Maui’s future foretold: Barbarians
in Paradise – Terror Comes to Maui.
Paperback and e-book at Amazon.
For a list of all my blogs, see www.kurtbutlerblogs.blogspot.com.
The events I recount here are part of a
nightmare I’ve been living on Maui for more than a decade. They show that the
early stages of the tyranny and turmoil predicted in my prophetic flash novel, Barbarians In Paradise – Terror Comes To
Maui, are starting to develop.
My appeal to the state Supreme Court for a review of the verdict in
Kurt v. MDDR, et al (my lawsuit
against the owner of Alive and Well Health Fraud Store) has been denied. See previous blog posts for details leading up to the
appeal. Also, my lawsuit in federal court against the County of Maui for years
of encouraging and aiding Alive and Well’s crimes against me has been
dismissed. I lost both cases on procedural grounds because I could not afford
an attorney and none would give me the slightest bit of help or answer the
simplest of my questions and the law forbids non-attorneys helping me.
My ten year struggle to get the injustice system to recognize and defend my First Amendment right to free speech has failed and is over. However, this does not mean I will give up. On the contrary, I will re-double my efforts to expose Alive and Well’s criminal frauds, even knowing that the county will continue to support the store’s efforts to shut me up and that I risk my life by demonstrating. And I will show the world that Maui County is a nasty little police state where the government tramples on our basic rights routinely, and the lawyers are too opportunistic and chickenshit to take it on. Since I can't get justice in the courts I will have to fight the tyranny by other means, in other venues.
My ten year struggle to get the injustice system to recognize and defend my First Amendment right to free speech has failed and is over. However, this does not mean I will give up. On the contrary, I will re-double my efforts to expose Alive and Well’s criminal frauds, even knowing that the county will continue to support the store’s efforts to shut me up and that I risk my life by demonstrating. And I will show the world that Maui County is a nasty little police state where the government tramples on our basic rights routinely, and the lawyers are too opportunistic and chickenshit to take it on. Since I can't get justice in the courts I will have to fight the tyranny by other means, in other venues.
The following is a statement of the key facts
of this ten-year saga, presented in chronological order. I would not believe
the events could occur if I had not lived them. Of course, Alive and Well’s
opposition to my demonstrations was predictable because my exposé threatened
their lucrative criminal enterprise. But the County had no dog in the fight
besides trivial tax revenues, so it’s willingness to squander hundreds of
thousands of taxpayers’ dollars and risk even more in order to protect the
store from my words, and protect the store’s insurance carrier from my claim,
is astounding and it was utterly unpredictable. I knew from previous
experiences that the County usually behaves like a stupid, blind beast, but I
still would not have predicted such extreme, unethical and criminal behavior in
this case.
I’m leaving out most dates to avoid
clutter, but keep in mind that the first incident occurred in 2003. Now, a
decade later, I’m still trying to assert, and get the county to acknowledge and
protect, a simple right that most people in the world take for granted, and I’m
still trying to warn people about Alive and Well’s criminal scams.
Thanks to the County, most of the
Joneses’ prey haven’t got my message yet. (Thanks also to the state, which
knows about the frauds and could end Alive and Well’s scams now if it chose to,
but prefers to keep the tax dollars coming in.)
Demonstrating near the store is more
dangerous than ever because Alive and Well’s license to murder me, granted by
the County to Alive and Well owners and employees, was not invalidated by the
courts, not necessarily because they agree with the County, but because no
lawyer would help me and I made costly procedural errors. My losses in court do
not reverse earlier rulings that my demonstrations are lawful, but they imply
that the County acted within its rights in issuing to Alive and Well a license
to murder me should I demonstrate, lawfully or otherwise.
It is important to carefully consider
the facts of this case because they vividly illustrate the County’s contempt
for basic rights and the rule of law, and its arrogant, dishonest, unethical
and criminal habits. Given the long nightmare I’ve been living, it’s tempting
to see all this through paranoid eyes and imagine that the County has been out
to get me for many years. But the truth is even more disturbing: this is
how its police and its legal thugs treat everybody who does not have the money
to fight them.
This is not an isolated case and it is
remarkable only in that: the County knowingly committed so many unethical and
criminal acts in one case; it has stubbornly persisted in its misconduct for many
years; and it has fought long and hard in court, both denying it committed
unethical and criminal acts and defending its right to commit them.
Here, then, are the facts, told in
present tense because the events still live in me and I still experience them
in the present tense, though most of them occurred years ago.
