From an innocent shopping trip to a false drug test, new court documents reveal what triggered a traumatic and fruitless raid of a Leawood family’s home.

When we first met Bob and Addie Harte in March, they had no idea why deputies from the Johnson County Sheriff’s office had banged on their door in April 2012 looking for marijuana. Their only guess was the hydroponic garden in their basement. The father-son project was for growing tomatoes and squash — not marijuana.

The Hartes sued to get the police records, and 41 Action News filed a request for the information weeks ago. Those records reveal it all started when a member of the Missouri Highway Patrol spotted Bob Harte at The Green Circle in August 2011.

The owner of the hydroponics store in the River Market isn’t happy his customers are being watched.

“Why should they be?” asked Bennie Palmentere. “This isn’t a communist country.”

Seven months later in March 2012, that MHP member called the tip into the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office. Incident reports and a search warrant affidavit state deputies then spent three early April mornings digging through the Hartes trash.

The first week they found nothing. But during the second and third weeks, reports say they found wet leaves and stems which “field-tested positive” for marijuana. This led to obtaining the search warrant, which was served April 20, 2012.

Deputies found nothing illegal when they served the search warrant. When the plants in the Hartes basement tested negative, officials had the plant evidence found in the trash retested, but this time in the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office Criminalistics Laboratory.

Lab tests of the plants from the trash came back negative this time. Lab forms state “these are yielding false positive tests from the marijuana field test kits”. There had never been marijuana in the Harte’s trash at all.

The Johnson County Sheriff’s Office declined to comment, citing pending litigation. Bob and Addie Harte Family released a statement through their attorney:

We have reviewed the materials produced concerning the raid of our home. The facts speak for themselves and are more incriminating of law enforcement than we might have imagined. We cannot understand how the low level of police work, which included using an unreliable marijuana field test, could have permitted a swat-style raid of our home. We have also found out, for the first time, that reliable laboratory testing was done after the raid and proved that there was no marijuana whatsoever in our garbage.

RELATED: Ex-CIA agents sue after JoCo home targeted in fruitless 4/20 pot raid http://bit.ly/X2gFT7

DUI Checkpoints

Sobriety checkpoints — also known as DUI checkpoints — are the most common roadblocks you might encounter. They function as a general purpose investigatory tactic where police can get a close look at passing motorists by detaining them briefly. A roadblock stop is quick, but it gives police a chance to check tags and licenses, while also giving officers a quick whiff of the driver’s breath and a chance to peer into the vehicle for a moment.

Remember that your constitutional rights still apply in a roadblock situation. Though police are permitted to stop you briefly, they may not search you or your car unless they have probable cause that you’re under the influence or you agree to the search. As such, you are not required to answer their questions or admit to breaking the law.

Since the Supreme Court’s ruling in Illinois v. Caballes police have more leeway to use drug-sniffing dogs in roadblock situations. There’s no need to waive your rights simply because dogs are present. But be advised that your legal options are limited if you’re arrested as a result of a dog sniff during a roadblock.

Also keep in mind that police closely monitor cars approaching the roadblock. So you’re not likely to have any success trying to evade it.

Sobriety checkpoints are generally permitted by the courts, but only if conducted properly. If you’re arrested at a police roadblock always consult an attorney before confessing or agreeing to a plea bargain. There might be some legal options that your lawyer can pursue.

US Border Checkpoints

Be aware that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents — which are part of the Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) — are permitted to search you and your belongings at the U.S. border without probable cause or a search warrant. So anytime you cross the border, you consent to a search.

CBP may generally stop and search the property of anyone entering or exiting the U.S. If agents have reasonable suspicion to believe you’re concealing contraband, they may search your body using pat-down, strip, body cavity, or involuntary x-ray searches.

Searches of Electronic Devices

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled that Homeland Security border agents must have reasonable suspicion before they can legally conduct a forensics search of laptops, mobile phones, camera memory cards, and other electronic devices.

Unfortunately, this limited ruling still permits agents to conduct a “quick look” laptop search, such as asking you to turn on your laptop to peek at open windows. So always password protect your files before crossing the border. And, of course, never voluntarily give agents your password.

