I am seventy years old. I've lived and worked in several American cities and states, including what are arguably the most liberal and the most conservative states in America. I ran a business for twenty five years looking out on one of the main streets of the city. To the best of my recollection, I have never seen an American police officer come to the assistance of a law abiding citizen. I've lost everything I worked for in my life twice, corrupt police were at the heart of it both times. I have seen police take bribes, file false reports, threaten citizens on behalf of criminals, protect drug traffickers and threaten to harm me for no reason other than being a law abiding citizen.

I certainly don't like writing about stuff like this and I'm sure police officers aren't going to like it either. I'm describing how police destroyed my life, twice. If they don't like it, they shouldn't have done these things to begin with. Also, when you put somebody on the street a couple times and threaten to kill them, don't expect them to be polite. I'm doing them a favor by not putting their names and photos here. Some of them have families, their kids are not to blame.

I have known several law enforcement officers "personally", some of them for a number of years. I knew their families, their kids. I've encountered many law enforcement officers professionally, mostly as a victim of some sort, and encountered more who were on the other side from law abiding American citizens. It is on these relationships that I base my view of law enforcement officers. I do not watch TV, my opinion is not affected by fairy tale cop shows and clearly biased "news" reports on American television.

All the law enforcement officers I knew "personally" had the same characteristics, or behavior patterns. The most prominent, and most common, was dishonesty. After all, you have to be able to shoot a kid in the back and lie to his mother why you did it. Lying to your family, lying to your friends, lying to yourself. Manipulation and fabrication of evidence is a daily job skill. One of my "personal" cop relationships came to an end when he asked to lie to his wife in front of his daughter after instructing her to lie to her mother. When I refused, he was dumbstruck that somebody could actually be honest and truthful.

Also prominent in law enforcement behavior is the concept of "the thin blue line", a few heroic law enforcement officers are the only thing preventing the collapse of the civilized world. In the simplified world of law enforcement there are only two kinds of people; the police and the "perps". "Perp" is short for "perpetrator", or criminal. If you are not a law enforcement officer, and their families, I presume, you are considered a criminal. Law abiding American citizens are viewed as criminals who haven't been caught yet.

Any evidence produced solely by police or that passes through police possession can be considered edited, altered or total fabrication. Any police misconduct is investigated by the police, like letting murderers investigate bank robbers. Every state, every city, every county in America has the death penalty without trial. They are called the police. Judge, jury, executioner.

The police protect themselves and criminals. Lawyers protect police and criminals. Lawyers are judges and politicians who do the bidding of those who pay them(not American taxpayers, that salary is a bonus). Who protects the law abiding American, the kid at school, the American veterans? Nobody except for themselves, which is tough for an elderly vet or fifth grade student.

Corruption is the American Way of Life

No matter where you are born in America, especially if you are born in an American city, you are surrounded by crime. Growing up in a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio, I found this out pretty quickly. Getting robbed, having your car stolen, home robberies, you name it, was regular fare. Television was fairly new and on the TV shows, the cops not only the good guys, they were heroes every week! Out on the streets of Cleveland, the story was a little different. The first exposure I had to corrupt police seemed pretty innocent. There was a decal people put on the driver's side window of their car. It was a star with the letters "F O P". FOP is the Fraternal Order of Police, the largest organization of sworn law enforcement officers. If you had this FOP star on your windshield and you got pulled over by a cop for a traffic violation, odds are pretty good you'd get off with a warning. Especially if you are friends or family of a local cop, who probably gave you the FOP decal. Seems innocent enough, but it was a clear demonstration that the cops are not going by the book and everyone is not receiving equal treatment under the law.

One of my friends in Cleveland bought a used car that was obviously stolen. Trust in the police in those days was not very high and we thought it was a setup to bust us with our quarter ounce of Mexican dirt weed, but the title had the previous owner's name and signature on the title; a very high ranking Cleveland police officer. When the title for the car went through without a hitch, it was business as usual.

Iran Contra 1978

In 1978, I went on a surf trip through Central America with a friend. At the time, there was a civil war going on between the Sandinistas and the Contras. It was a dangerous place and we tried to keep as low a profile as possible because there was a lot of animosity directed toward me and my companion because we were Americans. America was backing the Contras, which was the current government and would later be overthrown.

At the overnight bus stop in the capital city, Managua, it was obvious that something was going on. Keep in mind this is 1978; no internet, cable TV or cell phones. We went to a nearby restaurant/bar and were reading the local newspaper when several men approached me. They were angry and it was hard for me to understand what they were saying.

They were angry because they said that Americans involved in drugs had killed people they know. As the only American around, they were taking it out on me. I didn't fully understand at the time, but Nicaragua was in the middle of a civil war between the corrupt, American supported dictator, Anastasio Somoza and the Sandinistas(Sandinista National Liberation Front). Eventually I convinced them that I did not know US President Jimmy Carter personally and I was an average guy just like them.

