get it then; it's this
same Goddamned mental case! He's been following me, and he intends to run me down! At this point it becomes a
matter of physical survival. What will he do next? I can't outrun him on a 23mph scooter. I can perhaps stop and hide in
someone's yard until police arrive. But he'll see my scooter there. What lengths will this piece of shit go to? He's clearly
deranged. Now it appears he's homicidal. What's the best course of action here? He punches it and his loud pipes
resonate through the otherwise peaceful streets.

Merced Cop
The best course of action seems to be to try to avoid him long enough to find a place to hide the scooter and get
the real police on scene. I have plenty of video at this point to put him in jail.

Below, I end up behind him again. He clearly has no plans to leave the area. He puts his car into reverse and tries to
back into me. I now have the best image yet of his California plate: BLUHETE. How precious.
Merced Cop

Below: I backed up the scooter to avoid being hit, and this guy pulls ahead through the intersection, right in front of the
white car, which has no stop sign and has the right of way, and which had to brake for the blue car. I turn right, hoping
to get away from him once and for all. But as soon as he sees me turning right, he opens his door while still driving. I
figure he's going to try to take a pot-shot at me, so I rev up to the scooter's staggering 23-24mph and try to get away.
Merced Cop

Merced Cop
Above: After he went straight and I turned right, I rode about six or seven blocks in the exact opposite direction from
him, simply hoping to escape. I turned at every corner. I ran stop signs and kept the scooter at 23-24 mph the entire
distance in the opposite direction. But I accidentally ran into a cul-de-sac and had to turn around. And immediately upon
turning around, who is there? The same stupid son of a bitch. He had continued on away from me, but turned around
and has been following me all this way. Think about this for a moment. I had ridden in the opposite direction for at least
six blocks, at a continued speed of 23-24mph, running stop signs. But this nut job had caught up to me. That means there
is no possible way he could have done that unless he far exceeded the speed limits on these quiet residential streets
(25 mph). He stopped, facing me, and began lurching his car and revving the engine. The man is clearly insane. At that
point I had had enough. I stopped, put the bike on the stand, and called 911, explaining that an insane man in a car was
chasing me and that I was unable to get away from him. I supplied the location, off of Barclay, in north Merced. Merced PD
transferred me to CHP, which was, of course, a mistake (leave it to Merced). After summarizing to CHP, I was
transferred back to Merced, who had to take the whole complaint again. All this time, the mental-case sat across
from me, revving his engine. I described this behavior to the dispatcher, and told them to expedite. I completely
believed this was going to come down to a life and death match. This jackass had a hot car that could outrun and
squish my scooter, and, by his belligerent demeanor, he probably had a gun. He was the exact OPPOSITE of
ANYONE you'd EVER want to own a gun. It is for this guy that gun laws need to be far more strict.

 

Merced Cop
Above: Merced police arrive. I walked over, across the intersection, and gave them my statement. They asked me
what I wanted to do. I replied that I wanted to prosecute for pulling out from the stop sign without looking, for threats of violence,
assault with a deadly weapon (trying to back into me), for impersonating a police officer, for careless driving, and for harassment. I
showed them my camcorder and assured them I had the evidence on tape. I asked the officer if they had ever had trouble with this
guy before, assuming they already had a file on him and would be just itching to put him away. The officer replied, "He's one of us."
I said NO. It's not possible. He looked at the ground, clearly embarrassed and chagrined, and said yes, indeed, this flaming piece of
garbage was, indeed, one of theirs. I said fine -- we can't get him for impersonating an officer (though after reviewing the tape,
he clearly said he was on-duty, and I don't believe he was). But we can still charge with all of the other things. The officer said,
"Well, can't we just find a way to work this out?" I asked if he was doing his job or covering for one of his own. He didn't reply. But
he did tell me the offender was stating that I had chased him and that he had been unable to get away. I explained the top speed
of my scooter, and told him to advise his friend to just keep on making that claim. I want to see him push that argument in
court.

We all know what happens when you try to prosecute in a small, corrupt town. It DOES NOT MATTER how much evidence you have.
The system will close ranks to protect him. This is the BS I fought against when working in political corruption cases in younger years.
It is extremely hard to bring charges and make them stick, even for the Federal government. For a plain citizen? Forget it. The best
you can do is make it public. What's the best way to chase away the cockroaches? Turn on the light. It may be that another
citizen can use this documentation at another time after having trouble with this jackass. I guarantee it will happen. Perhaps some
attorney will need to bring me in to testify in a case against this man. I make an extremely good witness on the stand. It's my prediction
that the city will have to eventually cull this guy out; he will cost the city money and credibility and reputation. What remains to be
seen is how MUCH damage the city will endure before doing that. My guess is, with Merced government being not the brightest bulbs
in the string, they will endure a very great deal. Good for them. They deserve every gram of it. They never should have hired a loose
cannon like this in the first place. Now they can reap the rewards of stupidity.

