WV Town With NO First Amendment! | LAWSUIT Filed

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Edgar Orea brought me this footage. He’s a street preacher who was arrested in Bluefield, West Virginia for the content of his protected First Amendment speech. Edgar and his wife moved to Bluefield in order to serve the people of nearby McDowell County, West Virginia, which is the poorest county in the entire nation. But from the very beginning, they were harassed by the Bluefield Police Department, as you’ll see in the video. The police objected to the content of their message. In this particular incident, they actually arrested Mr. Orea and took him to jail based on the content of his anti-abortion sign, which showed an aborted fetus.

There was a similar case litigated in Kentucky: World Wide Street Preachers’ v. City of Owensboro, 342 F.Supp.2d 634 (W.D. Ky. 2004). In that case, another street preacher was arrested in a public park for showing a large sign with a similar photograph of an aborted fetus. The police claimed that this was causing public alarm and was likely to cause a confrontation. So they cited the individual, but otherwise didn’t arrest him or interfere with his other activities. The Court held:

A function of free speech under our system of government is to invite dispute. It may indeed best serve its high purpose when it induces a condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, or even stirs people to anger. Speech is often provocative and challenging. It may strike at prejudices and preconceptions and have profound unsettling effects as it presses for acceptance of an idea. Terminiello v. Chicago, 337 U.S. 1, 4, 69 S.Ct. 894, 93 L.Ed. 1131 (1949)….

In light of Supreme Court precedent, the Court cannot find that the Plaintiffs’ sign, no matter how gruesome or how objectionable it may be, constitutes “fighting words.” The Plaintiffs’ speech, whether one agrees with it or not, was certainly not of “slight social value.” Rather, their speech was a powerful, albeit graphic commentary on a societal debate that divides many Americans. Furthermore, their speech was not directed at any particular person. Their speech commented on a highly significant social issue and was calculated to challenge people, to unsettle them, and even to anger them, but not to insult them. Such social commentary is not only protected under Supreme Court precedent but also is highly valued in the marketplace of ideas in our free society. 

Here, the Bluefield Police Department did much more than issue a citation, but rather placed Mr. Orea in handcuffs and carted him off for incarceration. Then they refused to return his signs, except for one. They charged him with two criminal misdemeanors: disorderly conduct and obstruction, two favorites of law enforcement officers for arresting people who have committed no crime. Fortunately, the charges were dismissed by the Court following a motion to dismiss based on the First Amendment.

Here’s the federal lawsuit, filed last week:

Entitled Couple Faces Cops – And Reality

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Several people sent me this video from the Crime Scene Cam youtube channel, showing a young, entitled couple confronting cops over their parked cars, several of which are in the public roadway. They learn several lessons here. But the more important lesson is the interplay in Fourth Amendment rights when it comes to the public road, versus the curtilage of your home.

Arkansas Trooper PITS Wrong Car During Pursuit

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Yet again, the Arkansas State Police make the news for their aggressive use of PIT maneuvers during pursuits. This time they actually wrecked the wrong “4 door sedan.” They got the color and the number of doors right. But unfortunately, it was the wrong one. Nevertheless, they stand behind their aggressive PIT policy. Is there a federal constitutional violation when they do this, and injure an entirely different person than they were intending to injure?

Mechanic Arrested For Failure to ID | Makes Case Law!

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This is footage of a 2019 arrest for failure to produce ID to a police officer. A car broke down; a mechanic was called, and showed up; some idiot thought it looked suspicious and called the cops; then the cops showed up and demanded ID. But the guy was busy and obviously annoyed that the cops are harassing him while he’s trying to help somebody. This interaction resulted in a civil rights lawsuit for false arrest. Originally, the officers were granted qualified immunity. But just last week, the 11th Circuit issued an opinion in the plaintiff’s appeal. Who was right? Was the mechanic illegally arrested?

Here’s the 11th Circuit opinion.

Here’s the original raw footage, cited in the opinion.

Prosecutor Attacks Me Over Video

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Fayette County Prosecuting Attorney, Anthony Ciliberti, issued a formal press release today about me. This was in response to two recent Youtube videos I published about the police officer overdose hoax case that happened in Oak Hill, West Virginia. This was the case where two police officers claimed that a guy they were arresting threw drugs at them, causing them to OD, only to be saved by Narcan. As it turns out, there was no OD, so the attempted murder charges had to be dropped. I exposed the truth, as well as the video footage. And the prosecutor was not happy about people knowing the truth.

