Thao Alleges Prosecutorial Misconduct, Desantis Pardons Pandemic Crimes, Montana Challenges CRT

Chauvin/Floyd Officer Tou Thao’s defense lawyer files a motion alleging serious governmental misconduct in the Chauvin Trial! Florida Governor Ron Desantis offers pardons for all pandemic related crimes. Montana State Superintendent of Schools asks the Attorney General for clarification on Critical Race Theory instruction in state schools. And more! Join criminal defense lawyer Robert F. Gruler in a discussion on the latest legal, criminal and political news, including:​

• Chauvin Co-Defendant Tou Thao’s defense lawyer files a Motion for Sanctions for Prosecutorial Misconduct!​
• Thao is alleging the government tampered with government witness Dr. Andrew Baker, pressuring him into changing his testimony.​
• The Defense is alleging that Dr. Mitchell called Dr. Baker and told him that “neck compression has to be the diagnosis”. ​
• We review the motion and the request for sanctions, including what defense lawyer Robert M. Paule is requesting.​
• Journalist Michael Tracey investigates COVID/pandemic related arrests conducted by police in Newark, NJ and the numbers are revealing.​
• Police issued thousands of citations and summonses for pandemic related crimes like “failing to maintain 6’” and others.​
• Support Michael Tracey at https://mtracey.substack.com/p/new-documents-show-police-charged​
• Meanwhile, Governor Ron Desantis of Florida promises reprieve for all those charged with COVID crimes.​
• Desantis also granted clemency to Mike and Jill Carnevale, gym owners who were arrested four times.​
• The Florida reprieve will be extended to mask and social distancing crimes and violations.​
• Elsie Arntzen, Montana Public Schools Superintendent, asks the State Attorney General for further guidance on instructing critical race theory in schools.​
• Does Critical Race Theory violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964? Of the Equal Protection Clause? Is this appropriate for schools?​
• Christopher F. Rufo and his legal foundation continue to fight Critical Race Theory on First Amendment Grounds: https://twitter.com/realchrisrufo/status/1392622115434553345​
• Your questions from Locals.com after each segment!​

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Transcript

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Speaker 1 0:00

Hello, my friends. And welcome back to yet. Another episode of watching the Watchers alive. My name is Robert ruler. I am a criminal defense attorney right here at the RNR law group and the always beautiful and sunny Scottsdale Arizona, where my team and I over the course of many years have represented thousands of good people facing criminal charges. And throughout our time in practice, we have seen a lot of problems with our justice system. I'm talking about misconduct involving the police. We have prosecutors behaving poorly. We have judges not particularly interested in a little thing called justice, and it all starts with the politicians, the people at the top, the ones who write the rules and pass the laws that they expect you and me to follow, but sometimes have a little bit of difficulty doing so themselves. That's why we started this show called watching the Watchers so that together with you

Speaker 2 0:47

More help , we can shine that beautiful spotlight

Speaker 1 0:52

Of accountability and transparency back down upon our very system with the hope of finding justice. And we're grateful that you are here in with us today. We've got a lot to get into we're getting back into the Derek Shovan case because his co-defendant tau is now alleging that there was some prosecutorial misconduct going on. That's a big deal. That's a big allegation. Anytime the defense comes out and says that the prosecution did something that was intentionally malevolent, that was sort of an evil thing to do. That's a huge problem. And it's not an allegation that people just throw around lightly. So the fact that tau thous attorney is now making this claim is a big deal. So we're going to go through that motion. I want to show you the actual document that was submitted, then the government responded. So the same prosecutors that we watched throughout the Shovan trial, they responded they're going, what, what are you talking about? Because there was , they're saying that there was no prosecutorial misconduct, big claim. And they're talking specifically about some misconduct involving Dr. Baker, which one was the governors of the government's own witness that came in and did the autopsy on George Floyd and testified about it. So he key witness there claiming that there was some misconduct, the defense attorneys want sanctions on this thing. So we got to break that down. Then we're going to change gears. We're going to talk about this. This COVID really COVID criminal law is been something that is sort of this new evolution that we hadn't, I wasn't expecting on a criminal lawyer. We do a lot of criminal law. Didn't ever think that there would be a new category of crimes. I know we have alcohol crimes and drug crimes and sex crimes, but now we have pandemic crimes. Now we just have people that get charged with crimes because of no social distancing or were not wearing their masks. And so there's a journalist by the name of Michael Tracy, a good follow over on Twitter or somebody who does very good work. And he did a deep dive on some police arrest numbers out of Newark, New Jersey. So I want to go through that. He wrote a nice little piece over on sub stack. Pretty sure he made that free. So we're going to go through it. And he goes through any details exactly how many arrests were made for these different pandemic crimes. So kind of interesting numbers. I mean, law enforcement really went into hyperdrive to make arrests and to round people up for not following the Fowchee rules or whatever. So that is an interesting story. Then we're going to change gears and we're going to talk about what's actually happening in Florida because governor Ron DeSantis sort of doing the opposite of this, we know that in some cities and locations, that the governors and , uh , and , and police departments, police forces are rounding people up for, I don't know , going to church and things like that. Not so much here anymore, that's taking place in Canada, but it was a problem here. And while , while some jurisdictions like in Newark, New Jersey, while they are rounding everybody up, other jurisdictions like Florida are saying that they're going to part in and actually grant reprieve for anybody who was charged with a COVID violation back during the pandemic. So big, you know, Roundup of applause for DeSantis on that. You know, we don't want people being charged with crimes unnecessarily, the hand of a massive bureaucratic power, hungry power , mad government. So definitely a good move. Happy to see that. Of course, we want to break that down then for our last segment, we're going to talk a little bit more about critical race theory, because this is a bubbling topic that is a sort of festering around the country. We're going to change gears. We're going to talk about what's going on in Montana, Montana school superintendent Elsie Aaronson R a R N T Z E N is the school superintendent. And she came out and she sent a letter over to the state attorney general, basically asking for some guidance on critical race theories and it's instruction in school asking, Hey, you know , if you want us to go and teach this stuff, we got to find out, is this in violation of, I don't know, the civil rights act of 1964 is what you're asking me to do a violation of some sort of law, because it sounds like you're telling me to go in here and teach a bunch of racially charged concepts to certain demographics. Sounds like that might be in violation of federal law. Can you give us some guidance on this thing? So send a letter over there and we're going to see what comes back as a result of that. Now this is something that of course is taking place in Montana, but we're seeing this bubble up all around the country. So we've got a lot to get into. And if you want to be a part of the show, the place to do that is by heading over to watching the watchers.locals.com, which is our community over there, where you can support the show and be a part of some upcoming events. We've got a Saturday, May 22nd event coming up. That's going to be next weekend for our virtual meetup, for the watching the Watchers community. And then we have law enforcement interaction training. That's going to be taking place on June 12th, so you can sign up for that stuff over at our watching the Watchers community. And you can also participate in the show. So as we're about to go through the slides in the show, you can ask questions, leave comments, log criticisms, whatever you would like to do, send it over there because miss faith is clipping those. And she's going to add those to my slides. And so let's go ahead and get into the news. Derek Shovan is back in the news alongside with his co-defendant tau . If you remember the four officers that were there during the incident back in may of 2020 involving George Floyd, that was, there were four of them. And so we've been following their cases along for some time of, we know Derek Shovan

Speaker 3 5:58

Was convicted. He has not been sentenced yet at this time, but he is going to be sentenced here at the end of June. Now, as his case is rounding to a close, we still have the three co-defendants, the three other officers who were there at the scene. One of them goes by the name of tau . And so we're going to be talking about him because his defense attorney today submitted a very interesting motion alleging that the government, the prosecutors, the same prosecution, the same office that was in charge of convicting Derek Shovan, they're claiming that they were involved in misconduct, that there was some sort of malfeasance taking place there that involved Dr. Baker of course, is the witness that for the government who came out and did the autopsy for George Floyd. So they're saying that there was some back and forth between the prosecution and Mr. Baker, Dr. Baker, that led to a changing of an opinion that ultimately wound up hurting their Shovan . So very, very provocative stuff. Now we're going to get to that. We're going to actually go through the article, but before we do, I want to show you another ruling that came out today. Judge Cahill. You remember the judge that we have been following along during the Shovan trial, he came out today and is actually granting a continuance for the three other officers. And so on frame this out just a little bit better, if you were called Derek Shovan was charged with the three counts, essentially murdering George Floyd. The other three officers were charged with crimes for aiding and abetting Derek Shovan. So we needed Derek Chauvin's case to complete first so that we could then determine whether or not to move forward with the criminal charges against the other officers, if Shovan would have been acquitted. Well, then there was no crime there and there's nothing to aid in a bet from the other officers. So naturally this is sort of, you know, th th the , the natural progression of cases Chauvin's convicted, then we're going to change gears and focus on the other officers. So now we're there. And the question is that that's before the court is, well, did Derek Shovan get a fair trial? I mean, did this happen in a fair and impartial manner? We know that the whole thing was a circus for a very long time, including during the trial right in the middle of it. And we saw a media spectacle, we saw Maxine waters, we saw $27 million settlement. We saw another shooting involving Dante, right . And Kim Potter. And the list goes on and on. I mean, nobody can say that this wasn't without spectacle, because there was a spectacle virtually every day of the trial. So the question then is, well, if Derek Shovan, didn't get a fair trial, or if he did get a fair trial, what do we do about these other officers? Let , let me, let me be a little bit more artful with that. We're saying currently the, the court is saying that Derek Shovan did get a fair trial, that , that they could hold it in the venue that they did in Minneapolis, under the exact circumstances that it was held and that there was nothing wrong with that. Right? Cause if they come and admit that there was something wrong, well, then that's going to open the door for appeals and post-conviction relief and all that stuff. So the court and the government, they're going to say Nope, by the book, nothing went wrong here. So the defense is now going to have to try to open that door to crack that nut a little bit. So now we're asking the question, all right, we went through Derek Shovan, what can

Speaker 1 8:56

We do for these other officers to maybe make it a little more fair, a little bit less ,

Speaker 4 9:00

Uh , partial. And one of the things that the judge

Speaker 1 9:04

Did today is actually delay the trial. So granted a continuance because it's too hot right now. Same thing that we've been talking about for Derek . Shovan why didn't the judge change the venue. That was a very common question. But the other question that I had is why didn't the judge just continue it out, push it back another year. And we've seen press. I mean, we see this all the time. We see that the Parkland shooting, which is a little bit more complicated case is something that happened. I think back in 2018, still have not had a trial on that. George Floyd was a 2020 case and we already had the trial it's already done. Hadn't even been a year yet done in closed. So why did the court force it to happen so quickly? And if they did, was that the wrong thing to do now? It kind of looks like it might be because the judge, according to the New York times is delaying the trial for the other judges. So you can see that here. Let me just read through this, the delay in the trial of the three officers who were charged with the aiding and abetting of second degree murder allows for separate federal case against the officers to move forward. So in Minneapolis, the trial of three former Minneapolis police officers charging the death of George Floyd had been delayed several months to allow for a federal case against the officers to move forward. The decision was announced. So you see what's happening here, right? They they're saying,