Checkpoints Near the Border

Be aware that DHS agents have recently set up constitutionally-questionable “security checkpoints” up to 100 miles inside U.S. territory. If you should drive into one of these roadblocks, you are not required to answer the agent’s questions (usually starting with “Are you a United States citizen?”). Nor are you required to consent to any searches.

Visit www.checkpointusa.org/blog to learn more about this program and check out the video below. By actively “flexing” their rights, these brave citizens expose the techniques DHS agents (and police in general) use to trick and intimidate citizens into compliance. Also take note of the practical necessity of flexing your rights repeatedly.

Drug Checkpoints (it’s a trap!)

The Supreme Court has ruled that random checkpoints for the purpose of finding illegal drugs are unconstitutional. However, police sometimes put up signs warning drivers of up-coming drug checkpoints and instead pull over people who make illegal u-turns or discard contraband out the window. If you see a sign saying “Drug Checkpoint Ahead”, just keep driving and don’t panic. If there’s a rest area following the sign, DO NOT pull into it. If you do, you’ll find yourself surrounded by drug-sniffing dogs.

Police departments, especially in the Mid-west, have been pushing their luck with this tactic, so if you encounter anything resembling an actual drug checkpoint, please contact that state’s ACLU Chapter. Similarly, if you’re arrested as a result of a real or fake “drug checkpoint”, you must contact an attorney to explore your legal options.

TSA’s Mysterious ID Requirement

Many folks are concerned about the TSA’s requirement that passengers show a photo identification before passing through security. Of particular concern, is TSA’s persistent refusal to release the text of the law that it uses to justify that requirement. For more on the sheer absurdity of the policy, read security expert Bruce Schneier’s interesting analysis.

Testifying against a bill that would put limits on the use of unmanned drones in Washington state, industry lobbyist Paul Applewhite shocked a House Committee hearing when he said that drones had been used for “indiscriminate killings,” while arguing that the technology should be approved for “lethal force” within the United States.

These targets (see images below) are used to train DHS employees to shoot American citizens and they depict pregnant women, old men, children and even young moms with guns. The purpose of the targets, according to the company that sells them, is to “eliminate any hesitation” that U.S. government employees might normally feel in shooting to kill pregnant women, children and old men. (I’m not making this up. The government’s plan to murder Americans is now right out in the open…)

InfoWars reports they have been informed the “no hesitation” targets were “strictly for Department of Homeland Security and other law enforcement agencies.”

How stupid do they think we are?

This puzzle isn’t difficult to assemble, folks. We’ve got the U.S. government already on record purchasing 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition to be used domestically, inside the united states. The government is also purchasing thousands of full-auto assault rifles, calling them “personal defense weapons.”

On top of that, there are hundreds of thousands of multi-body coffins being stored right now at FEMA camp facilities, and there’s also strong evidence that FEMA camps are being activated with core staff coming on line.

And then we’ve also got the feds saying they want Americans to turn in all their guns and completely disarm themselves so that only the government has guns.

Um… how much evidence do you need, folks? I’m just wondering how so many Americans can still be living in a state of total denial about all this. It is abundantly clear that the current occupying government of America — which is an illegitimate occupying force of anti-constitution traitors and criminals — literally has a plan to mass murder tens of millions of Americans by either gunning them down in the streets, or rounding them up and stuffing them info FEMA coffins (or mass graves).

Article continues here ->

Here is the company’s website selling these targets.

No More Hesitation Pregnant Woman

No More Hesitation Little Boy Real Gun

No More Hesitation Young Mother Playground

No More Hesitation Young School Aged Girl

theNewspaper.com:

Roadside sobriety tests can be used only to gather evidence to convict a driver, not to exonerate him, under a decision handed down last week by the Kansas Supreme Court. The court found passage of such tests is only one of many factors that play into the “whole picture” of whether someone should be arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI).

The decision came down in the case of Bruno Edgar, who was stopped at a driver’s license roadblock on July 29, 2007. A police officer at the checkpoint asked Edgar for his license (which was suspended) and noticed a “real light smell of alcoholic beverage” coming from Edgar’s white Dodge pickup truck. The officer decided to conduct three of the standard field sobriety tests.