On July 7, 2003, while I’ve been
peacefully, quietly and lawfully demonstrating (holding a sign and offering
flyers) for just a few minutes, on the public sidewalk near the Alive and Well
store, Darren Jones storms out of the store, red-faced and furious. Waving his
arms and shouting that I can’t do this and he won’t let me do it, he harasses
me and threatens that he will kick my ass up and down the street if I don’t
leave. Other store employees come out and join in harassing, insulting and
threatening me. Jones then snatches my flyers, badly scratching the back of my
hand with his fingernail(s) in the process.
I then reflexively snatch his little
gold-chain necklace from his neck and hold it ransom to get my flyers back. It
worked; after a few minutes’ stand-off, he agrees to the trade. I give him the
necklace while he simultaneously hands me the flyers. But he is still
determined to prevent me from offering them to people. He calls the police and
lies about everything, claiming that I was harassing customers and blocking
traffic. And, worse, claiming that he came out to politely ask me to leave and I lunged
at his throat and tried to choke him – a fantastic fabrication, given that he's 20 years younger and had several buddies with him. Police Officer Kihata
speaks only with Jones and store employees. He flat refuses to hear and
document my complaint about the crimes committed against me, even though there
was no denying that Jones and his friends had come out of the store to accost
me on the public sidewalk.
Kihata then assists Jones in a citizen’s
arrest of me and refuses to assist me in a citizen’s arrest of Jones. He had
already judged the case solely on the basis of what Jones said and without
listening to a word from me. Then he punishes me on the spot by locking me in
his squad car sitting in the hot sun for some 20 minutes with the windows
closed and the air conditioner off while he talks with the Joneses.
I yell for help, kick the window, holler that I’m sweltering and suffocating. Kihata yells back, “I don’t care.” I faint from heat stress and hit my head on the hard plastic seat. Kihata would later lie under oath during the trial, claiming the AC had been on. And again when he claimed that he could not get a statement from me because I was ranting and raving. Ironically, my “ranting and raving” consisted of repeatedly asking when he would take my statement. He never did take it.
This is how the railroading process begins, right from the start. If the police listen to only one side of a dispute, designate one person as the victim solely on that person's word, investigate only one alleged culpable person and refuse to hear that person out, their reports (which designate the parties as "victim" or "responsible") and their testimonies are then "evidence" that help the prosecutors keep the railroad running smoothly.
I yell for help, kick the window, holler that I’m sweltering and suffocating. Kihata yells back, “I don’t care.” I faint from heat stress and hit my head on the hard plastic seat. Kihata would later lie under oath during the trial, claiming the AC had been on. And again when he claimed that he could not get a statement from me because I was ranting and raving. Ironically, my “ranting and raving” consisted of repeatedly asking when he would take my statement. He never did take it.
This is how the railroading process begins, right from the start. If the police listen to only one side of a dispute, designate one person as the victim solely on that person's word, investigate only one alleged culpable person and refuse to hear that person out, their reports (which designate the parties as "victim" or "responsible") and their testimonies are then "evidence" that help the prosecutors keep the railroad running smoothly.
I’m jailed and charged with assault, harassment,
disorderly conduct and property damage. After a few days I make bail. Then for
30 days I pepper the Maui Police Department and county officials with attempts
to get my complaint investigated. Only after I ambush and corner Mayor Alan Arakawa on a
radio talk show and embarrass him into intervening do the police finally invite
me to come to the station in Wailuku and give my statement about the incident.
But even after this they never investigate my allegations. In
subsequent months I repeatedly demand an investigation of my complaints, always
to no avail.
With my trial pending and now more
concerned about free-speech rights and due process than health fraud, I again attempt
to peacefully and lawfully demonstrate at the same spot, on the sidewalk near
the store. One of the Joneses summons the police with the same false
allegations they made on the previous occasion, that I was blocking their
driveway, harassing customers, trespassing and interfering with their business.
These became their standard criminal lies, to be repeated many times over the
next eight years. They took many photos of me, but somehow never captured me
doing any of the things that they repeatedly told the police and the courts I had
done.
Officer Samuel Gasmen arrives and speaks
with the Joneses. He then approaches me and asks if I have a permit to protest.
I say there is no such thing and that in America people don’t have to ask the
government for permission to express their opinions. Gasmen insists that I show
him my permit to protest or leave the area. I refuse to leave and he arrests me
for protesting without a permit. This was later changed, probably by a
superior who knew there is no such crime as protesting without a permit. The charge was changed to blocking the sidewalk and
disorderly conduct. Better to fabricate two baseless charges of real crimes than specify an act that is not a crime.
No charges were ever pursued in the case,
confirming my complaint that the arrest was harassment intended to end my
demonstration and discourage future demonstrations. In order to make a point
about freedom of speech, I would later sue Gasmen in U.S. District Court for unlawful
arrest.