Speaker 4 10:16

Saying that they're sort of allowing their they're stacking

Speaker 1 10:21

These cases in a way that's going to allow the timely progression of both cases. So we're just going to delay the trial in the lower level state court case. We're going to put that on hold so that the feds can take their case and move forward with it. So they're sort of jockeying cases around which ones have priority over other cases. So that's the, that's the decision right now, according to the judge, as to why they move the case back, we go back. We see that the decision was announced on Thursday by judge Peter Cahill during a pre-trial hearing for the three officers. And so this is in this state court because it's judge Cahill comes week after weeks after another officer, Derek Shovan was convicted. The three other officers, they were scheduled to face trial on August 23rd. Now they're going to be tried in March, right? Judge Cahill said three officers face charges of aiding and abetting, second degree murder and aiding and abetting. Second degree manslaughter. The delay in the second trial will have the effect of both allowing a recently announced federal case to move forward while also putting some distance between the second trial and the enormous publicity generated by Chauvin's trial, which was livestream and shown to television networks around the world. What, and judge Cahill said, what this trial needs is some distance from all the press that has occurred, and that is going to occur this summer, which is like obvious, right? If you, if you know that if, if these three officers get the benefit of that, of some distance, why didn't Derek , Shovan get that. If you're saying that the media exposure, if you're saying that the temperature in the room is a little bit too high, and that you're going to continue the case out August all the way to March. So like another six months, why don't we do that for Shogun going to be the same critique that if it's too hot for these other officers will certainly, it was too hot for Shovan Shovan is the prime defendant. He is the number one person. So it was going to be always more tense, always more volatile in his trial versus these other officers article continues. Mr. Chauvin's conviction was handed down April 20th. About two weeks later, the department of justice announced indictments against four other officers on federal criminal charges of violating Mr. Floyd's civil rights. The indictments were not a surprise, but they were unusual, partly because Shovan had already been convicted of murder in Minnesota. Well, they want their pound of flesh as they always do. So the trial, as we're going to see here, if we look over at the court docket from Tao , you'll notice that it was actually bumped back till March 7th, 2022. So we've got a long, long way out. And you know , I'm not sure what this is going to do for Chauvin's case, but I think that naturally the defense can make the argument that they should have done the same thing in Chauvin's case. If they're going to continue this for the other officers, because it's too hot, it's too volatile. It's still a little bit too spicy to hold these trials in a way that's going to be fair and impartial. Well, Derek showman's was 10 times worse than anything else that any one of these officers did, he was the guy with the knee on Floyd's neck for nine minutes. The other guys weren't. So do they think it's going to be worse for them or better, or , or what? And if it's not going to be worse, which I think there was really no argument for then why didn't show up and get those same benefits. But you know, the court is trying to make do . And I think the judges response here was going to be that the judge couldn't have predicted anything, right? When, when the Shovan trial started, we didn't have Maxine waters jumping out parachuting into Minneapolis. We didn't have the $27 million settlement yet. Right? W w th th day one of jury selection, we didn't have the Dante right shooting. So the judge tried to keep the train on the tracks, the best he could, but the universe just kind of fell apart for Derek Shovan right in the middle of trial. So interesting stuff. Now, there is another very significant, substantial motion that is going on. I want to show you what this looks like. This is a motion for sanctions for prosecutorial misconduct, and it is stemming from witness coercion. Do you see this here in red stemming from witness coercion, this is towel foul , who is submitting this motion. His attorney is submitting it on his behalf in the state of Minnesota versus him , right? So he's a defendant. This is a criminal case going over to judge Cahill, state of Minnesota, same County County, Hennepin County. And it was filed yesterday. So very, very interesting motion asking for sanctions. We're going to , we want the court to sanction the prosecutors getting carried away here. They want you to sanction the prosecutors because there was a misconduct and it's not just regular misconduct. Like they didn't file a motion late. This is witness coercion. Whoa. That is a big, big claim. So let's see what is going on here. So you're going to notice that the first page is a notice of motion and motion. So they're notifying the court right now that this is coming up and it's very interesting. It says, please take, notice that at the next available hearing. So the next time we're in court together, we are going to move the court for a factual, finding that the testimony of Dr. Baker, if you recall, was the medical examiner who actually did the autopsy of George Floyd. They're going to say was directly and indirectly coerced by the state and its agents and for any and all appropriate sanctions resulting from ratification of said coercion by the States, Dr. Baker was directly and indirectly coerced by the state and its agents. Dr. Baker was one of the key witnesses. It was Dr. Tobin and Dr. Baker really were the two government witnesses. Remember he completed the death certificate. He was the guy who wrote , uh , you know, neck compression caused by law enforcements of duel . And you know , that language that we spent like three weeks talking about dissecting, pulling it apart, taking the letters what's going on with that one, we spent a lot of time on it. Now they're talking about this witness being directly coerced by the States

Speaker 4 15:53

Or its agents. Big

Speaker 1 15:55

Claim. Let's take a look and dive into this. So here is some factual background provided by the defense. It says Dr. Andrew Baker, that Hennepin County medical examiner conducted an autopsy of Floyd on may 26 on Tuesday, may 26, same day, Dr. Baker met with prosecuting attorneys to explain his findings

Speaker 4 16:13

From the autopsy Dr. Baker ,

Speaker 1 16:16

Conveyed that the autopsy revealed no physical evidence suggesting that Mr. Floyd died of asphyxiation during that meeting the same day of the autopsy, Mr. Floyd did not exhibit signs of petty. Uh petichiae.

Speaker 4 16:30

I don't know how , what that means,

Speaker 1 16:31

But damage to his airways or thyroid brain bleeding, bone injuries, or internal bruising, all quotes

Speaker 4 16:37

And referenced here on Friday

Speaker 1 16:39

29th. So a couple of days after that, a complaint stated that the full report of the Emmy or the medical exam was pending, but that the preliminary findings quote , revealed no physical findings that support a diagnosis of traumatic asphyxia or strangulation. See the complaint in state vs . Shovan right. So they're , they're actually going back to some court documents that were submitted at some point prior to June one, 2020 Dr. Roger Mitchell. And so remember Floyd died back in may. So June one, couple days later, former medical examiner of Washington DC read Dr. Baker's preliminary findings, Dr. Mitchell then spoke with Dr. Baker before Dr. Baker finalized his findings on June one. So this other doctor comes in and sits and meets with Dr. Baker during the conversation between Mitchell and Baker. The following transpired Dr. Mitchell quote, call Baker and said, first of all, Baker should fire his public information. Officer. Then Mitchell asked Baker what happened because Mitchell didn't think it sounded like Baker's words. Okay. This is back on June one Baker said that quote Baker said that he didn't think next neck compression played

Speaker 4 17:44

Apart. According to the

Speaker 1 17:46

Complaint over the weekend, Dr. Mitchell thought about Dr. Baker more after the phone conversation between Mitchell and Baker, Mitchell decided he was going to release an op ed critical of findings in the Washington post that Dr. Baker published there, Dr. Mitchell first called Dr. Baker to let him know the following transpired. So these two, these two people are sort of having conversations before Dr. Mitchell publishes this op-ed . He calls Dr.

Speaker 4 18:09

Baker to let them know first

Speaker 1 18:11

To let them know that he was going to be critical of Baker's findings says, quote, in this conversation, Mitchell said, you don't want to be the medical examiner who tells everyone, they didn't see what they saw. You don't want to be the smartest person in the room and be wrong. Said there was a way to articulate the cause and manner of death that ensures you are telling the truth about what you were observing and via. All of the investigation. Mitchell said, neck compression has to be in the day

Speaker 4 18:38

Diagnosis right now. Again,

Speaker 1 18:41

This is an allegation, okay, this is an official court document. You can go on the website and pull it out . The government has already responded to this. Now, I don't know if this is accurate or not, or true or not. I haven't vetted it myself. I'm not working on the case. I'm not on townhouse case. I have no idea whether this conversation happened or not. The government at this point in time seems to think that this is a bizarre claim and that there's nothing to it. So just keep that in mind, as we're reading through this, this is the defense perspective here, and it is a wild claim. We basically have Dr. Mitchell allegedly calling Dr. Baker and saying you found what you found, but you got to go back in there and say that neck compression has to be jammed in there before you release your findings. Following the two conversations on Monday, June one, the Hennepin County medical examiner issued a press release report containing the final autopsy findings. So basically that same day, they find the final autopsy findings included neck compression. This was contrary to Dr. Baker's conclusion before speaking with Dr. Mitchell twice on November 5th, the state met again with Dr. Mitchell following prosecutors were present. We have Lola Joshua Larson . We have Matthew Frank. So he was part of the trial, Aaron Eldridge , part of the trial paralegal. Diana dome was there. Corey Gordon was there. If this interview was recorded, the audio has yet to be disclosed

Speaker 4 19:56

Close to the defense. Well , Lensky director of this. All right , let's see what's going on here. Um, has yet to be disclosed to the defense. The letter was,

Speaker 1 20:07

There was a letter that was sent. It was highly inflammatory of Dr. Fowler's medical experts in his professional opinion. The letter called for immediate investigation into the practices of the physician, as well as the practice of Maryland state office, the letter, what letter are we talking about? Less than 24 hours after receiving the letter, Maryland attorney General's office announced that there should be a review of all in custody deaths produced by the office of the chief medical examiner. No discovery closed here containing Dr. Mitchell's intimidation and coercion. This includes no documentation. The state reported to Dr. Mitchell, any pertinent medical information bound for his behavior and potential criminal activity. This is bizarre. The state specifically prosecutors Lola and Matthew Frank Aaron Eldrin Corey garden knew that a potential expert witness had coerced the state's main expert witness, the only expert to perform the physical autopsy

Speaker 4 20:54

In this, in , in the case, they referenced

Speaker 1 20:57

Down here, Phillip Jackson , they have a death report filed in the Baltimore sun. The state connected with Dr. Mitchell records on when and why the state determined they would no longer use Dr. Mitchell as an expert opinion in any audio recordings of the conversations between Mitchell and the prosecutors looked like they were not disclosed. The state is required to disclose these materials to the defense under this court's discovery orders disclosing such materials would determine whether Dr. Mitchell was a state agent or actor that's , uh , uh , uh , thous due process rights are involved. Anything could be a substantial interference with his rights. The state violated the court's discovery orders. When it failed to timely disclose the memo. Prosecutors have a duty as ministers of justice. We've got all that. A lawyer is responsible for another lawyer's violation of the rules. If they have knowledge of the conduct and they ratify it, supervising attorneys are also responsible for their support and subordinates in response to the state knowledge and the ratification of Dr. Mitchell's coercion of Dr. Baker, the defense moves the court for

Speaker 4 21:54

Is what they're asking for

Speaker 1 21:56

An order dismissing the charges against that as the sole medical expert, who performed the autopsy findings that were unlawfully coerced, or in the alternative, any of the following an order requiring the state to disclose all materials relevant to the hiring and contracting of Dr. Mitchell, any audio recordings of Dr. Mitchell and communication with Dr. Baker, they want a factual finding that Mitchell coerce Baker, they want a factual finding the Mitchell coerced Fowler, a factual finding that the state ratified the coercion of the medical experts. And in order borrowing, barring the following prosecutors from participating in the trial of Val Ellison, Cattell Valasquez Larson , Matthew, Frank Eldridge, and Gordon.

Speaker 4 22:36

That's not it

Speaker 1 22:37

Folks. There's more, they also want a complaint to the Minnesota lawyers, professional responsibility board, or the Supreme court in which the ratifying attorney is licensed, or they want this court to require that everybody involved reports themselves an order requiring the state to report Dr. Mitchell to the appropriate medical boards for his ethical violation. And in order preemptively removing all potential jurors from sitting on the jury, if they acknowledge in avoid Deere , they saw red or acknowledged and open letter or open pen letter from Dr. Mitchell signed off by this attorney, Robert Paul out of Minneapolis. So yeah, those are some , uh, some very spicy claims right there. No question about it that Dr. Mitchell influenced Dr. Fowler and Dr. Baker in a way that changed their opinions before it was released. And it sounds like it happened very quickly. We have the death on may 26, then we have the autopsy takes place shortly thereafter. Then on June one, we get the final results that are released out to the public. And apparently there's some evidence somewhere that there was a conversation taking place between Dr. Mitchell in some capacity that was influential to these other doctors. And now, I don't know where this attorney is getting this information. Did

Speaker 3 23:46

Dr. Baker make that claim? Did Dr. Mitchell self report that he was coercing people? Probably not. Did Dr. Fowler make this claim? Uh , did Dr. Fowler record anything? Did Dr. Baker record anything or w what's

Speaker 4 24:00

What's going on here?

