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	Fixing the Law Enforcement System - Part A
	Short of jailing them all

	05/19/2009

	Paper By: Howard Taylor


	One of my pet peeves in life has always been people who complain about something yet when asked how to improve or fix it shrug their shoulders and stuff a donut in their mouth. Generally I am not that kind of person and specifically I am not that way concerning the growing problem of irresponsibility on the part of law enforcement at all levels. I have been promising myself and others this paper is coming for some time but have found convenient projects that helped push it back but today is definitely the day. Let me state the problems as I see them: 1. Laws designed to protect us from government are incomplete and that is by design. 2. The police have become brutal and are getting worse. 3. Civil Rights have taken a serious step backward. 4. Management, at all levels of the legal system, has a narrow focus designed to protect “the system.” 5. The law is interpreted differently depending on whether one is a civilian or whether one is some how tied to law enforcement. 6. All levels of law enforcement ignore the law when it is convenient. 7. The hiring process for the typical police department is a tragic comedy of errors. These problems span a wide range of necessary actions in order to begin the process of healing the justice system in this country. Let’s begin by constructing a simple frame work. Please observe the three laws of robotics: 1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. 2. A robot must obey orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. 3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law Now let’s change the wording around a little so it better fits those involved in law enforcement. We could use any agency but lets use the police since they are the front line of law enforcement we most come in contact with: 1. A police officer may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm as long as such does not conflict with the Second Law or Third Law. 2. A police officer must obey the law and orders given to him/her by the legislature and superiors, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law or Third Law. 3. A police officer must protect his/her own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. Kevin Yoder - District 20, Kansas - a 'Stewie-dicked' worthless pish if I ever saw one. He goes to church on Sinday and prays for himself and the damnation of those who don't fit his mold. I for one am glad I am not like him or his retched brood. BTW - this is his signature he puts on his web site presumably to assure us of his committment to law, justice, honesty and due process. MY HAIRY MANICURED ASS! Perfect! If the police followed these three simple rules my work would be done and we could all sleep better. Right now many of you are hearing the sound of a stylus screeching across a vinyl record indicating something has gone wrong and we are already off course and you are right. You are right because when I listed some of the problems above I purposefully left one off: no one in law enforcement wants to budge and inch and risk losing any of their power over the citizens. I did not say authority – I SAID POWER. Let me delineate the difference between POWER and AUTHORITY and thus explain point 1 above. POWER is the ability to achieve an end without fear of obstruction from outside groups or persons and without the requirement of explanation. Those in power may do as they please when they please and answer to no one. AUTHORITY is also the power to achieve an end however that power is provided through the grace of those held under such power and most importantly there are consequences for misuse of said authority. It boils down to accountability. Men of power such as Hitler answered to no one as long as their war machine existed. Statesmen of authority serve with power under the grace of those they serve. There is accountability. This brings us to point ‘A’ listed above. There are hundreds if not thousands of laws on the books detailing the proper conduct of the government but by design that is where most of these laws stop. These laws fall short in that they do not define punishment for violating these laws. In the end governmental agencies can violate many of the very laws they pass without fear of punishment. This is by design. Their thinking is that if you have the money and the time to take them to court and if you can win then and only then will you prevail. In the end there is no price for them to pay for violating the law. This needs to change. Every law must be backed by criminal or civil penalties. That would be a huge step forward in holding the authorities accountable for their actions or possibly better put 'lack of inaction.' Allow me to give you a perfect example of this concept. Sometime around 2000 I had my Kansas driver license suspended by the state of Missouri for a bogus DUI which I passed a breath test for but was still convicted. More on that in a later article. How a state can suspend a document issued by another state is questionable but they did (as far as they were concerned). Missouri notified the state of Kansas and Kansas sent me a letter notifying me they too were suspending my license for one year. At the end of the year Kansas sent me an 'official' letter informing me I could get my driver license back and detailed the procedure. I followed the procedure but when it came time to take the driver test again the state employee ran a check of my license and noted I was still under suspension in Missouri and therefore I could not have my driver license back at that time. I left rejected and dejected. About thirty days later I got a second 'official' letter from the state of Kansas informing that if I did not get my license back I would be suspended again. I took both 'official' letters to the DMV and again was told I could not have it because of the Missouri suspension. I went home and thought about this. I am a computer programmer. Computers do what people tell them to do. These 'official' letters were printed by a computer so a person must have told the computer to do it. My conclusion: the law is programmed into the computer! I went to the Kansas Legislature’s web site and after scouring many pages of endless garbage I hit pay dirt. I found statute 8-252. Click