People are hung up on about 4-5 different red herrings. Like the status of the teeth - are they removeable or permanent? That the person is a drug-dealer, although never convicted as one. And a few other things things like complaining about the label of "nazi" and whether or not it is appropriate. They also justify the tyrannical Nazi-style acts of the State based soley on the low character of the accused.
I think that a lot of Americans are very uncomfortable with confronting the issue here. That the State actually possesses such motives and desires.
For those of you with reading comprehension issues, let me assist:
Talk about taking a bite out of crime — government lawyers are trying to remove the gold-capped teeth known as "grills" or "grillz" from the mouths of two men facing drug charges.
For starters, we are not calling the cops "nazis"..but instead the State (not as in State like FL, but as in government). The government lawyers are the representatives of the State. They want the teeth.
"I've been doing this for over 30 years and I have never heard of anything like this," said Richard J. Troberman, a forfeiture specialist and past president of the Washington Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. "It sounds like Nazi Germany when they were removing the gold teeth from the bodies, but at least then they waited until they were dead."
This is the guy that called it Nazi-like. He is a lawyer, with 30 years experience and is appauled by this move. We echoed his ideas.
According to documents and lawyers involved in the case in U.S. District Court, Flenard T. Neal Jr. and Donald Jamar Lewis, charged with several drug and weapon violations,
Charged, NOT convicted. Big difference.
were taken on Tuesday from the Federal Detention Center to the U.S. marshal's office, where they were told the government had a warrant to seize the grills.
The government wants the grills. They issued a warrant for them. They do not care (at this point in time) whether or not they are permanent or removeable. That is irrelevent, the key here is the movtivation and desire of the State. To seize parts of one's body.
Before being put into a vehicle to be taken to a dentist in Seattle,
If they were removeable, you'd think they'd just yank them in the detention facility. It seems to me that they figured out that they were not, so they needed a dentist to remove them. That is how DETERMINED they were to get the grills.
they called their lawyers, who were able to halt the seizure, said Miriam Schwartz, Neal's public defender. A permanent stay of the seizure order was signed Tuesday by U.S. Magistrate J. Kelley Arnold, court documents show.
Miracle. I guess the entire system isn't tyrannical just yet. I think this is more of "getting caught with fingers in the cookie jar" ...Being that the representatives of the State wanted to seize the teeth, and that a Judge issued a warrant to do it. That again shows that their motive was clear. Only after a stink was made about it by the defense attorney did they reverse themselves.
Grills, popularized by rappers such as Nelly, are customized tooth caps made of precious metals and jewels which can cost thousands of dollars for a full set. Some can be snapped onto the teeth like an orthodontic retainer, and others are permanently bonded to the teeth.
Neal and Lewis have permanently bonded grills, their lawyers said, declining to provide more description.
This doesn't matter.
Government lawyers who asked a federal judge on March 29 to order confiscation of the grills said they did not know the caps had been bonded to the drug defendants' teeth.
"Asset forfeiture is a fairly routine procedure, and our attorneys were under the impression that these snapped out like a retainer," said Emily Langlie, a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office in Seattle.
Really? then why were they off to the Dentist's office? Removable one's should be easily taken care of during the body-cavity seach prior to incarceration.
Once the government understood that removal of the grills could damage the defendants' teeth, they abandoned the seizure attempt, she said.
Oh yeah right. If it were a retainer, it wouldn't cause damage being that they'd be easily removable. Otherwise it is permanent, so much so, a denist was set up to remove them.
Are they going to have us believe that the same Nazi-thugs who want to seize teeth actually care about the well being of these accused people's real teeth?
Schwartz and Zenon Peter Olbertz, Lewis' lawyer, criticized what they said was a clandestine attempt to have the grills removed.
That's exactly what it was. The government tried to pull a fast one and have a dentist remove the permanent grills. When they got caught, they backed down and made excuses and played dumb.
Folks, that's your tax dollars hard at work.