Speaker 3 24:01

Presumably this attorney, Robert Paul has some more information, so we'll wait until more comes out. Now, the government, at this point in time, they have no idea what the heck is going on. They submitted this today. They said here from the office of the attorney general Keith Ellison, the , uh , this afternoon, we received defendant thous motion for sanctions. They say , uh, the bizarre allegations offered in support of the motion are false and wrong. And we intend to file a complete response state, respectfully request a court, give us one week to file a response signed off on by Matthew Frank assistant attorney general.

Speaker 4 24:34

So there

Speaker 3 24:38

Was dumbfounded as the rest of us. Uh , what, what are you talking about? Uh, it would be highly inappropriate if it , you know , if , if the state was sort of leaning on people or using any undue pressure to cause them to make a decision one way or the other, but it is a juicy one. And I'm very curious to see where this goes, because if there is evidence, what if this attorney comes out? What if Robert Paul comes out and says, yeah, we've got recordings. In fact, Dr. Mitchell was on a phone call with Dr. Baker saying, Hey, jerk, if you don't, you don't update your medical report, your medical examination to include neck compression. Then I'm going to have repercussions coming for you, my friend, right? If there's something like that, that that's in evidence, that's a big deal. But I have a hard time believing that there is because these are professional people. They know how inappropriate that is. They also know that this is the trial or was the trial of the century, might be the trial of the century. Again, given the fact that Brandon Mitchell , uh, juror number 52, kind of botched that one. Didn't he? But that's good stuff. All right. So , uh, let's take a look@somequestionsoveratwatchingthewatchersdotlocals.com. If you want to support the show and be a part of a great upcoming, probably the biggest, best, coolest, newest community that you'll ever find. So watching the watchers.locals.com , let me introduce you to somebody who was a part of it. His name is Jeremy Machida , what's up Jeremy. He says, I'm really loving the look of the studio. It looks very pleasant, always loved to be a part of your community. It's our community, my friend, it's ours. Keep up the great work. Thank you, Jeremy. Yeah. As you'll notice a little bit of a different environment here today. So we kind of , uh, going to be bouncing around between a couple of different spots and it is different, right? The other one looks like it's kind of in a spaceship with all the blue lights and the screens and everything like on blasting off to Mars with Elon, this one's light .

Speaker 4 26:19

Okay. Let's just have a chat in this cozy little corner.

Speaker 3 26:23

How about that? Thanks Jeremy. I appreciate it. I appreciate it. You know, I get, I get a little bit self-conscious when I start playing around with this stuff, cause I have no, I , for anything faith knows this Liberty or death says too bad, judge Cahill doesn't have the power of the federal case. Do you think the federal prosecutor will attempt to have the federal case re docketed to a date before the state case? It's a good question. So you know why I don't know what , how they will prioritize those cases. Um, you know, typically typically the general rule of thumb is that the, the, the case that's kind of first in time gets priority. So in this case it would be the George Floyd case, the state-level case because they were charged before the federal civil rights charges happened. So it tipped , you know , courts don't want cases to get old. And I mean, that literally like the , the older, the case gets the more kind of , uh , anxious or IR irritated, even judges will get that. Why, why are all these cases sitting on my docket? This case is six months old, get it off my docket. Cause they, you know, they have a case volume just like the rest of us, right? An attorney might have a , you know, 70 case volume at any one time or, you know, some attorneys have significantly more than that. Some attorneys have less than that. Depends on the area of law. Judges also have a caseload . And so if their caseload starts to get too high, because there's a bunch of old cases on there, they're gonna want to boot those out. So in this case, you know, the state case has , uh , it's , uh , it's older than the federal case. And so maybe I would think that that would be get priority, but I don't know. I don't know for sure. It's going to be up to the judges. Uh , if thous motion is successful, what does that mean for Shovan? So , uh, so that would, in my opinion, that would be something more akin to what's called a post conviction relief in Arizona. We have a mechanism in the law that allows you to go back and sort of reopen the case and correct anything that would be a manifest injustice , really. So in this case, if you were able to find something like this, that was damning enough that you could say, look, man, this is so bad than it was this. This is a manifest injustice . We know. So unequivocally here that Dr. Baker's testimony was improperly influenced by Dr. Mitchell, that it actually could have caused a change in the verdict. That's a manifest error. That is something that is so unjust that they have to reopen the case in order to correct that. And so they would probably, you know, basically reorder a new trial remand that for a new trial, during a post-conviction proceeding , uh , if the motion is successful. Yeah, I think that that would be, I think that's what would happen if there was enough conclusive evidence that, that happened. Now, the reason that happens is because you don't want it to be, you don't want to give the government the benefit of sort of covering up for the misconduct until the final verdict until the jury reads the verdict, the government can then sort of go, Oh , okay. All of our corruption, we kept tucked away until that final moment. Now we can reveal it all. And so the analogy that we'll often use is let's say, you know, you get convicted of a , a DUI charge and you are arrested. You're convicted. We go to trial, we present the case. There was no alcohol. We say that this was a disconnect case. They got the wrong blood vials, whatever still convicted. And sometimes that happens, right? The jury's just convict people. We see that unfortunately too often. So this is something that now the question is, well, okay, you're convicted. Is there anything you can do about it? No, because the jury found you guilty. Well, what happens a year from now that officer who arrested you and actually impounded you and who drew the blood and who transported the blood from the van back down to the crime lab, maybe that officer is investigated for dishonesty down the road. Maybe he was swapping blood vial labels and, or he was doing something inappropriate that now makes the evidence that he had in his possession questionable. Well, what do you say to him? And all of those people who are in jail or facing criminal charges as a result of his misconduct, you got to sort of reopen those cases and the law needs a mechanism for doing that. And that's sort of what we're talking about here in Derek Chauvin's case. If he were to learn later down the line that the government was really involved in significant misconduct, the court would have essentially no choice, but to reopen the case, send it back and say, do it again because of what happened. And if the, if the misconduct was, was serious, enough was sanctionable enough was , was conduct. That was egregious enough. Yeah. One of the sanctions could be that the government doesn't get to bring the charges against them . I mean, if it is, if it is,

Speaker 4 30:38

Is that damning,

Speaker 3 30:41

Maybe that would be inappropriate sanction , but that is, that would be a big sanction. Okay. Because the entire country is sort of utilizing this case as a, an escape hatch for all of our racial pressures that have been bubbling up and consuming the country for the last , um , at least my lifetime, 35 years. Next up, we got Todd trout in the house, says, I knew at the time the Dr. Baker was feeling a lot of political pressure. Yeah. I think that's an understatement. I think that they all were, and he sort of felt it in my opinion most when , when I was watching him, I mean, he seemed extremely careful that may have just been his personality. But yeah, I mean, he was in a very difficult position because for my reading of his testimony, he did not think that George Floyd died of positional asphyxia or that it was a cause of low oxygen. He said it was a result of basically his heart just giving out. We clip the video of his testimony here on the show where he said, no, I mean, it was hypertension, arterial sclerosis, also the , the other complicating factors

Speaker 4 31:40

Or methamphetamines and

Speaker 3 31:42

Fentanyl and other things. There were a lot of factors, but positional asphyxia caused death caused by low oxygen. It was not one of them. So he had to now be a government witness who was not testifying in the way that the government wanted him to testify. Not, not, not , uh , an enviable enviable position LT 13 says that is a lot of detail to be made up. Right. And that's kinda, it kind of feels like that. Like it's a little bit too, a little bit too accurate that date and time, this location, this conversation, now it could easily be just another, you know, just the misinterpretation of a legitimate conversation. Maybe Dr. Baker is calling Dr. Mitchell and saying, Hey, listen, here's my opinion. I've done my analysis. You know, we heard Dr. Baker and his testimony. He was saying that he takes enough pictures so that he can get enough details, you know, zoom in and take pictures of every single thing that he does so that he can basically make a record that is sufficient and detailed enough that any other examiner could just take those notes, take those pictures and then conduct their own exam. So maybe it was something like that. Maybe he just said, Hey, Dr. Mitchell, what do you think of this? I don't think that there is any neck compression. What do you think? And he says, I think there might have been some neck compression , uh, just based on, on my analysis of this. He said , well, that's an interesting interpretation. Uh, I disagree. I don't think that that's, that that's accurate. And so it could have just been a couple of colleagues talking about this, not in a way that amounted to any undue pressure. And it's just a matter of interpretation, but you're right. It is a lot of detail . And that may just point to the fact that there was in fact, a conversation that happened. We have up leafy bug in the house says , I don't think the Lang the trials will make much difference. They are, there are powerful interests that will loudly publicize these trials, regardless of whether they're held next month, next year, or next decade. There's a lot of political profit and keeping people angry about George Floyd. Yeah. And , and look, it's not just about George Floyd, right? It's almost every single time that there's an incident like this. There is outrage that is just primed and ready to go. Even if it's not in alignment with the facts. Okay. When w look, when, when police improperly shoot and kill anybody, there should be outraged because that's not appropriate. Right? I'm not saying that that, that shouldn't be something that we disfavor or look down upon. That is absolutely something that we should, and we do often here . But if it is a situation where we don't even have the facts yet, when we're talking about Mikaila , Brian , who's in the middle of swinging a knife at somebody, and already prior to any of the facts coming out, the media was out there, ranting and raving about, you know, this being white supremacy, LeBron, James, go get that guy. You go , come on. You know, now it's , it's like the boy who cries Wolf. If you cry Wolf too many times, mom's not going to come when there's a Wolf in the room. Good point we have Jeremy Murrieta up next says they need to find they need a week to find and destroy any and all evidence. Oh, yes, yes. Okay. I understand what you're talking about now. So , uh, I did see, I don't actually, I don't actually know if you're talking about this one. Jeremy, I saw a post on Twitter about somebody took a screenshot of what looks like a computer database system that says Derek Chauvin's personnel file got deleted. I have a hard time believing that that actually happened. I think that that is probably memorialized somewhere for all eternity. Can't imagine that anybody deleted the file, but there is a meme or something like that going around. We've got our last question on this segment comes from Oh , Sox as Rob big fan. So do you think this case will end up many others, big punishment now down the road, we'll be reversed. Post-conviction you know, I actually, if I had to guess, I do not think that Derek Shovan will be any, I think that this will probably be the end of the line for him. If I had to guess. I think that the court of appeals probably is not going to find anything went wrong here, that warrants a new trial. And I think that the political momentum is already moving one direction. You know, Derek Shovan, in my opinion has sort of been the scapegoat, the country that ,

Speaker 1 35:39

Uh, that is just very convenient

Speaker 3 35:40

Wrap this case up. All right . Just put everything over there. We're gonna ,

Speaker 1 35:44

You know , take all of this racial sensitivity, all of these issues. We're just gonna bundle it right up in here. We're going to shove Derrick Chauvin's name right on that. And we're going to say, thanks for, thanks for just carrying that weight for the rest of society. Not appropriate, not, not at all what justice should be, but unfortunately I think it's a reality. And I think that when his case does hit the court of appeals, I hope I'm wrong on this because not because I am a fan of Derek Shovan in any way, shape or form. I think the man is , uh , not a good person, but at the same time, I don't think that what happened in court was proof beyond a reasonable doubt in any sense of the word. And so I'm more in alignment and in favor of that concept than I am , uh, any other concept. And so we got to just make sure that we're holding the line on the presumption of innocence and the reasonable doubt standard ,

Speaker 3 36:28

Uh , regardless of the

Speaker 1 36:30

Defendants, which could be Derek Shovan could be George Floyd doesn't matter. That standard is what is most important. But I , that being said, I'm still not sure that the court of appeals is going to do anything about it because the momentum is just

Speaker 3 36:43

Too, too, it's too

Speaker 1 36:45

Unidirectional at this point. Nobody wants to go back and do this over again. And even though maybe it should be ,

Speaker 3 36:50

Be done again, it's okay .