Edgar passed the horizontal gaze nystagmus test, passed the one-leg stand and “did fine” on the nine-step walk-and-turn test. At this point, the officer testified he would not have arrested Edgar, but he decided to try a preliminary breath test (PBT) — a handheld portable breathalyzer-like device. The officer then told Edgar he had no choice but to submit and that he had no right to consult an attorney regarding the test. Edgar failed and was convicted of DUI.

Edgar appealed, arguing the reasonable suspicion needed to conduct the breath test evaporated when he passed all three sobriety tests. The district court ruled having the initial suspicion was enough to “run a gamut of tests” and that officers should not be hampered by an arbitrary order of which test needs to be performed before another. The high court narrowly sided with Edgar that the sobriety tests must be considered as a factor in determining whether there was reasonable suspicion, but the court punted on the harder question of whether passing all the tests eliminated suspicion.

“We are asked simply whether the results from Edgar’s three successful field sobriety tests should have been considered in deciding whether reasonable suspicion existed to request the PBT,” Justice Dan Biles wrote for the court. “The answer to that question is yes. And while the Court of Appeals continued the analysis to consider whether there was reasonable suspicion in light of the field sobriety test results in Edgar’s case, we need not address that question, which may be a close call at best, given our holding on the next issue.”

Edgar had also appealed the preliminary breath screening because the officer falsely told him he had no right to refuse the test. Under Kansas law, refusal to use the handheld breath-testing device is a “traffic infraction.” The court treats the test as a search for Fourth Amendment purposes and consent to the search must by voluntary. The high court found it did not matter that the state has an implied consent statute covering the handheld test device.

“So even though Edgar impliedly consented to the PBT under the terms of the statute by driving, such consent may always be withdrawn — an event made unlikely when a driver is affirmatively misinformed by a law enforcement officer that he or she cannot refuse, which effectively contradicts the statute,” Justice Biles ruled. “We hold that the officer’s misstatement that Edgar had no right to refuse the PBT rendered the test involuntary… Accordingly, the district court erred by not suppressing the PBT results. And that error also invalidates Edgar’s DUI arrest and the subsequent blood-alcohol test.”

A copy of the decision is available in a 150k PDF file at the source link below.

Source: PDF File (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2/1/2013)

Download (PDF, 121KB)

If you want to understand why this case is important to me (@kccheckpoint) please read through this and you will easily see that this is all about harassment of Mikkelsen and has nothing to do with “trespass”.   Thanks to those who gave money to assist with attorney, as you can see he is still fighting this BS charge, anything you can give will ONLY go to this case or KCCHECKPOINT issues… your support is appreciated.  DONATE

See also: [VIDEO] KC Checkpoint Protester Arrested by KCPD for Holding Sign on Public Sidewalk Link includes video of police behaving badly.

Motion to Dismiss Filed in KCCheckpoint Protesters #KansasCity #MO Trespass Case by mikem676

The justices heard arguments Wednesday in a case involving a disputed blood test from Missouri. Police stopped a speeding, swerving car and the driver, who had two previous drunken-driving convictions, refused to submit to a breath test to measure the alcohol level in his body.

The justices appeared to struggle with whether the dissipation of alcohol in the blood over time is reason enough for police to call for a blood test without first getting a warrant.

In siding with defendant Tyler McNeely, the Missouri Supreme Court said police need a warrant to take a suspect’s blood except when a delay could threaten a life or destroy potential evidence.

The state court upheld an order throwing out the results of the blood test, which showed that McNeely’s blood-alcohol content was .154 percent, well above the .08 percent legal limit.

Read More ->

Video of young Shelbi Walser crying her eyes out was shot by her mother, Tammy Daniels, earlier this week as she was detained for over an hour by TSA agents at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.

The girl, who suffers from brittle bone disease, and is confined to a wheelchair, was “randomly” selected for an explosives test while traveling to Florida for specialist medical treatment.

“I was just scared, because I didn’t know what they were going to do,” Walser told KHOU News 8.

A screener swabbed the girl’s hands and was no doubt delighted that she tested positive for “explosive material”.

