(DUer) Carlos Miller Arrested For Photographing Police Crack-Down on Occupy Miami

[Scurrilous]

Last edited Mon Feb 6, 2012, 10:02 AM - Edit history (1)

<snip>

"Local journalist Carlos Miller has a blog called Photography is Not a Crime. Apparently Miami-Dade police officers are not avid readers.

County cops arrested Miller on Tuesday night as he was filming the Fuzz forcibly evacuating Occupy Miami protesters from Government Center downtown. But he says the police are the ones who messed up.

"They took a routine bullshit arrest and turned it into a huge constitutional violation and a possible federal lawsuit because they deleted my footage," Miller says. "They messed with the wrong reporter."

Miller says that the police were actually doing an admirable job clearing Government Center without violence. But when he asked a policewoman if he could move past a phalanx of officers in order to get to his car, he says all Hell broke loose."

http://blogs.miaminewtimes.com/riptide/2012/02/carlos_miller_arrested_for_pho.php

[Blue_In_AK]

1. Raging_in_Miami.

They've messed with the wrong guy.

[ellisonz]

2. +1

Clearly, the Miami Police Department has not learned Carlos Miller is not to be trifled with. One of the great ones...

[tkmorris]

4. I agree

Carlos is the real deal, and police suppression of photogs is his pet issue. This is SO gonna end up in court, and not the way the Miami cops are accustomed to either. I do wish he'd return to DU, he was one of the good ones.

[Bozita]

14. Carlos is a true American hero!

[mdmc]

15. 1

[sakabatou]

3. And some people wonder why other dislike the police

[friendly_iconoclast]

5. UPDATE: The arresting officer is one Major Nancy Perez

And unfortunately for her and her department, Carlos has managed to recover the video:

http://www.pixiq.com/article/miami-dade-cop-who-arrested-me-is-media-spokesperson

[Jester Messiah]

10. It's only going to get harder for them to delete footage in the future.

Too bad about that whole "cloud storage" thing, eh?

[EFerrari]

12. Go, Carlos!

[myrna minx]

23. .

[zonkers]

28. Wut?? How do you recover lost video????

[friendly_iconoclast]

38. "Quick erase" only erases the filename(s), not the actual files.

Forensic software can then recover the files.

Which is why when you're disposing of storage media, you should either physically destroy it or do a low-level format and then overwrite it
multiple times with some innocuous files. Large numbers of public-domain text files from the Gutenberg Project work nicely...

[zonkers]

48. Very interesting. Thanks.

[Ichingcarpenter]

6. Can you change the title to include that this is a DUer

I hope he's still a member he is great.

DUer RagingInMiami WON the Sun Sentinel Best of Blogs!

[Scurrilous]

9. Done.

[EFerrari]

11. If anyone is on Twitter

it might be helpful to send the link to @MotherJones, @democracynow, etc.

I hope those @ssholes didn't hurt him.

[Festivito]

7. Wow. Politce destroying evidence and obsrtucting justice. Oh-oh. /nt

[EFerrari]

8. Kick

[surfdog]

13. In my view....

Snatching somebody for no reason is called kidnapping
If the police can't tell why they are snatching somebody then it's kidnapping flight for your fucking life

[friendly_iconoclast]

16. It's definitely deprivation of rights under color of law, a Federal crime

Last edited Tue Feb 7, 2012, 11:05 AM - Edit history (1)

The relevant statute:

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/242.html

U.S. CODE

TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 13 > § 242

§ 242. Deprivation of rights under color of law

Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or to different punishments, pains, or penalties, on account of such person being an alien, or by reason of his color, or race, than are prescribed for the punishment of citizens, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both; and if bodily injury results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include the use, attempted use, or threatened use of a dangerous weapon, explosives, or fire, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, shall be fined under this title, or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.

http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/investigate/civilrights/color_of_law

False arrest and fabrication of evidence: The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right against unreasonable searches or seizures. A law enforcement official using authority provided under the color of law is allowed to stop individuals and, under certain circumstances, to search them and retain their property. It is in the abuse of that discretionary power—such as an unlawful detention or illegal confiscation of property—that a violation of a person's civil rights may occur.

Fabricating evidence against or falsely arresting an individual also violates the color of law statute, taking away the person’s rights of due process and unreasonable seizure. In the case of deprivation of property, the color of law statute would be violated by unlawfully obtaining or maintaining a person’s property, which oversteps or misapplies the official’s authority.

And seeing as the Justice Department told the Miami-Dade P.D. last month rather explicitly that photography and/or videography of their activities was
legal, well someone's will be in a heap o' trouble for this. and it won't be Carlos...

[sarge43]

17. Is there anything we can do to help him? n/t

[tblue]

18. Geez! What was he doing that got him arrested?

Creeps.

[EFerrari]

33. He was doing his job.

[suffragette]

19. K&R

[AlbertCat]

20. Carlos Miller Arrested For Photographing Police Crack-Down

A badge of honor....


If only the police went after white collar crime as vigorously.

[Lisa0825]

21. I love that he smiled for his mugshot! LOL! GO CARLOS! :-) nt

[pinboy3niner]

22. K&R!

[Number23]

24. K&R! Thanks, Scurrilous!

[proud2BlibKansan]

25. Again? Good for you, Carlos. You get em!!

[yardwork]

26. K&R for Raging In Miami. I love that guy.

[Dawson Leery]

27. Break the FOP!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=103&topic_id=627781&mesg_id=627784

Let the 1% pay their salaries.

[William769]

29. Recommended.

[lpbk2713]

30. Very true.

" They messed with the wrong reporter. "

[Kalidurga]

31. I read some of the comments to the story whoops...

good reminder of why I stay off mainstream message boards.

[Norrin Radd]

32. kr

[musicblind]

34. DU and Skinner both need to work hard to get this story to the masses and make this case VERY public

If people only KNEW.

[EFerrari]

35. I sent it to MotherJones and to Amy.

Tomorrow I'll take it over to Greg Mitchell's Occupy blog. I don't know if Thom or Keith might be interested.

[ellisonz]

36. Here's his video:

Gotta love Maj. Perez - "A woman is being that hard on you, come on relax." Carlos: "You guys relax. I am relaxed."

[truth2power]

37. "A woman is being that hard on you? C'mon, relax." Too cute...

[Metta]

39. Good for him. nt

[Renew Deal]

40. I don't think this is the first time he's had these issues

I think he's been caught on the front lines before

[EFerrari]

43. He didn't have issues. The Miami Police have issues with the press. n/t

[Renew Deal]

44. Right

I'm not blaming him. He's had issues run-ins with cops before IIRC.

[EFerrari]

46. Yeah, the Miami PD beat the sh!t out of him for being a reporter

and then, they lied about it. He won that case.

I guess they still haven't learned their lesson. This story is now all over Twitter.

[woo me with science]

41. K&R

Thank you, Carlos.

[avaistheone1]

42. It's feeling like Amerikkka and I don't like it.

[DisgustipatedinCA]

45. I know he's Raging_in_Miami on DU, but did he also used to be Jiacinto on DU?

Do any of the other oldtimers remember Carlos, aka Jiacinto? As I recall, he was really argumentative, but his heart was in the right place. Any chance Raging & Jiacinto are the same person? Thank you.

[UTUSN]

49. No, no, and no. n/t

[a2liberal]

47. K&R (n/t)