Little-Acorn
Gold Member
The Wisconsin police raids against the homes of leaders of conservatives causes supporting Scott Walker, started with a relatively legitimate police investigation of documented embezzlement by a known suspect. But it suddenly spiraled out of control, exploding into Kristallnacht-style investigations and late-night raids of the houses of law-abiding people having nothing to do with the embezzlement... but who were all leaders of various conservative groups supporting causes that Democrats and union thugs didn't like.
Such things routinely happen in dictatorships, third-world countries, and other banana republics.
The Democrats seem to be trying everything they can, to transform the United States into another such third-world country.
---------------------------------------------------
Wisconsin s Shame I Thought It Was a Home Invasion National Review Online
Wisconsinâs Shame: âI Thought It Was a Home Invasionâ
by David French
April 20, 2015 4:00 AM
For dozens of conservatives, the years since Scott Walkerâs first election as governor of Wisconsin transformed the state â known for pro-football championships, good cheese, and a population with a reputation for being unfailingly polite â into a place where conservatives have faced early-morning raids, multi-year secretive criminal investigations, slanderous and selective leaks to sympathetic media, and intrusive electronic snooping.
Yes, Wisconsin, the cradle of the progressive movement and home of the âWisconsin ideaâ â the marriage of state governments and state universities to govern through technocratic reform â was giving birth to a new progressive idea, the use of law enforcement as a political instrument, as a weapon to attempt to undo election results, shame opponents, and ruin lives.
Most Americans have never heard of these raids, or of the lengthy criminal investigations of Wisconsin conservatives. For good reason. Bound by comprehensive secrecy orders, conservatives were left to suffer in silence as leaks ruined their reputations, as neighbors, looking through windows and dismayed at the massive police presence, the lights shining down on targetsâ homes, wondered, no doubt, What on earth did that family do?
This was the on-the-ground reality of the so-called John Doe investigations, expansive and secret criminal proceedings that directly targeted Wisconsin residents because of their relationship to Scott Walker, their support for Act 10, and their advocacy of conservative reform. Largely hidden from the public eye, this traumatic process, however, is now heading toward a legal climax, with two key rulings expected in the late spring or early summer.
The first ruling, from the Wisconsin supreme court, could halt the investigations for good, in part by declaring that the âmisconductâ being investigated isnât misconduct at all but the simple exercise of First Amendment rights. The second ruling, from the United States Supreme Court, could grant review on a federal lawsuit brought by Wisconsin political activist Eric OâKeefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth, the first conservatives to challenge the investigations head-on. If the Court grants review, it could not only halt the investigations but also begin the process of holding accountable those public officials who have so abused their powers.
But no matter the outcome of these court hearings, the damage has been done. In the words of Mr. OâKeefe, âThe process is the punishment.â
It all began innocently enough. In 2009, officials from the office of the Milwaukee County executive contacted the office of the Milwaukee district attorney, headed by John Chisholm, to investigate the disappearance of $11,242.24 from the Milwaukee chapter of the Order of the Purple Heart. The matter was routine, with witnesses willing and able to testify against the principal suspect, a man named Kevin Kavanaugh.
What followed, however, was anything but routine. Chisholm failed to act promptly on the report, and when he did act, he refused to conduct a conventional criminal investigation but instead petitioned, in May 2010, to open a âJohn Doeâ investigation, a proceeding under Wisconsin law that permits Wisconsin officials to conduct extensive investigations while keeping the targetâs identity secret (hence the designation âJohn Doeâ).
John Doe investigations alter typical criminal procedure in two important ways: First, they remove grand juries from the investigative process, replacing the ordinary citizens of a grand jury with a supervising judge. Second, they can include strict secrecy requirements not just on the prosecution but also on the targets of the investigation. In practice, this means that, while the prosecution cannot make public comments about the investigation, it can take public actions indicating criminal suspicion (such as raiding businesses and homes in full view of the community) while preventing the targets of the raids from defending against or even discussing the prosecutionâs claims.
Why would Chisholm seek such broad powers to investigate a year-old embezzlement claim with a known suspect? Because the Milwaukee County executive, Scott Walker, had by that time become the leading Republican candidate for governor.
District Attorney Chisholm was a Democrat, a very partisan Democrat. Almost immediately after opening the John Doe investigation, Chisholm used his expansive powers to embarrass Walker, raiding his county-executive offices within a week. As Mr. OâKeefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth explained in court filings, the investigation then dramatically expanded: Over the next few months, [Chisholmâs] investigation of all-things-Walker expanded to include everything from alleged campaign-finance violations to sexual misconduct to alleged public contracting bid-rigging to alleged misuse of county time and property.
