It’s Confirmed: recent “compliance checks” were an “operation”
We have received a spike in comments and contacts from people who have had address verifications, many of which involving multiple jurisdictions over the last two weeks. We suspected it was part of one of these “operations” taking place in certain counties, such as Brevard, Bay and others. You know the ones… Its where they round up a bunch of people, mostly on petty technical violations, and then put out press releases such as the one in Bay County where they announce “Operation Watchdog” arrests 37 people in sex offender sting.
Only these are not, for the most part, new sex offenses. These are mostly technical violations, such as not registering a broken down trailer in a backyard. And for the 29 people who were arrested for a technical violation, such as not registering a trailer, they (as you can see from the below press conference) want “Take this element out of our communities”
Oh and naturally this is a “joint operation” between local, police, the FDLE, the US Marshals, Department of Homeland Security…
In the media it’s called “click bait”, in this case it’s Federal Grant bait.
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As Justice Holmes would say, “men must turn square corners when dealing with the government”. Rock Island v U.S., 254 US 141 (1920). Justice Holmes made it clear that you can’t trust anyone in government 100 years ago. Timeless advice.
Sc:
You are under no obligation to answer your door if the police don’t have a warrant. The state places a duty on the police to do compliance checks but you have no corresponding duty to cooperate.
The same for registration forms. You are not required, nor can they force you to sign a registration form. The only thing they can do if you refuse to sign is write refused to sign on the form.
I worked for the military police and for a civilian police force prior to any of these registration laws being in effect. We asked people to sign miranda waivers and about 1/2 refused. It was no sweat off of our ass, we just wrote refused to sign and just moved on.
Florida has many defense contracts so it is important for the security of out country that military contractors in Florida who have intimate knowledge of defense systems can be framed for CP. If they ever get out of prison they will be released in Florida and arrested again.
Sc:
You are under no obligation to answer their questions. Your best bet is to keep your mouth shut. If you don’t have the money to fight them, show your ID through a window but don’t ever open your door to them unless you are on probation or parole.
Very good advice!
Another question comes to mind… Was this “operation” carried out like those previously? County matters not, or does it? I am under the presumption that they have similar methods.
Hmm…. IS there a proper way to carry these out? Something to the effect of being read the Miranda Rights before asking you any questions?
SC: Miranda only comes into play after arrest. LE can ask anyone questions all day long, whether by knocking on doors (as validated in Florida v. Jardines) or through what’s known as a Terry stop, after the SCOTUS case in the 1960s.
@ AJ / Detroit
Oh. I’m aware that I am under no obligation to do anything more than show them my DL. I’m under no “official” supervision nor do I ever provide info not required. I appreciate the responses…
I was hoping for some type of clarification like… Do they travel in groups and show up at your doorstep at dinner? Do they have a warrant to search the home area, etc. That sort of thing.
AJ
I use to work in Law enforcement, a Terry Stop can only be applied when the officer has a resonable suspicion that a person has committed a crime. For example, a lady stops an officer and tells him that the guy in the green shirt has a gun.
Even though the officer did not see the gun, he / she now has the right to stop the person and detain them for a reasonable amount of time based on the suspicion given by a citizen.
This BS is another reason the registry IS in fact punisment. We are under LIFETIME suspicion since all of us apparently are taking turns plundering the cities looking for new victims, like a blood thirsty vampire.
AND don’t even get me started on officers lying to cover their ass. One of the many reasons I left. I got tired of looking the other way while homeless people got their brains bashed in for nothing.
There are in fact some real decent police officers and I met some both while being one myself and a few that stopped me while be a registrant. A few I will never forget for their kindness, and a few more I never forget for being detained for hours at a time just to mess with me, hoping they can cause me to lose my temper and get slammed the ground.
Usually asking for a “Watch Commander” causes them to crap themselves and let you go. Especially in larger agencies. The smaller departments seem to get away with more harassment, because the chief is the Father of the Captain, whose daughter is a dispacther and her boyfriend is a detective.
So time and time again, the courts, judges and legislators have ruled or claimed the registry is “Civil” and therefor NOT punishment. Give me an example of ANY of civil violation that can send you to prison for possibly life.
A registry violation, especially a simple mistake, hurts NO one. There is NO victim. And yet, we could face a long stay in the pokey for a mistake on our car registration that may not have even been our fault.
Why haven’t we won some court battles in those areas? I am telling you straight up, the cases we keep bringing is causing them to go after us. I am for sure NOT saying to stop them, just that I believe it it retribution due to the fact we are starting to win some victories.
At the rate they are doing stings, there won’t be any of us left to fight the registry.
I agree that perpetuating an adversarial relationship with LE can be seen as a losing battle as they have more legal weapons and tripwires in their arsenal, and we have apparently very little sympathy that keeps our cases from being the slam dunks in the courts that they logically should be.
How we change this, I don’t know. It almost seems a cultural phenomena unique to Florida where this kind of foolishness takes place. The corruption and misinformation being spewed by authorities and then regurgitated by an eager media is beyond comprehension by those of us who live relatively peaceful lives in other states where this doesn’t routinely take place.