I again lawfully demonstrate on the
public sidewalk near the store and the Joneses again call the police. Two
officers, Tanaka and Adachi, arrive and approach me. Adachi questions me and
makes hostile comments. I ask them to explain to the Joneses that I have a
right to demonstrate and should not be harassed. They refuse.
Darren Jones files a TRO petition to
prevent me from demonstrating near the store. It contains many lying
allegations. False swearing in a TRO petition is felony perjury, but it gets
him the automatic ex parte TRO order
that prevents me from demonstrating for three weeks pending the hearing. All
the lies in his petition could have got Jones several years in prison.
Unfortunately, in order to protect its own lying witnesses, especially police
officers, the County has a policy of broad perjury decriminalization.
Darren Jones’ TRO petition is heard and
dismissed by the judge. I ask the police and prosecutors to bring perjury
charges against Darren Jones for the lies in his sworn petition and I offer
proof of the lies. They refuse to investigate my allegations. Jones’ many sworn
lies constitute multiple counts of felony perjury. This is far more serious
than the petty misdemeanors I was charged with, but the county went after me
with a vengeance and let Jones slide on the felonies, refusing to even
investigate.
Dennis and Mona Jones file a TRO petition
to enjoin my demonstrations. It is identical to Darren’s and likewise contains
many counts of perjury. Filing it is clearly an abuse of process as well as
perjury, designed to silence me for another three weeks, and it works.
Dennis and Mona Jones’ TRO petition is
heard and dismissed. I ask the police and prosecutors to bring perjury charges
against Dennis Jones and Mona Jones for the lies in the sworn TRO petition and
I offer proof that they lied. They refuse to investigate.
The Joneses file a lawsuit that attempts
to do what the two TRO petitions failed to do, stop me from demonstrating. It is
quickly dismissed. By this time there can be absolutely no question that my
demonstrations are lawful, but the Joneses are still determined to stop
them by any means necessary. Their radio infomercials are broadcast to most of the state and to the
world online, but they’re have a fit because I handed out a dozen flyers.
I write a detailed letter to Deputy
Prosecuting Attorney Marie Kosegarten explaining exactly what had happened on
July 26, 2003, and asking for an investigation of my complaint against Darren
Jones. Though she and chief prosecutor Benjamin Acob have no reason to believe
Jones rather than me, she ignores the letter and proceeds with the prosecution,
demonstrating the essence of arbitrary and capricious law enforcement, just as
the police had.
About a year later I’m tried in District
Court for the charges stemming from the incident during my first demonstration.
Representing myself, in my closing I warn that a conviction would condone the
attack on me and lead to another one someday. My words would prove prophetic
three years later. On the strength of perjury by Darren Jones and Officer
Kihata, I am convicted by a judge of harassment and 4th degree
criminal property damage.
This is patently absurd. I was
lawfully demonstrating when Jones and his pals came out of the store to accost
me on the sidewalk, yelled insults and threats at me, and stole my flyers. I
defended myself and I was arrested, jailed, and released on bail. I would later be convicted and
jailed for three days. Nothing happened to the Joneses.I write to DPA Kosegarten and point out the obvious and provable perjury committed by Darren Jones during the trial. I ask that Jones be prosecuted for felony perjury as well as for harassing and assaulting me. She does not reply.
I occasionally demonstrate. The Joneses
call the police on several occasions. They respond. They do not arrest me, but
they are overtly hostile. They harass me with admonitions not to harass
customers or block the driveway, as if I’d ever done those things.
I settle my lawsuit for unlawful arrest
in US District Court against Officer Gasmen for $25. Though it cost me net
$475, it seems a moral victory at the time because I made my point. But instead
of changing the County’s attitude toward my demonstrations, the lawsuit
increased its hostility to the level of a vendetta. A good attorney could have
got a settlement of at least 10 thousand dollars. But, lacking the money for a
lawyer, I had to settle for a symbolic $25, assuming the County would be more
respectful of my free-speech rights. Instead, the County retaliated with a
vicious vendetta, now going for ten years and counting.
As I have pointed out to the police and
prosecutors, there is simple but powerful proof that the Joneses lied
repeatedly about my conduct, but they consistently refused to hear me out and
to investigate and prosecute the Joneses for their criminal lies. By March of
2007 the de facto immunity granted by the County of Maui had conditioned Alive
and Well owners to believe that they were free to commit all manner of crimes in
attempts to suppress my lawful demonstrations. During this month they would
resort to violent measures, and their faith in the County’s continued support
would be vindicated.
Alive and Well prepares to stage a
day-long promotional party on Saturday, March 24, with music and free samples.
