It is encouraging to finally see the subject of illegal torture abroad by our government brought to light and addressed. This is a stain on what little remains of our national honor. But why is the press also so mum about daily torture of unconvicted U.S. citizens here in the Homeland?
It is a very well-kept secret, but it happens every day. My personal efforts over the years to expose this judicial and government crime have been snubbed by media outlets. I must suppose our remaining (five) mainstream purveyors shy away from such subjects out of fear of retaliation by government (or not getting their next big merger approved), but torture of innocent American citizens does occur every day, under color of law, on U.S. soil. No one seems to be talking about it, though many of the torture techniques are precisely the same as suffered by the victims of the CIA's clandestine operations abroad. Public prosecutors allow and/or prompt such illegal conduct, and the former prosecutors sitting on the bench as judges, condone and suborn it, though both parties are in violation of federal criminal statutes 18 USC section 241 and 242 (deprivation of constitutional rights under color of law, and conspiracy to deprive). Were we still a nation of laws rather than men, these criminal acts would place these judges and prosecutors in prison for many years. So why doesn't such criminal behavior get punished? Why do judges and prosecutors seemingly never suffer penalty for their constant and daily crimes against We the People? Primarily, because there is no one to charge them with these crimes. Prosecution has become the prosecutors' sole prerogative in post-constitutional America. Our founding fathers never heard of a "public prosecutor." These hired guns are unlikely to charge themselves or their co-conspirators on the bench for criminal conduct and at present, there is no one else to do it. Worse, the courts granted themselves immunity from prosecution back in 1967 (in a string of questionable Supreme Court decisions beginning with Pierson v. Ray) and this slide into complete lawlessness by prosecutors and judges has worsened now to the point of being a daily occurrence. There is no penalty for their crimes, as long as they are at work when they commit them, and their only oversight is what is known as peer review. Most jails with which I am familiar have some form of a sleep deprivation program where non-compliant citizens (who do not agree to plead guilty to uncommitted crimes or are trying to prepare for trial) are only allowed to sleep...on the floor....for no more than 4 hours per day. The rest of the 24 hour period, the unconvicted citizen is required to stand or sit up straight. The temperature is kept in the 50-62 degree Fahrenheit range. The unconvicted citizens are dressed in skimpy prison pajamas, with 24 hour lighting, making sleep even four hours a day nearly impossible. Government's victims becomes zombie-like after just a few days of this torture. Diesel therapy, as it is known, is another common torture of unconvicted American citizens who do not want to plead guilty. Government's victims are simply ridden around at taxpayer expense between jails and prisons all over America to break them down, while concurrently keeping innocent-until-proven-guilty citizens from their attorneys and support of family, just to elicit government's desired outcome of a guilty plea without trial. Taking a defendant out of the federal district or division of charge is also a federal crime on the part of the judge and prosecutor who order this to be done (see Rules 18 and 20, F.R.Crim.P. and 18 USC sections 3232 and 3234), though the judge in the case is the only party who can order such criminal conduct. The worst and most common crime committed by judges and prosecutors every day, however, is simply holding citizens illegally who have not been tried within 70 days, as is required by the Sixth Amendment and 18 USC section 3161(c). Absent a legally excludable delay (and there are only seven such reasons), a trial has to commence within 70 days of arrest, or the case can be dismissed (see 18 USC section 3162(a)(2)), but I've never seen this law followed on a single occasion or in a single case, state or federal, though it is a constitutional right under the Sixth Amendment. I've also never seen the court follow this law when a motion for dismissal was filed. Attorneys are now sanctioned for doing so. Worse, any citizen not yet tried in 90 days, must be released on bond (see 18 USC section 3164(c)). This law applies to the state courts as well, according to Article Six of the U.S. Constitution (as well as Amendment Six), but I have never seen this law followed by any court, federal or state, either. These criminals of bench and bar continue to get away with it because they suffer no penalty for their crimes and there is no independent authority over them, other than Congress, which has been asleep at the wheel on this issue for a century or more. The Fourteenth Amendment demands that all of us be treated equally under the law. So how is it that this elite group of common criminals in pinstripes and black robes who violate federal statutes and constitutional law every day are immune from penalty of law themselves? Good question, and one that should be asked of every member of Congress. It is not just Guantanamo Bay and CIA torture rooms around the globe that are violating law and human rights, friends, and it is certainly not just so-called "terrorists" who are suffering these abuses. These crimes occur to some extent in almost every jail and prison across America every day. The victims are unconvicted American citizens, and the criminals are judges and prosecutors who took an oath to uphold the laws they violate. Doubt me? Don't. I personally suffered each torture described above, during 29 illegal moves between jails and prisons all over America during 87 months of illegal incarceration. This criminal government conduct was committed, ordered, and suborned by a still-sitting