By now, we’ve all, likely, heard the sad story of the brutal murder of two dogs owned by Mayor Cheye Calvo of nearby Berwyn Heights, and the physical attack on the mayor, his wife, and his mother-in-law in a poorly managed, un-Constitutional, and case-of-the-wrong-person attack on his home, conducted by the ever righteous Prince George’s County Police and SWAT team. On @TAC, the web-log of The American Conservative magazine, Kelly Vlahos has written a worth-the-while post on the pernicious effects of post-9/11, USA PATRIOT Act totalitarian America, which begins with a re-telling of the Calvo story and the provision of some disturbing news about how local law enforcement conducted itself.
Writes Vlahos at one point:
When the Patriot Act was first passed in 2002, right wing advocates demanded fealty, while assuring the new police and prosecutorial powers would never be abused — that they were essential in the Global War on Terrorism. Well, beginning with the use of the Patriot Act to investigate a Las Vegas strip club operator who was bribing local officials in 2003, there is now a well-documented trail of abuses.
But despite all the data, the striking-down of Patriot Act provisions as unconstitutional in federal courts across the country, the drip-drip of revelations by the White House and the Justice Department, the establishment organ — cranked by its foot soldiers — maintains the illusion that the abuses are rare, and still, if you are innocent, you have nothing to fear.
Nothing to fear, just as Cheye Calvo had nothing to fear.
Tags: 9/11, Cheye Calvo, Police violence, Prince George's County, Totalitarianism, USA PATRIOT Act
The Terrapin Times 
19 August 2008 at 1:48 pm |
You know, I think I at least have a fighting chance to protect myself and my family against your average criminal burglar, etc. But how can I protect my family against jack booted thugs like these cops? If in the middle of the night I grab my shotgun and start shooting at “armed home invaders” I expect even if i get one or two, the rest of the gang will keep coming and murder me and my family. If by some miracle I survive I will leave my own home in handcuffs likely charged with homicide. After hundreds of thousands in lawyer fees I will lose my home and maybe even my liberty. Oh yeah, and my beloved dogs will be dead. And then, the ultimate insult, some coy son of a B—-, law enforcement offcial will give a press conference and essentailly say, oops, ya know, every now and then ya just have to break a few eggs to make an omellette..sorry bout your dogs, your chidlren, your wife..you. Time to buy more shotguns.
20 August 2008 at 11:39 pm |
This remind me of the secret police in Romania. They there mix up the poison and the antidote in the same govt laboratory. Here they cops let the postal man plant the drugs on the doorstep then they wait and bust in and shoot they dogs in the back! In Romania they would after a few hours get the residents all to sign confessions that they all were drug traffickers! Prince Georges cops must have not yet learned Romanian secret police interrogatiopn techniques! Maybe we bring ex Romanian secret police to Prince George place to teach they cops how to better interrogate the residents!!!!
23 August 2008 at 2:18 pm |
If you call any of the officials in Prince George’s county, not one of them will even say they are sorry for what happened. This is how arrogant they are. Clean house I say, a fish rots from the head down.
30 August 2008 at 10:11 pm |
[…] Greenwald has it here. Scares me to death, what the police do these […]
1 February 2009 at 7:48 pm |
Rep. Steny Hoyar is the Congressman for this district. Everyone write to him and demand action. Do not let up on him. I plan on contacting as many P.G. County residents and letting them know that Rep. Hoyar truly is not defending their rights. He must take action, if not he does not deserve his seat.
I called the P.G. police department ~5 pm after hearing the report of the raid on WAMU (3 times). When I called the main police department, they did not know anything about what was going on. The police are/have been making unwise decisions without their superior’s knowledge. Hence, the Sheriff and Police Chief of Prince George’s County need to be removed also. I was furious to hear the family dogs were killed for no reason. The voting citizens are being punished and the crooked police are acting like Rambo. This has to stop. These are civil liberties, the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, that are at stake.
If this can happen to Calvo, this can happen to any law abiding citizens. Get this story out to the citizens.