Speaker 1 36:53

It's a , it's as political as anything, right? It's a justice system. It's supposed to be apolitical, but believe me, it's not great questions. Once again, those all came over from watching the watchers.locals.com really appreciate the support over there. And as another reminder, you know, if you are somebody who is in the state of Arizona and you've been charged with a crime, I want to also let you know that we handle those things too at the RNR law group. So just a little bit of a law firm plug there. You may hear more of those coming down the line in between these segments, but I appreciate all the support one way or the other. Thank you so much for all the love that you show the show, the show, it really does mean the world to us. All right . So let's change gears. We're going to swap on over, and we're going to talk about COVID pandemic crimes.

Speaker 3 37:35

One year

Speaker 1 37:36

Ago, I would not have guessed that there would be a new category of criminal offenses in the United States, but there are, there are pandemic crimes, COVID crimes that are spreading around the country. And while we're sort of dealing with them, now, many people were charged over the last year, but many courts were closed and a lot of things were just kind of put on, hold on, hiatus for the lockdowns and so on and so forth. But now we're starting to be able to look back a little bit and say, well, what was all that record? What were all those cops doing? Showing up at people's businesses and writing citations for not wearing masks or for not socially distancing or for going to a park or a church, or spending time with your family, walking your dog, whatever. We all know it. We all live through it. And I am a defense lawyer. I got calls from people saying, Hey, the Scottsdale police are at my house right now, or they're at my business. They're at my gym. They're at my restaurant. They're at my hair salon. What should we do about this? Well, you know, at the time the government basically had total control and they were acquiescing to themselves. Anytime that anybody challenged any of these authoritarian sort of, you know, shows a force law enforcement , uh, the government , the courts and Congress, and everybody just sided with law enforcement. We're in an emergency. They have a lot of leeway, a lot of power to do whatever they want to do. So now we're looking backwards there . We're saying what happened because this felt inappropriate. It felt like the government touched us in all the wrong places, and we're not happy about it. And I want to show you an article from Michael Tracy . Now he's over at sub stack. Amet Tracy T R a C E Y dot [inaudible] dot com and encourage you to go support him and to follow him on Twitter because he does good work. He's also pretty prolific on clubhouse as well. And he did a deep dive on this. So he went through and found a bunch of documents from Newark, New Jersey that detailed some of the arrests that were taking place back during a very high sort of intensity COVID crime enforcement era. And I want to show you what some of his research looks like because it is insightful. He says new documents show that police charged thousands of people for petty COVID violations in March and April of last year. Drastic emergency measures were imposed by federal state and local government authorities. For the stated purpose of curbing COVID by March 16 , 2020, all States had declared a state of emergency by April 7th, all States, except for had imposed a stay at home order counties and municipalities also decreed their own separate COVID related orders as is usual in the U S the details vary greatly by jurisdiction . Some measures were far more stringent than others, but in general, a new legal regimen had taken hold across the country. In the name of combating what was described as a once in a lifetime public health crisis. Yes, the COVID crimes. Now just leaving your house, walk on your dog, not wearing a mask or not. Social distancing is enough to charge you with a crime kind of a scary thing, but that's the nation we're living in from the outset, a pressing question, and still yet to be adequately answered was how exactly these emergency orders would be enforced on a practical ground on the level , uh , on the ground level where a police officer's being directed to issue summonses and make arrests . If so, what under what authority? The diffuse patchwork of laws in the U S made this difficult to ascertain in any kind of comprehensive way. Last April, I went to Delaware after coming across reports on social media, that police were pulling over drivers without of state license plates, pursuant to the governor's COVID related emergency

Speaker 4 40:49

Order. And I remember this, right?

Speaker 1 40:51

I think this was , uh , around New York. They were actually stopping people going in and out crossing state lines, going, Hey,

Speaker 4 40:58

Where are you coming from? We don't

Speaker 1 40:59

Want you in our state unless you're quarantined for a certain period of time, right? This is not in the distant future. I mean, I know many of us want to forget about this, but this was happening. It says, when I wasn't pulled over myself, I did speak to a number of people who had been seemingly arbitrarily since they were from nearby Maryland, routinely from Delaware, they were stopped arbitrarily. He says, even if one believed that certain emergency measures were justified under the circumstances that potentially perilous implications for civil liberties during the periods were unmistakable. State authorities had been vested with vast new power to surveil and monitor citizens, regulate behavior, punish them for non-compliance . And yet our knowledge of how these authorities were actually deploying their powers was severely limited, widespread closure of courts, further complicated

Speaker 4 41:44

The situation,

Speaker 1 41:45

Right? You have a bunch of cops out there enforcing a bunch of crimes. The courts are closed, so they're not processing any crimes. You've got people that are basically out of work that are now trying to, you know, go do something in the world. They are trying to keep their businesses open their homes, you know, rent and mortgage is paid and food on the table for their kids. And the cops are out there rounding people up for let's see, let's see what they're doing out there. Oh, how about this sitting in a park was one of the violations. How about this sitting and talking to others? Oh, there's another one. Here are examples of unauthorized or otherwise unlawful acts, which allegedly contributed to quote jeopardizing the health, welfare, and safety

Speaker 4 42:25

Of the people. Police

Speaker 1 42:27

Also accused them of , uh , sitting on a milk crate visiting with no legitimate purpose, hanging out, being in the street with the company of another industry, with the company of others, sitting on a bench, smoking, encouraging others, to not social distance, standing outside, enjoying the weather, socializing with another, not social distancing. And of course, standing without a mask, which is basically a death penalty type of an offense. These violations are punishable by up to six months in prison and a fine of $1,000. All for that stuff. Sitting at a park, hanging out

Speaker 4 42:57

Industry, sitting on a

Speaker 1 42:58

Bench, smoking the stuff that you do in a free country where you're allowed to just get up and go outside of your house. Well, back over here in Delaware, New Jersey, they're arresting people for that stuff. Now, as of on April 26,

Speaker 4 43:10

For example, a woman was charged

Speaker 1 43:13

By police with violating another statute to see call in 24 dash 7.1, a one as defined as recklessly, engaging in conduct, which creates a substantial risk of bodily injury to another person. All right , well, that sounds pretty bad. What was her violation? I was described by police as did knowingly endanger other citizens by not having a face mask on per government executive order to have one to quell the high rate of COVID-19. So by not having a mask , they charged her with a crime that says she was recklessly engaging in conduct, which creates a substantial risk of bodily injury to another person. Folks, I will tell you this, okay. That type of charge is a commonly seen charge. You see that in Arizona, it's a reckless charge. Reckless comes from the old common law it's been around for a long time. We know what it means.

Speaker 4 43:59

It's sort of pernicious in our statutes and it is really for stuff that is reckless, okay. Like creating a substantial

Speaker 1 44:09

Risk of bodily injury to another person. It's like, you know, the example is like waving a sword around, right. Or, you know , spinning a gun, a loaded gun, right. That's reckless. It has a very likelihood of causing substantial risk of bodily injury. They're saying this stuff for a mass . Now, look, if you want to say that the mask is going to prevent somebody from catching COVID and dying. I , I get, I get, okay, I get the argument. They're charging people with this stuff regularly

Speaker 3 44:32

Out of New Jersey. And , and these are serious crimes, right? Six months in jail, $1,000 , fine.

Speaker 4 44:37

People have to face criminal penalties for this stuff.

Speaker 3 44:42

Not insignificant when that happens to you. Okay. You might be somebody who's sitting there going, well, just put the stinkin mask on. This is a big deal, right? This can really wreck somebody's life. And if you're just sitting there saying, well, they should just put the mask on. Right.

Speaker 4 44:53

Well , I guess, I guess you can be of that position. We have

Speaker 3 44:58

Somebody else saying here or no, this is another part of the article says here's a small sampling of the summons. Summons is issued on one

Speaker 4 45:05

Day in April. Take it from

Speaker 3 45:07

The police log I obtained. Okay . One day. So they're just going around and racking all this up. Refuse to disperse, practice, social distancing, violating a shelter in place. Failure to abide in a shelter in place congregating with other people, criminal charges for this garbage , uh , violating executive order for COVID-19 group of people hanging out, violating a stay at home ordinance, violating executive order. And the list goes on and on violating shelter in place . Look at all these things. People being charged with crimes for this garbage go into a park and stuff. All of the above individuals were charged with obstructing administration of law or other governmental function, a disorderly person's offense. As you can see a large number of people, but not all of whom are listed as non-whites were explicitly accused by police of disobeying orders of the governor on March 30th, a man described as black was charged with congregating without maintaining a distance of six feet and without a destination in violation of the coverage disorder , Oh, April 27th, another black man failed to obey the governor's order by taking part in non-essential travel and failing to social distance,

Speaker 4 46:15

April 28th and other black men on

Speaker 3 46:18

They've one , we have a white, Hispanic issue to summons for standing in violation of governor's orders.

Speaker 4 46:25

For all of the above

Speaker 3 46:25

Violation. Police said no warning was given and spoke with a spokesperson, Phil Murphy for the post, what she thought of.

Speaker 4 46:34

So many people

Speaker 3 46:34

Being ensnared by the criminal justice system for the crime of defying, the governor she responded saying throughout the pandemic, local law enforcement has enforced executive orders and issued citations when they deem appropriate as they would with regard to any others

Speaker 4 46:49

State law. Right? So yeah, nothing. So they have no answer , right? It's just, well, they have to enforce the law. Okay. I guess so what did the Newark police say about it?

Speaker 3 47:01

He said they did issue summonses to individuals. They found nothing more. They're clearly not what happened per the Newark police , his own direct. Wait, what? Hello

Speaker 4 47:09

Per this week.

Speaker 3 47:12

It issue summonses to individuals found to be in violations. These were primarily for large gatherings and businesses operating outside of executive orders. Let's see. That's not what happened for the police. His own records, a significant number of people were issued summons for claim defenses, for failure to wear a mask, which is what a black man was cited for on 17th. Being

Speaker 1 47:30

Outside of nonessential business saved. So I already went through all of those. Here are more of the violations . So individual will stop for an enforcement order was observed. An individual was deserved, observed on the corner , stopped for violating COVID-19 executive orders, drinking a 16 ounce can of steel reserve

Speaker 4 47:48

In public. Oh no.

Speaker 1 47:50

We have somebody who is standing in front of commercial property. We have somebody congregating with three other people failing to maintain six feet of distance failing to wear proper protective gear. So not wearing them

Speaker 4 47:59

Mask. All of these people just being charged with crimes six months jail man named Richard Brandt is another example. April 20th ,

Speaker 1 48:11

Seventh. He has , uh , he had been with his wife going for a walk. It says that we were by ourselves. She had her mask on. I had a mask in my hand, two cops drove by them in a squad car, stopped specifically to give him the ticket brand said of the main officer said, I think he was a newbie. I'm telling him I'm with my wife. I'm not around anybody. It took them a long time to write it up. The new guy was very nervous. He was also perspiring giving it to me because he knows what a racket. The whole thing is. He's embarrassed by what he has to do. Many of these citizens are citations issued over a year ago are still active cases. According to the New Jersey court system, others appear to have been dismissed at the discretion of the prosecutor. Still even being brought into the system. This way can have serious consequences for people. Yeah. There's no, no doubt about it. Many people don't understand this. You know, they think that

Speaker 4 49:02

If your charged with it

Speaker 1 49:04

Crime and the prosecutor just dismisses it later down the road that, Oh, no harm,

Speaker 4 49:08

No foul . Is that the case?