senior federal judge in Raleigh, North Carolina (who had no more jurisdiction over the case than you or me) and two Assistant U.S. Attorneys. None of these criminals were ever charged or punished for their violations of federal law, though it was reported to the highest echelons of government. No one can tell me it doesn't happen, nor are protections in place to keep it from happening, because I have lived it and seen it first hand, but like Jan Karski, the famous Polish officer who warned President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill of the Holocaust, no one is listening or taking action. The press has its head in the sand, and those tasked with preventing such government crimes are complicit in them through willful blindness. CIA and foreign torture? Criminal and horrible. Domestic torture of unconvicted American citizens? Criminal and unforgivable. I say let's get back to the United States Constitution which precludes all of this government lawlessness both abroad and at home, and let these dark criminals of bench, bar, and spookdom get their just reward. It won't take many of them being put in jail and prison for the word to spread around that We the People have had enough. Yes. That's the answer. Let's devolve back to the rule of law and U.S. Constitution, where none of these perpetrators are above the law! Back to our Constitution! That's the answer. Viva la devolución! Howell W. Woltz
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BIG WIN FOR JUSTICE…AND ‘JUSTICE DENIED’
As part of the competition for the best student film worldwide, Justice Denied: the Film, was seen by more people than ever since its creation. (Film can be seen at www.justicedenied.com) By connecting the film, which describes the sordid state of America’s judicial system, with the protestors on the streets this weekend marching against police brutality, the toxic cocktail of where we stand as a nation was mixed and consumed by a world agape in disbelief. Everything once held sacred by our nation, including due process of law, integrity in policing, and in court proceedings, has seemingly been cast to the wind. We have become that against which we once fought. Your vote for Justice DeniedBIG WIN FOR JUSTICE…AND ‘JUSTICE DENIED’ As part of the competition for the best student film worldwide, Justice Denied: the Film, was seen by more people than ever since its creation. (Film can be seen at www.justicedenied.com) By connecting the film, which describes the sordid state of America’s judicial system, with the protestors on the streets this weekend marching against police brutality, the toxic cocktail of where we stand as a nation was mixed and consumed by a world agape in disbelief. Everything once held sacred by our nation, including due process of law, integrity in policing, and in court proceedings, has seemingly been cast to the wind. We have become that against which we once fought. Your vote for Justice Denied in the quarter-finals, propelled this issue (and film) onto the world stage. Thousands as far away as India and China watched and then voted for Justice Denied, as will be possible again when the film is entered into the next semi-finals on Wednesday, December 17, 2014. PLEASE CARRY THIS ALL THE WAY THROUGH TO THE FINISH LINE MAKING ‘JUSTICE DENIED’ NO. 1 IN THE COMPETITION BY VOTING IN THE NEXT ROUND, WHICH IS SCHEDULED FOR WEDNESDAY. To all of you, worldwide, who have made this happen, a hearty thanks. By bringing the world’s attention and awareness to what may ultimately prove to be America’s human rights tragedy of the 21st century, pressure from abroad – as well from within -- can move the ball forward for long-overdue change. For more information about the issues addressed in ‘Justice Denied,’ please see: www.howellwoltz.com The United States now has over 18,000 separate police organizations with the legal authority to kill American citizens. No dictator, tyrant, or "evil empire" has ever had such a police presence, either in sheer numbers of gun-toting officers, or the number of independent police authorities with the authority to use lethal force.
By every definition, our nation has become a police state. We have more laws with prison as penalty (314,000 of them), the highest conviction rate in the world (98.6%) and more prisoners than any nation on earth or history (7.3 million, or one in every 31 Americans are currently imprisoned or suffering liberty restraint). There are marches going on all over the United States this weekend, and public attention is finally focusing on this tragedy. Twitter posts abound from #MillionsMarchNYC #blacklivesmatter #ICantBreathe #Justice LeagueNYC all calling for an end to senseless police brutality, but no one in power seems to be listening....yet. What troubles those of us intimately familiar with what is still called the "justice" system in America is that once arrested and charged, there is no longer a system of due process to allow them their day in court. Much like the police brutality that often starts this process, there is a brutal conviction machine that will end up destroying all but 14 of every 1,000 of its victims and 95% will be forced to plead guilty rather than going to trial. If you would like to argue this issue with me, I ask that you first watch the 15 minute film, Justice Denied, at the link below. I hope you then vote for it to go to the Sundance Film Festival. If you still want to argue with me, which I very much doubt, feel free to call, write, or email, and we will talk all day or night. My contact information is at www.howellwoltz.com and I would love the opportunity for anyone to prove me wrong. http://studentfilmmakerawards.com/matchup/justice-denied-vs-posthumous/ Please spread this to your friends and anyone interested in a return to justice in America. Thank you, Howell W. Woltz There is no excuse for the murder of unarmed Americans by those charged to "serve and protect" them period, and it must stop. But don't hold your breath, because that won't happen any time soon.
