Martial Law in Boston Did Not Catch the Suspect


Daniel McAdams
Lew Rockwell Blog
April 21, 2013

Look at these chilling photos of a major American city under total martial law. The local police force and investigative units have switched over to military assault vehicles on the streets, robo-cop science-fiction soldiers plugged in to all manner of spooky devices looking like the Borg and screaming orders like “if you want to live, turn off your cell phones.”

We read the shocking full story in the Washington Post today. Perhaps some of us are too naive, but this still seems unreal in the United States:

“By order of the state, a public transit system that serves more than 1.3 million riders a day was padlocked. Amtrak trains were suspended between Boston and New York. Businesses, offices and some of the world’s greatest universities were shut. Taxis were ordered off the streets for part of the day. Residents were instructed to stay inside.”

As does this:

“An indication of the complex investigation ahead came Friday night, when an Obama administration official told NBC News that Tsarnaev would not be given a Miranda warning when he is physically able to be interrogated after receiving medical treatment.

“Instead, the official said, the government will invoke a legal rule known as the ‘public safety exception,’ which will enable investigators to question Tsarnaev without first advising him of his right to remain silent and to be afforded legal counsel.”

But this is what strikes one the most, pondering all of the above: the police state did not catch the suspect. The borg did not catch the suspect. Martial law did not catch the suspect. People forced to stay in their homes did not catch the suspect. Warrantless searches did not catch the suspect.



Like the government’s initial failure (or worse) to identify and apprehend the suspects before the bombing, the government also failed in its military assault on an entire city.

Let us never forget that Dzhokar Tsarnaev was discovered by a private citizen, who happened to go out and check on his boat (i.e. violating the lockdown order of the cops), see a body inside of it, and call the cops. In other words, the police state achieved nothing but the psychological conditioning of the population: when we, the state, decide any particular event is important enough, you will lose every single right including possibly the right to life if you resist.

Writing in the Washington Times Communities section, Thomas Mullen sums it up nicely:

19-year-old Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokar Tsarnaev is in custody. Assuming that Tsarnaev is indeed guilty of these crimes, a very real threat to public safety has been taken off the streets. That’s the good news.

The bad news is that the Tsarnaev brothers have taken the last vestiges of a free society in America down with them.

The Bill of Rights was already on life support before this tragedy. Before the dust settled after 9/11, the 4th Amendment had been nullified by the Patriot Act. The 5th and 6th Amendments were similarly abolished with the Military Commission Act of 2006 and the 2012 NDAA resolution, which contained a clause allowing the president to arrest and indefinitely detain American citizens on American soil without due process of law.

This legacy is the real Boston tragedy. The Rubicon has been crossed.

Boston Bombing Lessons: Martial Law Doesn’t Work


Thomas R. Eddlem
New American
April 21, 2013

Only after the curfew in Watertown, Massachusetts was lifted and alert resident David Hanberry went outside his home to get a smoke, according to news reports, did the case of the Boston Marathon bombing manhunt forsuspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev crack open. That was when Hanberry saw blood on the tarp of his dry-docked boat and called the police.

Up until that time, a wide assortment of local, state, and federal officials were engaged in a dragnet that essentially shut down the City of Boston, and included house-to-house searches in the neighborhoods of Watertown, Mass. and New Bedford, Mass., the latter being near where 19-year-old Russian immigrant Dzhokhar Tsarnaev had enrolled in college. Tsarnaev, a Muslim from the Dagestan area of Russia that abuts Chechnya, became a U.S. citizen on September 11 of last year.

In essence, the lessons from the Boston Marathon mean that the following procedures employed in the week-long manhunt proved to be completely ineffective in apprehending Tsarnaev:

• House-to-house searches in a dragnet-style search;

• Use of military-style helicopters across the state;

• Use of tanks and armored vehicles on the streets of Boston, Cambridge, Watertown, and New Bedford;

• Shutting down the city, except for limited coffee shops;

• Stopping all public transportation;

• Banning taxi service across the City of Boston; and

• Abandoning the federal Posse Comitatus law banning the use of soldiers in law enforcement.

Moreover, the use of curfews in a number of towns actually likely delayed apprehension of the suspect, as the curfew essentially took more than a million pairs of eyes off possible getaway scenes.

Veteran police investigators have traditionally rejected the dragnet because they see it as a waste of police resources, but in the post-bombing panic, politicians demanded that police on the beat appear to be doing everything they can to solve the crisis. In this case, that appearance included a curfew that amounted to searching and hassling people who were clearly not in cahoots with the bombing suspects. Police detained and searched anyone on the streets of Boston and Watertown, even searching famous local news reporters multiple times during the course of the manhunt. In some instances, news reporters received death threats from over-zealous police officers.

