by Virgil Vaduva

Xenia is a small city in Ohio, peppered with foot-deep potholes, abandoned buildings with a high unemployment rate and very busy bureaucrats. Just a few months ago, the city’s council decided to spend $6 million on a new “Justice Center” and the cost is expected to balloon well into the $20+ million range. The city is in dire need of infrastructure upgrades, road repairs and sewage system improvements, but a new police station and a new office building for the city’s employees became critical.

But these are not even the worst things about the city of Xenia.  A few years ago, Xenia also decided to ban the practice of panhandling. At the request of the police department and cops who were “too tired” of dealing with homeless people on the street, the city decided to pass an ordinance that banned panhandling virtually anywhere in the city, making it impossible for anyone to ask another individual for financial help, anywhere in the city. In essence, the city has made it illegal for someone to speak with a stranger if the speech involves asking for immediate help.

Many individuals have been fined and prosecuted under this unconstitutional ordinance, raking in thousands of dollars of fines extracted from the most vulnerable and poor people on the streets.

A bit over a year ago I decided to speak to the Xenia City Council and warn them about the fact that their ordinance is unconstitutional. They ignored my warning, and as a result the very next day I decided to take the path of civil disobedience and panhandle in front of the city hall and police station. I raised $41.98 which was donated to United Voluntary Service, a charity helping the homeless in Xenia. I was also ticketed for violating this unconstitutional law, which led to a full-blown jury trial after which I was found guilty, sentenced to 30 days in jail, community service and fines. The jail sentence was suspended on the condition of good behavior for a term of 2 years. During the trial I was not allowed to talk about the constitutionality of the law and my first amendment rights, I was not allowed to even mention the constitution, or the fact that the police in town were behind the passing of this ordinance. A judge literally told me, “there will be no mentioning of the Constitution in this court room.”

After immediately appealing, the appeals court finally reversed my sentence and they sent the case back to the court to be retried. All the charges were dropped a few days ago, and the city’s attorney said they will change the ordinance or get rid of it. Right now it’s unclear what this means.

After about a year and a half, the swift hand of the judicial system finally found me innocent of any wrongdoing spending tens of thousands of dollars of the city’s money and my own money, hundreds of hours going into my defense and substantial effort aimed to win and undo the work of the Xenia bureaucrats. What took them only a few minutes to ratify with the stroke of a pen, caused hundreds, if not thousands of people to be harassed, arrested and fined by their cops. None of the cops and Xenia bureaucrats involved in this will ever be held personally responsible for their decisions, and while I am fortunate enough to afford the legal fees to pursue such a case just for the immoral and unconstitutional aspect of their law, most people cannot do so and rarely, if ever anyone speaks on their behalf or stands up for them.

Now while this may be a win for me personally, the issue is nowhere near close to being resolved. The hundreds of people who have had their first amendment rights violated will need retribution. I am in the process of collecting all the names of the individuals detained or fined under this law and bring this issue to the attention of federal courts.

To make matters worse, the city of Beavercreek, which is next door to Xenia, has an ordinance identical to the one in Xenia, also banning panhandling everywhere within city limits. More and more local bureaucrats decide on a regular basis and in a systematic way to violate the constitutional rights of people in need who are unable to represent themselves in court. Beavercreek is the same city where a police officer shot a black man named John Crawford in a local Walmart for holding a BB gun he picked off a store shelf.

Beavercreek will be our next target for their unconstitutional and illegal practices regarding panhandling, and there will be no rest for the corrupt and immoral politicians and cops running these cities and violating our rights. Yesterday I “panhandled” for charity in Beavercreek and I was given a “warning” from their police and asked not to do it again in the future. I raised $18 dollars which will also be donated to United Voluntary Services to help the homeless in the area.

Officers Hall and Darkow (the second officer involved in the shooting of John Crawford) of Beavecreek PD showed up and threatened, attempted to intimidate me and warned me about standing on a street corner with a cardboard sign that said, “Help the poor.”  In today’s America, this is now a crime.

Officer Darkow was the backup officer involved in the shooting and killing of John Crawford in a Beavercreek Walmart. He is currently being sued by the Crawford family.

Officer hall attempting to give me a written warning about panhandling in the city of Beavercreek and threatening me with arrest if I continue to peacefully raise money for charity

Officer hall attempting to give me a written warning about panhandling in the city of Beavercreek and threatening me with arrest if I continue to peacefully raise money for charity

The officers refused to answer questions about the constitutionality of the law and why they are violating their oaths to the Constitution by enforcing a law targeting Americans’ first amendment rights.

The same individuals who have sworn an oath to obey and protect the Constitution are actively using their roles to undermine the very document and rights they were entrusted to protect.