Speaker 1 49:13

What about the fact that you were probably arrested and your Liberty was seized for a certain period of time and that your night was ruined and that you now have beyond that an active criminal record, that's probably on the internet somewhere. Most of these records are public records. Okay? So once you get into the system, you never get out of it because we all know as soon as something hits the internet, it is there forever. Unfortunately it scares the hell out of me. I say a lot of things on this show,

Speaker 4 49:38

But it is what

Speaker 1 49:39

It is, right? So if you're charged with a crime, now you get charged. The government later dismisses the case against you. You still have the, the original submission. It's still out there somewhere. And if you had a mugshot taken, there are all these mugshot websites. Now that will sort of sees your picture and they'll put it up there for all eternity.

Speaker 4 49:57

So, you

Speaker 1 49:57

Know, for the governor or for whoever was enforcing these things, I'll just go get them a bunch of citations for their masks. They charged him with misdemeanors. These were just, you know, minor offenses. They're they're misdemeanor offenses that very likely could carry consequences for them. We have another example on the gypsy man, who said he received asylum in the U S got a COVID related summons while working at a business. He was under the impression he was permitted as to work as an essential activity by police entered, asked for IDs and handout handed out summonses. So we've some more of those. He's got more examples in his article. I would encourage you to read through that. We have Bob [inaudible] , he's a criminal defense lawyer in the city. He shared his opinion, says Newark needs to charge people with this. Like the chief needs a set of hemorrhoids. Okay. So Bob DeGroote Bob DeGroote coming in with a spice. That's a , that's a good defense attorney right there. You know, that's a good defense attorney. Karen Thompson, senior staff attorney for the ACLU of New Jersey told me she had just started to obtain similar records for New Jersey. It's a little breathtaking, the scope she said, given the huge number of summonses issued the ambiguity around how they are being handled. Newark municipal court is still being conducted over zoom. There's a risk that these cases get lost in the system as has happens with these municipal cases that can backfire on those jars . People get the summonses and they don't know about them. They're not informed about them. Suddenly. It goes from them having a summons to them, having a warrant for their arrest, which is also accurate. So, you know, a lot of people who are not familiar with the court system, they, you know, they don't know how that , how this stuff works. They get a summons. Maybe they think that they're going to get something in the mail. Maybe the summons is their court

Speaker 4 51:31

Date notice. And sometimes it

Speaker 1 51:33

Is in some different States. You don't get anything in the mail. So in Arizona, for example, people will get a ticket and their court date is right there on the ticket. Many times people will just forget about the ticket or they'll forget about the court date. And they'll get a letter in the mail later that there's a warrant for their arrest. And they go, well, wait a minute. I thought I was supposed to get a court date. Notice I got my ticket, but nobody showed, told me when my court date

Speaker 4 51:58

It's on the ticket. Right?

Speaker 1 52:00

So it's just those little mix-ups. Well, now what happens then that person, they may not know about it. They may have moved. Their address may not be up to date with the court. Now they're driving around on the street, taking their kids to school cop, pulls him over. Hey, you know , I stopped you . Yeah. You're you're going about 10 over. Just wanted to check your license and your registration. Oh, by the way, your license is suspended because you forgot about that old court date. Now, guess what happens? Well, it's a class one misdemeanor in Arizona. That's the same as a DUI is called driving on a suspended license. You can't do that. They impound your car, throw it in there for 30 days. You can get it out early if you reinstate your license, but it's a huge ordeal, cost a ton of money. It's a big problem. So people just don't recognize how incredibly damaging the criminal justice system can be. So when we just have these politicians, so just go right from mask orders or things like that, there are a lot , a lot of consequences for people. And these typically are people that can't afford a lawyer. Okay? These are people who are out. Like we heard standing on a corner, drinking a steel reserve. What's going to happen with that guy's case. You think he's going to go hire a powerful criminal defense attorney to go handle this thing for him? No, probably not going to go to court, going to be another warrant, going to be another sort of, you know, a stacking of fines and fees. And his life is probably going to be a lot more difficult as a result of this. So the question is, why are we doing this? Why are we enforcing this? Why are we spending so much time and effort

Speaker 4 53:17

And resources on imposing these governmental waste ?

Speaker 1 53:23

If I can be so blunt about it, all the kicker of all this is later on in may Newark like countless places in the U S hosted massive protests after the death of Floyd, all of which flatly violated COVID policies, which we all knew

Speaker 4 53:36

COVID will only kill you. If you are

Speaker 1 53:41

Not at a George Floyd protest, if you're there,

Speaker 4 53:43

You're safe, you're good to go. So that's not medical advice. That's a joke. Oh , this topic, here we go. We have more

Speaker 1 53:52

Is violating failures to disperse after the shelter in place order may arrest Barca . Even though both officials had just spent months hectoring, ordinary citizens for failing to socially distance and for gathering in small crowds, Barco himself was a participant in the protest that violated his own executive order. So the mayor passes the rules saying that you can't go out there and protest. Then the mayor himself goes out there and protest . Meanwhile, all of these other people have been charged with crimes for not social distancing for being within six feet of each other, for congregating to close for operating your business for being at a park. Then the mayor goes out there because for him, it's politically feasible. It's now permissible to go out and do that. The hypocrisy just makes my blood boil as I'm sure it does yours, but Rocca even admitted as much to me at the time. He said, this is a violation, but we're doing it anyway. He said of the protest in Newark last may and elected officials wonder why people get fed up with the manifestly arbitrary nature of these enforcement measures because they are baloney . The discretionary powers granted to state authorities to curtail the spread of the virus have yet to be fully documented or interrogated. He says that these tactics accomplish anything that benefited public house health, I dunno , does arresting the guy drinking steel reserve on the corner. Did that say

Speaker 4 55:05

Lives? These officers, there are other ways to handle this. Governor. Ron DeSantis is now ringing

Speaker 1 55:13

Spell a little bit over from the daily mail. We learned that he in fact is going to do the opposite. So while in Newark, they were arresting a bunch of people in charging them with crimes. It sounds like maybe some of those arrests were also taking place in Florida, but the governor is going to undo that, going to pardon a bunch of individuals who are facing criminal charges and going to grant them reprieve from any criminal consequences, which is a good thing. Especially if you are a defense attorney and you're tired of the over-criminalization of everything in this country. Let's take a quick look at this article. Over from the daily mail. Ron DeSantis is going to pardon all Floridians being prosecuted for failing to wear masks or socially distance. As he surprises a couple on Fox with the announcement after, after they were arrested for not enforcing COVID rules at their gym. Florida's governor on Wednesday, announced live on air clemency for everyone in his state. Who's being punished for COVID rules. Rhonda Sanchez , Republican governor was on Fox news. He was flanked by two people, Mike and Jillian Carnevale who are gym owners from plantation, Florida. They were repeatedly arrested for a fusing to enforce a mass mandate. The state itself didn't it. Mass mandate

Speaker 3 56:24

As the Santas spoke strongly against them throughout the height of the pandemic, but individual counties and municipalities did have them, despite DeSantis weighing in against them. Now, people who are in snared by the local rules will have their slates wiped, clean. The Santas said, so I was in the firmly keep the gyms open camp throughout the entire pandemic. I know that that was not a popular opinion back there in March, April and may, but I thought it was very important because if you are facing a pandemic, that is a health concern, probably a good idea to be healthy. It might be a good idea to exercise, eat well, take your vitamins, not drink too much alcohol and put other toxins and poisons in your body. But we didn't hear much of that. Over the last year, we heard a lot of other stuff like slapping a piece of fabric on your face. Okay? So now we have the governor who is coming out and helping some people who were running a gym during this time. And we had some of these issues here in Arizona. There was a guy Tom Hatton here , uh , runs a gym called mountainside fitness that actually sued the government over this so that it was an equal protection violation. And I agree with him why our grocery store is allowed to be open. Why are Walmart's allowed to be open, but a gym can not be open. Now people say, because there are people are hyperventilating and they're in close proximity. Same thing happens with grocery stores. People are touching a lot of stuff there too . Picking up fruits, picking up the box of cereal and putting it's the same concept. And if they are going to shut down one business and not another, they better have some pretty good justification for it. If we're all talking about science, well, did they have any justification for, for closing the gyms down and not the other businesses? Well, no, in my opinion, they didn't, and they didn't present any, certainly before the government came out and issued their orders. So I was pretty irritated about that. And now we have , uh , you know, Ron DeSantis who was dealing with some other gym owners. I'm not a gym owner, but other people who are gym advocates who , uh, were, were arrested multiple times for trying to run their business and keep people healthy in the middle of a health pandemic. So here's Ron DeSantis over on Laura Ingram on Fox news last night. Wait, let me swap this over. And we'll play that again.

Speaker 5 58:37

All outstanding fines and penalties that have been applied against individuals are suspended. I think we need to get away from trying to penalize people for social distancing and, and just work with people construct .

Speaker 3 58:53

Yeah. So that sounds very reasonable to me. And I, you know, I like to see more of this in general. I just don't, I don't understand the idea of why our society is so hell bent on punishing the hell out of people for every single thing that happens. You know, I like the idea that maybe, maybe our government says, you know, we did something and it wasn't the best idea to do that. So we're just going to get rid of all that. You know, we had to be a little bit aggressive on the front end, in order to achieve some policy end, which I disagree with, but I at least the justification,

Speaker 1 59:22

Right? At least the explanation is this is just an emergency. And now you come back down later and say, look, we had to do what we had to do, but we're not intending on charging you people with these crimes for this. I think what Ron DeSantis did was very reasonable and appropriate. And I'd like to see other governments do that because it was an emergency. And a lot of people didn't really know how to navigate the whole situation and we should be compassionate and empathetic for those people. Mike Carnavale the gym owner was first arrested on July 27th for what their supporters in a GoFundMe page said. What described was as taking a stand for the health and freedom of his community and his country. He was arrested twice more, August six, August 7th for not enforcing facial coverings during strenuous exercise. Jillian carnival was also arrested on August 7th. The couple will be granted. Clemency DeSantis said describing the punishment as a total overreach, same deal will be granted to everyone in his state said, I'm glad you have Mike and Gillian on. I think we have the clip here on the next segment. So let's watch this weight, new studio, a technicality problems. Thanks for the understanding. Here we go.

Speaker 6 1:00:29

Jillian and Mike joined me now, along with our attorney Corey stroller, also with us Florida, governor Ron DeSantis. Who's been following this story very closely. Mike, I want to start with you. You've been arrested three times over the masks. It's hard to believe isn't it LR? No, I just like , I can't believe this was his and I States of America when I'm hearing this, what happened? So two months after Jim's reopened in South Florida, Broward County came down with the mandates saying the facial coverings had to be worn during strenuous exercise, 24. You know , we filed a lawsuit against Broward County for this 24 hours after the lawsuit was filed, we were arrested. We were arrested three times in total. They seized our business. They offered us 10 days in jail. We declined that. And now I'm looking at six months in prison. They also arrested Jillian here as well. Jillian , does this seem like the country you grew up in? Definitely. Definitely not. It barely feels like America. Uh, Corey , uh, what are the prospects here of getting any assistance or help?

Speaker 7 1:01:40

Well, we really, at this point have to rely on governor DeSantis and I hate to put it in his lap and his executive general counsel's lap , but we've got a political activist judge that originally told Mike and Gillian before I was ever retained that the state was offering a diversion program. And the judge said he was going to personally decline it. And it was the judge that said the only resolution he would approve is a 10 day jail sentence for Mike in jail matters before Jillian's case was transferred in. So the way Broward state charged it, Mike is spacing actually to second degree misdemeanors for a total of 120 days in jail.