To ensure that I don’t spoil their promotion by displaying a skeptical sign or
offering critical flyers, Alive and Well hires a very young (19 years old),
very large (310 lbs) and very naïve security guard named Clinton Myers. They
tell him the same lies they had told county employees and the courts for years
– that I had a history of harassing their customers, blocking their driveway,
trespassing and interfering with their business.
They also tell him the additional lies
that I had been convicted of felony assault for the incident in 2003 and that
there was a standing court order forbidding me from demonstrating. It was Myers’
job to enforce the order and keep me out of the area that day. Myers would
later tell me and then the police all this.
Shortly before noon on Saturday, 3/24/07,
I arrive on the public sidewalk near the store, take the flyers from my
shoulder bag and unroll my sign. But before I can offer the flyers or display
the sign Clinton Myers and his partner Jason Keefner come out of the store and
approach me in a threatening manner. Myers order me off the sidewalk and out of
the area. He says that his friends who own the store hired him to keep me away
for the day. When I refuse to leave he viciously assaults and batters me,
causing severe injuries, and violently detains me. During the assault Keefner
snatches my flyers, just as Darren Jones had done on 7/26/03, and tosses them
into a dumpster in the parking lot. This vividly illustrates that MDDR’s beef
with me is all about my words.
When police officers Samuel Gasmen (the
one who had unlawfully arrested me and who I later sued) and Mary Sagawinit
arrive they witness Myers violently pressing me onto the sidewalk with all of
his 320 pounds as I gasped for air and asked for help. Myers did not release me
until Officer Sagawinit to him to get off of me. Instead of arresting Myers the
officers greet him warmly and Gasmen shakes his hand,
congratulating him for taking down the bad guy Butler.
I urge the officers to question the
Joneses about their involvement in the incident. They refuse. I ask Officer
Gasmen to fetch my flyers out of the dumpster, which was on Alive and Well
property. He refuses. I then ask him to at least look into the dumpster and
bear witness that they were there. He refuses. Sagawinit shakes her head no,
she won’t do it either.
An hour or so later I experience severe
pain in my lower rib area and my left shoulder, and I go home. The pain
increases over the weekend and Monday I’m diagnosed with four rib fractures and
referred to physical therapy for my shoulder. I was later diagnosed with a
severely torn rotator cuff. My left arm hung like dead weight and hurt
constantly. It would take a 5-hour surgical procedure, 30 physical therapy
sessions and 17 months for the shoulder to heal, the pain to end, and nearly full
strength and function to return.
The police had witnessed the last
moments of the brutal assault on me by a man twice my size and one third my
age. It occurred on a public sidewalk. I could have been killed by suffocation
or a broken rib (I had four of those) piercing a vital organ. I had no weapon, had committed no
crime, and could not have reasonably been deemed to pose a risk to Myers or
anyone else or anyone’s property. There was no possible justification for the
assault, yet the police did not arrest the assailant or even treat him as a
suspect. Instead they treated him like a fellow law enforcement officer while
they treated me with rudeness, hostility and belligerence.
Sagawinit’s report quotes Myers as
insisting that a court order forbids my demonstration, but when she learned
this was not true she did not follow up and ask him who told him the lie, then
investigate the Joneses who thereby manipulated and tricked Myers into
harassing and assaulting me. This was a clear violation of HRS 702-222 and
702-223, complicity and responsibility for the crime of another.
The officers quote Myers as saying he
“escorted” me (violently carried me fully off the ground in a dangerous
full-nelson hold) from the area because I refused to leave. They failed to ask Myers
by what authority he ordered me to leave the area and then used violence
against me to enforce his order.
The officers did not even ticket Myers
and Keefner for illegally parking their two cars all the way on the public
sidewalk and completely blocking it. In contrast, the same Officer Gasmen had
previously arrested me for allegedly blocking the same sidewalk while I was
standing peacefully, in compliance with sign-waving laws, and not blocking anything
or anyone.
About two weeks after the incident I
showed my medical records to the police. They changed the incident report
classification from “assault III” to “assault II” and referred the case to the
prosecutor. I again asked them to investigate the Joneses for hiring Myers to
commit crimes against me, but they refused.
I was summoned for a meeting with two
deputy prosecuting attorneys, Maria Kosegarten and Iwalani Mountcastle. Kosegarten
had led the prosecution against me for the incident in July, 2003, and would
surely be reluctant to admit she had been mistaken back then. After I recounted
the events of the recent incident she questioned me in a hostile manner
about my motives and my judgment in protesting the store’s activities, as if I
was the suspect. But she did finally say Myers would be prosecuted.
