(833) 2-REPEAL
floridaactioncommittee.org
Members of homeless camp arrested on charges of violating probation after camp was shut down
A group of homeless people was arrested Friday afternoon for violating probation after their camp, where they were required by their probation officers to stay, was shut down and there was nowhere else for them to go.
Of the 13 people who had been living at the camp, at least seven had GPS monitors or ankle bracelets registered to the site — in the woods at 4820 Highway 192 near Melbourne — that required them to return there during the evening or risk being in violation of their probation.
The owner of the property wanted the site bulldozed, the camp members said, and they were warned Tuesday by the Brevard County Sheriff’s Office that they had to vacate the area by 8 a.m. the next morning.
That put them in a quandary: if they stayed, they’d face trespass charges and violation of probation because the camp was being closed down. If they left, they also could face violation of probation because that’s where they were required to report.
Source content only available to subscribers.
From the FAC story. That is as Jim Crow as it gets. Stay.. get arrested. Leave .. get arrested. My only question is.. What did the PO have to offer the individuals that are in a County mandated homeless situation? I thought it was the job description of the PO to help in exactly a case like this.
AL
When I was on probation, I was looking for somewhere to go. The probation officer pointed at an address where I got mail and asked why couldn’t I live there. I said “Because you cannot fit inside a PO BOX”. She did not find the humor in it and had the nerve to yell at me for saying that.
If the probation officer doesn’t speak on their behalf and tell the truth, he/she should be fired and arrested for lying to officials, lying in a capacity as an official and causing others great harm and detriment because of those actions.
I had told you in a few past posts how out of the blue the officer who does my address checks was always super nice. And yet the last time I was checked on, he was doing and saying things that was causing the neighbors to come over afterwards and ask “What was that all about”?
I am saying that to say this. I believe there is a movement to get us all back on some kinds of charges so we can never get off the registries. So many places registered people are gaining wins, even if small. If the registries are ended, a lot of people are going to lose jobs.
Have you ever thought about the type of cop it takes to, instead of solving crimes, is driving around harassing people who are just trying to live their lives? I said before, if when I was in law enforcement, if there had been registries and they tried to assign me to that task force, I would have declined. If they said I had to, I would have resigned.
It is one thing to check on people who are on probation, but most of us have long since completed our obligations imposed by the courts. Now we are having yearly add ons to a registry that did not exist when many of our original charges were handed down. So we are living under a forced, illegal system of retroactive compliance. In other words, a police state.
The address check 4 times a year.. Why? I own my home for the past 10 years and have no thoughts of moving. When I go to Pennsylvania to visit my daughter and granddaughter I go and tell them when I am leaving and when I am getting back..
This year I came back on the date I told them and before I could get to register that I was back, They were at my door. That makes no sense to me. I could understand if I was late getting back. Even if I was late getting back I was registered in Pennsylvania. I would have the proof of when I left Pennsylvania since I tell them when I am leaving. I always get the officers name so if there are any questions they can call them to verify my information. But that checking and verifying my address four times a year is a waste of time and money.
Let’s think about this for a moment… If the registry is NOT punishment, then how does one GET ON the registry? Simple answer; You have to be CHARGED by police AND CONVICTED by a court. You don’t get caught peeing in a bush and automatically get put on the registry the moment the cop arrests you, right? Right. Just like you don’t get put on probation by the cop who arrests you for stealing cigarettes from a gas station. So, when you get put on probation and/or the registry it’s OBVIOUSLY part of your SENTENCE handed down by a judge at your day in court.
That means that being on a registry for life is a lifetime sentence. Having police stop by to do verification of your address long after you’ve completed probation means you’re still being treated as if you’re on probation. So the court’s sentence never ends.
To come off the registry in one state and then move to a state like Florida and get put back on it IS ex post facto or even double jeopardy as you’re being forced to do something that your original sentencing judge said would only be for 10 yrs (in your home state). And from my understanding based on what I’ve read in comments on this site over the years, FL doesn’t bother sending you in front of a judge to determine if you have to be put back on the registry. The DMV will notify the FDLE right then and there when you change your drivers license over to FL state from wherever you came from. Correct?
Has this been argued or will it be argued that the only reason someone ever got on a registry was through an initial court conviction and that would need to be the same process to put someone BACK on it?
Maestro
I respect you bro, having said that, one big flaw in your theory.
You said:
“OBVIOUSLY part of your SENTENCE handed down by a judge at your day in court.”
There was NO registry when I was sentenced. Judge did not even make any illusions to said horrors. In fact, the registry did not come about until 7 years after my incident. I was already doing a sentence when the immoral list was forced on people.
Seems I am not the only who was retroactively forced onto it. Seems an imbalance when you apply something to a group who had no chance to bargain the registry because of already being sentenced. And yet those who came after me and others, at least got to us that in some sort of plea, possibly for a lesser sentence. (Since the registry was, as they say in the Matrix “It is inevitable, Mr. Anderson”.)
The probation officers who arrested those guys should be fired for dereliction of duty. As a probation officer it was their job to help them integrate them back into society and at least make an effort to find them a place to live, even temporary, until they can find a more permanent setting. I smell lawsuits coming against the ever so “gods” of the Florida Department of Corruption (err Corrections)
Seeing how this was a catch 22 situation, I would hope that the judge and prosecutor show some leniency, and reinstate their probation. This was a situation that was pretty much out of their control. A damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.
So the Sheriff’s office set them up to violate?
Hopefully a sensible judge will see the catch-22 of this predicament and work with probationers to correct this situation.