Speaker 6 1:02:20

And Jillian is facing one for a total of 60 days in jail. Oh my God, this is basically not having people wear masks while exercising. Oh my God, this is insanity. Governor DeSantis. Uh , it sounds like Broward is like thumbing their nose at you. You've been very pro reopening getting rid of these mandates , uh, what the heck's going on here and what can you do? Well,

Speaker 5 1:02:47

Well, it's a total overreach, Laura. This is exactly what we ordered against last summer many, many months ago. Uh , and so I was actually just recently briefed on this case , uh, and we looked at it and so I'm glad you have Mike and Gillian on. And I'm also glad to, beyond to be able to say that , uh, effective tomorrow morning, I'm going to sign a reprieve under my constitutional authority. Uh, so that'll delay the case for 60 days against both of them. And then when our clemency board meets in the coming weeks , uh , we'll issue pardons, not only for Mike and Gillian , but for any Floridian , uh , that may have , uh , outstanding and fractions for things like mass and social distancing. The fact is, wow, not even right to be wearing masks when you're exercising the world health organization advises against it. It's not healthy for people to be doing that in the first place. So it was a bad restriction. Uh, but these things with health should be advisory. They should not be punitive. And so , uh, we're happy to use our constitutional authority. I think they've been treated poorly and , uh , fortunately , uh , they got a governor that cares.

Speaker 6 1:03:59

Uh , wow. How does that feel to the carnivales? They, you, you just got your reprieve on national television. Thank you so much coming into Santas . We thank you. Appreciate that a lot. Well ,

Speaker 1 1:04:11

Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. So that's a powerful thing that happened right there. And it was interesting because it sounds like what the attorney was talking about was about the , the , the government was offering this, this couple, these two people, a diversion deal, which means that if they would essentially plead guilty. Now , I don't know how this works specifically in Florida, but I can give you the framework on how this typically works in Arizona. A couple of ways, this works , but I'll give you the one that, that is more common. So in a diversion case, what that means is that if you agree to plead guilty and then do something on top of that, they will delete your guilty pleas . So the way that this would work practically is you would go into court and you would say, okay, listen, yes, I'm going to plead guilty to violating the governor's executive order that limits COVID gatherings or whatever. These two gym goers, whatever they were charged with, they would say, yes, I'm going to plead guilty to that. But if you remember, we've been following along the Derek Shovan case, that alone is not the end of the case, right? You have a conviction, then you have a sentencing. So you have to first be found guilty or plead guilty first. And then the judge will sentence you after that. Well, what's happening now with Derek Shovan he's been convicted and the judge is going to sentence him. And it's very likely going to be a substantial amount of time in prison, but in a diversion deal, you can plead guilty, but the judge can not sentence you, or they can hold off on sentencing you and give you the opportunity to go and do something. So to remain law abiding, or to go take an alcohol class or to go take an anger management class, or to go do something in exchange for coming back to the court and providing proof of that. But if you do that, then the court at the sentencing will dismiss the case. So there are some authorities under state law that allowed different courts to sort of effectuate those deals so that the guilty plea will then sort of just be torn up. So what would have had to have happened if that is the same structure in Florida, is that these , this couple would have had to have gone into court and said, yep . I plead guilty to this. Yes. I agree . We were in violation of the law. And so obviously they're not going to be able to do that, right? They're not going to go in there and say, all right, like our fault, we're going to plead guilty on this thing. Sorry, we're going to go take these classes and come back. And then we're going to ask for you to dismiss the case. And so that typically can be a pretty good deal. A lot of people may want to take that deal. In other situations, like if you're in a disorderly conduct case, right? You're out in old town at a bar, you get into a fight. You're not an activist. You're not taking a stand for anything. You just had too much to drink. So sure. You'll go spend a Saturday morning and an anger management class in exchange for a dismissal. The whole thing goes away. Sounds pretty good. But for these, this couple, for these two people, right, this isn't , this is a point, this is an activist moment. They are standing up for their business for health, for free freedom in America. And so no way in hell, are they going to take a diversion deal where they have to go in and plead guilty to something that's not going to happen? And the judge, it sounds like wasn't going to accept that anyways, if they, if the government was offering that and they weren't going to take it. And the judge was sort of wanting to make a political spectacle out of this said, well, I'm not going to take that anyways. I'm not taking anything less than 10 days of jail in a plea deal, because that's what I think is appropriate. So these people basically were at the end of the line, right? I mean , I'm speculating here, but I would guess if I were their defense attorney, that this is how this was going, that they're not taking a plea deal, that the government is not dismissing the case. They can't do that. And that the judge wouldn't be accepting a plea deal that they would take, even if they had any inclination to do so. So the only other option would have been a trial. Now, the governor just came out. That's not going to happen either.

Speaker 3 1:07:43

So that whole thing is , uh, it was, it was, is now going to go away

Speaker 1 1:07:48

And it's the right move. We don't want people overly criminalized for anything in this country. So we're going to wrap up this article over here, says finally, that Florida is among only five States that have fully opened. According to Itali , being kept by a government relations from Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, all have 100% scores on the firms . Tally. When it comes to being fully open, represent eight other States are almost along

Speaker 3 1:08:16

The way they have a 96% score. We have, Illinois is the lowest with 45. New York has 52. California is 50. Isn't that interesting? All the big city, big blue States as for clemency, Florida is the first state in the U S to issue such a clemency and DeSantis has positioned himself throughout the pandemic as a pro-Trump bulwark against democratic authoritarianism. And he's doing a good job of it. I mean, he's capturing a lot of eyeballs. The number of people affected remains unclear for perspective, just in Miami Dade County alone, there were 1800 citations, totaling , $760,000. Can you believe that another 215 citations totaling $109,000 in Naples, we had 4,000 citation totalling another almost $800,000. So we've got almost $2 million right there, just in fines, just in fines. And I've said this right? And I know it's irritates a lot of the pro-police audience out there, but serve and protect or tax collect. How much money is that run is given a lot of that back. Cause they're not going to collect it overall. 52 out of 67 counties and 212 out of more than 400 municipalities responded to the sentinels inquiry. Uh , orange County reported 13 arrests, Florida stood out from other States when it comes to hands off coronavirus rules and did a pretty good job with it. Since the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, no two States have been more different in their approaches in California and Florida in early March, California Newsome limited gatherings, closed bars, indoor dining at restaurants and implemented mass mandates and implored residents to stay at home. Comparatively Florida, governor Ron DeSantis has enacted few measures, lifting an ordinance that prevented people from operating businesses, restaurants as well as lifting COVID-19 related fines and penalties in September, despite these different approaches, both States ended up with roughly the same outcome. Oh, so you're telling me that all of those arrests in Newark and Orlando or, and all of these other places that they didn't do much of anything or the I'm sorry, the arrests were happening all over the country, but I'm talking about the mass mandates and the business limitations and the limited gatherings and the indoor dining bands and the list goes on and on. Let's take some questions over from watching the watchers.locals.com. And first one in the house is from Osaka says, Rob, is this possible that this was about money, hard for a city to make money like traffic tickets or other city ordinances when no one was out and about? Yeah, I think that you're exactly right. Criminal law is big, big money. And I talk about this a lot. So is traffic tickets, traffic tickets, and traffic fines in, in Scottsdale. The last time I looked at the numbers, our photo radar system, the , the cameras that take your pictures all over the place. We have a lot of them in Scottsdale, millions of dollars a year. Okay. I don't remember what the number is now. And I don't know what the number is , uh, relative to COVID because that year was bad. But the last time I looked at it was like six to 7 million bucks a year. That's that's not insignificant. That is a nice chunk of change. We just heard in the previous slide that there were almost $2 million in fines and fees that were going to be generated from some of these COVID restrictions. So they make a ton of money over this stuff. And if nobody's out driving around, if nobody's holding conferences, if nobody's going out to bars and sixth street in old town and having wedding parties and bachelor parties and coming in for golfing events, well, you're not going to get many DUIs. You're not going to get many disorderly conduct or urinating in publics or criminal trespasses. So how do you make up for the gap in your budget while you go enforce all these COVID crimes, not wearing a mask, not social distancing. We just saw Florida 2 million. Now they're not going to collect it because the governor is going to give it all back. But wow, well , we'll give it back to the people. It shouldn't have taken it in the first place. Ryan is in the house says last year, when all of these draconian curtailments of constitutionally protected freedoms were taking place, I suspected that once all of the COVID-19 restrictions eventually would be lifted, there would be a massive delusion of lawsuits being filed against local and state governments sweeping the nation. Do you anticipate this happening? If so, when should we expect to start seeing this? So I'm not sure that we're seeing a massive delusion of lawsuits. I mean, I know that it kind of depends what lawsuits you're talking about. I mean, I think that we're going to see a lot of consequences from the COVID era. You know, I think people are sort of have this mindset that, Oh, we're over it. You know, that we have , uh , the vaccines are out now, everybody's out and about a lot of restrictions are being lifted, but we have not paid the bill for that. Okay. We basically took a year off. We printed a lot of money. Didn't produce much of anything and we're gonna the bills coming due. And we're seeing that in inflation, we're seeing that in the stock markets. And so people who are doing cartwheels because it looks like Biden has delivered us to the promised land, I think are in, for a rude awakening when the end of the year comes. Unfortunately now, as it comes to COVID, I'm also not, you know, not sure that we're going to see any, any lawsuits, sort of, a lot of people were afraid. A lot of lawyers were afraid that the, that the outset of COVID that people were going to be suing each other for giving each other COVID right. So if you're like an employer and an employee gets sick, is your employee going to Sue the employer or is , you know, is, is Walgreens going to get sued or is Walmart going to get sued or, you know, for having people who get sick in their stores, in other words, is there going to be a lot of civil liability flying back and forth? And I just haven't seen that. And really, I think that a lot of States are even responding to sort of prevent that sort of COVID protection laws to , to insulate people from any

Speaker 8 1:13:38

Of those , uh,

Speaker 3 1:13:41

Know frivolous claims that might be coming down the pike, because it really is a hard thing to prove where did you get it? And who gave it to you? And what was the cause? And did you contribute to it? Or can you know, how , how do you prove it all? So , uh , are we, are we seeing those civil lawsuits? I don't know. I don't practice in that space. Maybe we are, maybe we aren't. So I really couldn't speak to that intelligently, but I think that, you know, the , the bill will come due in terms of our financial or economic situation. And you will see some, some constitutional litigation work its way through the courts. And we may not see the outcome of that for several years. Like there are a lot of questions about, you know, freedom of religion and whether or not you can maintain a church and have a congregation and perform a mass when you are in the face of governor lockdowns, right? It's, it's a, it's a very important question. And those legal questions take a lot of time to work their way through the courts a lot longer than a year in, in many cases. And so, you know, unless the Supreme court accelerates anything, we may see that some of these constitutional issues land at the Supreme court, this term or next term, but I think there's still a lot to sort out. We're just sort of working our way through the wreckage right now, you know, for about a year, our butt was in the fire and I use this all the time. This is the fire, and this is our, but just right in the middle of it, well now we're sort of working our way out of it. And some of the heat is dissipating as we create some distance there, but now we're looking back and we're saying that was a , that was a roaring fire. That was a big, hot flame. What happened there. And we want to make sure that we're doing our investigation to see where, you know, where it came from and w w we really want to prevent it again. And I don't just mean the pandemic. I mean, everything right? The government overreach, all of our response, which, you know, many people are still debating about its efficacy, a lot of things that we can do to improve ourselves as a S as a society. There's a great book by Nassim to lab . It's called antifragile . And it's this concept that,

Speaker 4 1:15:32

That when you have a system that is,

Speaker 3 1:15:35

Is that is, let's say robust. There are these three kinds of statuses, or there's a status of a system that can be strong or be robust. In other words, it's not going to be knocked off of its game. Under ordinary circumstances, it's robust, right? Like think of a car that's reliable. It gets you where you're going. That is a strong vehicle. It's, it's effective at doing its intended function. That is a robust