If you have been one of the hundreds of people harassed, arrested or fined by the Xenia and Beavercreek police for panhandling, please contact me as soon as possible at [email protected] so I can help you out. I want to hear your story.

Virgil Vaduva is a Libertarian security professional, journalist, photographer and overall liberty freak. He spent most of his life in Communist Romania and participated in the 1989 street protests which led to the collapse of the Ceausescu regime. He can be reached at vvaduva at truthvoice.com.

by Virgil Vaduva

Update (August 6, 2015):

Representatives from Ohio Students Association have contacted me and have denied any association with the individuals behind the e-mails sent to Jim Anderson. As of right now, nobody has taken any responsibility for the statements made in the e-mails sent to Jim.

Original story: 

A clear pattern of discrimination and exclusion has been emerging within the last few days regarding the organization Black Lives Matter. It started with the organization attempting to schedule an event at the same time and location as other organizations and immediately attempting to put in place rules limiting attendance, excluding members of Anonymous, members of Cop Block and members of Ohio Open Carry, all organizations which oppose police brutality and work hard to further liberty.

These actions and attempts to control the narrative and attendance to the one year anniversary demonstration of John Crawford’s shooting by Ohio police have stirred up quite a debate in various circles, prompting individuals that would otherwise work together to further the cause of liberty to take sides based on political views and other opinions.

Black Lives Matter, the George Soros funded organization, is now on full attack against Anonymous, a de-centralized organization which has been attempting to participate in exposing police brutality throughout the world for years.  The attempt on the part of BLM to limit speech and control the message at public events is not new and I have documented a number of instances where bigotry is on display by members and leader in Black Lives Matter.

Just today an activist and journalist named Jim Anderson based out of Columbus, Ohio contacted me to inform me that he was told by members of BLM that he was “too white to attend a police brutality protest.”

As early as November 2014 the leaders of Black Lives Matter Columbus have contacted Jim and demanded that he cancels his event against police brutality due to conflict (as they scheduled it after he did) and informed him that no members of Anonymous are welcome to any of their public events.  Furthermore Guy Fawkes masks were banned and white people were told not to attend and were not welcome at any planning meetings. These tactics are identical to the tactics BLM is attempting to use to intimidate white attendees in Beavercreek, Ohio planning to attend the one year anniversary protest of the John Crawford shooting on August 5, 2015.

Screenshots of e-mail exchanges between Jim and representatives from BLM and Ohio Student Association show what appear to be outright and unapologetically bigoted attitudes towards police brutality supporters simply because of their association with Anonymous or simple due to their skin color.

When Jim inquired about the confusion generated by the exclusion of Anonymous members, he was told that Anonymous members lack “revolutionary-ness” (sic) and can be threatening to people of color. The insensitivity of the language used to describe Anonymous is astounding. The BLM leaders are attempting to describe Anonymous members as violent, unaccountable individuals who show up at protests in order to intimidate people of color.

This is not the first time members of Black Lives Matter have excluded whites from their events. In an event scheduled in Dayton, Ohio early in 2015 several messages went out indicating in essence that “no whites are allowed” at their events and that white people are not welcome to participate or take part in police brutality protests. When an outraged community pointed out the bigotry of these demands the request made on Facebook were deleted and BLM leadership pretended they never happened.

In a recent video allegedly recorded in Cleveland, Ohio, another white journalist who attended a BLM meeting to support their cause was assaulted, pushed, cursed at and grabbed before he had a chance to leave the public property he was on.

When asked about the bigoted remarks, the organizers defended the behavior by claiming this was a “private” meeting, however the meeting is clearly out in public on what appears to be public property.  Not only that, but the journalist was clearly in the process of leaving, as he was asked to do, when he was assaulted and threatened. You can watch the video here.

Talis Gage, a leader in Black Lives Matter compares Anonymous members with the KKK in a Facebook post

In a more recent event, a Black Lives Matter leader did not mince words when he outright stated that “the mask is the new sheet” when criticizing Anonymous for attending some BLM events.  He stated:

“Sometimes I wonder if the mask is the new sheet and are they in cahoots with each other I know I know there is some black mask anon members but like the old days you had house negros and field negros and we are not that far from those times. I have associated in all these diff groups but I can’t say I trust them.”

Additional BLM members followed with more inflammatory comments against Anonymous:

“Both anonymous masks and guns endanger people of color…”

All these comments were removed when I warned them that I was taking screenshots, as the story would be hard to believe otherwise.

