Friday, January 8, 2016

Open Letter to Maui Government Criminal Moana Lutey (Deputy Corporation Counsel)


Dear Ms. Lutey: 

This is regarding your recent letter claiming that perjury has not been decriminalized in Maui County. Saying it does not make it so. You and the county have been lying about the issue of perjury for many years.

In order for the county to maintain the illegal policy it must deny that the policy exists. You have done this so brazenly that you insult our intelligence. Maria De Leon's perjured TRO petition (and the automatic ex parte order) followed by her false police report landed me in jail for 30 days. The judge who finally heard the case called her a liar, dissolved the ex parte order and denied the petition. I tried for two years to have her prosecuted for the perjury and false reporting that led to my arrest. I was always either ignored or told that the police do not investigate complaints of perjury, by policy. That was only one of four cases in which the county refused my attempts to have perjury prosecuted. Are you claiming that the county investigates all complaints of perjury except mine? Surely you know that would amount to an illegal vendetta. 

When I filed a lawsuit in federal court over the issue you and Richard Rost suborned perjury by Chief Phillips, who swore to the court that perjury is investigated and prosecuted the same as other crimes. The time limit for prosecution had not yet expired in the De Leon case, and I continued to urge an investigation throughout the federal court proceedings and for months afterward. But all my appeals to the chief and to the prosecutor fell on deaf ears. You and Chief Phillips spit in my face and in the court’s face. And when I requested examples of perjury prosecution the county supplied none. 

But you know all this. Who do you think you’re fooling with your preposterous lie? The problem is that you are a pathological liar and almost certainly a genuine psychopath as clinically defined by psychiatric criminologist Robert Hare in his classic book Without conscience. Your crimes against me, especially your felonious obstruction of justice in Kurt Butler vs. MDDR, stole my First Amendment right to free speech, ruined me financially, and condemned me to live in abject poverty and pain through my senior years. And they cost the taxpayers more than one hundred thousand dollars. All this to save MDDR's insurance company about the same amount. But your are utterly oblivious to the harm you caused, completely unrepentant and lacking remorse, a defining characteristic of the psychopath. 

I don't know to what extent you act on your own, but surely the mayor and your boss in the department are aware of your actions and are therefore, at the very least, complicit in your crimes. I strongly suspect bribery in the MDDR case, but I don't know who was paid off. Was it the two cops, you, your boss, or the mayor? Or all of you? I know MDDR, which mints money with criminal lies that rip off and endanger the victims of its scams, can easily afford to make very generous payoffs. 

One last point: if the county does not maintain a perjury decriminalization policy, why not agree to my demands? What harm could come from issuing a memo reminding police officers that it is their duty to investigate complaints of perjury the same as any other serious crime, something they are obviously unaware of?

Why not remind the public, with a press release, that people have a right to have their complaints of perjury investigated, and prosecuted if warranted by the evidence? To save face you could say that there has long been a misunderstanding about it. And why not tweak the TRO petition forms to warn potential perjurers and to inform respondents of their rights? The county’s refusal to meet these demands supports my contention that there is a perjury decriminalization policy, and that the county wants to keep it and keep lying about it.

Here's a link to all my blogs: 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. 
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.

 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. 








Thursday, September 5, 2013

A License to Murder


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.


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’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.
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.
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.
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. 
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.

 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. 





Monday, June 17, 2013

Maui FARts Lawsuit

That is, F.A.Rts., First Amendment Rights lawsuit.

If I lose we all lose -- except for the government tyrants who would take a giant bite out of my right to freedom of speech and yours too. What they did to me is routine in Putin's Russia, in China, Iran and Cuba, but it shouldn't happen here if the Bill of Rights means anything.

I have provided information on this case in previous posts and blogs. Here I provide the text of my civil rights lawsuit against County of Maui, which outlines my allegations of malicious criminal misconduct intended to violate and suppress my First Amendment right to free speech.

For links to my other blogs, go to www.kurtbutlerblogs.blogspot.com.

 For extensive background on this case, see especially the link to "Killer Lies."

I am still seeking an attorney's help -- representation or just advice.

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. (Also other books by Kurt Butler.)

I apologize for the different sizes of type in this post. Try as I might, I can't get it to cooperate.



IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF HAWAII

KURT BUTLER, Plaintiff, v. COUNTY OF MAUI, Defendant                              
CIVIL NO.  CV13 00163 
                            
_________________________

COMES NOW PLAINTIFF KURT BUTLER, acting pro se, and for cause of action against the above-named Defendant, alleges as follows.
1.  PLAINTIFF Kurt Butler (hereafter “Butler”) is a citizen of the United States and resident of Maui, Hawaii, and was so at all times relevant to this action.
2.  DEFENDANT County of Maui (“the County”) is a county in the State of Hawaii and was so at all times relevant to this action.
3.  This civil rights action is taken pursuant to 42 USC, Sections 1983, 1985 and 1986. Jurisdiction of this Court is invoked pursuant to 28 USC, Sections 1331, 1343(a)(3) and 1367, and Article III of the United States Constitution.
4.  Venue is proper pursuant to 28 USC, Section 1391.
5.  Plaintiff’s First Amendment right to freedom of speech has been violated by the Defendant, County of Maui (“the County”).
6.  Plaintiff is entitled to equitable relief.
7.  Plaintiff understands that certain relevant events occurred outside the time limit period for bringing a civil action, and he cites them to provide context and illustrate motive for the events that occurred within the limitation period. Furthermore, in order to show that a longstanding practice is tantamount to a policy, Plaintiff must, by definition of “longstanding”, cite events outside the two year limitation period.
8.  During the years 2003 through 2011 Butler, a long-time anti-health-fraud writer, whistle blower and activist, has sometimes lawfully demonstrated (displayed a sign and offered flyers) and attempted to lawfully demonstrate on a public sidewalk near the Alive and Well Natural Health Emporium in Kahului, Maui, (hereafter “Alive and Well” or “the store”). Alive and Well is owned by MDDR Health Solutions, Inc (“MDDR”), which is owned by Dennis Jones, Darren Jones and Mona Jones, who run the store. As a responsible former health professional and health journalist Butler believes he has not only a right but a duty to expose and protest the criminal deceptions (per se violations of federal and state anti-fraud laws and food and drug laws) that the store has been using in its hour-long radio commercials for more than a decade to sell its expensive and dangerous products such as “miracle cures” (their term) for terminal cancer and HIV/AIDS, and superior substitutes for “killer vaccines” (their term for all vaccines), which they urge everyone to avoid, especially children.
9.  As a criminal enterprise that dispenses misinformation dangerous to the public health and welfare, and that promotes a radical political agenda, Alive and Well is a legitimate target of dissent and peaceful public protest. Such protests are protected speech. Butler has as much right to sign wave protesting health fraud as the mayor has to sign wave promoting his reelection. And Butler has as much right to protection of the law while lawfully demonstrating as any politician has.
10.  However, Butler has been repeatedly denied the routine municipal services that constitute protection of the law with a consistency that would be a major scandal should a politician be treated the same way. The store’s owners and employees have repeatedly used criminal means and abuse of legal process to stop and prevent Butler’s lawful demonstrations. The courts have repeatedly and unanimously affirmed Butler’s right to demonstrate, yet in all relevant instances  the County has consistently allowed and supported MDDR’s unlawful attempts to suppress Butler’s lawful demonstrations and punish him for them.
11.  Rights purportedly guaranteed by the Bill of Rights do not really exist unless they can be enforced and protected in the legal system. There are two possible options for this: criminal law and civil law.
12.  By mid 2008 County of Maui had firmly established and made it clear to Butler that it strongly disapproves of his demonstrations and would deny him the normal municipal services that constitute protection of criminal law in connection with his demonstrations. It did this by unlawfully arresting him for protesting without a permit, which is not a crime since there is no such permit; by harassing him during his demonstrations; and by repeatedly refusing to investigate his complaints of crimes committed by Alive and Well employees and owners in attempts to stop his lawful demonstrations. These crimes include multiple counts of harassment, terroristic threatening (death threats), assault, theft and destruction of his flyers, making fraudulent 911 calls, false reporting to the police, and perjury.
13.  Even when two police officers witnessed a violent assault on Butler by a store security guard twice his size and one third his age – an assault that caused Butler a serious lifetime injury and could have crippled or killed him – they did not arrest the assailant or investigate those who hired him to commit crimes against Butler. No charges were filed in the case and the County made it clear that no charges would have been filed even if Butler had been killed in the assault.
14.  The County’s motive for refusing Butler protection of the law is unclear, though it may be to be to ensure the continued robust health of this criminal enterprise because it pays taxes and employs people who pay taxes.
15.  It is self evident that the store’s beef, and the County’s beef, with Butler has always been about his words. If his sign and his flyers had praised the store’s “miracle cures” or advocated re-election of the mayor, neither MDDR nor the police would have bothered him. And if police officers had witnessed an opponent of the mayor assault Butler on the public sidewalk while he sign waved for the mayor they would have been expected to arrest the assailant and prosecute those who hired him to commit the crime, and they surely would have done so. But the County objected to Butler’s demonstrations targeting the store, so it allowed MDDR’s criminal activities against him to occur with impunity.