I asked why the Joneses had not been
investigated and suggested they should be prosecuted for conspiracy and
complicity. She replied that there was no evidence they had committed any
crimes, even though Myers had clearly implicated them, as stated in the police
reports.
As the months went by with no word of an
arrest or grand jury hearing I occasionally called the prosecutor’s office for
an update. I was always told to be patient because the case is moving forward.
They were lying to me.
About a year after the incident I asked
for a personal meeting with the prosecutor in charge of the case. I met with
DPA Gerrie Sheppard on March 19, 2008, and learned that she had not yet read
the police reports and knew almost nothing about the case. No grand jury had
been convened. Myers still had not been arrested or charged. And, as Kosegarten
had done a year earlier, Sheppard questioned me with a hostile tone about my
demonstrating.
I said I have the same right to sign-wave
as politicians and I deserve the same protection of the law. Sheppard said she
did not like my attitude, ordered me out of her office and told me to never
come back.
Shortly thereafter I received a letter
from the chief prosecutor Benjamin Acob informing me that the evidence from a
purported additional investigation suggested I was probably responsible for my
own injuries and that there would be no prosecution in the matter. I asked Acob
what evidence justified Myers’ attack on me, but Acob did not reply. The
collection of documents generated by the so-called investigation and the
so-called additional investigation is rich with absurdities that reek of
malicious intent, cover-up, and incompetence so extreme that it defines idiocy.
Here are some examples.
Officer Vernon Gosney was involved in
investigating both the incident on 7/26/03 and the one on 3/24/07. In both
instances he was dismissive of my complaint and refused to properly investigate
or order a proper investigation. After the second incident, when I asked how I
was supposed to get justice and prevent another violent attack and serious
injury if the police refuse to investigate, Gosney replied, “Sue them.” That’s
how violent-crime victims are supposed to get justice on Maui if the government
dislikes you. Following the scuffle in 2003 Jones was not just told to “sue
him.” I had been arrested and vigorously prosecuted, even though the tiny
scratch I was allegedly responsible for (snatching his necklace after he
snatched my flyers) would not have sent a first grader to the school nurse and
even though the police did not witness the alleged assault as they did the far
more serious assault on me.
Then, apparently attempting to sabotage
even the “Sue them” option, Gosney lied in his report about where the incident
occurred. I had explained very clearly to him exactly how and where the assault
happened. I described having to walk around the thugs’ two cars parked illegally
on the public sidewalk and later being locked in a full-nelson hold, carried to
and slammed onto Myers’ Mustang, then slammed onto the sidewalk that the cars
were parked on. Yet Gosney’s report says the incident occurred in the parking
lot, which means I admitted I had been trespassing. I reiterated in a letter to
Internal Affairs that I never set foot on private property that day, but the
record was not corrected.
During the purported additional
investigation Myers refused to talk to the police, saying he preferred to seek
legal counsel first. This suggests he believed he had a legal problem and
needed help defending and justifying his assault on me, but the police never
got back to him and his counsel. So they never really interrogated the
perpetrator of the violence.
I then attempted to find an attorney to
represent me in a tort. I failed. Most attorneys I spoke with told me that
winning a lawsuit would be nearly impossible because there had been no arrest
and no prosecution. So by denying me protection under criminal law the County
had also taken a big bite out of my protection under civil law. I had to
represent myself. The County would later take even bigger bites out of my
protection under civil law.
Myers fled to the mainland and I
obtained a default judgment against him, but he had no insurance or assets. I
suspect that the Joneses persuaded him to leave and paid for his trip so he
would not testify.
A jury trial was conducted in Circuit
Court in Wailuku regarding the case Kurt
Butler v. MDDR Health Solutions, Inc. I alleged MDDR’s responsibility for
the crimes of another – complicity; and complicity with respect to results.
(HRS 702-222, 702-223) These are charges the County should have brought within
hours of the assault. My case depended heavily on the truthful testimonies of
Officers Gasmen and Sagawinit, whose reports strongly implicated MDDR in
pre-meditated complicity with Myers to prevent my demonstration that day by
criminal means.
In case their testimonies would not fit
in during the first day of the trial, subpoenas had been prepared and filed to
command Officer Gasmen and Officer Sagawinit to appear the next day. During the
trial that afternoon I saw that the two officers were outside the courtroom
with Lutey. Several minutes later my assistant left the courtroom to serve the
subpoenas. Officer Gasmen was served, but Officer Sagawinit could not be found.
I asked Lutey where Sagawinit was. She replied “In the building” but refused to
say where in the building. Plaintiff asked Lutey to call Sagawinit on her cell
phone and tell her to please come to the fourth floor. Lutey refused, saying,
“I don’t owe you anything.” Her voice dripped with contempt, venom and anger.