Between May 5, 2010, and May 3, 2012, the Milwaukee Defendants filed at least eighteen petitions to formally â[e]nlargeâ the scope of the John Doe investigation, and each was granted. . . . That amounts to a new formal inquiry every five and a half weeks, on average, for two years.
This expansion coincided with one of the more remarkable state-level political controversies in modern American history â the protest (and passage) of Act 10, followed by the attempted recall of a number of Wisconsin legislators and, ultimately, Governor Walker.
Political observers will no doubt remember the events in Madison â the state capitol overrun by chanting protesters, Democratic lawmakers fleeing the state to prevent votes on the legislation, and tens of millions of dollars of outside money flowing into the state as Wisconsin became, fundamentally, a proxy fight pitting the union-led Left against the Tea Partyâled economic Right.
At the same time that the public protests were raging, so were private â but important â protests in the Chisholm home and workplace. As a former prosecutor told journalist Stuart Taylor, Chisholmâs wife was a teachersâ-union shop steward who was distraught over Act 10âs union reforms. He said Chisholm âfelt it was his personal dutyâ to stop them. Meanwhile, according to this whistleblower, the district attorneyâs offices were festooned with the âblue fistâ poster of the labor-union movement, indicating that Chisholmâs employees were very much invested in the political fight.
In the end, the John Doe proceeding failed in its ultimate aims. It secured convictions for embezzlement (related to the original 2009 complaint), a conviction for sexual misconduct, and a few convictions for minor campaign violations, but Governor Walker was untouched, his reforms were implemented, and he survived his recall election.
But with another election looming â this time Walkerâs campaign for reelection â Chisholm wasnât finished. He launched yet another John Doe investigation, âsupervisedâ by Judge Barbara Kluka. Kluka proved to be capable of superhuman efficiency â approving âevery petition, subpoena, and search warrant in the caseâ in a total of one dayâs work.
If the first series of John Doe investigations was âeverything Walker,â the second series was âeverything conservative,â as Chisholm had launched an investigation of not only Walker (again) but the Wisconsin Club for Growth and dozens of other conservative organizations, this time fishing for evidence of allegedly illegal âcoordinationâ between conservative groups and the Walker campaign.
In the second John Doe, Chisholm had no real evidence of wrongdoing. Yes, conservative groups were active in issue advocacy, but issue advocacy was protected by the First Amendment and did not violate relevant campaign laws. Nonetheless, Chisholm persuaded prosecutors in four other counties to launch their own John Does, with Judge Kluka overseeing all of them.
Empowered by a rubber-stamp judge, partisan investigators ran amok. They subpoenaed and obtained (without the conservative targetsâ knowledge) massive amounts of electronic data, including virtually all the targetsâ personal e-mails and other electronic messages from outside e-mail vendors and communications companies.
The investigations exploded into the open with a coordinated series of raids on October 3, 2013. These were home invasions, including those described above. Chisholmâs office refused to comment on the raid tactics (or any other aspect of the John Doe investigations), but witness accounts regarding the two John Doe investigations are remarkably similar: early-morning intrusions, police rushing through the house, and stern commands to remain silent and tell no one about what had occurred.
At the same time, the Wisconsin Club for Growth and other conservative organizations received broad subpoenas requiring them to turn over virtually all business records, including âdonor information, correspondence with their associates, and all financial information.â The subpoenas also contained dire warnings about disclosure of their existence, threatening contempt of court if the targets spoke publicly.
For select conservative families across five counties, this was the terrifying moment â the moment they felt at the mercy of a truly malevolent state. Speaking both on and off the record, targets reflected on how many layers of Wisconsin government failed their fundamental constitutional duties â the prosecutors who launched the rogue investigations, the judge who gave the abuse judicial sanction, investigators who chose to taunt and intimidate during the raids, and those police who ultimately approved and executed aggressive search tactics on law-abiding, peaceful citizens.
For some of the families, the trauma of the raids, combined with the stress and anxiety of lengthy criminal investigations, has led to serious emotional repercussions. âDevastatingâ is how Anne describes the impact on her family. âLife-changing,â she says. âAll in terrible ways.â OâKeefe, who has been in contact with multiple targeted families, says, âEvery family I know of that endured a home raid has been shaken to its core, and the fate of marriages and families still hangs in the balance in some cases.â Anne also describes a new fear of the police: âI used to support the police, to believe they were here to protect us. Now, when I see an officer, Iâll cross the street. Iâm afraid of them. I know what theyâre capable of.â
Cindy says, âI lock my doors and I close my shades. I donât answer the door unless I am expecting someone. My heart races when I see a police car sitting in front of my house or following me in the car. The raid was so public. Iâve been harassed. My house has been vandalized. [She did not identify suspects.] I no longer feel safe, and I donât think I ever will.â Rachel talks about the effect on her children. âI tried to create a home where the kids always feel safe. Now they know theyâre not. They know men with guns can come in their house, and thereâs nothing we can do.â
Every knock on the door brings anxiety. Every call to the house is screened. In the back of her mind is a single, unsettling thought: These people will never stop.
