Friends,
I share J.J. Johnson's outrage. Unfortunately, we have seen
over the last few years a transition from "peace officers" to
"law enforcement officers". The self description of police
today also accurately describes the difference between
police in America (peace officers) and police in Nazi Germany
(law enforcement officers) 60 years ago. Today, Hitler would
be proud of American "law enforcement officers".
Jim Hardin
The Freedom Page
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Republic USA
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New Mexico Bus Driver -
Latest Victim of Gun War Speaks OutDespite lack of assistance from any gun organization, he plans to fight to the end.
By J.J. Johnson - Published: 01.17.01
What makes the victimization of Alex Gonzales so frightening is how a bad situation can snowball on you. For this law-abiding firearms enthusiast, it all started weeks ago with nosy neighbors at a home owner's association. Today, the Gonzales family of Albuquerque, New Mexico sits near homelessness, with Alex's entire arsenal taken from him.
Alex has a wife, and two children - ages 5 and 7. He has a clean criminal record, and is a bus driver for the City of Albuquerque. And, he likes to go shooting on the Mesa. He is part of the gun culture. Over the last nine months his job driving a bus caused him to leave the house at different hours than the rest of his wonderful, caring neighbors of the West Mesa Neighborhood Association. One of them, a 75-year old woman with at least three eye surgeries (for cataracts) was so caring that she decided it was time to keep an eye on Gonzales. "She thought I was selling drugs", Gonzales told Sierra Times.
A few weeks later at the Neighborhood Association Meeting, the dates and times he left his house were neatly written down by his "caring neighbor" and her assistant, both of whom live across the street from Gonzales. "When they presented me with this, they accused me of dealing drugs because of my work hours. So I called my job and had them fax my recent work schedule over. I showed that to them," Gonzales said.
But the nosy neighbor(s) weren't buying it.
Flash forward to December 31, 2000. Alex Gonzales admits setting off a few firecrackers around 10:00 pm that night for the children. "I knew people would be shooting at midnight, and I didn't want my kids around that", he noted. Then he and his wife, his brother and brother-in-law decided to try to win that $500 jackpot at the Sandia Casino on the nearby Indian reservation. As usual on their nights out, they'd leave the children under the watchful eye of their next door neighbor. Pretty safe, considering the nearest police precinct is only three blocks away.
Keep that in mind - only three blocks away.
As per usual, ringing in the New Year in many places in America means field-testing some of that Second Amendment hardware - in unison. According to Gonzales, the police were ordered to stay in during those hours for safety reasons. Go figure.
This is when the mess all started.
According to Albuquerque Police Department Sgt. Paul Romero, they were called from three blocks away shortly after midnight on New Years' Day by that wonderful, caring, 75-year old neighbor who had the THREE eye surgeries on a complaint of hearing and seeing shots fired in the West Mesa Neighborhood.
She saw Gonzales in the parking lot of their eight-unit apartment complex firing several guns in the air over a period of 30 minutes, Romero said.
"He would empty one weapon, go back inside and get another, and fire that one until that one was empty, go back and get another," according to Sergeant Romero, who's had a history with Alex Gonzales.
But if you've been following this, you'll recall that Gonzales (and his adult family members) were at the San Dea Casino.
Nevada residents and regular casino visitors all know that in any casino, there are almost as many security cameras as there are slot machines. The Sandia Casino is no exception. "But the casino will not release the tapes for security reasons," Gonzales told Sierra Times.
Nevertheless, after the cops got the New Year's call about shots being fired, they chose to ignore the drunk drivers and look in to this serious problem. The police admit finding nothing - not even signs of Alex Gonzales.
But in the American tradition of being innocent until proven otherwise, Alex Gonzales was served with a warrant 10 days later - based on the information given by two neighbors - who OF COURSE, had no comment for Sierra Times.
"I had just got home from work at about 7:00 am," Gonzales said. "They waited until eight (when the warrant took effect,) then asked me to come outside to check out a broken window that I had called about the other day."
Once lured outside, he was met at gunpoint by 2 male and 2 female officers in street uniforms.
Having no idea what was going on, Gonzales was told that a warrant had been issued. Then he was "arrested," and handcuffed. Alex asked for names. "We are not at liberty," they said.
Gonzales said the police did holster their hardware once inside the home. There were children inside. According to Gonzales, while ransacking the house, they told the children nice, comforting words like, "SHUT UP!", "DON'T TALK" and "YOU CAN EAT AFTER WE LEAVE!" and spoke of course, as if they were trying to get the children's attention - from a quarter mile away. Others outside heard this as well.
While you're digesting the horror the Gonzales Family is going through at this time, we should remind the reader that Gonzales has no criminal record, does not deal drugs, has a stellar record with his employer, and all firearms were purchased via the cute little yellow ATF form called 4473. And they were all in a locked Hallmark Home Security Safe. And if any of you are asking those stereotypical questions in the back of your head based on this victim's last name - he was born in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Read on...
Due to a minor domestic case that was settled amicably back in March of 1999, Alex had his firearms confiscated before, but beat the charges in court and got them all back. From there, one could safely conclude that there may be bad blood left over. There is. Back when this minor incident happened, Gonzales' firearms were all catalogued in a database.
That's why most of them showed up on the warrant for the taking on Jan 10th.
Since the safe was locked, Albuquerque's finest asked for the safe key - well, not exactly. "Give us the keys or we'll just rip the whole thing outta here!" is how they asked according to Gonzales. And yeah, they pretty much trashed the place something good: "They ransacked the apartment, tearing pictures off walls and ripping through videocassettes.
"It was ridiculous," he said. "All the neighbors saw it. Those neighborhood association people were taking pictures. The cops had me sitting in handcuffs. We couldn't use the restroom. We couldn't talk. We couldn't ask any questions. I couldn't even talk to my kids!"
Family traumatized? Of course. Rights violated? "Tell it to the Judge" was all he was told by those wonderful guardians of a free society called Albuquerque Police. After this little law enforcement action, the cuffs were removed, and he was told that he was being "un-arrested". But it gets worse.
The landlord, due to the pressure put on by the neighborhood association gang and his colleagues (he's also in law enforcement,) gave the Gonzales family an eviction notice over the whole thing. They now sit in wonder of what will happen to them next. For this incident, they are about to be - in effect - homeless.
Did we mention that Alex Gonzales has NOT been charged with a crime?
Part of the key evidence, are the .308 caliber brass shells found near the home that night. Police say that's the gun that was being fired - according to reports.
Now, as lawyers do, Gonzales's attorney did not want the list of firearms removed from the home for public review. Sierra Times will respect that wish, but we can safely say that among the firearms, magazines, ammunition, and even his son's paintball gun and a pellet gun that doesn't even fire, no .308 caliber weapon was among the police's bounty.
As for the final insult, the Gonzales' received no calls of encouragement from any pro-Second Amendment organizations or any words of support. Only two other calls from local media until Sierra Times. Still he is fighting this. "I will fight this to the end. My Constitutional rights have been violated!" he said.
And when the court battle starts, Sierra Times will be there as well.
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