“It could have come off fertilizer, because we have chickens. I could have run through something from them,” little Shelbi bravely told reporters. “It could have just come off the ground, because I roll through everything.”

The screeners then called for bomb specialists to come to the terminal to assess the situation.

Ms Daniels said that she was physically restrained by TSA agents and not allowed to comfort her daughter during the ordeal.

“I am by no means undermining our safety in the air. After 9/11, by no means am I doing that,” Daniels added. “But when it comes to children, common sense is not in a textbook.”

Dallas News | myFOXdfw.com

To top it all off, the TSA failed to check the wheelchair, which was most likely the source of the material that found its way onto the girl’s hands.

One positive note from the incident was reportedly in the reaction of onlooking travelers who took issue with the TSA’s actions.

“There were people saying, ‘Really? You’re going to do this to her? Y’all have to take her somewhere private where she’s not out in the public and everyone can see her,’” Shelbi said.

Eventually mother and daughter were told they were free to go, without being offered an explanation by TSA screeners.

In a statement regarding the incident, the TSA wrote:

“We are sensitive to the concerns of passengers who were not satisfied with their screening experience and we invite those individuals to provide feedback to TSA through a variety of channels.”

“We work to balance those concerns with the very real threat that our adversaries will attempt to use explosives to carry out attacks on planes.”

Whether they are touching up toddlers in wheelchairs, humiliating cancer victims, or removing diapers from sick grannies rest assured that the TSA is keeping you safe America. Keeping you safe from the dangerous terrorists that hate your freedoms.

Article from Infowars.com

“San Antonio police Deputy Chief Anthony Trevino appeared Monday in Austin before the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee,” reports KHOU.

“The San Antonio Express-News reports Trevino urged legislators to allow law officers to stop drivers and do routine sobriety tests near so-called drinking-and-driving “hot spots.” He says local data could be used to identify areas where such behavior is prevalent.”

Jim Harrington of the Texas Civil Rights Project opposed the idea, saying sobriety checkpoints allow for police abuse of power. The measure is expected to be debated by legislators in January.

The notion of permanent DWI checkpoints where police can pull over any vehicle at any time under the justification of catching drunk drivers is anathema to the 4th Amendment, which protects “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.”

Given the fact that San Antonio is one of a number of cities across the country which enforces “no refusal” blood-draws against people police suspect of driving under the influence, Texans could find themselves with a needle stuck in their arm simply for exercising their right to mobility.

Attorney Jamie Balagia has described the blood-draw controversy as a “ridiculous trampling of our Constitution,” labeling it “un-American”.

Although America is referred to as the “land of the free,” it is increasingly being littered with checkpoints that are remolding the country into something more akin to the Soviet Union than a bastion of liberty.

The ACLU has dubbed a 100-mile area in-land from the border as the “Constitution-free Zone,” noting that 2 out of 3 Americans live within this buffer zone – around 190 million people in total. Americans in these areas are forced to answer questions when they drive through Border Patrol checkpoints. Many are standing up for their 4th amendment rights by refusing to answer such questions.

The TSA has also announced that it will conduct “security assessments” on highways having already set up checkpoints on interstate roads in Tennessee last year. The federal agency was responsible for over 9,000 checkpoints across the United States in 2011.

Reprinted from Infowars.com

Information Liberation – Oklahoma motorists are guilty until proven innocent. Police in Tulsa set up a checkpoint to catch motorists who were driving without insurance, or even simply driving without proof of insurance. Those caught driving without insurance had their cars towed, while those without proof of insurance got fined a whopping $250 for not having their papers in order. Unfortunately, scams like these are popping up everywhere these days as police are desperate for cash and local governments are reluctant to raise taxes with the economy in the trash (incidentally, the economy is in the trash because of the very same government).

Via Newson6.com:

Oklahoma is cracking down on uninsured drivers by testing a new method in Tulsa. The Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office set up an insurance checkpoint in west Tulsa overnight Saturday. Deputies were there until 3 a.m. making sure drivers had proof of insurance. Violators received $250 ticket, and those with zero insurance had their cars towed.