Police Brutality

"The Stasi and Soviet secret police employed every imaginable form of brutality, physical and mental, to eradicate enemies of the state. The kidnapping of anti-communists operating in West Berlin was almost a weekly occurrence between 1945 and the early 1960 s. Guther Bush, a top official of the institute for all German affairs which kept track of communist human rights violations said that more than five hundred cases were being investigated by the Berlin police in spring of 1995. Many of the victims disappeared without a trace."[1]

I have been the victim of a terror campaign for over two decades. The violations I have experienced range from mundane but annoying deposits of garbage on my property to terrifying discoveries of mutilated and murdered pets, identity theft, mail tampering, burglary, vandalism, wire fraud, rape, death threats, police brutality, illegal commitment to Yale New Haven psychiatric hospital and finally illegal imprisonment and torture.

Ironically the hospitalization and imprisonment backfired. I was diagnosed with situational anxiety and exhaustion by my physician and the court dropped the trumped-up traffic charges. Nonetheless, the two weeks I was imprisoned without being charged enabled my captors to ransack and putrefy my home, steal my vehicle, my beloved parrots, their cages, and abuse and impound my dear puppies.

Perhaps my neighbors, James Devoe and his girlfriend Cara Allen, who were charged with pet-sitting in my absence, were remiss. The Compact Disc containing the information correlating to my non-profit was also stolen along with various legal documents, items of clothing and jewelry. Although my dogs were returned to me, my parrots are still in the hands of my tormentors. I fear they are being exploited in a research lab.

"Nobody told me where I would be taken. After driving for several hours, the van stopped. When the door opened, I was taken out of this cage and led into a large building. There I was put into an other cell. When the door banged shut, I looked around me. I was appalled. The place was filthy, the mattress on the cot was even filthier, the toilet bowl a stinking, cracked receptacle. This was the experience of Horst Erdman, a freedom fighter who was captured and tortured for distributing leaflets on May 29, 1953, during the reign of East Germany s Stasi regime." [2]

Perhaps I am lucky. Erdman was sentenced to eleven years of hard labor. He described his attorneys as useless panderers. The prosecutors and judge were mere puppets intent on carrying out the state s malicious agenda.[3]

Erdman was threatened with the death and torture of various family members. So was I. Erdman was ordered to remove his clothes. His penis and anus were probed by a guard. I experienced the same sort of humiliation. In reading Erdman s account, I am astounded at how history repeats itself with such resounding accuracy.

Erdman was sleep deprived, isolated, told that various friends or family members had been killed, subjected to extreme temperatures and obnoxious noises. He was constantly provoked by the criminal convicts, murderers, sexual deviants, robbers and batterers whom the state housed with political prisoners order to exacerbate the suffering and increase the psychological burden [4]

My experience was almost identical to Erdman s. This indicates that far from being random and coincidental, my experiences at Yale New Haven psychiatric hospital and at Niantic Correctional Institute were specifically choreographed to create fatigue, stress, discomfort, humiliation, agony and ultimately physical and psychological breakdown.

Torture is a time-honored discipline and targets are studied through intense privacy invasion and provocation prior to and after their incarcerations.

John O. Koehler validates my experience in the following account.

"Absolutely nothing was sacred to the secret police. Tiny holes were bored in apartment and hotel room walls through which Stasi agents filmed their suspects with special video cameras. Even bathrooms were penetrated by communist voyeurs." [5]

Targets are followed by brown shirted harassment teams who are instructed to model inappropriate behavior, provoke, befriend, belittle, and demean.

Weaknesses are discovered and exploited and as in my case, when the target can t be persuaded or manipulated to break the law, officers merely lie in wait, write tickets for imagined transgressions, make it impossible for the target to get to court, falsely imprison and torture.

I expect abusive, degrading behavior from the corrupt Guilford Gestapo nevertheless, when my friends, family and ex-husband abandoned me in my hour of need, my heart was broken.

While imprisoned, I was forbidden to engage in even the most basic of grooming rituals. I was denied direct contact with my friends and family, denied the opportunity to contact anyone by telephone, denied adequate bedding, clothing, toiletries, cosmetics, lotion, a mirror, hair dryer, hair tie, basic writing implements, paper, pain reliever, hair conditioner or privacy.

My skin became dry and cracked, my hair a disheveled mess, and my face hollow and gaunt. I was subjected to extreme hot and cold temperatures in order to increase the physical and emotional stress. At night the guards flashed a bright light in my eyes every fifteen to thirty minutes.

