Bakersfield DUI Defense Attorney | Anniversary of Pearl Harbor and Our Need for Vigilance

Anniversary of Pearl Harbor and Our Need for Vigilance

Posted By Richard Middlebrook on Dec 8, 2010 5:33am PST

If asked, I wonder how many people would say that they feel more attacked by their own government than by outside countries or groups.

On December 7, 1941, the Japanese began a surprise attack on our western fleet located at Pearl Harbor. A day that will live in infamy had begun. For generations, the attack has become a distant reminder to stay vigilant of attacks from the outside. But nearly 70 years later, most of us feel more onslaught from inside our own government than from any outside group or country.

From the heavy burdens of taxation to the stripping of fundamental Constitutional rights, most Americans feel most attacked internally, not externally. Our own government has continued an oppressive campaign against it's own citizenry.

While the obvious internal threats are clear (taxation, over regulation of industries, laws that take up thousands of volumes), some threats come at night while nobody is watching...in the twilight.

One of my favorite quotes:

"As nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the air - however slight - lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness." Justice Douglas

Those incursions come daily. They come with decisions small and large. Most seem insignificant at the time and only in retrospect with the light of change is it more apparent what was lost. Rights are won in huge momentous sweeps like the Revolutionary War, but are lost with one law and one legal opinion at a time.

Those rights don't just disappear. They are gently pried from good people's hands in exchange for what appear good and honorable trade offs: "security" or "regulations".

The problem is that the stripping of liberties effects everyone universally, not just those "bad" people. From decisions allowing virtually unlimited entry to your home without a warrant or even a reasonable suspicion that some illegal activity is occurring to simple falsification of documentation and records to justify the convictions of drivers accused of being under the influence, the rights of fairness and privacy are slipping away almost unnoticed.

Just yesterday, I had a member of California Highway Patrol admit that he had failed to calibrate preliminary alcohol breath testing devices for months and months. They are required to be calibrated every 10 days or 150 tests. He continued to allow those devices to be used by patrol officers who believed those devices were accurate and could be relied on to arrest drivers. The reason this was allowed: He forgot to order enough calibration solution and it took months to get new batches.

What does that mean? It means that machines that wouldn't be admissible in court were being used to arrest people and the only person who knew this, told nobody. Hundreds of people were arrested based on results from inadmissible machines.

Need more? The Kern County District Attorney's Crime Lab has a policy of backing up chemical test results regularly from the hard drive to a back up drive. The two forensic alcohol analyst charged with that responsibility simply "forgot" to do so...for eight months. When the lab hard drive failed and was unrecoverable, thousands of test results and data supporting them, simply disappeared.

The analysts admitted their error to their supervisor, who told the lab chief. He of course reported it to his supervisor at the Kern County District Attorney's Office asking them to tell "anyone" who would need to know; implicitly he meant the defendants and their representatives. This was important. It meant the District Attorney did not have the necessary evidence to admit chemical test results in hundreds and hundreds of cases. This would mean possible reduced penalties or dismissals of cases.

How many defendants were notified? NONE. How many attorneys were told? NONE! How did we find out? Internal memorandum produced in discovery responses that took years to obtain.

Hundreds of people were railroaded into pleas where the evidence had simply disappeared due to lab misconduct and malfeasance and it was disclosed to nobody until nearly two years later. This was well after all those cases had been pled or gone to trial.

This is your government at work. One that believes the ends (those ends that they deem socially, morally and ethically acceptable) justify the means. We must be vigilant or the twilight will close into darkness before you even notice the change occurring.

If you aren't a DUI driver, why worry? Because if falsifcation of records is overlooked here, it is permissible to be overlooked everywhere. In the valuation on your home and the property taxes you pay. On tax returns and audits. On licensing authorizations. On internal bidding for projects and contracts. If the courts allow these errors as simple "mistakes" to justify the admissiblity of results without support, then those rights are stripped forever in all governmental "mistakes".

Be vigilant!

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