Speaker 4 1:16:00

Item. Okay ? Same thing, or the opposite concept of this would be something that

Speaker 3 1:16:06

It is fragile. You have robust and you have fragile, or you have a robust car. Then you have a fragile car. Something that breaks down every time you get in it, the ignition doesn't turn on this tube breaks. This hose falls off, nothing is functioning. So you have something that's robust and you have something that is fragile. Well, you also have a concept it's called antifragile . That means when something is sort of facing pressure, when it's facing stimulus, it actually gets stronger. So when you talk about a fragile item and you apply pressure to that, it's going to break when you apply pressure to a robust item, well, it's not going to break as easily. It's going to be strong. It's going to be able to withstand the consequences of whatever pressures you're putting upon it. And many people think that that's great. You want to be robust. That's exactly what you want to be. And that's true for most situations, but there are other , there's another category it's called antifragile . And it's when there is some harm that comes upon the system or comes upon that thing that you are acting upon, it actually gets stronger. So the analogy that , uh, to Lev uses in his book is the airline industry. Okay? Airline industry, every time there's a plane crash, that is a dramatic thing, right? That is an awful thing. We use some lives, but out of that bad environment, out of that bad incident, the entire system of the, of the airline industry gets stronger because we root out the problems we say, Oh, that machine didn't work. That equipment failed. We should've tightened up this procedure, that pilot screwed that up, whatever. And the entire system gets a little bit stronger. So, you know, same concept as we're working our way through this pandemic. You know , we want to make sure that as a society, we are taking a look at some of the old systems and the old things that don't serve us anymore and get rid of those while we are favoring and supporting the things that , that continue to work and , um , Governments and politicians and governors. And we're all trying to figure that out, moving down the road, next question comes from DeSantis. I'm sorry. It comes from wanting to know, says, did DeSantis actually stay execution of prosecution and recommend that he would send the case to the party committee and recommend it gets pardoned? Doesn't the governor have full pardon powers. What does the pardon committee do understand? The governor gets a lot of requests, but this was done on live TV, on the Ingram show. So I don't know about the specifics, but I think on the show, didn't he say that he was going to sign an order tomorrow, which will probably be maybe today or tomorrow. So we'll be able to take a look at what that says a little bit more specifically, but either way. I mean, I think that those are just details. This is him ultimately making the commitment that these charges are going to go away, which is a good thing. Sharon, Courtney says this was a golden opportunity to get a lot of extra cash from fines and from the government. Yeah. Uh you're right, Sharon, no question about it. Justice first is in the house, says COVID restrictions. You can't legislate social courtesy. Most of these violations would only require the cops read a statement to everyone present about the medical risk and courtesy to others, and then leave it at that for adults to make decisions

Speaker 4 1:19:05

Sounds.

Speaker 3 1:19:05

It sounds reasonable to me, right? I think that that most people can, can think for themselves, but the government doesn't think that they think that you have to be told what to do and you have to abide. Otherwise, if you don't, you have to be arrested and charged with a crime. Jeremy [inaudible] in the house says, how about government's able to bring criminal charges against people for violating rules dictated by the governor or health department and not by the legislature at most when these be considered misdemeanors.

Speaker 4 1:19:30

So

Speaker 3 1:19:31

Yes. That, yes , they should be considered misdemeanors. I would imagine. I don't think that anything that we've talked about, what amounts to a felony violation, no felony, the difference between misdemeanors and felonies, felonies, you think about prison, misdemeanors. You think about jail, most low level offenses that don't involve, you know , massive amounts of drugs or serious physical injury or repeat offenses. Most of those are going to be misdemeanors. So I would imagine that that most of those would be misdemeanors. If not all of them, quite frankly, Liberty or death says, wow, here I am thinking that article guaranteed the people, a Republican form of government, you know, the whole separation of powers . Good to know that all it takes is a pandemic with a 1% mortality rate for the constitution and the rule of law to be suspended. And the executive can order the arrest and fines of the citizens for disobeying. That's, that's a great summation of it. And I mean, really, that's kind of what happened. I mean, we, we saw litigation around the country that were in direct response to the COVID regulations and courts all across the, the entire nation just turned around and said, yep , you're allowed to do that. You're allowed to do that. You're allowed to do that. You're allowed to do that.

Speaker 4 1:20:40

That's the new reality

Speaker 3 1:20:42

We have. Baranski's in the house says, Rob, the people that set up Nancy Pelosi's COVID violations

Speaker 4 1:20:48

Also set up all these people. Oh, I see. I see what's happening. Yes, yes. I understand what you're saying. Yes, they did.

Speaker 3 1:20:58

And conspiracy for COVID violations. I got it. Yes. You're exactly right. We have underscore shade says, can citizens do a call to action

Speaker 4 1:21:04

Suit for those untouchables who broke the masks ?

Speaker 3 1:21:09

Look at those violations, these mask violators, can you believe these people? We have Ryan in the house as I gained over 20 pounds, thanks to the gyms being closed during lockdowns. Now with the gyms reopened, I now go every day , have lost half of that, still working at it. Thanks to you and faith , joy for giving us all a regular dose of sanity during this rough time. Well, that's awesome. News, Ryan. I think that's really great. And you know, I think a lot of people are in your position and a lot of people are working themselves back through it. I know that it was a, it was a struggle. I mean, even for myself, it's like, okay ,

Speaker 4 1:21:37

Aye, aye, aye.

Speaker 3 1:21:41

When a little bananas, when they were closing the gyms, I mean, I went, I drove out, I drove hours to assemble all sorts of weightlifting gear because for me, it's, it's more than just about fitness. You know, it's sort of part of my mental routine. We talk about, you know, staying balanced, staying centered, having an existence system to make sure that you are on track, staying motivated in alignment with your mission, your principles, your vision, your values, you know, you're saying your affirmations, all of those things for me, a gym, the gym is a big part of that. It's also a big part of my sobriety about keeping me focused about making sure that I show up and do well for my business, for my team, for our clients, for my family, for everybody, who's important to me in my life. It's an integral part of that.

Speaker 4 1:22:21

And it's important to me. So when they said,

Speaker 3 1:22:23

Oh, you don't get to do that anymore. You just don't. We just decided for you. And I said, I know, but I'm, I'm young and I'm not a high risk category. And I have a private relationship with this business, the

Speaker 4 1:22:34

Gym, by the way, agreed. They

Speaker 3 1:22:37

Also wanted to keep open. They were suing the government in order to do that. It's a private company, they're private land. They're their personnel, their , their place of business. They can let anybody in that they want to let in. I'm a private citizen. I could not go and do that

Speaker 4 1:22:51

Business with them because the government said so, right, regardless,

Speaker 3 1:22:55

What'd you say about COVID you could say you , two people are idiots, YouTube morons. You're going to go in there and work out with a bunch of other morons. Good rinse to all of you,

Speaker 4 1:23:02

Right? That's fair. That's our decision. We to get up and do that,

Speaker 3 1:23:06

And you can say, well, it's got this, you know, spill over effect and it's going to hurt other people. And the list goes on and on. And you can, you can say that about everything until you're blue in the face. I wanted to go

Speaker 4 1:23:16

In this. They didn't let me do it. I'm still a little bit hot about it, but we're back in

Speaker 3 1:23:21

Business now. Now, Ryan, I just wanted to commend you again on your, on your commitment to getting back in there because a lot of people are not doing that. Right. Look around. A lot of people are just sort of writing that year off as

Speaker 4 1:23:31

Last year, which I think is said, we've got to get back in business. Let's get after it. All right. Norovirus.

Speaker 3 1:23:38

I was in the house, says, I'm betting on this. The police motor vehicle stops is what will break the spirit. People will fire police over the fact that they do taxation this way. Yeah. People, people hate the traffic stops. There's no question

Speaker 4 1:23:51

About that. No question about

Speaker 3 1:23:53

It. We, we, some years ago, maybe a decade ago we had somebody in Arizona who actually shot one of the photo radar cameras .

Speaker 4 1:24:00

I mean like good, like four

Speaker 3 1:24:03

Or five rounds into that thing. Just like, nah ,

Speaker 4 1:24:07

Made everybody feel good, but then

Speaker 3 1:24:09

That was illegal and I do not condone illegal activity. All right, we are going to be , uh , thank you once again, for all of those questions over from watching the watchers.locals.com, I really appreciate your support. You can find us over there. A lot of good events coming up, a lot of good things that you can download over there, including a copy of my book. So check that out. All right. And for our last segment of the day, we're getting back into critical race

Speaker 4 1:24:31

Theory.

Speaker 3 1:24:33

Montana is joining the fight against critical race theory. We have a new letter that has been sent over by the Montana school superintendent over to the Montana superintendent. I'm sorry. The Montana attorney general all over critical race theory. The superintendent of the schools is saying, Hey, we can't teach this stuff in school. This is crazy. This is basically racism and it's violation. It's in violation of the civil rights act of 1964. So attorney general, if you're telling us that we need to do this stuff, or the Biden administration is telling us through the department of education that we got to make these pivots in our curriculum. I need to know how to do that because the way that I'm reading the laws, this is a violation of the laws.

Speaker 4 1:25:14

So help me out. So I want to show

Speaker 3 1:25:16

You what this looks like. And once again, this is being brought to us by Christopher Rufo, who is doing a great job on all of the critical race theory stuff. He says, breaking Montana, superintendent arson asked the state attorney general to investigate whether promoting critical race theory in the classroom violates the civil rights act of 1964 by treating individuals differently based upon race and creating a racially hostile environment. Right? And we've talked about critical race theory. It's about, you know , this idea that sort of, you know, racism is systemic. It's inherent in our society. It's been institutionalized and that essentially no interaction in our society

Speaker 4 1:25:53

Can occur without

Speaker 3 1:25:55

A racial component as a part of it. And so schools are now having to figure this out. We're talking about Mount Montana, but this is taking place all over the country. In many States,

Speaker 1 1:26:04

Many state legislatures are passing rules and regulations. We have other States that are sort of encouraging and endorsing critical race theory. We talked about this earlier in the week. I think it was Washington state that says we're good. We're critical race theory. We're a go. Then we change gears and we talk about Oklahoma. They said, no, we're not going to be doing that. And the governor signed a law that puts some limitations on that. So we're seeing the country sort of split , uh , two different directions. And now Montana is joining the fray. So I want to show you a little bit about this woman. Her name is Elsie Arnstein superintendent of public instruction. She , uh, let's see here by law, the state superintendent has general supervision of the K through 12 public schools and districts. So that's a big, that's a big chunk of , of kids, right? Elected in 2016, we got a four year term she's been teaching in public schools for 23 years, has a degree in economics education, university of Montana. Teaching career served in the Montana legislature for 12 years, four terms in the Montana house of representatives. One term in the Montana Senate from 2013, sworn into superintendent of public instruction. 2017, been married to her high school sweetheart for 41 years, two daughters, grandmother, four grandchildren, strong background, key initiatives, and all of these things. Montana hope, Montana teach Montana learn and Montana ready. And so we have this woman now who is sending a letter over to the attorney general person by the name of Austin Knutsen sent this back on May 12th. So this was yesterday. We can see here,

Speaker 4 1:27:37

Let's , uh, white. There we go.

Speaker 1 1:27:41

Uh, we see here, this was drafted on May 12th. Uh , the office of public instruction sent over to the office of the attorney general. And so the attorney general is sort of the state's lawyer, right? So it's the, the main attorney for the entire state. So it's the main person who handles education all K through 12 education, sending a letter over to the main attorney for the entire state of Montana

Speaker 4 1:28:02

Saying, Hey, what's going on here pursuant to my authority as the public servant

Speaker 1 1:28:09

Independent school supervisor, I am asking

Speaker 4 1:28:12

For a, an opinion from

Speaker 1 1:28:14

The attorney general on the legality of teaching so-called anti-racism and critical race theory in Montana public school , specifically, I request your opinion.