Such things routinely happen in dictatorships, third-world countries, and other banana republics.
The Democrats seem to be trying everything they can, to transform the United States into another such third-world country.
---------------------------------------------------
Wisconsin s Shame I Thought It Was a Home Invasion National Review Online
Wisconsinâs Shame: âI Thought It Was a Home Invasionâ
by David French
April 20, 2015 4:00 AM
For dozens of conservatives, the years since Scott Walkerâs first election as governor of Wisconsin transformed the state â known for pro-football championships, good cheese, and a population with a reputation for being unfailingly polite â into a place where conservatives have faced early-morning raids, multi-year secretive criminal investigations, slanderous and selective leaks to sympathetic media, and intrusive electronic snooping.
Yes, Wisconsin, the cradle of the progressive movement and home of the âWisconsin ideaâ â the marriage of state governments and state universities to govern through technocratic reform â was giving birth to a new progressive idea, the use of law enforcement as a political instrument, as a weapon to attempt to undo election results, shame opponents, and ruin lives.
Most Americans have never heard of these raids, or of the lengthy criminal investigations of Wisconsin conservatives. For good reason. Bound by comprehensive secrecy orders, conservatives were left to suffer in silence as leaks ruined their reputations, as neighbors, looking through windows and dismayed at the massive police presence, the lights shining down on targetsâ homes, wondered, no doubt, What on earth did that family do?
This was the on-the-ground reality of the so-called John Doe investigations, expansive and secret criminal proceedings that directly targeted Wisconsin residents because of their relationship to Scott Walker, their support for Act 10, and their advocacy of conservative reform. Largely hidden from the public eye, this traumatic process, however, is now heading toward a legal climax, with two key rulings expected in the late spring or early summer.
The first ruling, from the Wisconsin supreme court, could halt the investigations for good, in part by declaring that the âmisconductâ being investigated isnât misconduct at all but the simple exercise of First Amendment rights. The second ruling, from the United States Supreme Court, could grant review on a federal lawsuit brought by Wisconsin political activist Eric OâKeefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth, the first conservatives to challenge the investigations head-on. If the Court grants review, it could not only halt the investigations but also begin the process of holding accountable those public officials who have so abused their powers.
But no matter the outcome of these court hearings, the damage has been done. In the words of Mr. OâKeefe, âThe process is the punishment.â
It all began innocently enough. In 2009, officials from the office of the Milwaukee County executive contacted the office of the Milwaukee district attorney, headed by John Chisholm, to investigate the disappearance of $11,242.24 from the Milwaukee chapter of the Order of the Purple Heart. The matter was routine, with witnesses willing and able to testify against the principal suspect, a man named Kevin Kavanaugh.
What followed, however, was anything but routine. Chisholm failed to act promptly on the report, and when he did act, he refused to conduct a conventional criminal investigation but instead petitioned, in May 2010, to open a âJohn Doeâ investigation, a proceeding under Wisconsin law that permits Wisconsin officials to conduct extensive investigations while keeping the targetâs identity secret (hence the designation âJohn Doeâ).
John Doe investigations alter typical criminal procedure in two important ways: First, they remove grand juries from the investigative process, replacing the ordinary citizens of a grand jury with a supervising judge. Second, they can include strict secrecy requirements not just on the prosecution but also on the targets of the investigation. In practice, this means that, while the prosecution cannot make public comments about the investigation, it can take public actions indicating criminal suspicion (such as raiding businesses and homes in full view of the community) while preventing the targets of the raids from defending against or even discussing the prosecutionâs claims.
Why would Chisholm seek such broad powers to investigate a year-old embezzlement claim with a known suspect? Because the Milwaukee County executive, Scott Walker, had by that time become the leading Republican candidate for governor.
District Attorney Chisholm was a Democrat, a very partisan Democrat. Almost immediately after opening the John Doe investigation, Chisholm used his expansive powers to embarrass Walker, raiding his county-executive offices within a week. As Mr. OâKeefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth explained in court filings, the investigation then dramatically expanded: Over the next few months, [Chisholmâs] investigation of all-things-Walker expanded to include everything from alleged campaign-finance violations to sexual misconduct to alleged public contracting bid-rigging to alleged misuse of county time and property.
Between May 5, 2010, and May 3, 2012, the Milwaukee Defendants filed at least eighteen petitions to formally â[e]nlargeâ the scope of the John Doe investigation, and each was granted. . . . That amounts to a new formal inquiry every five and a half weeks, on average, for two years.