In the end, if the goal of the terrorists was to terrorize, the terrorists won in Boston. Rather than returning to its ordinary business, the two suspects identified by authorities — Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and his older (deceased) brother Tamerlan — were able to terrorize — and even shut down — one of the world’s greatest cities for days. The two presumably hated America for its freedom, and were able to get the government to take away much of those freedoms from its citizens for a period of time.

The scare even led to a humorous over-reaction in Bridgewater, a college town where a “suspicious” backpack forced the evacuation of part of Bridgewater University. The Navy bomb disposal team arrived to find the backpack full of beer, according to the Brockton, Mass.-based Enterprise newspaper. The newspaper story did not record how police disposed of the “suspicious package.”

The reaction of Massachusetts’s state and federal officials to the Boston Marathon bombings — two black powder bombs with nails and ball bearings that killed three people — can be contrasted with the wave of 125 nearly identical bombings, technologically speaking, that took place across America in major U.S. cities during the 1917-20 “Red Scare.” The differences are that many more were killed 100 years ago, top U.S. government officials were targeted (including the U.S. Attorney General and judges) back then, and the federal government did not shut down entire cities. Although the period is known as the “Red Scare,” the genuine security threat was greater than the threat authorities responded to in Boston. And with the exception of a set of warrantless searches by the Justice Department’s Bureau of Investigation (later the FBI) under J. Edgar Hoover, the public’s liberties were respected.

And as if the attacks on civil liberties during the current Boston manhunt weren’t sufficient offense against the Bill of Rights, South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsay Graham has called on denying Dzhokhar Tsarnaev — a U.S. citizen — all of his rights under the U.S. Constitution. On the evening of Tsarnaev’s arrest, Graham tweeted the following remarks:

• “If captured, I hope Administration will at least consider holding the Boston suspect as enemy combatant for intelligence gathering purposes.”

• “The Law of War allows us to hold individual in this scenario as potential enemy combatant w/o Miranda warnings or appointment of counsel.”

• “Under the Law of War we can hold #Boston suspect as a potential enemy combatant not entitled to Miranda warnings or appointment of counsel.”

Graham later tweeted a partial retraction, claiming: “As to any future trial, if this suspect is an American citizen, he is NOT subject to military commission trial. #Boston.”

However, that trial could (and probably should) be indefinitely delayed, according to Graham and Senator John McCain (R-AZ). The two issued a joint statement on April 20, arguing: “We hope the Obama Administration will consider the enemy combatant option because it is allowed by national security statutes and U.S. Supreme Court decisions.”

Martial law was not directly responsible for catching Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. That's indisputable. However, it certainly reduced his options, and I would argue led indirectly to his capture. (I really don't think that boat was his first choice for a hiding place.) And it may well have saved lives (we will never really know).

He had already demonstrated that he had the means and the desire to commit mass murder. Shutting down Boston had the effect of reducing his ability to commit mass murder.

For sure, hindsight is 20/20. The authorities wasted a whole lot of time, energy, and money, doing things that they really should not have been doing. But I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. If they did not know that Dzhokhar was already seriously wounded, then most of their actions were not unreasonable.

What worries me more is the willingness of a couple Senators, of all people, to abrogate this young man's constitutional rights, on the grounds that he is somehow an "enemy combatant." Frankly, that scares me.

Onward and upward,
airforce

I am of the opinion that we are seeing NDAA in action here. Locking down Boston for the sake of security, and at the cost?

We no longer have a Constitution or bill of rights!

Not for the sake of security, but for the sake of lives. And not just one or two, either. These punks had already demonstrated their willingness to commit mass murder, and killing children didn't bother them, either. We'll never agree on this, but I wouldhave been inclined to do the same thing.

Onward and upward,
airforce

The FBI Fosters, Funds and Equips American Terrorists
http://youtu.be/TBobEiXInxQ

Martial Law Tactics in Watertown, Massachusetts - 4/19/2013

http://youtu.be/cBKCnJPFO5I

House search
http://youtu.be/4nrkcUV_7Qk

LIVE INSIDE Martial Law in Watertown MA

Part 1 http://youtu.be/KVypXHNZT4s

Part 3 http://youtu.be/OiJUVetLtNI

Part 4 http://youtu.be/OiJUVetLtNI

Part 5 http://youtu.be/FrK_5Dn84tQ

Part 6 http://youtu.be/Qi8GB-Om7VM

Part 7 http://youtu.be/eKCYsWN34GQ

Part 8 http://youtu.be/CzBVOxiAcuk

Part 9 http://youtu.be/MS_1cTDxYUo

Part 10 http://youtu.be/L1CQdGwHMic

Part 11 http://youtu.be/oeeWCTohFm0

Part 12 http://youtu.be/KY8PqQ-ppbM

Part 13 http://youtu.be/dsOyd0H21TQ

Part 14 http://youtu.be/0GQhO4u0yzA

Part 15 http://youtu.be/QXVaLCVvD-Y

Part 16 http://youtu.be/yRoko2dzyPw

Sorry Air Force. Not a good enough reason the the actions I am seeing on video. This is where we part company on this issue.