Consequently I was sleep deprived, exhausted, and terrified. I cried myself to sleep almost every night. I was scared to death of loosing my pets, my vehicle, my home and my career. The guards took the liberty of revising letters that I sent to my ex-husband, consequently, I suspect they also revised letters that my mother sent to me. This violation only served to exacerbate my fears and anxieties.

After two weeks of this misery I was finally given my day in court. I was forced to appear in court wearing dingy scrubs and a stained t-shirt because my jailers pretended to lose my street clothes. I looked like an unkempt homeless woman. Because I am a woman who takes extreme pride in her personal grooming and presentation, this was a particularly degrading and humiliating experience.

During in court my wrists were tightly cuffed behind my back as if the guards were purposely attempting to call attention to my breasts. The cuffs on my ankles cut deeply into my skin. I must have looked like an an emaciated cow on display at a stock show.

In the following excerpt, John Koehler describes how handcuffs are used as instruments of torture.

"One of the favorite torture instruments used by the Stasi was a special handcuff called the Die Acht or the figure eight, so named because of the configuration. Lacking the swivels of normal handcuffs it was ridged to prevent movement of the hands. " [6]

I am convinced that my jailers in coalition with the local police were seeking to punish and castigate me for refusing to engage in illicit activities which would enable them to paint me as either insane or dangerous and thus destroy my career as an activist. One irate guard, after forcing me to endure an illegal cavity search, screamed, "You have given our officers more problems! "

Obviously they were retaliating.

Apparently, my ex-husband, Shawn W. Miller, who works for Raytheon, a company engaged in contracting with the government to manufacture weapons of warfare, played an integral role in the torture that I was forced to endure. Participating in the theft of my vehicle and pets must have felt like sweet revenge.

Torture is designed to destroy the body as well as the spirit. Joseph Kneifel, a political prisoner held by East German communists and released in 1987 recalled,

"When we arrived in Bavaria, I experienced the last infamy of the Stasi. When I unwrapped my sparse belongings I found they had stolen my personal documents, all court papers, my drivers license, wrist watch, and mail from my wife." [7]

Kneifel also discussed seeing his wife for the first time after her release. Although he had not been told of her torment he could tell when he saw her that she had been tortured.

"I could tell by looking at her. She was forty years old and she looked fifty." [8]

I was forced to leave the court-house, hail a cab in the streets of New Haven and retrieve my dogs from the pound looking like a homeless woman. I came home to a filthy ransacked house, toilet bowls filled with my neighbors feces, an empty refrigerator, ruined clothing, the horror of thinking that my beloved parrots had been sold to a research lab and a chorus of participatory abusers who told me that I deserved it.

My bathroom mirror revealed an abundance of thick grey streaks in my once ash blonde hair. My newly acquired jowls, crows feet and sunken cheeks were clearly the product of years of terror followed by illegal kidnapping, imprisonment and torture at Niantic.

Torture degrades the torturer. The dignity of the victim can not be compromised by sadistic police officers who have lost touch with the fundamental moral lessons most of us learned in Sunday school. [9]

The men and women charged with operating the Guilford police department have blood on their hands. So do my neighbors, ex-husband, and the members of my family who either participated in the criminal activity that I was forced to endure or merely turned an apathetic blind as I was being led away by officer Mark O Connor to what may well have been my death.

Shortly after my release from prison I paid a visit to the Guilford police department to inquire about the fate of my stolen parrots. I was met with stonewalling, blank faced officers who are apparently trained to play deaf and dumb. According to the Guilford police department, local state and federal laws only apply to some of the people some of the time.

While waiting to be assisted, I noticed a brochure sitting on an entrance table. Apparently the Guilford police department are now marketing themselves as feminists.

I find it painfully ironic that a police department which participates in the retaliatory abuse and torture of a domestic violence victim and survivor would suddenly announce the creation of their own domestic violence prevention program.

Clearly, the Guilford P.D. is in need of enlightenment.

Torturing an innocent American citizen on American soil is an act of treason.

Failure to investigate a reported crime is a crime. Failure to protect a crime victim from further assaults is a crime. Warrant-less surveillance, search and seizure, telephone call re-routing and spoofing are crimes. Retaliation is a crime. False imprisonment and torture are crimes.

Harassment under the color of law is a crime, police brutality is a crime. Perhaps the newly sensitive officers employed at the Guilford police department might be motivated to make amends for their failure to protect this domestic violence victim further abuse before embarking on a campaign to save Guilford s remaining victims.

The Guilford police department appear to be in the business of comforting the comfortable and afflicting the afflicted.

For over twenty years I have worked on behalf of the environment, animals, working people, victims of domestic violence and sexual assault. Most recently I have been a vocal advocate for privacy and free speech.

