The number of criminal cases filed by city employees against travelers on the city’s streets — police officers wielding federal powers via commercial trucking law — is staggering.
By David Tulis / NoogaRadio 92.7 FM
The top charge imposed by citation to court since January 2016 is financial responsibility, 30,489 citations. Financial responsibility is the compulsory insurance law that all drivers and operators of motor vehicles have to obey to exercise the privilege of being involved in the transportation shipping field.
The next most common is speeding, with 23,637 citations. A citation in a criminal matter lets the accused sign a form agreeing to appear either in city court or Hamilton County sessions court in a criminal case.
The next one is the auto registration law, 18,564 citations. To operate a car or truck commercially and for hire, the self-propelled device or instrument must be registered with county clerk Bill Knowles as a motor vehicle, pursuant to the motor and other vehicle law at Tenn. Code Ann. § Title 55. Enforcement of this law is under federal jurisdiction in U.S. Code § Title 49, transportation, and regulates shipping safety. The state has no authority to block travel, but it by law claims power to regulate privileges.
A graphic display shows a second category of citations under driver insurance, with an added 11,925 criminal cases. https://www.chattadata.org/Public-Safety/Top-25-Citation-Violations/ruhk-85ux
Total insurance violations are 30,489 criminal cases under commercial enforcement.
The next most common act alleged by Chattanooga police to be a criminal offense is violation of the driver license law with 17,770 citations against men and women in their cars and trucks or on motorbikes. The city attorney’s office has failed to respond to an open records request regarding documents showing delegated authority to enforce the driver license law.
The “light law” is cited in 7,732 citations. The light law is used as pretext to conduct the federal drug war within the city limits, and serves to let cops interrogate and harass people on the roads with impunity and no evidence of any real crime having been committed.
The citations are under the Tennessee trucking and shipping statute at Tennessee code annotated § Title 55.
‘Economic stops’
The city website calls these offenses “economic stops” as contrasted to “safety stops.” Stop is a euphemism for criminal arrest, and every “stop” is an arrest. The cases that establish the nature of traffic stops as arrests are State v. Garcia, 2003, and State v. Raspberry, 1982, and Robertson v. State, 1947.
“The other type, economic stops,” the city says, “are often a result of an out of date city sticker, lack of insurance (financial responsibility), or out of date auto registration. Typically, there are disproportionate citation rates for economic citations for BIPOC communities and there are no links to decreases in traffic accidents due to these citation types” (emphasis added).
In other words, traffic arrests with “economic” citations to court do nothing for the safety of the roads.
City lacks OK to enforce driver license law
The Tennessee department of safety and homeland security tells the federal government in its covenant for free money that it is the “sole agency” to enforce the safety laws of the road in Title 55.
City government has been under Tennessee transportation administrative notice 920 days and has made no response or rebuttal to its restatement of the Tennessee law and its disabilities under the state constitution. I gave the city notice of the limits of the statute Feb. 20, 2018, and under the rules of notice, it is continuing to abuse the people in bad faith, with malice, intent, knowingness and reckless disregard for their rights.
Under notice rules, being put “on awares” legally requires response, rebuttal or reformation.
City employees are, under notice doctrine, personally liable for any wrongs done in pursuit of Title 55 enforcement. I’ve asked city council to consider acting to protect the estates and property of these employees, serving Mayor Andy Berke’s police department, who are put into the way of legal harm by refusal to bring reform. They are personally liable for torts done in their personal capacity.
Hamilton County also is under TAN. This reporter gave Sheriff Jim Hammond personally the notice and demanded obedience to black-letter law vs. his complicity with judicial policy, which allows the so-called ultra vires (outside the scope, and thus illegal) activity. That was March 1, 2018, or 911 days ago. Sheriff Hammond is reported not to have even read the notice.
The corporations of Red Bank and East Ridge also are under transportation administrative notice regarding what I call a remnant of Jim Crow. So is State of Tennessee, the notice sent certified under the Bill Haslam administration.
Driving while black
The data also describes arrests and the ratio of white to black. Driving on revoked as a criminal charge is primarily aimed at African Americans with 1,861 or 73% of arrests. Whites are seized 27 percent of the time with 687 arrests.
I have reported that driving on a revoked license does not meet the arrest without warrant statute requirement of “public offense.” It also doesn’t meet the requirement that in use of a car in a crime or offense, that there be presence in the event a collision or involvement either of alcohol or flight. Apart from these conditions, arrest on the spot is forbidden — but done routinely with permission of Lorrie Miller, local magistrate, who knowingly misreads this law and knowingly misconstrues its protections.
In convention with her are local sessions court judges such as Lila Statom.
Blacks account disproportionately for the charge of carrying a weapon unlawfully. Blacks account for 81 percent, at 669 arrests. Whites account for 19% at 155. The intent to go armed statute is unconstitutionally vague, and is part of a whites-only body of law created in the 19th century to regulate and the descendants of slaves.
City admits no authority for license enforcement
In pursuit of the liberating claims in administrative notice, I am asking Phil Noblett, city attorney, for evidence that the state has delegated enforcement of the driver license law to the city. The statute says the “Uniform Classified and Commercial Driver License Act of 1988.” at chapter 50 of the motor vehicle code shall be administered by the department of safety.” Tenn. Code Ann. § 55-50-201,
My open records request for this delegation of authority is 109 days old, The open records law gives the state actor seven days to answer.
There is no such delegation order, because at law authority and power are given, not delegated, and power cannot be delegated from one agency to another. Statute grants power to a party to act. That party is not able to “delegate” or pass along that party to somebody else or some other agency.
Authority is granted — and that where authority stops. The city has no legal enforcement authority of the driver license law, based on this provision, nor does it have authority for any enforcement authority of the field of transportation.
Every two years the commissioner of safety files documents with the U.S. government so that it might obtain subsidies. The power to regulate shipping is narrowly confined to a Nashville-based police organization
The Tennessee Highway Patrol of the Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security is the sole agency in the State of Tennessee responsible for enforcing laws related to size, weight, and safety regulations for commercial motor vehicles. The Tennessee Highway Patrol is the State’s lead agency for the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program, and does not fund any sub-grantees. (italics added).
City of Chattanooga is in violation of federal law in its abuse of the people through the shipping and trucking law at Title 55. Repeated efforts to contact George Calhoun, the new head of the local NAACP chapter replacing Dr. Elenora Woods, have failed.