Speaker 4 1:28:22

And as to whether these practices violate title six

Speaker 1 1:28:27

Of the civil rights act of 1964 and the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment article two, section four of the Montana constitution and other things .

Speaker 4 1:28:38

So flushing out what the claims are. Three of them, civil rights act. We have

Speaker 1 1:28:44

The Montana constitution and the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment.

Speaker 4 1:28:49

We have standing

Speaker 1 1:28:50

That is being established right here. So she's saying I have the ability to go in and ask you for your opinion on this. I have standing on this matter that they go through some legal analysis. The U S department of education recently released a proposed new rule, establishing priorities for grants in American history and civics education. So she was referencing this, this came out April 19, 2021. So this is a Biden policy

Speaker 4 1:29:15

Offer priority to grant quote projects,

Speaker 1 1:29:19

Incorporate racially, ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse perspectives. They're going to get grant money. OPI has serious concerns about the effect, this proposal on the education of students in Montana. It raises serious questions as to whether it encourages schools, to treat students differently on the basis of race in violation of federal and state non-discrimination laws.

Speaker 4 1:29:43

Government is saying according to the U S department

Speaker 1 1:29:47

Education, we're going to give you a grant so long as you incorporate this into a project that includes racial, ethnic, cultural, and linguistic linguistically diverse perspective .

Speaker 4 1:29:58

Sounds, sounds kind of

Speaker 1 1:30:02

Right. Let's see what else is in here. The most troubling aspect of the proposal is the incorporation of the so-called anti-racist teachings. Okay. So it's about the content. Let's see what this is about. Critical race theory, going into the classrooms. The proposal States that schools across the country are working to incorporate anti-racist practices. It explains as the scholar Ebrum X Kendi has expressed quote , an anti-racist idea is any idea that suggests the racial groups are equals in all their apparent differences, that there is nothing right or wrong with any racial group anti-racist ideas argue that racist policies are the cause of racial inequities. It is critical that the teaching of American history and civics creates learning experiences that validate and reflect the diversity identities, histories, contributions, and experiences of all students. So this comes from an article titled how to be an anti-racist in 2019 .

Speaker 4 1:30:58

So the soup

Speaker 1 1:31:00

Attendance has accordingly under this priority. The applicants proposed projects that incorporate teaching and learning practices , uh , okay. Kennedy's how to be an anti-racist is quite radical. She contends, she says that the most threatening racist movement is the regular Americans drive for a race

Speaker 4 1:31:16

Neutral state, according to Abraham Kendi . So if you want a race, neutral state

Speaker 1 1:31:23

Is threatening the racist movement incorporating the idea of institutional racism, structural racism, and systemic racism. This policy argues that a racist policy is any measure that produces or sustains racial inequity between racial

Speaker 4 1:31:37

Groups, an anti-racist

Speaker 1 1:31:39

Policy is any measure that produces or sustains racial equity between racial groups by policy.

Speaker 4 1:31:44

I mean, written unwritten, the most

Speaker 1 1:31:46

Shocking aspect of this philosophy is the pronouncement that the only remedy to pass discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discriminate.

Speaker 4 1:31:57

What, okay.

Speaker 3 1:32:01

Right . Anti-racism is closely linked with a discipline known as critical race theory, CRT stresses, racial divisions. These ideas are fallacious. They also lead to discrimination. When implemented, for example, the city of Seattle's office of civil rights developed a race and social justice training, rich required white employees to examine their quote relationships with white supremacy, racism, and whiteness, and explain how their families benefit economically from the system of white supremacy, even as it directly and violently harms black people. Okay. One prominent critic of CRT are used that quote under the banner of anti-racism Seattle's office of civil rights is now explicitly endorsing principles of segregationism group base guilt and race essential ism, ugly concepts. It should've left behind a century ago. These fringe ideas have found their way into school. She says in the spring of 2019, another school district began developing the BLM at school curriculum, which unopposed, which quote, unapologetically aims to create a new generation of allied

Speaker 4 1:33:01

Activists. What did the school district do? Well, they went on

Speaker 3 1:33:05

To separate administrators in professional development training programs into two groups based on race whites. And

Speaker 4 1:33:12

Non-white . So we're going

Speaker 3 1:33:14

Back to segregation now. So in Seattle, they say that they're going to have this BLM curriculum. What happens when a slogan becomes a curriculum posted in the Atlantic? So they actually divide the study ,

Speaker 4 1:33:26

Black people over here, white people over there. Very,

Speaker 3 1:33:30

Very progressive offers, a various quote, racially exclusive affinity groups that separated students and parents and community members by race more segregation. They also implemented a disciplinary policy that included explicit direction to staffers to consider a student's race when meeting out

Speaker 4 1:33:48

Discipline. So certain punishments go to certain ethnicities, got it,

Speaker 3 1:33:56

Carry out a colorism privilege. Walk that separated seventh and eighth grade students into different groups based on

Speaker 4 1:34:02

Race. That's good for the

Speaker 3 1:34:04

Kids. Uh, we have what else on November 25th, the U S department of education for civil rights, open an investigation of a complaint against the district for a violation of title, six parents are asked to quiz their kids on whiteness and give them approachable. Examples of quote , how whiteness shows up in school or in the community. And it's focused on whiteness and its invitation to readers, to challenge racism by interrogating and rejecting it. The worldview of not. My idea is similar to that of Robin D'Angelo's white fragility. We have another example from New York. All right , let's see. Here she finishes. She says actions such as these seem to violate the plain language of the civil rights act, which says no person in the United States shell on the ground of race, color, national origin, be excluded from participation, in be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to the discrimination under any program or activity receiving federal financial assistance. When the school or exclude students on the basis of race for these quote anti-racist activities, it constitutes different treatment. Additionally, in some instances, these materials may cause a racially hostile environment under the law harassing conduct. If they are sufficiently severe pervasive and persistent. So as to interfere or limit the ability of a student to participate are problematic. Thus, if a school allows students to be judged, labeled, or assigned guilt, according to their race, this could create an impermissible hostile environment and looking for more information, I look forward to receiving your response signed off on by Elsie our Knutsen state superintendent, Montana office,

Speaker 4 1:35:34

Public instruction. So

Speaker 3 1:35:37

Trying to figure out what is happening with the youth, take a couple of questions over from watching the watchers.locals.com . We've got soul under siege says, why are we even calling it critical race theory? Just call it what it is, teaching people to be racist, because that is what it is, how this is even the debate blows me away. I know I don't, I don't get it either. I really don't. I'm having a, I'm having a difficult time wrapping my head around

Speaker 4 1:36:00

How they , uh , sort of

Speaker 3 1:36:03

Skipped over something that we all learned. I mean, I remember growing up,

Speaker 4 1:36:07

You

Speaker 3 1:36:08

Don't judge people by the color of their skin, right? That's exactly what MLK taught us. I mean, we learned that my entire life, right? Don't judge people by the color of their skin , uh, judging them by the content of their character. I thought that was a powerful message. I still think it is. They don't. For some reason we have Liberty or death says they teach this crap in our law school to force us to go to these quote professionalism presentations once a month month where they pushed soft bigotry of low expectations. We also have CRT type classes, race, and the law and lawyers in advancing social justice.

Speaker 4 1:36:39

Okay. I mean, I

Speaker 3 1:36:41

That's one way to practice law, I guess. Well, it , look, if they're going to defund the police, maybe this is a whole new area of law. Maybe this is what it looks

Speaker 4 1:36:47

Like . Now we just pinky to says,

Speaker 3 1:36:50

Rob, that is what is wrong with America. We've already had diversity training, turning everything. The exact polar opposite is not good. Extremely

Speaker 4 1:36:57

Games are bad. They are bad pinking . I know they are . Thank you for it .

Speaker 3 1:37:01

We got CHASCo. Our last one in the house says, geneticists will tell you that there are no races. You can't tell by DNA, which race a person is. How do you deal with mixed race individuals? How many

Speaker 4 1:37:13

Are there supposed to be? I don't know. Is there a limit or is there a, supposed to be a certain number of anything? I'm just kind of doesn't matter what , whatever, I don't care how many there are. That could be, you know, maybe one day we'll all just keep co-mingling and then we just have one race. Maybe

Speaker 3 1:37:35

Wouldn't that be nice. Those are questions over from watching the watchers.locals.com . Thank you all so much for those. And I want to thank, we have a couple of people who signed up to support the community. Big, big welcomes over to T Baggins T Baggins is in the house. That's good. We all welcome to Baggins. We also have LXO. This Is also now a supporter over@watchingthewatchersdotlocals.com. Welcome to you both. Thank you so much for signing up, looking forward to connecting with you over there. And I also want to thank all of those who asked questions today. You see who you are up there. You make the show possible. Thank you for keeping things engaged in light and fun and asking great questions that prompt some nice conversation. I appreciate it. If you want to be a part of the community, you can sign up by going over to watching the watchers.locals.com and you can download a copy of my book for free. It's called beginning to winning right there. You can also download a copy of the slides which are available for your perusal. Download a copy of my impeachment party documents might exist in systems, personal productivity development. Talk a little bit about some existence systems today. You can check that out. We share links throughout the day. We also connect with great people. We have

Speaker 4 1:38:44

Online local , uh , locals, community,

Speaker 3 1:38:47

Only monthly meetup that is coming up on May 22nd, which is a Saturday seven to 8:00 PM. Eastern time. Looking forward to connecting with you there. We also have law enforcement interaction training coming up on Saturday, June 12th, which is going to be a lot of fun. I'm excited. I'm still putting together this presentation. And so , um , uh , it's going to be fun. I think we're gonna be able to talk about a lot of interesting things, especially in light of , uh , what's going on in the world around us. So that'll be fun. June 12th, that's going to be at 9:00 AM. Arizona times can be 12, 12, noon Eastern. So join us on that June 12th. All right . And as we know, before we get outta here, I gotta tell you that I am a criminal defense attorney here at the R and R law group. We're located in Scottsdale, Arizona. We have a great team of people and we're all very, very passionate and dedicated to helping good people who are facing criminal charges. We want to help them find safety, clarity, and hope in their cases and in their lives. So if you happen to know anybody in the state of Arizona, who is in a situation where they need some help, if they're facing criminal charges, if they've got a DUI that's outstanding, a domestic violence case, any disorderly conduct, misdemeanor offenses, felony offenses, traffic, offenses, anything, and everything in between. Anytime somebody is in trouble with the law, we can help. So we would very much appreciate it. If you sent a referral our direction, we can help with all of that stuff. We can help with any current active cases. We can deal with old cases, quash old warrants , uh , help restore rights, the right to vote, possess a firearm, apply for federal benefits. The ability to drive again, a lot of very important things that sometimes people just kind of forget about. They , they make do without those where they make, do with a blemish on their record. When they go apply for jobs, they got to explain it. And it's , you know, we can clear that up. So give us a call. If you need help with any of that stuff, we love the work that we do. We're super passionate about it. And so if you want to give us a call, we offer free case evaluations. So really have nothing to lose. We'll give you a copy of my book. If you come on into the office and we'll do everything we can to make sure that you leave better than when you came in. So we would be honored and humbled. If you happen to know anybody, if you sent them our direction, all of the information is down in the description below

Speaker 4 1:40:48

Really means the world. When somebody calls and said, Hey, you know, found you on kind of a cool thing.

Speaker 1 1:40:54

So thank you so much for all of your support today. Quick reminder, we're going to be back here tomorrow. Same time, same place. It's going to be at 4:00 PM Arizona time, which is 5:00 PM mountain, which is 6:00 PM central, which is 7:00 PM out there on the East coast. For that one, Florida man out there, everybody have a tremendous night's sleep. Have a nice hearty dinner. Cause I will see you right back here

Speaker 9 1:41:14

Tomorrow. Bye-bye .