I am aghast at the idea that Anonymous is being compared with one of the most despicable and racists groups in the world, the KKK, which has lynched, burned and executed people simply because of the color of their skin. Furthermore, Anonymous has shown incredible support for the black community on the issue of police brutality. Several prominent investigations by Anonymous have led to exposing internal e-mails and comments from NYPD and Baltimore PD showing extensive racism among police officers.

When members of Anonymous contacted the BLM leaderships to inquire about the public event scheduled in Dayton Ohio in April, they were told in very clear terms, “It’s an event that’s not for anonymous members.”

The ingratitude shown by Black Lives Matter and the outright disregard for any desire to cooperate with people and groups which have supported them for the past year is very disturbing, to say the least. Exclusion, discrimination and bigotry appears to be alive and well throughout the BLM organization, and is dishonorable to police brutality causes where black Americans have been targeted by police throughout the country.

I am unsure how to encourage BLM leadership to resolve this problem, or even if they are willing to solve the problem or eliminate bigotry from their midsts, but if you want to contact BLM, you can do so by going to their website and writing them a message about the serious problem they are creating by attacking groups of people which have been supportive of the cause of police brutality well before BLM even came into existence.

Words don’t break bones, but they should certainly prompt someone to step back and reconsider their support for such organizations.

Virgil Vaduva is a Libertarian security professional, journalist, photographer and overall liberty freak. He spent most of his life in Communist Romania and participated in the 1989 street protests which led to the collapse of the Ceausescu regime. He can be reached at vvaduva at truthvoice.com.

Beavercreek Police Department used a city firetruck and dispatched three firefighters to wash away the messages written by activists in chalk

by Virgil Vaduva

The Police Department in Beavercreek, Ohio did not take well to a group of local activists writing messages in chalk in the public property surrounding the PD building.  Yesterday the activists took it to the pavement mostly with messages regarding the shooting of an unarmed black man by one of the cops working for the Beavercreek PD; the shooting was found to be justified by an investigative board.  Sean Williams, the officer responsible for the shooting of John Crawford in a local Walmart is still employed by the department and continues to be paid by the local taxpayers.

The local community has shown overwhelming support for the police department.  In the past I have covered at least one pro-police rally and was able to record footage showing at least one police supporter stating that he was happy a black man was killed by the cops.

With messages calling out for the remembrance of John Crawford and the prosecution of Sean Williams, the activists spent about twenty minutes chalking the sidewalks surrounding the building.  I participated in the event and did not anticipate such a quick and massive response from the City of Beavercreek attempting to erase the truth behind these messages.

About an hour after the chalking, the city dispatched a tanker truck manned by three firefighters to wash away the chalk from the pavement.  As reminded in the video below, the area has experienced daily downpours and it is unclear why they responded so quickly to the chalking when they could have waited out for the evening rain to wipe out the chalk.  The cost and waste of city resources to cover the message of truth is not surprising as they continue to refuse to file charges against the killer of John Crawford and refuse to answer questions about the incident.

Fortunately I was able to anticipate the fast response and recorded the incident.  You can watch it below.

Let me start off by saying right away that I absolutely love Kroger. As a gun owner, a libertarian and activist I nearly adore Kroger’s strong stand for gun rights, especially in the face of strong criticism coming from anti-gun groups like Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. The company’s executives have taken a very clear and unambiguous position stating that all gun owners are welcome as customers in their stores, including open carry customers, so I make it a point to often open carry whenever I go shopping for groceries.  This is both in support of Kroger but also in support of open carry rights here in Ohio.

As a large family we likely spend tens of thousands of dollars there, so this article is less about Kroger and more about Pierce Bryant, a retired Cincinnati cop who works as a Loss Prevention Division Manager at Kroger and is responsible for managing security and loss prevention for stores in the Cincinnati and Dayton areas.  Bryant’s LinkedIn profile states his responsibilities as a Loss Prevention Manager:

Responsible for the Division execution of the Company standards and initiatives to reduce asset loss throughout the division. Responsible for developing Division goals and strategy action plans for implementation of Company/ Division loss prevention initiatives.

Retired Cincinnati cop Pierce Bryant currently works as a Loss Prevention Division Manager for Kroger in the Cincinnati/Dayton area

Many local gun rights activists are aware of Bryant’s subversive anti-gun tactics.  I have been contacted by one individual who has provided me with an e-mail he sent to a Kroger manager at the corporate office, advising Kroger of anti-gun signs being posted in one of their Cincinnati-area stores, signs which are in violation of corporate policy.  To his surprise, the e-mail ended up in Pierce Bryant’s hands who refused to do anything to solve the problem.