I went with them to the place, which was nearby, where their friends had supposedly been killed to try and settle things down and see for myself what was going on. It was dark, but people had lights and there was no doubt that someone or something had lost a lot of blood and not that long ago. At the time, the chance of Americans being involved in this(except for me) seemed pretty remote. I would find out later that just the opposite was likely true. Not until years later did I learn that this was likely connected to the Iran-Contra affair, or at least American CIA or government operatives supporting the Somoza regime.

Further south, we ran into a California style ranch home, fenced in with a large paved driveway that ended on a jungle dirt road. We went up to the front gate and were met by two American police/military looking guys. They asked what we were doing despite the fact I was carrying a seven foot surfboard. I asked if we could had some water. One guy went to the house and came back with a gallon jug of water, which I accepted with my thanks.

Even further south, we stayed in a small town, went surfing and made friends with the people. I asked them about the modern house when everyone else lived in concrete block buildings. He confirmed what I already suspected, that the house belonged to drug traffickers who were somehow connected to the American government.

In 1978, American law enforcement of some kind was at the root of drug trafficking in Central America while Nancy Reagan was saying "No To Drugs".

Carlsbad Gestapo

About 1980, I opened a small storefront business on State Street in Carlsbad, California. At the time, Carlsbad was a relatively small city, which would grow very quickly.

Real estate developers had the city council in their pockets and the Southern California housing boom was on it's way. The city, including the city council members, were all from somewhere else, eager to cash in. Real estate prices and rent skyrocketed and the character of the city changed as new residents poured in. In a place where people left their doors unlocked and let their kids go to the beach at the end of the street because they knew neighbors would be there to keep an eye on them, the crime rate went up dramatically. Not on paper though. Police reports were rare. High crime rates would lower new home prices and the city council couldn't have that.

Carlsbad laughingly became "the city with no crime". Break-ins and burglaries were becoming a regular occurrence around my shop. It got to the point where I began to sleep on the floor of my office to prevent someone from coming in and stealing expensive equipment.

Across the street, in an unfortunate neighboring business's parking lot, became a 24-7 drug mart. Everybody knew about it. You could sit in the showroom of my office and watch the whole thing. Pretty soon word got around what was going on. Keep in mind, this was the 80's. The most popular people in Carlsbad were cocaine dealers. Unfortunately, what was going on across the street was worse. The good people of Carlsbad did not want drugs in their new tract home neighborhoods(unless it was coke for them). Kids will be kids and they wanted drugs too. So the parking lot across the street became the one stop shop for all the Carlsbad kids who wanted to get high. This drug mart operated with the full knowledge of the Carlsbad police, who intervened in fights and OD's, but the drug sales continued. Kids couldn't afford Columbian cocaine and my local sources told me the coke dealers did not need to sell blow to kids when their parents were buying as much as they could get. These drug dealers, with the explicit support of the police, were selling a new product from the Mexican drug cartels; "crystal" or crystal meth. Super cheap, the stream of young customers went on for years.

The happy Carlsbad homeowners were watching their "drug free" neighborhood's real estate values go through the roof, but it was a different story in the older part of town. Robberies, vehicle break-ins and theft became an every day thing. All covered up in the city with no crime.

Windows were broken out of neighboring businesses on a much too frequent basis at substantial cost to the owner. If the windows remained boarded up for more than a day or two, the city would come by and demand a new window. Requests to put decorative security bars over windows, common today, was denied, as was the use of video security cameras that showed the streets outside the shop. Covering up crime at every step of the way at the expense of the local business owners.

Then came my turn. One evening, working late as self employed businessmen usually do, a tweaker threw a large brick through the front window and came in. For those not familiar, a "tweaker" is a person under the influence of crystal methamphetamine. The drug is known to give people superhuman strength and impervious to pain. This guy had probably come from across the street at the city's drug mart all loaded up and already looking to make money for his next fix. Having already stopped several break in attempts, I had a 1" dia wooden dowel ready to go. He came towards me and I hit him square in the head with the wooden dowel, breaking it over his head. He didn't even flinch. We grabbed each other and started rolling around in the broken glass on the floor. I ripped out clumps of his hair, scalp attached. He said he had a knife and was going to kill me. Every time he let go of my arm to get the knife, I would pound his face or rip another clump of hair out. I jumped up and got ready for more, but the guy got up and ran through the broken window. I was all cut up from the broken glass and I had fractured my right forearm from hitting the tweaker so hard. The cops came by, it was the last time I called 911. They took a couple fingerprints off the front window and ignored the clumps of hair, flesh and blood. DNA testing wasn't needed, fit the clumps of hair to the guy's head. That was pretty much the end of it until the city came by the next day to say "hurry up with the new window". While I was still bleeding.