I do not agree with this action and would not summit to this kind of thuggery. This is my interpretation of what I saw.

Only one word comes to my mind after viewing a video. PATHETIC!

I believe you to be a good man and patriot, but please reconsider your position.

The 4rth ...... you're for it or you're not....its not there only when its convienient for Cops.

The first 10 have been there since our great country was born. I now understand the difference between a free market anarchist and a libertarian. The first 10 will be there until and hopefully after I pass. I would rather see 100 guilty men go free than to watch one innocent man hang.

S

You know, I once heard the late evangelist Oral Roberts say, "I've never made a mistake in my life."

I sort of nodded my head and said, "Okay..."

Then he added, "Oh, I've done a lot of things that turned out to be mistakes later, but they weren't mistakes when I did them, and if I'd known they would be mistakes later, I wouldn't have done them."

And that's where I think we are on this. Yeah, in hindsight, it probably wasn't necessary to shut down Boston. But I didn't know that, and I don't think the police knew that, either. They had to act on the information they had and, if you're going to make a mistake, make a mistake on the side of saving lives.

So, yes, if it was a mistake to shut Boston down, well, I would have made the same mistake.

But you're right, Leonidas. If there's one thing I've learned in all my years, it is to reevaluate my position on things. (Heck, back in the 60's, I was a Democrat!) And if more information comes to light about this alleged bomber that would change my position, well, I'll change it.

Onward and upward,
airforce

No worries. This I hope you can tell is meant in a respectful manner and not, in a divisive one.

I have to defend our "Once upon a time" Constitutional rights, and any deviation from this is wrong as 2 boys in bed.

Our Republic is now an active battle field. Of this there can be no doubt. There actions are telling us their intentions for the rest of us.

No, I didn't take it that way. The only thing I would take issue with you about, is "Constitutional rights." They're just "rights," that happened to have been mentioned in the Constitution. (That's where us free market anarchists differ with everybody else.)

But would you rather have seen 100 innocent men, women, and children murdered, than see the police do a house-to-house search?

A lot has been said about what the police would have done in years past. Well, back in the olden days here in Oklahoma, the sheriff would have rounded up a posse and gone house to house, searching for the sorry prick.

Onward and upward,
airforce

So who finds him? The man of the house or the posse?

And as was said before I have the utmost respect for you AF. Sometimes I respectfully disagree.

Sorry you had a question

I will not trade freedom for security

This looks like one of those things where we just have to respectfully agree to disagree. And I'm not upset by that. It's actually gratifying to be associated with so many people who are so passionate about defending their rights. I wish I could clone you guys.

Onward and upward,
airforce

Maybe the issue should really be if more information comes to light about this alleged govt.....

Though I can't see where more is needed!

I don't wish to see any innocent murdered; however Yes versus an unwarranted house-to-house search.

Set a precident were 320 million lose their rights in exchange for the potential that 100 innocents die at the hand of a shot, bleeding suspect?

Then when does it end?

Do you really want to open that bag of worms?

Nveer mind dumb of me. I know you don't want to play God. My daughter was recently born. We had fun doing it the old fashioned way. The results? She has me wrapped around her finger and I will never be the same

gonna be hard to do that shit when you are receiving incoming from every house in sight!!!!

Well, after reading this thread, and then the one about Oathkeepers and their "permit" for Lexington Green, a clear pattern can be seen.
Martial Law in Boston, for the "public's safety".
Denial of Free Speech at Lexington Green for the "public's safety".

Seems we're now trading Liberty for safety.
Of course, we'll get neither.

I could "sort of" see closing down public transportation, and emptying the streets, for both "public safety", and to deny the terrorist the ability to freely travel amongst the citizens, hidden among them.
But at this point, they know who they seek, and, more importantly, they know all those people dragged from their homes at gunpoint and then searched, were not the one being sought, and yet did it anyway.
It merely made for a good "sheeple training" opportunity.

Good bless you, your grandchild and your family. This is why we long to live free.