I believe that the bill of rights, civil rights legislation and the Constitution should protect all of the people all of the time. I don t believe in selective democracy. I believe in the right to privacy, the right to pursue happiness, the right to be protected from illegal search and seizure, the right to a fair trial before punishment and the right to be represented by an unbiased attorney.

I filed numerous police reports here in Guilford as well as in Maryland. However, when I asked to see copies of these reports I was told that I would be charged a dollar a page. This directly violates The Victims Bill of Rights act.

Criminal investigator Jeffrey C. Naylor speaks clearly and succinctly about the victims bill of rights act in the following excerpt:

"The Victims Bill of Rights is a significant piece of legislation which provides valuable information for crime victims. While the language varies somewhat from state to state there are common provisions within The Victims Bill of Rights Act.

Crime victims are entitled to receive a free copy of the police report relating to the crime.
They are also entitled to:

1. Be free of intimidation
2. Be told of possible compensation for victims of violent crime.
3. Be told of possible compensation in the form of restitution.
4. Be told of social service agencies that can help
5. Be assisted by criminal justice agencies.
6. Receive prior notification of the convicts release, escape, or being sent to a work release program in the community.
7. The right to have personal and family safely considered when bail is being considered.
8. The right to provide information to a probation department conducting a pre-sentence investigation about the impact of the offence.
9. The right for victims and other prosecution witnesses to be provided with a private room during the interview process where occupants cannot be seen or other wise identified.
10. The right to prompt return of any property that is no longer needed as evidence.
11. The right to have that statement considered during sentencing and during any parole action.
12. The right to have the prosecutor notify employers that the need for testimony may include absence from work. [10]"

I am a respectable, healthy woman. Yet I watch in horror while my basic human rights are trampled. I have worked selflessly all of my adult life for my community but I can t win this war without your help. I am in desperate need of legal, financial and emotional support. I have been emotionally and financially devastated.

When the institutions charged with protecting and alleviating the suffering engage in perpetuating the abuse, all hope is lost.

My name is Shawnna Armstrong. I am the president and founder of The Starfishgirl Anti-Stalking Campaign. Starfishgirl is a public charity. Our tax ID: 20-534-6241
Please send a tax-deductible contribution to: Starfishgirl Anti-Stalking Campaign in care of the Guilford Post Office, Guilford, Ct, 06437.

Addendum

I. Police Brutality; Spring 2008
II. Identity Theft
III. FBI Color of law Statutes
IV. Notes

Police Brutality log: Spring 2008

I have been systematically abused by various officer employed by the Guilford police department. In spring of 2008, Officers Robert Norman, Jeffrey Provencher, and Patrick Leary forced themselves into my home, dragged me out to the street, took me to the police station and arrested me. They did not produce an arrest warrant, a search warrant, or bother to read me my Miranda rights. All of this for missing a court date which I had feverishly attempted to reschedule. I was not even given a week to petition the court for a new date.

Prior to forcing themselves into my home they asked if I was in possession of a large amount of cash. They pretended that my mother had called them. When I told them I was not, they informed me that they were going to arrest me.

I asked to be excused so that I could get dressed. The officers then informed me that I would be required to keep the front door open. I told them that because I had parrots in free flight as well as unleashed dogs in my home that keeping the door open was not an option. At this point they forced themselves into my home, followed me upstairs to my bedroom and insisted that I dress while they supervised. Terrified of the prospect of being forced to strip in front of three strange men, I attempted to go into my bathroom to change. That was when Officer Norman roughly seized my arm (subsequently causing severe bruising) and began to drag me out of my house.

He apparently had a last-minute glimmer of conscience and graciously allowed me to collect a pair of blue jeans to take with me to the station. My punishment for requesting privacy was being dragged out of my home while wearing my pajamas, arrested and publicly humiliated. The officers did not produce a warrant nor did they call for a female back-up.

I was not resisting arrest nor was I behaving in a belligerent fashion. I merely asked to be given the privacy and dignity of being allowed to dress myself away from the officers prying eyes.

The first question asked by officer Leary was, Do you wear underwear? He then asked me, Do you have scars? Balking at the obvious sexual harassment, I reluctantly answered. While being questioned I was made to sit on a tiny stool in a cage. The officers appeared to be taking great pleasure in their self-created S&M show.

After being booked I was escorted to a filthy cell which had recently been flooded with raw sewage. The cell smelled of excrement and urine. Exposure to raw sewage is known to cause impetigo, staph infections, or worse. I was disgusted and afraid. The cot in the cell also smelled of urine and feces and before long my hair and clothing were covered with the stench of the filthy Guilford police department.

Obviously the officers at the Guilford police department are comfortable wallowing in the scent of dung.