Why? Because those who commit crimes against "We the People" no longer suffer penalties for their own misdeeds. Judges and prosecutors have been above the law, by law, for 47 years. This was not a status granted them by our elected representatives (though even that would violate the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment). The courts granted that "above the law" status to themselves, judicially, beginning with Supreme Court decision Pierson v. Ray in 1967. This de facto immunity for criminal conduct has been less officially granted to the agents and police who assist these gatekeepers in keeping America's prisons full and overflowing, mostly with young men of color. How? The Not-So-Grand Jury is the answer. This once revered and very public institution is now held in secret. Defendants cannot even have an attorney, and a defendant is more likely to win some lotteries than get access to the transcripts of those proceedings. It all boils down to what the prosecutor tells the grand jury rather than the facts in the case. My trainer was recently on a grand jury for one whole year. I asked him yesterday how many times he and his fellow grand jurors refused to indict. His answer, "Not once." I asked how many times he felt like the prosecutor gave both sides of the story. His answer was the same, "Not once." When it is a friend (read Robo Cop), all manner of exculpatory evidence and excuses will be given, as proven in Ferguson, Missouri recently and again in New York City this week where a police chokehold of a non-violent man selling cigarettes became a homicide but the cop was not indicted. A recent Supreme Court opinion written by Justice Antonin Scalia determined that a prosecutor has no obligation to tell the whole truth (including exculpatory evidence) when it is one of 'We the People' being indicted, which is absolutely outrageous. This Supreme Court case came about because a prosecutor had failed to tell the whole truth about a defendant. Our most esteemed high court has decided that is OK. I disagree, as would the founders of this nation, who never knew a public prosecutor, because no such position existed in their day. Attorneys took turns prosecuting, which built a sense of fairness into the equation, as next week they had to make their living getting business from the same community they prosecuted the week before. Not so with "public" prosecutors. So how does it work for the rest of us, you ask? I'll tell you from experience...not too well. In every case I worked on where I was able to get a copy of a grand jury transcript, the prosecutor lied to the grand jury to garner the indictment. Every case. Prosecutors are above the law, by law, so there is no penalty for that criminal conduct. The judges (usually former prosecutors themselves) often know what their colleague is doing, but he or she used to do the same thing when they were prosecutors, and I'm unaware of a single case in recent history where the prosecutor has been restrained by the former prosecutor sitting on the bench. This has led our nation to the highest conviction rate on earth (98.6%). Less than one in 20 defendants now risk going to trial. The deck is so severely stacked against them that they will be found guilty in all but 14 cases out of 1,000, and they know it. Think of that for a moment. 1,000 of your fellow citizens walk into America's courts, but only 14 of them walk back out free. No nation on earth...no dictator or tyrant.....no "evil empire" has such a rate of conviction. Statistically speaking, an indictment is a conviction in America today. If prosecutors can and do lie in almost every case, and exculpatory evidence can be excluded by them, then our system is nothing more than a conviction machine. No one should be above the law in America. Not judges, not prosecutors, and certainly not those on the street granted the power of lethal force to be used only in our protection. This judicial, prosecutorial, and police crime-wave must be brought to a stop. The best way to do that is to return our grand juries to the open, public, honest affair they once were, where both sides are heard and the subject of a potential prosecution can defend him or herself while represented by counsel. In other words, we need to devolve back to constitutional rule of law, where no one is above it, and every citizen has the right to defend against unwarranted attack or prosecution by government. Yeah. We need a Devolution. Back to rule of law and Constitution.... Viva la devolución! Howell W. Woltz Author of "The Way Back to America: a 10-step plan to restore the United States to Constitutional government." |
AuthorBorn in North Carolina and educated at the University of Virginia, Wake Forest University and Caledonian University in Scotland, Howell now lives in Warsaw, Poland with his wife, Dr. Magdalena Iwaniec-Woltz. Howell is the European Correspondent for The Richardson Post and Chairman of The International Centre for Justice. Archives
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