16.  Having firmly established by its actions over several years that Butler would have no protection under criminal law, the County was aware that Butler’s last hope of protecting, defending and enforcing his right to lawfully demonstrate safely was to hold his assailant and MDDR accountable for the assault and battery in civil proceedings. The County knew that if Butler failed in this effort there would be nothing to restrain MDDR from continuing to use criminal means, including potentially-lethal violence, to deter his demonstrations. Butler’s right to speak freely would then be permanently eliminated, which is exactly what County of Maui had shown for years that it wanted.
17.  The County knew that the incident reports of the two police officers who witnessed the assault on Butler strongly supported Butler’s case, so it ensured that the officers would not testify truthfully for Butler. For several days the officers made service of the subpoenas ordering them to testify difficult and expensive by being evasive. Only after Butler sent a letter to Chief of Police Gary Yabuta reminding him that evasion of service is a crime, as is subornation of evasion, was Butler’s process server able to serve them.
18.  However, the County was still determined to avoid providing testimony that would help Butler’s case. It found an opportunity to do so, by criminal means, during the trial of Kurt Butler v. MDDR Health Solutions, Inc, et al, CV 09-1-0102(1), conducted August 29 – September 1, 2011.
19.  In case their testimonies would not fit in during the first day of the trial, August 29, 2011, subpoenas had also been prepared and filed to command Officer Gasmen and Officer Sagawinit to appear the next day, August 30. Being inexperienced, Butler did not think to make one subpoena for both days. During the trial that afternoon Butler saw that the two officers were outside the courtroom with Deputy Corporation Counsel Moana Lutey. It appeared that he might be unable to fit their testimony in that day, so Butler’s assistant left the courtroom to serve the subpoenas. Officer Gasmen was served, but Officer Sagawinit had suddenly left the area. When informed of this, Butler asked Lutey where Sagawinit was. She replied “In the building” but refused to say where in the building. Plaintiff asked Lutey, who knew that the subpoenas had been duly filed, 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. It was obvious that she had advised Sagawinit to get lost so she could not be served.
          20.  Taken aback, Butler 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 Butler suing Gasmen for the unlawful arrest in 2003 for protesting without a permit. Her words showed that she and the County had held a grudge for eight years because Butler had attempted to assert and enforce his First Amendment rights, both by demonstrating, which is protected speech, and by filing the complaint for unlawful arrest, which is also protected speech. To the County’s way of thinking, this made him a crazy troublemaker.
          21.  When Officer Sagawinit suddenly left the bench next to Lutey, she had not yet been informed that she would not testify that day. Though it was late and it seemed unlikely that she would be called to testify, she still should have been available either to be called to testify or to receive the subpoena, duly filed with a copy served on Corpration Counsel, to testify the next day. A plaintiff’s process server should not have to chase a witness or play hide-and-seek, especially when time is short and the witness is reasonably expected to be nearby. Nor should a process server have to outsmart a crafty witness handler who prefers that the witness not testify, as this would allow and encourage routine obstruction of justice by witnesses. But this is the problem the County created in this case. It is not likely that Officer Sagawinit would have suddenly left the area unless Lutey advised her to do so.
          22.  In her public outburst Lutey essentially admitted that long-festering contempt, vengeance and malice had motivated the Office of Corporation Counsel to coach and counsel Officer Sagawinit to obstruct justice by evading service of the subpoena. This criminal witness tampering and subornation to criminally evade service was a continuation of the County’s long-established malicious policy of doing nothing to help Butler’s struggle for freedom of speech and everything possible to set it back. This was extraordinary behavior, far from the norm for the County, which routinely cooperates in criminal and civil cases. The County indisputably denied Butler normal municipal services in retaliation for his protected speech that it disapproved of – his demonstrations, his lawsuit for unlawful arrest and his current lawsuit. This is a violation of Butler’s First Amendment rights.
          23. In this instance Deputy Corporation Counsel Lutey was the County official with final policy-making authority. It had been delegated to her by the Office of Corporation Counsel, and thus her acts constituted official County policy. The trial judge ran a tight ship and stuck to the schedule in deference to the jurors. Butler would have no chance whatsoever to appeal to a higher County authority to compel Lutey and Sagawinit to cooperate. So Lutey was the County authority in charge.
          24. Instead of providing truthful testimony Officer Gasmen pleaded no memory of the incident and Officer Sagawinit evaded service of the subpoena ordering her to testify as a witness for Butler on August 30, 2011. Her testimony was by far the most probative and crucial, and she was much younger than Gasmen and less likely to be believed should she claim to have forgotten. The judge denied Butler’s motion to recess the trial until the officer could be found and served, so she never testified. The verdict, rendered on September 2, 2011, was for the defendant.