Officer Provencher told me that they had been instructed to feed me. He then declared, We are turning off the cameras! There was a noticeable camera unit placed directly above the toilet. Throughout the day and night I was regaled with taped siren noises, periodic performances, interruptions, bizarre verbal insinuations, threats and insults.

Officer Thornton, upon bringing me a bag of food from McDonald s announced, Hears! You re food! She later stopped by my cell and exclaimed, Toy-let-paper! while handing out a few sheets for me to take.

Although I requested a blanket, I was made to freeze for hours. Eventually I was given a yellow plastic tarp to use for warmth. Shortly after I fell asleep I was rudely awakened by what felt like a radar or taser shock of some sort. The impact of the weapon was powerful enough to cause my body to temporarily convulse. I immediately became nauseated and disoriented.[11]

I was not allowed to look into a mirror, wash, brush my teeth, or comb my hair. Before attending court I was offered a large glass of orange juice to drink and was again placed in the cage. A large male officer sat next to me reading a book called, Star Trek. Suddenly he looked up at me and asked, Is this your book? I told him that the book he was reading was not mine.
He and a female officer then began to openly flirt with each other. They actually seemed to be flirting in order to try to make me jealous. Confused, I prayed for painless ending to this fiasco.

Soon I was transferred to yet another filthy dungeon located in the basement of the New Haven court-house. My hair barrette was immediately confiscated. For what seemed like hours I was subjected to more psy-ops abuse punctuated by bizarre dysfunctional performances both in the dungeon and in the court room. My attorney resembled President Obama. Various other attorneys made a point visiting the dungeon in order to question me. All of them bore striking resemblances to past employers, friends, or public figures.

By the time I was finally escorted into the court room I was so weak and nauseated that I had to struggle to keep from fainting.

The entire experience reminded me of the bizarre psychological and physical abuse portrayed in the movie, A Clockwork Orange. The setting was clearly contrived to create public shame and humiliation. Obviously my tormentors were attempting to subtly brainwash me into believing that various public figures in the Democratic Party were responsible for the abuse I had endured.

Finally I was released. I looked unkempt. My face was smeared with mascara and I smelled of the feces contaminated cell at the Guilford police department.

Alone, I walked out of the imposing marble court-house and into the sunshine laden New Haven green, hailed a cab and went home. Unfortunately my homecoming was not much of a relief. My home had been burglarized for the umpteenth time that year. I was missing a credit card and empty food packages from things which I had neither purchased nor consumed were strewn about my kitchen floor. I collapsed. Unbeknownst to me, this experience was only a preview of the torture that would befall me in the future.

Needless to say, these days when the Guilford Gestapo knock on my door, I don t answer. Would you?

Identity Theft

Gloria Naylor, in a brilliant account of her own harassment experience exclaimed,
"I didn t want to tell this story. It s going to take courage. Perhaps more courage than I possess. But they ve left me with not alternatives. I am in a battle for my mind." [12]

I believe that I am in a battle for my identity. Because my telephone calls are regularly tampered with I am often prevented from contacting agencies or people who could assist me in regaining my freedom.

Through modern-day telephone call re-routing and spoofing technologies, web site hacking, privacy invasion, terror and torture I am being denied to the right to pursue my career, support myself, develop relationships, enjoy basic creature comforts and more importantly, I am being denied the right to pursue happiness.

I am an American, freedom is my birthright. But I can t be free when my identity is being used to further the agenda of a monster. I can t be free when I am subjected to socially engineered scenarios, sexual harassment, burglary, kidnapping and torture.

If this sort of violation and victimization is allowed to happen to me, I assure you that it can occur in your life as well. Law enforcement tells me that I am protected. I don t feel protected. I feel violated. I am the victim of blatant and willful sabotage combined with the intentional infliction of emotional, financial and physical distress.

How much longer is law enforcement going to be allowed to regale me with bullshit while calling it sugar?[13]

The people who are doing this to me, regardless of their occupations are criminals. I am living the American nightmare.

FBI Color of Law Statues:

The FBI is clear with respect to harassment under the color of law. Their web site describes the obligation of law enforcement to treat the public with kindness and respect.

The following statues and protocols are explained on their web site at www.FBI.gov.

" The FBI is the lead federal agency for investigating color of law abuses, which include acts carried out by government officials operating both within and beyond the limits of their lawful authority. Off-duty conduct may be covered if the perpetrator asserted his or her official status in some way.

During Fiscal Year 2005, the FBI investigated more than 1,100 color of law cases. Most of these crimes fall into five broad areas:

excessive force;
sexual assaults;
false arrest and fabrication of evidence;
deprivation of property; and
failure to keep from harm.
Excessive force: In making arrests, maintaining order, and defending life, law enforcement officers are allowed to use whatever force is reasonably necessary.