In another incident in a high-crime area of Cincinnati, a Kroger store had a no-gun sign posted on the doors, which is believed to have been posted there at Bryant’s advice.  When inquiring as to why there is an anti-gun sign on the store doors, the store manager claimed the landlord requires the signs to be up, which was an untrue statement made at the time. After activists contacted the corporate office, the no-gun signs came down again, continuing the cat and mouse game.

The most recent anti-gun incident that took place in Pierce Bryant’s division took place in a Kroger store located in Beavercreek, Ohio.  When new inaccurate signs popped up on the store’s doors in violation of Kroger’s corporate policy, local activists inquired as to why the signs are up.

The signs, which are located on all the doors in the store, state that a gun carrier is committing a felony by walking into the store because the store has a liquor permit.  The problem is that this particular sign was made irrelevant years ago when the Ohio law was changed to allow gun carriers to walk into any establishment that sells alcohol without violating any law. The only requirement is that one may not carry a gun and drink at the same time.  Furthermore, the Beavercreek Kroger store does not even sell liquor in open containers which makes the sign meaningless.

Outdated, untrue and ominous sign plastered on the doors of the Beavercreek Kroger store threatening gun owners with a potential felony for simply walking into the store

When I attempted to discuss this issue with Evelyn Miller, the Beavercreek store manager, she said that the area Loss Prevention Manager (Pierce Bryant) is responsible for all the gun signage in for all the area stores.  When pressed to give the name of the particular individual posting the signs, she refused to give a name, grabbed my camera and threatened to call the local police.

After a member of Ohio Open Carry spent nearly two hours on the phone with various individuals at the Kroger corporate office, there was no clear answer as to why there are outdated, ominous anti-gun signs in a store when the official corporate policy is that all gun owners are welcome into the store.  When pressed again about why certain store managers are ignoring corporate policy, the answer was again ambiguous and unclear, with one individual saying “no comment” and another individual saying “we support the decisions our stores make.”

To many of us, it appears that the local Loss Prevention division of Kroger run by former Cincinnati cop Pierce Bryant is undermining the pro-gun corporate policy and push his anti-gun agenda on stores, sometimes perhaps even without the knowledge of local managers!  This is disturbing but not necessarily surprising based on past interactions with Bryant.

When a member of Ohioans for Concealed Carry (OFCC) called Bryant to inquire as to why certain stores prohibit guns and others do not and he observed that “Bryant was clearly unhappy with the corporate policy and was arrogant and almost a jerk” when discussing the issue of guns in the stores.

Kroger store manager Evelyn Miller threatened to call the police simply for inquiring about the anti-gun signs on the store’s doors and then proceeded to grab the camera and push it away

Kroger CEO Randy McMullen has repeatedly and publicly stated that Kroger will not take an anti-gun position as a result of boycott threats from anti-gun organizations, but it appears that a very real threat comes from inside the company where certain employees who may have anti-gun sentiments appear to use their positions of authority to undermine and water down what is clearly an unambiguous corporate policy.

With this said, we are calling on Kroger to clarify why certain divison managers for Loss Prevention are using their authority to push this agenda, making it very difficult for Kroger customers to have a uniform experience in stores across the state or country.

As a family, we will continue to support Kroger and will continue to shop and carry in their stores, however we are asking that all anti-gun signs which are attempting to intimidate gun owners be removed from store doors.  If a store sells liquor in open containers, they can certainly post a sign at the bar or tasting area where the alcohol is served, like all other establishments do.

In response to the rogue store managers’ insistence to keep signs posted in violation of corporate policy, Ohio Open Carry decided to host an open carry event at the Beavercreek store over the weekend.  All Kroger customers who are also gun owners can show their support of Kroger’s corporate office and protest the local managers’ agenda by shopping while carrying.  You can signup for the even on the Ohio Open Carry page here: https://www.facebook.com/events/1598973380389401/

An all-white pro-police demonstration in Beavercreek Ohio last year was apparently crashed by a masked Anonymous supporter with a video camera who asked hard questions.  Beavercreek is the place where an unarmed 21 year old John Crawford picked up an unloaded BB gun from a Walmart shelf; the police later showed up and killed him without any warning.

The man who recorded this vide was apparently also armed, open carrying a Glock, which may be the reason why he was not attacked and assaulted by the crowd.

The crowd interacts in various ways with him but at one point people in the police-loving crowd admit that they are “glad that an innocent black man was shot by the police” and claim that the cop “did was he was trained to do,” namely, kill someone.

Last week a Police Review Board found that the cops did nothing improper.  Nobody was ever charged in the shooting and killing of John Crawford and both cops are back on duty.

Watch in amazement below how this unfolded.