Taken aback, I asked why she was being
so hostile. Lutey replied, “Because you’re a troublemaker, an asshole and a
nut. You’re crazy.” As an example she referred to my suing Gasmen for the
unlawful arrest in 2003. This long-festering contempt, vengeance and malice – a
tyrant’s rage that a citizen had dared to assert his rights – had motivated the
Office of Corporation Counsel and Deputy Corporation Counsel Moana Lutey to
coach and counsel the two police officers to deceive the Court and obstruct
justice. This criminal witness tampering and subornation was a continuation of
the County’s long-established habit of doing nothing to help my struggle for
freedom of speech and everything possible to set it back.
Instead of providing truthful testimony
Officer Gasmen pleaded no memory of the incident and Officer Sagawinit successfully
evaded service of the subpoena ordering her to testify as a witness for me. Her
testimony was the most probative and crucial, and she was much younger and less
likely to be believed should she claim to have forgotten. The judge denied my
motion to recess the trial until the officer could be found and served. My main
witness would not testify, thanks to the County. Loo also made several other
critical error excluding key evidence of mine. For example, she ruled as
inadmissible hearsay my telling the jury what Myers said before and while
assaulting me – that he was hired by Alive and Well to prevent me from
demonstrating. The verdict was for the defendant.
The County’s malicious criminal acts –
witness tampering, perjury, evasion of service and suborning perjury and
evasion – were intended to sabotage my presentation of my case, and they
succeeded in that. The County’s policy has always been to refuse to protect and
defend my free-speech rights and to allow, encourage, support, aid and abet the
Alive and Well owners’ criminal attempts to prevent me from lawfully exercising
those rights. This sabotage of my presentation to the jury was the culmination
of that longstanding policy, and it cost me tens of thousands of dollars, if
not hundreds of thousands, in an award or settlement.
Furthermore, the County, having earlier
ensured that I would have no protection or relief under criminal law, further
ensured by its criminal acts during the trial that I would also have no
protection or relief under civil law. As far as the county people are
concerned, I can be harassed, assaulted, crippled and even killed with complete
impunity. This amounts to a license to murder. And this was the deathblow, long
sought by Alive and Well, to my freedom of speech.
The message to me from the County is "Don't mess with us or we'll get you good." And so they did. If you stand up for your inalienable rights in Maui County you will be severely punished.
All of my complaints about this systematic misconduct to the Chief of Police, the Mayor, the Prosecutor and Corporation Counsel have gone unanswered, making it clear that the County of Maui condones and approves the policy.
The message to me from the County is "Don't mess with us or we'll get you good." And so they did. If you stand up for your inalienable rights in Maui County you will be severely punished.
All of my complaints about this systematic misconduct to the Chief of Police, the Mayor, the Prosecutor and Corporation Counsel have gone unanswered, making it clear that the County of Maui condones and approves the policy.
I filed a civil rights lawsuit in
Circuit Court against the County for its longstanding policy of refusing to
protect and defend my First Amendment rights and for obstructing justice by
sabotaging my case during the trial. (For the text of the complaint see my post
of March 28, 2012).
Big mistake. It was assigned to Judge
Rhonda Loo, the very judge who had allowed the County to sabotage my case by
refusing to recess the trial until I could find the elusive Officer Sagawinit.
I asked her to recuse herself, but she refused. The outcome was inevitable: she
dismissed my complaint without so much as a hearing.
Ideally I would have appealed Loo’s
dismissal of my complaint to the Intermediate Court of Appeals, then, if
necessary, to the state Supreme Court. However, I had already wasted the $400
filing fee and didn’t even get a hearing in Circuit Court. Loo had denied my
application to file in forma pauperis
and I did not have another $400 for the appeal. Instead, months later I filed the civil rights
lawsuit in federal court. Any competent lawyer could have told me this is a
legal no-no, to file a case in federal court that had already been judged in
state court (res judicata), but none
would give me the time of day without thousands up front. The case was
dismissed and it was far past the deadline to file an appeal in state court of
appeals, like I should have right after the judgment.
The Bottom Line to This Point
Here, then, is the score to date for
each of the three parties involved in my ten year effort to lawfully expose the
criminal enterprise – to exercise, defend and protect my First Amendment right
to free speech. If I can help it, this will not be the final score.
Actions by Kurt Butler: I repeatedly demonstrated lawfully and
attempted to do so. I held signs, offered flyers and answered questions. I
scrupulously obeyed all the sign-waving rules, I never set foot on private
property, I was never loud or obnoxious and I was courteous to everyone. At no
time did I impede either pedestrian or vehicular traffic. At no time did I
violate any law. When legally challenged, several courts affirmed that my
demonstrations were lawful.