Needless to say, word got around pretty quick and it didn't take long for the tweaker to be spotted in a neighborhood near the city's open air drug store, going through yards and open garages looking for stuff to steal. One day he walked through an open patio door where a resident, aware of what has been happening, beat the guy nearly to death with an aluminum baseball bat. Friends at the local hospital told us the guy was in intensive care for some time. And the people he was victimizing get to pay the hospital bill. Although everyone knew what had transpired, no word or report from Carlsbad, the city with no crime.

To watch the Carlsbad police involved in drug trafficking was a disappointment, but not a shock. As the city grew at an uncontrolled pace, the City of Carlsbad hired police officers who were not from the area and knew nothing about the population. The Carlsbad police did not earn enough money to buy a home in Carlsbad, so they had to live in nearby cities. This clearly had an effect on many of them and certainly had what could be considered a "chip on their shoulder". Hassling people whenever possible, bogus searches for drugs, threatening businessmen and law abiding citizens and their families; it was a disgrace.

After many years of watching this outside my shop window, my neighbor asked me to speak at a city council meeting about the concerns of local businesses. I considered the Carlsbad City Council to be completely corrupt and saw no point in it, but since my neighbors asked me to, I did. I don't recall the exact exchange, but my comments got plenty of applause and the City Council did not like it. The next day when I opened my business, there was a Carlsbad police car parked in front of the door and stayed there until the other businesses nearby got the message. Every time I wrote a letter to the local paper, which was only a couple times, about some issue, the Carlsbad police were there to make sure I was able to open my business safely. I told the publisher of the newspaper, who was a fellow bodysurfer, he just shrugged his shoulders. My business was in an older building that had a mail slot in the front door. I taped the mail slot closed with duct tape so the cops couldn't stuff a bag of dope through the slot and kick the door down an hour later. Instead of "open for business", the front door of my shop was locked during business hours to keep the corrupt Carlsbad police and their nearby drug mart customers out. Of course, this was bad for business, that's exactly what the Carlsbad City Council wanted.

In a city founded by the Mafia - Google "La Costa Resort & Spa" - corrupt politicians and police did not come as a surprise. Police harassment was standard fare. Women were asked to "show a little something" to get out of questionable traffic stops. Kids who never did drugs found themselves in possession while they were out surfing because their parents had some kind of problem with the city. Because I had spoken out, my shop was now the spot for the many people who had issues, as I did, with the corrupt city government and police. As such, my business and my customers, many who not from the area, became targets of regular police harassment.

One early Sunday morning I watched the owner of an auto repair business, a few doors down from my shop, empty several 55 gallon drums of liquid down his driveway, into the street and into the storm drains, then washing his driveway down with a hose. He left soon after and I went to check the remaining liquid in the gutter. It was antifreeze, the green coolant used in automobiles. He had dumped over one hundred gallons of used antifreeze, poisonous to nearly all animals including humans, into a storm drain that emptied directly onto Carlsbad State Beach. Being a surfer and ocean swimmer in that same water, I was outraged. I called the City of Carlsbad and reported it.

Why did the City of Carlsbad extort my landlord and run me out of town after more than twenty years of being in business? Because the auto repair guy dumping antifreeze into the ocean did repair work on City of Carlsbad and Carlsbad Police Department vehicles, and no doubt did plenty of work for the City of Carlsbad employees.

After more than two decades of being in business; never missing the rent, bills or payments of any kind. I was never sued or ever had to issue a single customer refund and sold my American made products all over the world, yet I was run out of town by the corrupt Carlsbad politicians and drug trafficking Carlsbad police.

The Carlsbad Legacy

The streets of downtown Carlsbad and the nearby Pacific Ocean were not the only places the City of Carlsbad used to dump dangerous chemicals. Before every square inch of Carlsbad was developed, we rode our mountain bikes down to the box canyon behind the Carlsbad Transfer Station on Palomar Airport Road. On the dirt road, there were ditches where runoff from large garbage trucks dumping garbage into larger garbage trucks("transfer station"), would run down into the box canyon and San Marcos Creek watershed. This "runoff", with colors not found in nature, formed crystalline precipitates along the sides of the ditches. A bulldozer would periodically plow everything under. Out of sight, out of mind. No doubt any City of Carlsbad sponsored environmental studies came up smelling like a rose.

I knew that, at least some, of these chemicals were used in the metal plating procedure, like chrome plating motorcycle parts or golf clubs. These highly toxic, metal laden chemicals were deposited directly into the groundwater that likely carried some of them all the way to the Pacific Ocean. Since these chemicals are not water soluble, they will be in the ground for some time.

If you live in Carlsbad, you're probably saying "you don't care what I say as long as it's not me" or "sour grapes". If you live in southern Carlsbad, especially southwest Carlsbad, your street is a cancer potpourri cul-de-sac, dogs and cats only live a year and your kid has the IQ of an earthworm, you'll know where to start looking.

Corruption is the American Way of Life

Corruption Bribery Fraud

Iran Contra 1978

Carlsbad Gestapo

The Carlsbad Legacy