Here’s his press release:

Here’s just one of the original media reports from about a year earlier:

Here’s the allegations from the criminal charges:

Here’s the bystander video footage of the incident, showing what actually happened. Note that the female officer accidentally tases the male officer just before he starts to suffer whatever symptoms he is suffering:

Here’s my update video on the criminal charges being dropped:

Here’s my update video showing the officers’ bodycam footage:

Did He Throw Drugs at Cops? | Bodycam Released!

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Remember the video I posted that was filmed by my client, showing a police officer purportedly experiencing a contact overdose after an arrestee allegedly threw a white powdery substance in his face? The suspect was charged with two counts of attempted murder of police officers. Last week I posted a video about it. Well now we have the newly-released bodycam footage.

Cops Assumed They Were Criminals | Huge Update!

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Remember the case where my clients were harassed and arrested on a private home’s front porch, just because cops assumed they were responsible for some marijuana plants growing on a nearby property? Huge update: We just received a big ruling from the Court.

Original full video here.

Here’s the Order:

Cops Keep Getting This Wrong | When Can Cops Force You to ID?

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Police officers around the nation continue to misunderstand the Fourth Amendment and the concept of reasonable suspicion. This footage was submitted by Nick Failla, showing his arrest in Cocoa, Florida several years back. He just recently obtained the bodycam footage.

Many cops believe that they get to forcibly ID anyone they encounter as a part of their job. They are taught that its policy to do this for officer safety reasons. We see it over and over again. In this particular video, the female officer, who is a supervisor, explains repeatedly to Nick that, because she’s a police officer conducting an investigation, Florida law allows her to obtain the ID of anyone she encounters – whether or not a crime is even alleged. Nick disagrees with her and asks repeatedly for an explanation of what crime he was alleged to have committed. Let me see if I can clear this up.

Here’s Nick’s original video, along with his explanations.

This is a common issue and is the subject of one of my most popular Youtube videos – a case currently being litigated in federal court, involving the arrest of my client in a West Virginia Walmart. When police officers encounter pedestrians, they could trigger an investigatory detention, which requires reasonable suspicion, or they could just be engaged in a consensual encounter, which requires nothing. It’s just a conversation. 

Consensual encounters, i.e., a conversation, does not trigger the Fourth Amendment, and can be easily identified if the subject asks whether or not he’s free to leave. If the question isn’t asked, courts will look to the circumstances. Would a reasonable, regular person believe that he was NOT free to leave? Were emergency lights activated? Multiple police officers? Guns drawn? Put in handcuffs? Accused of criminal conduct? Told to show your hands? Told to get on the ground? Or was it just a conversation. 

The question is whether a reasonable person would feel free to terminate the encounter. If the person was involuntarily detained by the officer, that constitutes a seizure under the Fourth Amendment, no matter how brief the detention or how limited its purpose. 

If a detention occurs, the courts require the detaining officer to be able to articulate why a particular behavior is suspicious or logically demonstrate that the person’s behavior is indicative of some sinister criminal activity. It must be based on suspicion of illegal conduct. In other words, it cannot be based on suspicion of legal conduct, such as walking down a public sidewalk, or hanging out on top of your van with two women in a parking lot in front of a lake.

Here, there was clearly a detention. Therefore reasonable suspicion is required. Even in Florida, a police officer must have a particularized and objective basis for suspecting the person stopped of criminal activity.” United States v. Campbell, 26 F.4th 860, 880 (11th Cir. 2022) (en banc).

BREAKING: Cop Overdose Video | Lab Results In!

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Remember the video I posted that was filmed by my client, showing a police officer purportedly experiencing a contact overdose after an arrestee allegedly threw a white powdery substance in his face? The suspect was charged with two counts of attempted murder of police officers. Well, a year has now gone by and the toxicology results came in. The criminal case is now over. Was it real? Was it a hoax?

Here’s the RAW footage of the incident, as captured by my client:

Man Files Complaint and Gets Arrested Again | Cops Take Wife Hostage and Offer a Trade!

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New and shocking body camera footage shows police officers in Georgia unjustly arresting and threatening to charge a woman just days after they handcuffed and detained her husband for not satisfying their questions about a neighborhood disturbance. It all started last year on May 26, 2022, when officers with the Covington Police Department were called to investigate a shots fired call in a local neighborhood near Melody Circle.