Benefits to Kurt Butler: I had pleasant interactions with most people.
Many thanked me for the information I provided and for saving them money. Only
about 10 percent were hostile.
Costs to Kurt Butler: I was harassed,
my flyers were stolen, my sign was trashed, my life was threatened; I was arrested,
brutalized by the cop, jailed, arrested again, convicted by a brain-dead
part-time judge of two misdemeanors for defending myself from an A&W mob,
sentenced to three days in jail, which I served; the convictions have repeatedly cost me employment and housing opportunities; I was assaulted, battered and
severely injured by an A&W employee, disabled and in pain for 17 months. All
my complaints about A&W employees’ crimes were ignored or dismissed (even
though two cops witnessed the assault) and my civil case against A&W for my
injuries was maliciously sabotaged by the County; I’ve been ordered to pay
almost $25,000 to A&W’s attorney. I’ve been forced to spend hundreds of
hours in the law library and online researching the law in order to defend my
free-speech rights because no attorney would and it is a crime for a non-bar
member to help me. I’ve spent thousands of dollars on filing fees, computer
time, printing, copying, mailing, etc.
In short, I’ve been bruised, battered,
bankrupted and railroaded, my injured shoulder has started hurting again (the
surgeon warned me that it was probably a lifetime injury), a license has been
issued to murder me if I demonstrate near the store, and I failed to get the
license to murder me revoked by the courts. All this has cost me years of
frustration, aggravation, stress, headaches and loss of sleep. It’s been a
heavy price for simply exercising and defending my First Amendment right to
expose criminal fraudsters.
Actions by Alive and Well: the owners and employees of the store violate
the law many times daily with fraudulent promotions of products and services,
and endanger health and welfare of customers; they’ve committed multiple counts
of various crimes in attempting to prevent me from lawfully demonstrating,
including harassment, disorderly conduct, terroristic threatening, theft,
criminal property damage, assault, making fraudulent 911 calls summoning the
police, making false reports to the police, filing perjured TRO petitions,
filing affidavits with false sworn testimony, oral and written perjury, and
hiring a leg breaker to teach me a lesson. His assault injured me severely and
could have killed me. The Joneses are the cause of all the
costs to me (financial, health-wise, being jailed, etc) and costs to the
taxpayer of this ten-year saga.
Benefits to Alive and Well: Complete
support from the County, which has consistently aided, abetted and encouraged
it crimes against its customers and against me; and a great deal of money,
profits from its fraudulent enterprise. Health fraud can be a very lucrative
occupation, and it certainly is in this case. Crime pays. This is why they have fought so
hard to shut me up.
Costs to Alive and Well: None, although
they have pleaded with judges to stop my demonstrations because, ironically,
the mere sight of me holding a sign aggravates their many health problems.
Meanwhile they sit in their store surrounded by hundreds of panaceas and they peddle
purported mood enhancers and stress busters that are supposed to shield you
from all the stressors of modern life. Apparently they don’t work when the
stress comes from having your very lucrative scams exposed. If we really had
the rule of law here the Alive and Well store would be shut down and its owners
would be heavily fined, forced to pay restitution to their victims, forced to pay
restitution to me, and sent to prison for life.
Actions by County of Maui: for years the
county government, through its thuggish employees (uniformed and
white-collared), has used violence, unlawful arrest, perjury, and every dirty
trick and criminal connivance it could to aid, abet and encourage Alive and
Well’s criminal efforts to shut me up. The entire ten years of pilikia, the long chain of legal
wrangling that cost me and the taxpayers so dearly, could have been aborted at
any point by just one county employee doing the right thing. But they so
consistently did the wrong thing, and continue to do the wrong thing, that you
could have bet your life’s saving that they would do so forever and your money
would have been safer than with any bank.
Incredibly, County attorney Moana Lutey admitted – practically bragged – that the County’s actions over ten years in this case were part of a personal vendetta, an effort to retaliate and punish me for daring to exercise my free-speech rights and assert my constitutional rights against the County’s abuses. Such is the state of freedom of speech and the rule of law on Maui, which has become a sort of Moscow in the Pacific. Putin has nothing on Arakawa.
Incredibly, County attorney Moana Lutey admitted – practically bragged – that the County’s actions over ten years in this case were part of a personal vendetta, an effort to retaliate and punish me for daring to exercise my free-speech rights and assert my constitutional rights against the County’s abuses. Such is the state of freedom of speech and the rule of law on Maui, which has become a sort of Moscow in the Pacific. Putin has nothing on Arakawa.
