As most of my readers know I try to keep posts here related to Colorado in at least a tentative way, however I am beginning to really fear for a distant activist named Sam Dodson, and want to spread his story a bit further.
Sam lives in New Hampshire, he moved there from Texas as part of the free state project and has been part of several great activist projects including Kopbusters, where a small group of people lead by Barry Cooper did a drug raid sting on the cops and got the whole thing on film. He is also a once a week co-host on my favorite radio program/podcast free talk live.
Sam was arrested a month ago for a non-crime, he was filming in a courthouse lobby (legal in NH) and was ordered to stop. Sam knew he was not committing any crime and told the officers as much. This infuriated the officers and they hauled him off to jail in handcuffs. Because Sam was right, he has not been charged with any crime related to his initial offense (filming at a courthouse). Instead he has been charged with several offenses for actions that took place after the arrest (resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, and refusing to be processed). A real criminal is arrested and charged for a crime and then sometimes has charges like those Sam has tacked on (i.e. bank robbery + resisting arrest). Sam on the other hand has not been charged with any initial offense, and only for supposed offenses that happened after the cops arrested him.
After Sam was arrested he decided to exercise his right to remain silent in the most extreme fashion, he refused to identify himself. The judge ordered he remain in jail until such time as he identified himself. That was over a month ago. The police know who he is and what his name is, they have fingerprinted Sam and he can receive mail at the jail under his name, however they continue to hold him without a trial because he has never voluntarily stated his name. At this point there is no reason to delay charging him and moving through the process.
The reason I am becoming very worried about this man is that he has been fasting since he was arrested and at first he would drink milk mixed with 1/3rd of an instant breakfast mix, but now he has switched to only drinking water. He was extremely thin to begin with and does not have a lot of reserves to burn through. I am extremely scared he is going to harm himself by sticking to his guns, and not even accomplish his main goal, which is to shed light on the violence that surrounds the government, and the fact that they just make stuff up and call it a law, and then by the time they realize they were wrong the damage is already done to the victim of the abusive state.
Most will say that Sam is not acting in a reasonable fashion and I have heard him being accused of acting immaturely, but at this point I believe the Judge who is keeping him locked up without trial for an indefinite amount of time is the one who is acting immaturely and unreasonably. There is no reason to let this continue, they know who Sam is and there is no reason not to charge him and set a court date and bail. Judge Burke and Sam are at a standoff at this point, and if the Judge has any compassion he will not let more harm to come to Sam and will back down from his initial order to hold Sam without trial until he voluntarily gives up his name. This is not about the law, but about power and submission and needs to end right now, Judge Burke needs to act like a man of the law and ensure that the punishment fits the crime, and in this case the punishment has far exceeded any “crimes” Sam has committed.
Here is a video about the incident, when it was made Sam was still drinking Milk.
Here are a couple of links for those interested in helping or learning more.
http://freesamdodson.com/
The place to go to help
http://www.freestateproject.org
The Free State Project
Posted by: Keith | May 16, 2009 at 09:09 PM
I grew upo just south of Keen in Northfield, MA, not sure how wise it is to get involved with these guys.
Posted by: Shawn | May 16, 2009 at 09:31 PM
Shawn, why do you say that?
Posted by: Charlie | May 17, 2009 at 08:50 AM
Shawn, You don't have to get involved in the situation to simply see a man in jail, starving himself, for no real reason.
Sam is starving himself until the judge releases him, and the judge has no real reason to continue holding him as the judge knows exactly who Sam is.
Personally I believe the whole thing was handled incorrectly from the beginning, I think the only two legitimate options the government should have pursued was to either let Sam film, or remove him from the premise, I don't believe jail should have ever been on the table for filming in a courthouse lobby, and a month in jail is extremely unreasonable.
Posted by: severin | May 17, 2009 at 10:09 AM
Clearly everything they get themselves into seems to be handled poorly, probably illegally.
My point is, Keene NH, was always seen as a little "off". Probably not the best place to be pushing the envelope of the local authorities. I'm more anti-authority then the next person, but these folks seem to be getting themselves in more trouble than the average group. They seem overly adept in finding the loopholes that work against them.
Wouldn't running for office and getting involved in changing the local government be a better approach then taunting and annoying the current powers that be?
Posted by: Shawn | May 18, 2009 at 07:01 AM
Sam will have starved to death before libertarians who want to see him released are elected to some sort of government position where they will have the ability force Sam's release. You can take a political approach, but in this case the only real solution is to put pressure on the sitting judge to release him.
Posted by: severin | May 18, 2009 at 05:29 PM
While he is most likely unjustly detained, he is being an idiot for not providing his name. Even POWs give their name, rank and serial number when detained (back when there were humane captors)...
Instead of proving how the government is corrupt, he is proving WHY the fringe elements of the right believe the government is ripe with abuse. Believe it or not, most rational people do NOT have run-ins like this with the government...
Posted by: Jeff | July 19, 2009 at 09:51 PM
Your right most rational people do not have run ins with the government like this, because they are willing to submit to every petty and corrupt order given by the government. They pay every silly tax, they obey every petty rule, if they are pulled over and a cop asks them to do the hokey pokey they stick their foot out and shake it all about. They refuse to stand up to their slave masters, and being a good uncle Tom does mean that they don't get treated as poorly as the individual who says no to the master.
Posted by: severin | July 20, 2009 at 07:08 AM
Is he still starving?
Posted by: Shawn | July 20, 2009 at 03:36 PM
No, he has actually been released now. So he is eating and free at this point.
Posted by: severin | July 20, 2009 at 03:52 PM