25.  These malicious criminal acts – witness tampering, evasion of service and suborning evasion of service – were intended to obstruct justice by sabotaging Butler’s presentation of his case. They succeeded in this and thereby eliminated Butler’s last hope of enforcing his First Amendment right to speak freely. Since a right does not exist unless it can be enforced, the County’s criminal interference with Butler’s attempt to enforce his right to speak freely is tantamount to criminal interference with his right to speak freely, and is therefore a violation of his First Amendment rights.   
26.  Defendant, having previously ensured that Butler would have no protection or relief under criminal law, further ensured by its criminal acts during the trial that Butler would also have no protection or relief under civil law. The County has conclusively shown that, as far as it is concerned, MDDR employees can harass, assault, batter, cripple and even kill Butler with complete impunity. This was the deathblow, long sought by MDDR, to Butler’s freedom of speech.
27.  The County’s actions during the trial were the culmination of an 8-year pattern that is tantamount to a policy of denying Butler normal municipal services that would tend to protect, defend and enforce his First Amendment right, affirmed by several courts, to demonstrate near the Alive and Well store. Because, to Butler’s knowledge, no one else has attempted to protest the store’s deceptions, he cannot point to examples of the policy other than his own experiences. This does not negate the existence of the longstanding pattern.
28.  All of Butler’s complaints about this systematic misconduct – to the Chief of Police, the Mayor, the Prosecutor and Corporation Counsel – have gone unanswered, making it clear that County of Maui condones and approves the (written or unwritten) policy.
INJURY
29.  Butler, now almost 69, cannot demonstrate near the store without reasonable assurance that he will be safe and enjoy the protection of the law. Defendant has denied him this and has unlawfully given MDDR what the courts would not: a de facto injunction on Butler’s demonstrations, one obtained and enforced by the use of criminal violence and the threat of homicide. This is tantamount to a license to murder Butler should he defy the de facto injunction and demonstrate near the store. And this is a violation of Butler’s First Amendment rights.
30.  The greatest injury is the injury to our society. The logical corollary of Defendant’s policies and actions is to tolerate and condone hired violence in election campaigns and disputes over the environment, abortion, gay rights, Hawaiian sovereignty and other issues. A society in which the government chooses sides, then, by providing or withholding municipal services that constitute protection of the law, selectively condones and allows violence to terrorize the marketplace of ideas is not a free, open and democratic society. This is a violation of everyone’s First Amendment rights.
          31.  Without relief from this Court, Plaintiff will have to choose between two options. One, he must give up, as too dangerous, his right to demonstrate near the Alive and Well store. Or, two, he must be prepared to use extreme force to defend himself during such demonstrations.
          32.  Unless this Court provides Plaintiff relief in this case, County of Maui will be encouraged to similarly obstruct justice in future cases.
REMEDIES
33.  Wherefore, Plaintiff Kurt Butler asks this Court to order permanent equitable relief that will restore, protect, defend and ensure his right to safely demonstrate near the Alive and Well store.
34.  This relief should take into account that MDDR and its owners and employees are determined to prevent and interfere with Butler’s demonstrations and cannot be trusted not to harass, harm or kill him, especially knowing that the County will allow them to do so with impunity.
35.  Relief should also take into account that County of Maui cannot be trusted to protect Butler from harassment and assault; to apprehend and charge anyone who might harass and assault him, even if police officers witness the crimes; to refrain from harassing and assaulting him; to refrain from unlawfully arresting him; to properly investigate Butler’s complaints of crimes committed against him; or to otherwise respect and defend his First Amendment rights.
36.  The County’s behavior has been so extraordinary and brazenly criminal that Plaintiff cannot find legal precedents, which may not exist. Therefore, he can only suggest possible remedies, knowing that some of them may not be acceptable to the Court. He asks the Court to hold a hearing to consider these possibilities, as well as others that may occur to Plaintiff later and others that the Court may prefer.
37.  Extraordinary abuses and violations call for extraordinary remedies. Possible remedies that occur to Plaintiff at this time include the following:
Order County of Maui to fund private security for Butler’s demonstrations;
Order Federal Marshals or the National Guard to provide security;
Permit Butler to carry a firearm or a Taser;
Order the closure of the store as a criminal enterprise that engages in interstate commerce and uses violence to silence its critics;
Order the appointment of a special prosecutor to prepare charges relating to the crimes committed by the County and its employees during the trial, and present the case to a grand jury;
Order the County to arrange to provide Butler radio time – to be used exclusively to critique the store’s claims for its products – equal to that of Alive and Well’s commercials, approximately one hour per day;
Order other remedies that would at least partially compensate for the years that Butler has been prevented from safely demonstrating because of the harassment, threats and violence that County of Maui has allowed MDDR to commit against him.
Order County of Maui to reimburse Butler for expenses he incurs in connection with this lawsuit, including an attorney’s fees should he find an attorney to represent him.

Links to all my blogs: 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. 
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.

 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.