The county has shown that it can and
will encourage criminal con artists and discourage whistle-blowers by
selectively enforcing and ignoring the law. It has shown that it will not
hesitate to use violence and to encourage and allow the use of violence against
demonstrators it considers to be on the wrong side in social and political
disputes.
The County got away with maliciously
denying me normal services and the protection of my right to demonstrate in
retaliation for my lawful speech that it disapproved of. It can and will use
such tactics against others it disagrees with.
The County got away with obstructing
justice by encouraging and helping my key witness to evade service of a subpoena
to testify. It can and will use such tactics against others it disagrees with.
Benefits to County of Maui: This is the
most baffling part. It’s hard to see any benefit to the County of its helping
Alive and Well silence me, and thereby leave its residents defenseless against
the predatory quacks. Maybe someone is getting paid off, but I have no evidence
of that.
Costs to County of Maui: So far there has been no cost to any of the
employees responsible for the travesty I’ve described or for the County itself.
No one has been reprimanded, disciplined, fired, or prosecuted. However, as
I’ve already described, the County’s stupidity, stubbornness, meanness and
tyrannical mentality have cost the taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars
and a great deal of good will – locally, nationally and internationally.
I predict that eventually the cost to
the county of its vicious war on my basic rights, a war that forces me to
expose its foolishness and its tyrannical ways to the world, will be many millions
of dollars.
The cost to consumers, financially and health-wise, of the county helping Alive and Well Health Fraud Store to shut me up and rip them off is incalculable.
The cost to consumers, financially and health-wise, of the county helping Alive and Well Health Fraud Store to shut me up and rip them off is incalculable.
Of course, the greatest cost is to all
Maui residents. We’re all in danger when the government can so easily and with
impunity retaliate against a person for his lawful and protected speech that it disagrees with by
denying him normal, routine services; when the government can so easily obstruct justice
and sabotage a trial to get the result it wants, simply out of malice and
vengeance, when it’s not even a party to the case.
Another costly County “success” in this
case was its showing that it will allow, encourage and condone violence against
demonstrators in social and political disputes if it agrees with the
perpetrators of the violence on the issue in question.
History Will Absolve
Me For What I Do Next
This is not the only case in which the county
government has brazenly violated my constitutional rights. Over the years, in
several different cases, I’ve repeatedly been a victim of police brutality, perjury, lying in reports, obstruction of justice, unlawful arrests, harassment and personal vendettas. And I've endured prosecutors’
malicious prosecutions, slandering and smearing me to a jury and to the media,
twice attempting to railroad me with full knowledge that I was innocent while
their main witnesses against me were psychopathic liars and criminals. (They
succeeded once and a jury slapped them down once.)
Surely I cannot be expected to take all
this lying down. The County has waged a long and ruthless war against me and I
have an obligation to teach it that this kind of unconstitutional, criminal
behavior carries a heavy price. I will do my best to fulfill that obligation.
The ongoing nightmare of this case and
others inspired me to write a prophetic flash novel that peers into a future
Maui that’s been shaped by the exponential growth of the tyrannical tendencies
I’ve written about here and in other blog posts.
For links to all my blogs, see www.kurtbutlerblogs.blogspot.com.
For more detailed critiques of various forms of quackery, including naturopathy, see my book A Consumer’s Guide to “Alternative Medicine”. It was expertly edited by legendary quack buster Stephen Barrett. MD.
When the book was published almost 30 years ago it was strongly praised by responsible health experts and the rare responsible media, but trashed by new-age critics and even vandalized in bookstores by new-age fanatics. It is as true and relevant as ever, and has been mostly vindicated by time. Yet my courageous and far-sighted publisher, the venerable Prometheus Books, is still sitting on lots of copies. Please help validate their integrity by buying a copy. Or two or more as gifts. Perhaps 10 for your local school library and health classes. See their website for assorted discounts. Make them an offer. (My royalties are insignificant; this little promo is for the benefit of one of the world's great publishers, Prometheus Books.)
Maui's future foretold: Barbarians In Paradise -- Terror Comes to Maui. This is a prophetic flash novel about a future police state and those who rebel against it. Available in paperback and ebook at Amazon.com.
The critics say:
"Superb!" -- Dr. Victor Herbert in the New England Journal of Medicine.
"Excellent" -- National Council Against Health Fraud.
"Five Stars" -- Cooking Light.
"Thought provoking; a great book" -- American Journal of Health Promotion.
"Thought provoking; a great book" -- American Journal of Health Promotion.
Maui's future foretold: Barbarians In Paradise -- Terror Comes to Maui. This is a prophetic flash novel about a future police state and those who rebel against it. Available in paperback and ebook at Amazon.com.