The breadth and scope of the use of force is vast, from just the physical presence of the officer, to the use of deadly force. Violations of federal law occur when it can be shown that the force used was willfully unreasonable or excessive.

Sexual assaults by officials acting under color of law occur in jails, during traffic stops, or in other settings where officials might use their position of authority to coerce an individual into sexual compliance. The compliance is generally gained because of a threat of an official action against the person if he or she doesn t comply.

False arrest and fabrication of evidence: The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right against unreasonable searches or seizures. A law enforcement official using authority provided under the color of law is allowed to stop individuals and, under certain circumstances, to search them and retain their property. It is in the abuse of that discretionary power such as an unlawful detention or illegal confiscation of property that a violation of a person s civil rights may occur.

Fabricating evidence against or falsely arresting an individual also violates the color of law statute, taking away the person s rights of due process and unreasonable seizure. In the case of deprivation of property, the color of law statute would be violated by unlawfully obtaining or maintaining a person s property, which over steps or misapplies the official s authority.

The Fourteenth Amendment secures the right to due process; the Eighth Amendment prohibits the use of cruel and unusual punishment. During an arrest or detention, these rights can be violated by the use of force amounting to punishment (summary judgment). The person accused of a crime must be allowed the opportunity to have a trial and should not be subjected to punishment without having been afforded the opportunity of the legal process.

Failure to keep from harm: The public counts on it s law enforcement officials to protect local communities. If it s shown that an official willfully failed to keep an individual from harm, that official could be in violation of the color of law statute. [13]"

" Civil Applications

Title 42, U.S.C., Section 14141 makes it unlawful for state or local law enforcement agencies to allow officers to engage in a pattern or practice of conduct that deprives persons of rights protected by the Constitution or U.S. laws. This law, commonly referred to as the Police Misconduct Statute, gives the Department of Justice authority to seek civil remedies in cases where law enforcement agencies have policies or practices that foster a pattern of misconduct by employees. This action is directed against an agency, not against individual officers. The types of issues which may initiate a pattern and practice investigation include:

Lack of supervision/monitoring of officers actions;
Lack of justification or reporting by officers on incidents involving the use of force;
Lack of, or improper training of, officers; and
Citizen complaint processes that treats complainants as adversaries.
Under Title 42, U.S.C., Section 1997, the Department of Justice has the ability to initiate civil actions against mental hospitals, jails, prisons, nursing homes, and juvenile detention facilities when there are allegations of systemic derivations of the constitutional rights of institutionalized persons. [14]"

Notes:

[1] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado, Westview Press, 1999, page 126)
[2] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado, Westview Press, 1999, page 108. A tape recording of the trial was found by Erdman after reunification and was made available to me. Koehler, notes, page 421)
[3] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado, Westview Press, 1999, page 109)
[4] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado, Westview Press, 1999, page 108)
[5] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado, Westview Press, 1999, page 109)
[6] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado, Westview Press, 1999, page 109)
[7] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado, Westview Press, 1999, page 124)
[8] John O Koehler, Stasi, The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police, (Colorado,Westview Press, 1999, page 129)
[9] Allan Barker, Allan Barker s Essays
[10] Jeffrey C. Naylor, Unmasking the Cyberstalker, (South Carolina 2005, pages94-95)
[11] Royal Canadian Mounted Police, See web-site copy at: www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/ccaps-spcca/cew-ai/operations-17-7-eng.htm
[12] Gloria Naylor, 1996, (Third World Press, Illinois, 2005 p.129)
[13] The Search for the Manchurian Candidate, John Marks
[14] Federal Bureau of Investigation, See web site copy at: www.FBI.gov
[15] Federal Bureau of Investigation, See web site copy at: www.FBI.gov

© Shawnna Armstrong and the Starfishgirl Anti-Stalking Campaign, (2004-2010). Unauthorized use, alteration or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this report's author and/or owner is prohibited. Excerpts and links may be utilized provided that full and clear credit is given to Shawnna Armstrong and Starfishgirl with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Disclaimer:

Internet communications are not secure. Therefore Starfishgirl Anti-Stalking Campaign will not accept legal responsibility for the contents of this report. The opinions presented here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the sentiments of the Starfishgirl Anti-Stalking Campaign unless otherwise stated.

Disclaimer #2

I have a cyberstalker who is unable to respect boundaries. The cyberstalker can't control himself and regularly edits and destroys my work. Please bear with me while I attempt to resolve this problem.

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant. ~Martin Luther King Jr

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