Passengers disembark NH bus in handcuffs, M-16s pointed at them

[Echo In Light]

May 7, 2010 by legitgov

Police tasered, handcuffed man in his 60s who refused to give police his name

A tense standoff with a passenger aboard a Boston-bound Greyhound bus ended 'peacefully' last night when he surrendered to police, nearly 10 hours after authorities received a call about a suspicious device on board. Earlier, sixteen other adult passengers and the driver had exited the bus, which originated in Bangor, Maine and arrived in Portsmouth for a regularly scheduled stop at about 11:20 a.m.

Minutes later, someone aboard the bus called 911 and reported the apparent device, police said. Authorities quickly surrounded the bus and evacuated nearby buildings... Coming just days after a failed car bombing in New York City, the threat drew an overwhelming response, with bomb squads, SWAT teams, and a sharpshooter in an armored vehicle descending on the scene...

At about 2 p.m., 2 1/2 hours after arriving in Portsmouth, passengers began leaving the bus one by one, holding their hands in the air as they walked slowly past tactical teams with guns drawn. As they disembarked, some could be seen lifting up their shirts, apparently to show they were unarmed, and being quickly surrounded by authorities. Some could be seen in handcuffs. Once all the passengers got off, they were each put in handcuffs and taken to the police station, where they were questioned individually.

http://www.legitgov.org/Passengers-disembark-NH-bus-handcuffs-M-16s-pointed-them

http://www.boston.com/news/local/new_hampshire/articles/2010/05/07/standoff_with_passenger_on_bus_ends_peacefully/

[mikelgb]

1. damn sounds like a twilight zone episode or something

"Next Stop: Police State"

[RandomThoughts]

2. Always glad when mostly good passengers are safe.

Although people see things differently.

For many years the people that believe it is all satire or a joke, have said that people that raise their hands in joy are actually surrendering. It is from the side that sees it that way.

I see it a different way. Mostly as a good wave :hi:

[ixion]

3. The Police State marches onward

we should be so proud. :sarcasm:

[PDJane]

4. The Bush bunch started the police state........

It seems to have taken on a life of its own, now.

[grasswire]

8. actually the police state started under Clinton.

...when Janet Reno signed a memo of cooperation between the Department of Justice and the Department of Defense to provide massive monies to former defense contractors to arm local law enforcement to be used against what (a new term then) were called "urban hostiles." That was the beginning of the mentality that citizens were "hostiles" and that whole buildup and rollout. That was in the early 1990s.

[Echo In Light]

13. Our Militarized Police Departments ...

Testimony before the House Subcommittee on Crime

Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to speak today.

I’m here to talk about police militarization, a troubling trend that’s been on the rise in America’s police departments over the last 25 years.

Militarization is a broad term that refers to using military-style weapons, tactics, training, uniforms, and even heavy equipment by civilian police departments.

It’s a troubling trend because the military has a very different and distinct role than our domestic peace officers. The military’s job is to annihilate a foreign enemy. The police are supposed to protect us while upholding our constitutional rights. It’s dangerous to conflate the two.

But that’s exactly what we’re doing. Since the late 1980s, Mr. Chairman, thanks to acts passed by the U.S. Congress, millions of pieces of surplus military equipment have been given to local police departments across the country.

We’re not talking just about computers and office equipment. Military-grade semi-automatic weapons, armored personnel vehicles, tanks, helicopters, airplanes, and all manner of other equipment designed for use on the battlefield is now being used on American streets, against American citizens.

Academic criminologists credit these transfers with the dramatic rise in paramilitary SWAT teams over the last quarter century.

SWAT teams were originally designed to be used in violent, emergency situations like hostage takings, acts of terrorism, or bank robberies. From the late 1960s to the early 1980s, that’s primarily how they were used, and they performed marvelously.

But beginning in the early 1980s, they’ve been increasingly used for routine warrant service in drug cases and other nonviolent crimes. And thanks to the Pentagon transfer programs, there are now a lot more of them.

This is troubling because paramilitary police actions are extremely volatile, necessarily violent, overly confrontational, and leave very little margin for error. These are acceptable risks when you’re dealing with an already violent situation featuring a suspect who is an eminent threat to the community.

But when you’re dealing with nonviolent drug offenders, paramilitary police actions create violence instead of defusing it. Whether you’re an innocent family startled by a police invasion that inadvertently targeted the wrong home or a drug dealer who mistakes raiding police officers for a rival drug dealer, forced entry into someone’s home creates confrontation. It rouses the basest, most fundamental instincts we have in us – those of self-preservation – to fight when flight isn’t an option.

Peter Kraska, a criminologist at the University of Eastern Kentucky, estimates we’ve seen a startling 1,500 percent increase in the use of SWAT teams in this country from the early 80s until the early 2000s. And the vast majority of these SWAT raids are for routine warrant service.

These violent raids on American homes, when coupled with the imperfect, often ugly methods used in drug policing, have set the stage for disturbingly frequent cases of police raiding the homes not only of recreational, nonviolent drug users, but the homes of people completely innocent of any crime at all.

Cont...

http://reason.com/archives/2007/07/02/our-militarized-police-departm

[EFerrari]

14. National Security Act of 1947, Truman.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Act_of_1947

When I see this stuff, those kids who call themselves anarchists and run around breaking windows begins to make sense to me, even if I don't agree with. They're only fulfilling an expectation.

[Echo In Light]

16. The National $ecurity $tate ruse is always used to keep the fascist agenda hidden (in the open)

[grasswire]

5. well?

Did they find anything on the bus that would legitimize the horrible experience the passengers went through at the hands of authorities?

I don't see any info about the result of the search.

[flyingfysh]

6. the whole thing was a stupid misunderstanding

The guy didn't even speak English. He wasn't refusing to do anything, he didn't understand what people were asking him to do.

[WinkyDink]

7. I smell LAWSUITS!

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

9. They were protecting "The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave".

:sarcasm: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[PM Martin]

10. Everyone was handcuffed and taken to the police station?

:wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf::wtf:

[NotThisTime]

24. No, just want to say they were not all handcuffed... One person was for a short time, the rest had

to come off the bus in an orderly fashion, get patted down, where they then went into the garage... everyone was brought to the station for statements and then sent on their way with the exclusion of the one passenger....

[Juneboarder]

11. Unjust!

Things are getting scarier by the day...

[Webster Green]

12. This country is unhinged.

Home of the brave? :rofl:

[gratuitous]

15. Well, if none of them had done anything wrong

They probably didn't have very much to worry about. Unless, of course, one of the armed mob that took them into custody got scared, or there was a breakdown in communication, or someone with a lethal weapon was having a bad day and wasn't taking no shit from nobody, then there might be something to worry about. But, really, what are the odds?

That is, if you hadn't done anything wrong. Ever. Otherwise, up against the wall, motherfucker.

[bobbolink]

18. Exactly. Kent State students had nothing to worry about either. They were just going to class.

[Echo In Light]

21. Yep. We heard that a lot too once it came out that countless millions were illegally spied on

[Yeahyeah]

17. But how can I show them my papersss when I'm in handcuffsss?

[Echo In Light]

19. .

[arcadian]

20. They were protecting our freedoms

:sarcasm: if needed

[amborin]

22. New Hampshire --- ironic

[MetaTrope]

23. A piss-their-pants Tea Party Panic numbskull moment

Exactly the sort of situation that HAROLD AND KUMAR: ESCAPE FROM GUANTANAMO BAY used as its launching point...except that in the high-pressure world of crazed Fox news terrorism, now the parody has become reality.