here to see the law. The law is very clear: basically if a state other than Kansas suspends a Kansas driver license the state of Kansas may suspend a person’s license for a period of up to one year if that offense is punishable in Kansas. After that year the license will be reinstated regardless of the status of that person in the other state. That explains the 'official' letters I was receiving. I was in fact, according to Kansas law, fully entitled to my driver license yet the people at the DMV refused me. I printed the law from the Kansas Legislature’s web site and along with my 'official' letters went back to the DMV. I showed the law to the same clerk and she took my documentation to 'the back', presumably to speak with her superior, and soon came back and told me I could not have my driver license. That was it – it was final. No explanation was given. At this point she had a little trouble looking me straight in the eye while she spoke but I imagine she got over it quickly. Kevin Yoder - District 20, Kansas - Here is a more current picture of the fattened little pish if you need something for target practice with your paintball guns. (note the cheap skate has the same tie on - bad timing or weird?) I went home and pondered what to do. I decided to call my representative from Kansas and enlist his aid, after all, representing us is what they do – right? I called Kevin Yoder of my District 20. I explained my situation to him and he looked up the law on his computer as we spoke. He told me there was nothing he could do! I must be dumb because I thought this kind of thing is what his job is all about – representing people like me who live in his district. In the end Kevin Yoder refused to do his job. As a foot note Kevin Yoder has made The List. I decided to call Topeka and speak with the state’s attorney. I reached a man who was new and unwilling to make a decision because his more experienced peer was out of the office. He enlisted the advice of a non-attorney employee of the state who “… has been around forever and would surely know the answer to this problem …” We begin a three-way conversation and I listen as the state’s attorney explains the circumstances with amazing precision – he was a true master of oral eloquence. In the end “Mr. know-it-all” blurted out and I quote “Sounds like he gets his driver license back” end quote. At that point the “newbie” cleared his throat and explained he wasn’t ready to concede this matter and deferred until his more experienced peer returned the following week. One week became two and two became three and I finally decided it was going to take legal action due to the campaign of attrition waged against me. I prepared a legal brief that would have made Clarence Darrow proud and went to the Kopecky Law firm. After studying my material they agreed to make a call to the state’s attorney and get this straightened out. One week became two and two weeks became three and isn't this starting to sound familiar? So on and on we went again through no fault of my attorney. Once again it was the state of Kansas dragging their feet and violating my rights under the law. In the end and after having spent $800 and giving the state the ultimatum of a severe lawsuit the state conceded I was right and told me I could have my driver license back. I received a call from my attorney and she told me I could go get my license at which point I asked her what I should do if they still refused me at the DMV. With absolute disbelief this would happen she gave me the number of the attorney in Topeka she had spoken with - one Ted Smith. I went to the DMV and as I expected they refused to give me the license. I immediately used my cell phone to call the state's attorney Ted Smith in Topeka and he promptly instructed me to hand the clerk the phone. I could not hear what was being said but I imagine it went something like this: mam I am the state’s attorney in Topeka. You are violating Kansas law by denying this man his driver license. If you do not allow him to get his driver license he will bring a lawsuit against the state and win. After that heads will roll and yours will be first! She handed the phone back to me and keyed some data in the computer and I was allowed to get my license. It is important to note here that she did not have to get a supervisor to “unlock” my account because it was never locked! There was never anything in the way of me getting driver license back except the absolute willingness of numerous state employees to violate my rights defined by law! In the end I was out $800 and countless hours of frustration and there were no consequences what so ever for the state or my dead beat representative Kevin Yoder. Do you think they would have done this to me had the law specified a jail term for violating this law? Certainly not and this kind of thing has been set up to work this way by design. 'If you have the money and time to fight us go ahead and try.' That is their attitude. In summation I would suggest we amend laws and provide penalties to include fines and jail time to those who knowingly violate laws such as defined in this incident. Accountability is the key. If there is no accountability criminals will abuse authority and turn it into power and do as they please. Government will abuse us until the price becomes too high. Kevin I dare you to challenge me on this - are you feeling lucky? Well are ya punk? I'll give you 8000 characters here as rebuttal but I think I will take advantage of YOUR legal system and have the last word just as prosecutors do in U.S. courts. I think you would have to agree that is fair? - right? I can tell you right now I would charge Kevin Yoder with abandondment, cowardace, dereliction and just plain and simple failure as a trustworthy human being. If you or some one you know is or has gone through this same scenario with the state of Kansas please contact LawReport.org through the Contacts page so you can join a class action lawsuit against the Kansas Department of Revenue, the State of Kansas and some of their lowlife employees/henchmen/henchwomen who join them in their desire to violate the rights of citizens in good standing. This situation brings up a good question: If the state will not follow it's own laws then why should any of us? Where is the leadership in Kansas? I shudder to think it is the likes of Kevin 'Yoda' Yoder. Part B follows.