This expansion coincided with one of the more remarkable state-level political controversies in modern American history â the protest (and passage) of Act 10, followed by the attempted recall of a number of Wisconsin legislators and, ultimately, Governor Walker.
Political observers will no doubt remember the events in Madison â the state capitol overrun by chanting protesters, Democratic lawmakers fleeing the state to prevent votes on the legislation, and tens of millions of dollars of outside money flowing into the state as Wisconsin became, fundamentally, a proxy fight pitting the union-led Left against the Tea Partyâled economic Right.
At the same time that the public protests were raging, so were private â but important â protests in the Chisholm home and workplace. As a former prosecutor told journalist Stuart Taylor, Chisholmâs wife was a teachersâ-union shop steward who was distraught over Act 10âs union reforms. He said Chisholm âfelt it was his personal dutyâ to stop them. Meanwhile, according to this whistleblower, the district attorneyâs offices were festooned with the âblue fistâ poster of the labor-union movement, indicating that Chisholmâs employees were very much invested in the political fight.
In the end, the John Doe proceeding failed in its ultimate aims. It secured convictions for embezzlement (related to the original 2009 complaint), a conviction for sexual misconduct, and a few convictions for minor campaign violations, but Governor Walker was untouched, his reforms were implemented, and he survived his recall election.
But with another election looming â this time Walkerâs campaign for reelection â Chisholm wasnât finished. He launched yet another John Doe investigation, âsupervisedâ by Judge Barbara Kluka. Kluka proved to be capable of superhuman efficiency â approving âevery petition, subpoena, and search warrant in the caseâ in a total of one dayâs work.
If the first series of John Doe investigations was âeverything Walker,â the second series was âeverything conservative,â as Chisholm had launched an investigation of not only Walker (again) but the Wisconsin Club for Growth and dozens of other conservative organizations, this time fishing for evidence of allegedly illegal âcoordinationâ between conservative groups and the Walker campaign.
In the second John Doe, Chisholm had no real evidence of wrongdoing. Yes, conservative groups were active in issue advocacy, but issue advocacy was protected by the First Amendment and did not violate relevant campaign laws. Nonetheless, Chisholm persuaded prosecutors in four other counties to launch their own John Does, with Judge Kluka overseeing all of them.
Empowered by a rubber-stamp judge, partisan investigators ran amok. They subpoenaed and obtained (without the conservative targetsâ knowledge) massive amounts of electronic data, including virtually all the targetsâ personal e-mails and other electronic messages from outside e-mail vendors and communications companies.
The investigations exploded into the open with a coordinated series of raids on October 3, 2013. These were home invasions, including those described above. Chisholmâs office refused to comment on the raid tactics (or any other aspect of the John Doe investigations), but witness accounts regarding the two John Doe investigations are remarkably similar: early-morning intrusions, police rushing through the house, and stern commands to remain silent and tell no one about what had occurred.
At the same time, the Wisconsin Club for Growth and other conservative organizations received broad subpoenas requiring them to turn over virtually all business records, including âdonor information, correspondence with their associates, and all financial information.â The subpoenas also contained dire warnings about disclosure of their existence, threatening contempt of court if the targets spoke publicly.
For select conservative families across five counties, this was the terrifying moment â the moment they felt at the mercy of a truly malevolent state. Speaking both on and off the record, targets reflected on how many layers of Wisconsin government failed their fundamental constitutional duties â the prosecutors who launched the rogue investigations, the judge who gave the abuse judicial sanction, investigators who chose to taunt and intimidate during the raids, and those police who ultimately approved and executed aggressive search tactics on law-abiding, peaceful citizens.
For some of the families, the trauma of the raids, combined with the stress and anxiety of lengthy criminal investigations, has led to serious emotional repercussions. âDevastatingâ is how Anne describes the impact on her family. âLife-changing,â she says. âAll in terrible ways.â OâKeefe, who has been in contact with multiple targeted families, says, âEvery family I know of that endured a home raid has been shaken to its core, and the fate of marriages and families still hangs in the balance in some cases.â Anne also describes a new fear of the police: âI used to support the police, to believe they were here to protect us. Now, when I see an officer, Iâll cross the street. Iâm afraid of them. I know what theyâre capable of.â
Cindy says, âI lock my doors and I close my shades. I donât answer the door unless I am expecting someone. My heart races when I see a police car sitting in front of my house or following me in the car. The raid was so public. Iâve been harassed. My house has been vandalized. [She did not identify suspects.] I no longer feel safe, and I donât think I ever will.â Rachel talks about the effect on her children. âI tried to create a home where the kids always feel safe. Now they know theyâre not. They know men with guns can come in their house, and thereâs nothing we can do.â
Every knock on the door brings anxiety. Every call to the house is screened. In the back of her mind is a single, unsettling thought: These people will never stop.