In the end I advised that I was going to ride away from this on the condition that I never, ever have trouble or even an
interaction with this fool again. I will NOT respect his "authority" as a police officer and I will not ever obey his instructions.
If he ever pulls me over I'll advise him to keep an appropriate distance while I summon CHP. I consider this man to be a blatant
and documented threat to my life and I will interact with him as such. I believe he is documentably insane. I believe that
completely. I have no idea how he skirted through the psyche eval. He should never have been allowed into any law
enforcement position. I don't believe he's suited to be school crossing guard. It is my prediction that he will flame-out at some
point in his "career", and will sorely embarrass or possibly even bring down any department he works for. I would be astounded
and amazed if he had not been in trouble like this before. The demeanor of the responding officers made me believe that he had
indeed been a problem boy in the past and was known for it. They held him on-scene for perhaps twenty minutes after I departed.
I believe they attempted to convince him to get his act together. I do not believe they were successful, based on the incident of
5-3-2014, detailed below.

I worked narcotics enforcement for the Federal government many years ago. Then I was transferred to a unit that
specialized in political corruption, usually the selling of narcotics by elected officials and within offices of elected
officials (i.e. sheriffs)(we even snagged a sheriff's office cattle-rustling ring). I quit largely due to the poor quality of
officers that were being brought online. I saw just about every kind of misfit society could cough up like slimy hairballs,
somehow fenagle their ways into law enforcement. But I have never, ever seen anything like this guy in Merced. I am stunned
at the unprofessionalism of this individual, but in a back-handed kind of way, he's what California deserves, and I am so glad
to not be living in this part of the world any longer. To those still stuck in this loony bin, I apologize. I apologize because at one
time I may have been in a position to do something about this guy and get him out of your hair. But I am lifetimes
out of the service and I don't care to ever get back into it. You're on your own. You will have to find a way to deal
with this nut as best you can. The tragedy is that he may well ruin lives before he's culled. I hope that life is not yours.

Think about just one thing before I close this page. When someone runs a car at you, you are allowed to defend yourself
using any force necessary. It's called "assault with a deadly weapon" and it's a Felony. It's ironic, and terrifying, to realize that
Merced's police force gives us far more to fear than do Merced's criminals.

What a lovely place to leave. And cops today wonder why no one respects them.

 

UPDATE: 5-2-2014:

At 13:58 hours, I observed the above vehicle, driven by the above black male, driving northbound on Bancroft Drive, from
Tolman Way, at a speed in EXCESS of 50mph (posted 25mph) (he covered one block in about 3 seconds). He appeared
to be alone in the car. Once he was out of sight, I heard his exhaust continue on through the neighborhood at that same speed.
I am advising the people of Merced, straight up, that this individual is a threat to you and your children. I suggest you solve
this problem, or ignore it at your peril. I am convinced this man is mentally unbalanced and I believe he is capable of absolutely
anything. I have not forwarded this to his chief. Indeed, what would be the point. This whole Merced crew is cut from the very
same cloth. How accurate is my estimate of his speed? I have gained CONVICTIONS in court by measuring off distances
and demonstrating to the court that my ability to count seconds is extremely accurate. Again: My estimate: 50mph plus

 

UPDATE: 5-3-2014:

En route to H&W Drive-in for lunch from north Merced, I ended up behind -- you guessed it -- BLUHETE. There is no question he
recognized me. At 16:27 hrs PDT I pulled up behind him at a stoplight at Olive and M streets, southbound, after he passed me
exceeding the speed limit (see tape). Note that in the pictures below, he waited until I had stopped behind him to AGAIN put it
in reverse, apparently to again make me think he was going to back into me. This imbecile appears to be about as rogue as
rogue can get.

I'm going to state this once again bluntly and clearly for the record: I believe this man is mentally unbalanced. I believe he is
dangerous. I believe he is violent. I believe at this point that I have enough documentation to obtain an anti-harassment order against
him. I will be in Merced two more weeks. let's see what stupid stunts he can keep pulling within that time. The video for this particular
incident is on file (about a gig). I have set up an arrangement to have this page and all associated files delivered to the Merced
County prosecutor and the FBI in the event something "happens" to me. I may decide to submit them once I've left the area. I don't
believe there is any point in notifying the chief of police in Merced. He had to sign off on the hire of this nut-ball, and I do not
believe the chief would care about this man's behavior. I'm not sure WHAT this chief cares about, if anything:

Merced Cop
Coming up to light at Olive and M, southbound. Light is red.

Merced Cop
Above: He is stopped and has been for some time. Note no backup lights.

Merced Cop
Above: His backup lights go on as soon as I stop. Why is he going to back into me THIS TIME? What would a
psychiatrist have to say about this behavior? Do you REALLY want this man carrying a gun? I don't think so.