Border Patrol Smashes Their Way Into Vehicle As Man Refuses To Comply With Internal Checkpoint

Agent barks: "It's not intimidation, it's the law."
Infowars
Nov. 11, 2014

A man in Texas was dragged from his vehicle by border patrol agents who smashed through his window after he refused to answer their questions at a checkpoint more than 50 miles away from the Southern border.

“I am pretty sure my rights were infringed upon at the Hwy 281 Border Patrol Checkpoint just south of Falfurrias, Texas,” Thomas Sauer wrote on his YouTube Channel, following the incident during which he was arrested and held at the facility.

During the exchange, captured on Sauer’s cell phone, six Border Patrol agents are seen gathering around his truck threatening to smash their way in as he refuses to entertain questions over whether he is an American citizen.



(The exchange with the agents begins at around 6 mins into the video)

Sauer repeatedly tells the lead agent "I haven't done anything wrong. I've not broken any laws."

The agent cites a law, 18 U.S. Code § 111, which pertains to “Assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers or employees.”

“This is the only basis that the agent tried to use to detain me. As invalid as his basis was, even if he managed to actually find a way to properly execute this, it is still subordinate to the constitution.” Sauer notes, citing Fourth Amendment protections against search and seizure, and the Fifth Amendment right to remain silent.

When he accuses the agents of using intimidation tactics, the lead agent says “it is not intimidation, it is the law,” before smashing his way into the truck through the window, and dragging Sauer out. Sauer was held, questioned and subsequently released.

Using the excuse of attempting to apprehend illegal immigrants, Border Patrol agents have set up a network of internal checkpoints inside the United States. As we have documented, in some cases the checkpoints are as much as 100 miles from the border.

Despite what a Supreme Court ruling says, since the checkpoints are situated far away from the Mexican border, they are clearly a violation of the Fourth Amendment, which protects, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." Of course, the Supreme Court also once ruled that black people in America were slaves.

The ACLU has dubbed the 100-mile area in which the checkpoints have been positioned as the "Constitution-free Zone," noting that 2 out of 3 Americans live within this buffer zone -- around 190 million people in total.

There is no law that says refusing to comply with Border agents and/or police at such checkpoints gives probable cause to search an individual's vehicle. It certainly does not provide probable cause for agents to smash their way into the vehicle, particularly given that the occupant was not being aggressive, and no positive response from drug sniffing dogs was registered.

This is just the latest in a series of confrontations caught on video showing Americans standing up to the checkpoints.

Infowars previously reported on the case of Steven Anderson, who refused to show his papers at another Border Patrol checkpoint while traveling through California.

Anderson provided a sterling example of how to stand up for your rights in such a situation. When Border Patrol agents attempted to detain him for questioning, Anderson refused, citing his right as an American citizen to "go free on my way."



In another incident in 2012, a truck driver who passed through a checkpoint in Texas, 30 miles from the Mexican border, stood up for his Fourth Amendment rights by refusing to answer questions and eventually driving away.



These videos and hundreds of others like them accentuate the fact that Americans are not required to answer Border agents’ questions (usually starting with "Are you a United States citizen?"). Nor are Americans required to consent to any searches at such checkpoints.

Visit www.checkpointusa.org/blog to learn more about this program. By actively "flexing" their rights, these brave citizens expose the techniques DHS and Border Patrol agents (and police in general) use to trick and intimidate citizens into compliance.

Not all Americans who refuse to have their rights violated have been as successful as those in the videos above. In 2008, retired San Diego social worker Vince Peppard and his wife had their car ransacked after refusing to consent to being searched.

Alex Jones has also encountered similar "interior checkpoints" on numerous occasions, including the incident documented in the video below.


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Steve Watson is a London based writer and editor for Alex Jones’ Infowars.com, and Prisonplanet.com. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham, and a Bachelor Of Arts Degree in Literature and Creative Writing from Nottingham Trent University.













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