The Down Range Forum
Member Section => Down Range Cafe => Topic started by: JohnJacobH on September 21, 2007, 10:04:52 PM
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Just when you think it could not possibly get any more bizarre it does........
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=57733
Highway checkpoint asks drivers for blood, saliva
Travelers outraged by private research group's request
Posted: September 20, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2007 WorldNetDaily.com
Motorists in Colorado are expressing outrage over a weekend stunt in Gilpin County, about an hour's drive west of Denver, where highway checkpoints were set up so a private organization could ask for samples of blood and saliva.
"I don't think they're authorized to do what they're doing, and I view it as a gross violation of law-enforcement protocol," Roberto Sequeira, 51, told reporters for the Denver Post.
He said he and his wife were "detained" for about 15 minutes even after they protested they wanted to get home because of a sleepy child in their car.
Sheriff's officials were apologizing after they helped set up and run five separate checkpoints over the weekend.
They said workers for the Institute for Research and Evaluation were overly persistent in their demands of innocent travelers.
"It was like a telemarketer that you couldn't hang up on," Undersheriff John Bayne told the newspaper.
Sgt. Bob Enney said the deputies' assistance to the organization involved stopping motorists at the sites along Colorado Highway 119 for "surveys" on any drug or alcohol use. Surveyors also requested that motorists submit to breath, blood and saliva tests.
Enney said several hundred motorists were tested, and some later complained.
Sequeira said he repeatedly asked if the questioners were law enforcement officials and said he was not interested in participating in the study, but still was not given clearance to leave.
He told the newspaper that he and his family were approached by two researchers, and even after his repeated refusals, officials offered his wife, who was driving, $100 to get the couple to take part in a breath test.
"I think it's very dangerous," he told the newspaper. "Sometimes at checkpoints, unfortunate things happen."
PIRE spokeswoman Michelle Blackston told WND the deputies "did not stop" any drivers. "It was a voluntary survey. … Nobody approached them. There were signs saying that a survey was taking place. Nobody waved them down."
She said she was unaware whether the private organization reimbursed the county for the expense of having the deputies at the traffic sites. The organization's own researchers get the results of the work, she said.
Also to the newspaper, PIRE officials defended their actions. They said such statistics are important to gauge the impact of laws and enforcement policy. Their questions began over the summer and will continue at other locations around the nation through November, they said.
"We've been literally surveying thousands of people," John Lacey, of the Alcohol, Policy and Safety Research Center, said. It's through that organization PIRE is doing its research.
He said researchers push a few of those who initially refuse to participate to reconsider – even offering incentives.
"If we don't do that, the criticism will come out that we had so many who were refusers," Lacey told the newspaper.
Bayne said a similar study was done in the county several years ago, with no complaints, but he admitted last weekend's effort was aggressive.
"The people were too persistent," he told the Post. "Some people didn't feel it was voluntary."
Officials with the Colorado chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union said the fact that sheriff's deputies were on the scene, and surveyors wore blue jumpsuits, could have confused drivers.
Sequeira said his family was directed by sheriff's officials to pull over and he and his wife were greeted by "youthful, college" surveyors.
"We had a 10-year-old in the back who's tired, we tell them thanks but no thanks, we have to get this child back home to bed," he told the paper. But the workers persisted, telling them they would be provided help driving home if needed. Then they offered the $100.
"We say, 'No thank you, we have to get our child home,'" he recalled. "At this point, both clones start chortling at us and ridiculing us."
On a newspaper forum, the opinion was running fairly close to unison:
"The very act of pulling a motorist over subjects him/her and their vehicle (at very least) to a visual search. This means if the motorist was pulled over without suspicion of violating a law, than (sic) they have been subjected to an unlawful search…," wrote Warren Gregory.
"For the record the proper response to ANY such incursion into privacy is to ask the question, Am I under Arrest? If the answer is no ask if you are free to go. If you are told no demand to be arrested or you will leave and then leave," added Frank Vicek.
http://www.pire.org/topiclist2.asp?cms=169
Law Enforcement
PIRE has provided technical assistance and evaluation services to law enforcement personnel at many levels. PIRE has worked with local police, military police, sheriff’s offices, the DEA, State enforcement agencies, and enforcement agencies in Southeast Asia. PIRE has done more research on enforcement officer-led school-based prevention than any agency in the nation.
PIRE also studies the effect of law enforcement and its underlying policies on the remediation of public health problems. PIRE has been especially active in researching the impacts and best practices for a range of enforcement approaches to preventing impaired driving and underage drinking. In this arena, PIRE has carried out many projects to develop and evaluate enforcement strategies including sobriety checkpoints, responsible beverage service, enforcement of clean indoor air laws and compliance checks to enforce laws against alcohol and/or tobacco sales to minors. PIRE research shows that highly visible and publicized enforcement of public safety laws reduces violations of the laws.
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It's incidents like this where lawsuits are justified....as opposed to ambulance chasers.
Thanks for the heads up...heading through Southern Colorado tomorrow....you never know they may have just moved to a more quiet area.
Looks at the address and tell me it's not the feds behind this one.
Do a Google on 11720 Beltsville Drive and you'll see it's just a few miles north of DC
PIRE
Calverton Office Park
11720 Beltsville Drive, Suite 900
Calverton, MD 20705-3102
Tel: 301-755-2738
Fax: 301-755-2799
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Press charges, sue them 'til they bleed and if all else fails, hunt them down. This is as ominous as anything I've read in a long, long time.
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Not to pour gasoline on a fire, but I recalled visiting a government facility in that area. And surprise they are expanding their DNA research.
http://www.atf.treas.gov/labs/index.htm
Have a wonderful day!
Ratcatcher
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Not to pour gasoline on a fire, but I recalled visiting a government facility in that area. And surprise they are expanding their DNA research.
You may have nailed that rat.
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It's incidents like this where lawsuits are justified....as opposed to ambulance chasers.
This story may be growing. Video link:
http://cw2.trb.com/news/kwgn-invasive-checkpoint,0,2092732.story?coll=kwgn-home-2 (http://cw2.trb.com/news/kwgn-invasive-checkpoint,0,2092732.story?coll=kwgn-home-2)
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Interesting little tidbit in that news story...
The research firm, Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, which was working under the auspices of two federal agencies, is currently conducting an internal investigation of the incident in Colorado.
-Bidah
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Interesting little tidbit in that news story...
The research firm, Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, which was working under the auspices of two federal agencies, is currently conducting an internal investigation of the incident in Colorado.
-Bidah
Anything new on this important story. It's been a while....I'm thinking it is time for more info to come out.
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Rastus, from what I can find, which is zero, I am guessing that they want this to go away.. It created a furor, to put is lightly..
-Bidah
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Hopefully it was just a couple of line level guys who were being stupid. Sometimes this stuff is not about dark conspiracies.
But then, this did involve some planning and a lot of money and coordination. You don't spend the kind of money that has to be spent to decode DNA, put a staffed unit in the field, coordinate with local law enforcement, etc. without having an RFQ (Request for Quotation) and a SOW (Statement of Work). To do what was done takes a bit higher level of definition than a line supervisor would approve. It would take a level or so above line supervisor...and, come to think of it, whoever did push down this "exercise" had to be motivated by someone at a higher level who thought that the data would be "helpful" for some reason.
Have A Great Day In Jesus,
Ken
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I hope I don't get checked at one of these stops. If they saw my profile they would probably want me to father their master race!!! LMAO