KNOW YOUR RIGHTS AND USE THEM OR LOOSE THEM

Video: Border Patrol Rips Innocent Family Out Of Car

This is what it looks like to live in a police state

by Steve Watson | Infowars.com | March 18, 2015

In a shocking incident caught on video, Border Patrol agents in California forcefully pulled a man out of his car and drove off with his distressed wife and 4-year-old son simply because he refused to tell them where he was driving to.

The footage, taken from Rick Herbert’s dashboard cam, begins with his son singing songs in the backseat and ends with the child screaming in distress as thug agents rifle through the vehicle.

Driving through the checkpoint 35 miles north of El Centro, east of San Diego, Herbert was stopped and asked “Where are you going today?” to which he replied that he did not have to answer that question.

The border agent then immediately attempted to open the car door, which was locked. He then reached through the window, inside the vehicle and unlocked the door.

“Get your hands out of my vehicle, this is assault!” Herbert cried, asking “What is your reasonable suspicion?”

Herbert was then asked to state his citizenship, to which he replied he is a US citizen.

The agents then asked to look in the trunk for “anything illegal.”

“I do not consent to any searches or seizures,” said Herbert, citing protections under the Fourth Amendment. He then asked the agent several more times to explain what the reasonable suspicion was for asking him to step out of the vehicle.

The agent then grabbed him by the arm and and attempted to pull him out of the car, despite the fact that Herbert was strapped in with a seatbelt.

“Hey, dude, stop, I got to unbuckle my seatbelt first,” Herbert told him. “You’re being recorded, just so you know.”

“I know I am,” replied the agent, declaring “I’m not doing nothing against policy.”

“Yeah you are, I’m going to sue the sh*t out of you.” Herbert told the agent.

The agent then slammed Herbert against the back window and cuffed him, right in full view of his distressed child. Another agent then got into the car and drove it to a different area with Herbert’s distraught family still inside.

The footage becomes difficult to watch when the agent attempts to extract the innocent boy and he cries “no, no, I don’t like you.”

The Border Patrol issued the following statement regarding the incident:

On March 12, 2015, at around 10:54 am, the driver of a Chevrolet Cavalier approached the El Centro Sector Highway 86 checkpoint where a Border Patrol K-9 detection team produced a positive alert to the vehicle for contraband. Because of this alert for contraband, the male driver was directed by agents to the secondary inspection area for a more thorough examination of the car. The man failed to follow the agents directions to drive to secondary and was removed from the vehicle. Agents searched the vehicle and discovered a small testable amount of marijuana under the driver’s seat. The California Highway Patrol was called to the scene where an CHP officer conducted a roadside sobriety test on the driver as a precaution. The driver was eventually released without any charges.

In an email to police watchdog website photographyisnotacrime.com, Herbert verified that he was detained for some time and led to believe that he was being charged, before eventually just being released.

“I was arrested, fingerprinted and forced to sit on a bench inside for over an hour then let outside to do a field sobriety test conducted by CHP and then brought back inside until I was free to go.” Herbert writes.

“I was also told I was being arrested for a ‘testable amount of Marijuana at a federal checkpoint’ there was no Marijuana in our possession. He told me I am being charged and released and that charge would be on my criminal record permanently.” Herbert added.

The incident serves as a reminder of how the rights of everyday Americans are being violated en mass every day.

Using the excuse of attempting to apprehend illegal immigrants, Border Patrol agents have set up a network of internal checkpoints inside the United States. As InfoWars has documented, in some cases the checkpoints are as much as 100-200 miles from the border.

Despite what a Supreme Court ruling says, since the checkpoints are situated far away from the Mexican border, they are clearly a violation of the Fourth Amendment, which protects, “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” Of course, the Supreme Court also once ruled that black people in America were slaves.

The ACLU has dubbed the area in which the checkpoints have been positioned as the “Constitution-free Zone,” noting that 2 out of 3 Americans live within this buffer zone – around 190 million people in total.

There is no law that says refusing to comply with Border agents and/or police at such checkpoints gives probable cause to search an individual’s vehicle. It certainly does not provide probable cause for agents to force their way into vehicles, particularly if the occupants are not being aggressive or confrontational in any way.

This is just the latest in a series of confrontations caught on video showing Americans standing up to the checkpoints.

Being routinely stopped at a permanent checkpoint close to 200 miles away from the border by Homeland Security agents, one freedom loving American decided enough was enough recently and stood up to them on video. The self declared “free roamer” was laughed at by the agents before being sent on his way.

Last year, a man in Texas was dragged from his vehicle by border patrol agents who smashed through his window after he refused to answer their questions at a checkpoint more than 50 miles away from the Southern border.

(The exchange with the agents begins at around 6 mins into the video)

InfoWars previously reported on the case of Steven Anderson, who refused to show his papers at another Border Patrol checkpoint while traveling through California.

Anderson provided a sterling example of how to stand up for your rights in such a situation. When Border Patrol agents attempted to detain him for questioning, Anderson refused, citing his right as an American citizen to “go free on my way.”

In another incident in 2012, a truck driver who passed through a checkpoint in Texas, 30 miles from the Mexican border, stood up for his Fourth Amendment rights by refusing to answer questions and eventually driving away.

These videos and hundreds of others like them accentuate the fact that Americans are not required to answer Border agents’ questions (usually starting with “Are you a United States citizen?”). Nor are Americans required to consent to any searches at such checkpoints.

Visit www.checkpointusa.org/blog to learn more about this program. By actively “flexing” their rights, these brave citizens expose the techniques DHS and Border Patrol agents (and police in general) use to trick and intimidate citizens into compliance.

Not all Americans who refuse to have their rights violated have been as successful as those in the videos above. In 2008, retired San Diego social worker Vince Peppered and his wife had their car ransacked after refusing to consent to being searched.

Alex Jones has also encountered similar “interior checkpoints” on numerous occasions, including the incident documented in the video below.

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Steve Watson is a London based writer and editor for Alex Jones’ Infowars.com, and Prisonplanet.com. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham, and a Bachelor Of Arts Degree in Literature and Creative Writing from Nottingham Trent University.