In August 2014, a man named John Crawford was shot and killed in a Beavercreek, Ohio Walmart by a local police officer. What was his crime? Walking around the store with a BB gun. For months, both Walmart and the Beavercreek police refused to release surveillance footage showing the shooting. When the footage was finally released, it showed nothing to support the narrative established by police and their supporters.

Beavercreek cop mocked the killing of Eric Garner

The video showed Crawford standing in the pet aisle, holding his cell phone to his left ear while holding the BB gun in his right hand, pointed into the floor. Officer Sean Williams suddenly came from around the corner, and shot Crawford twice with his automatic AR 15, giving Crawford less than one second to comply with command to drop the gun. An initial police report of the shooting was virtually blank. It only included three words: “Shooting at Walmart.” A full report was not written and filed until seemingly all the officers involved had a chance to get together and get their stories straight.

There have been numerous protests since the shooting, including a die-in at Walmart and I have covered most of them very closely as an independent journalist. This was until the most recent one when I was arrested by the Beavercreek Police and charged with trespassing and obstruction of official business. This particular protest took place on Christmas Eve, inside the Fairfield Commons mall, a local shopping mall located across the street from the Walmart where the shooting took place.

While I disagreed with using the Mall as a venue to protest events that did not take place there, I observed officers escalating an otherwise very peaceful situation.  Their officers trapped over a hundred people, including protesters, journalists and shoppers with small children (unrelated to the protest) into a small area.  Those of us who informed them that we wanted to get out of the area and leave were told “we don’t care” and were pushed into the North East entrance doors of the Mall.  Worse, as protesters were leaving, BCPD again started assaulting them and arresting those who were vocally calling out for justice.  One officer purposefully stomped on an Eric Garner banned made by the protesters, then posed for a picture doing it.

Beavercreek cop orders a crowd to leave a local shopping mall

An older woman, who is a retired law professor from the University of Dayton was pushed down and then ordered to stand up so she could be handcuffed.  Because of her age she could not, and BCPD officers were attempting to drag her on the pavement.  Another man was being dragged on the pavement by his arms and a fourteen year old who was taking pictures was in the process of being arrested for crossing some undefined imaginary line in the pavement, however his father intervened and helped BCPD save face.

While I was clearly present as a journalist (and not a protester) and was displaying my press badge, I was also arrested and while I cooperated with the officers at every step, they still attempted to break my left wrist and put on plastic cuffs very tightly around my wrists, searching my backpack without my consent and without a warrant.  Worse, most of the BCPD officers involved in these activities removed their nametags so it was difficult to identify them.  The one cuffing me was pulling on my cuffs while I was standing still and not resisting, causing the sharp edges to cut into my wrists.

At the time of my arrest I was recording everything using a mobile app called Bambuser. Police took my phone away immediately and I mistakenly believed that they powered the phone off, wishing that the phone could have recorded some of the interaction that took place in the arrest processing area. Unbeknownst both to me and to the police, my phone continued to record audio for at least another 25 minutes or more, recording some very disgraceful comments made by Beavercreek officers.

Beavercreek cop walked and stomped on a banner made to protest the killing of Eric Garner

As I have been writing critical pieces about this department for several years, they all know me very well and they appeared quite happy to finally find a reason to handcuff me.  Several years ago this same department detained me for open carrying. Ohio is an open carry state, and at the time their officers were not aware that it is legal. So this time was understandably upset for being arrested. When asked about an ID, I informed them that my ID is in my pocket, and asked them not to touch my genitals. The response was, “You would like that too much!”

Even worse, when I was pointing out how police officers often get away with killing innocent people, including shooting John Crawford, officer Majercak mockingly apologized while smirking at me, saying, “I’m soooory, I’m soooory.” When I pointed out the killing of Eric Garner in New York, he again responded with a mocking, “Awwwww.”

You can listen to the entire audio clip below.

The callousness put on display, especially when police believe that nobody is recording, is disturbing. One can only imagine what they really discuss in the privacy of their homes and offices. It’s an outright disdain for the general public, for journalists and those who want to keep police accountable for their actions.  To add insult to injury, the arrest reports filed by the three officers who arrested me are full of inaccuracies and outright lies.  It is only by sheer luck that the audio saved by my phone will prove me innocent of many of the lies written by the arresting officers.

For now, Sean Williams is back at work and still employed by the Beavercreek PD. Nobody has been held accountable for the shooting of John Crawford. The department appears bent to continue arresting protesters, journalists and others who may be willing to question the circumstances surrounding the shooting of Crawford, never even offering a small apology for what happened.  This man left behind a baby boy who will never know his father. And to add even more to this tragedy, Crawford’s girlfriend passed away in a car accident on New Year day, wrapping up what has been a tragic year for this family.