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CounterPunch
February
10, 2003
The DiLDO DiALOGUES
My Adventures in Suing the LAPD
for Trampling the Fourth Amendment
by DR. SUSAN BLOCK
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.
U.S. Constitution: Fourth
Amendment
On the night of February 26th, 2000, for the second
time in less than two years, armed officers of the Los Angeles
Police Department invaded my television studio on the night of
a live broadcast.
Their excuse the first time? Looking
for hookers. They had seen my TV show and heard reports of scantily
clad ladies coming and going from my studio, so they figured
I must be running a brothel. As those of you who know me know,
though I believe that prostitution should be decriminalized,
I don't allow anything of that kind on my premises, which they
saw clearly as soon as they got there.
Their excuse the second time? They were
responding to an anonymous 911 call saying that four armed Hispanic
men who had just robbed and kidnapped someone had somehow gotten
into my studio through our steel-gated, double-locked front door.
The first time, when confronted by First
Amendment Attorney Jeffrey Douglas and a camera crew from Channel
13/UPN-TV news who happened to be there that night shooting a
news segment about my show, the officers quickly realized their
mistake and left within a few minutes. The second time, they
stayed and searched my studio for two and a half hours. Neither
time was I or any of my staff or guests arrested or charged with
any crime.
The second time was much more dramatic,
not to mention dangerous. Yelling "SWAT! Police!" and
threatening to break down the door, about 20 heavily armed LAPD
officers, backed up by rifle-wielding marksmen and a beam-shining
helicopter, swarmed into my private broadcast studio and art
gallery and, once inside, made themselves at home for two and
a half hours, delaying the live broadcast of my show, calling
in more officers, intimidating and threatening my staff and guests,
and searching the premises for hours without a warrant.
Are we outraged? Yes. Are we surprised?
No. This kind of behavior is condoned by the city of Los Angeles
and by it's internationally notorious gangster police department.
As I told the officers both times, if
they wanted to visit my TV show, they should have just called
up and asked for an invitation. We've already had several police
officers and their spouses as guests in our studio audience.
But they didn't call. They didn't ask. They just barged in with
their big guns, putting me, my staff and guests at high risk,
disrupting our show, seriously tarnishing my reputation and just
generally making big bullies of themselves, as the LAPD is so
famous for around the world.
So in January, 2001, we filed a lawsuit
against the LAPD. My original lawyer for this suit, Greg Smith,
had approached me through his public relations representative
when he heard about the police invasion on the news because,
he said, he was impressed by the merits of my case and appalled
by the warrantless entry and civil rights-abusive behavior of
the LAPD officers. In June 2001, when Smith learned that the
presiding judge would be the notoriously conservative United
District Judge Manuel L. Real, he told me he thought we should
drop the case because Judge Real was a "reactionary, sadistic,
misogynist, police-loving maniac, and we could never get a fair
trial." When I replied that I did not wish to drop the case
simply because we had drawn this judge, that justice could not
be served in that way, Smith agreed to do his lawyerly duty and
continue representing me.
Then, shortly after the attacks of September
11, 2001, Smith informed me that there was no way we could win
our suit in the ensuing conservative climate. I certainly did
not feel that this was a valid or ethical reason to drop the
case, and was shocked to hear a man who calls himself a civil
rights attorney bringing it up as an excuse. I felt it was more
important than ever to defend our Constitutional Rights against
an aggressive and unscrupulous police force.
Unable to scare me into backing down
from defending our civil liberties, Smith went to the Court of
Judge Real, the guy he'd just called a monster, and meekly requested
permission to withdraw from the case, falsely stating that I
was "uncooperative." Of course, the only way in which
I was "uncooperative" was in not agreeing to drop the
case just because we'd drawn a conservative judge and America
had been attacked by terrorists.
I pleaded with the Judge to give me time
to get another lawyer, but he refused. Though he was wrong to
use it as an excuse to drop my suit, Smith was right about Judge
Real being as reactionary as Jerry Falwell without the jolly
disposition. Some of the folks in his courtroom swore he looked
just like one of those withered Puritan Fathers pronouncing Hester
Prynn an adulteror, or even the Devil Himself, as he ruled against
me again and again.
And thus, I found myself forced into
the odd position of playing the "Legally Blonde" nonconsensual
pro per to my own case, without the benefit of a scripted happy
ending, and with the heavy-duty weaknesses of zero experience
and almost as little preparation (and in the midst of a real
estate debacle indirectly related to this police intrusion. For
more on that ongoing battle, click here) in front of the honorable,
horrible Judge Manny Real.
I did get a bit of legalistic help and
a lot of cheers of encouragement from some real lawyers, one
of whom is quite famous in the field of civil rights law, all
of whom shall remain nameless (for the time being).
Despite all these major drawbacks in
my first pro per outing, I know I had the hearts of the jury
members. This was not due to my lawyerly skills, of which I have
next to none, but due to my opponents' lack thereof, as well
as the outrageousness of what had happened on the night of February
26, 2000. When LAPD Defense Attorney Don W. Vincent boldly tried
to establish that one of my own cameramen made the call on the
apparently phony 911 tape, even though his voice sounded nothing
like the voice on the tape, some of the jury members looked my
way with sympathy, while others could barely muffle their giggles.
When Vincent later tried to say that
the presence on my set of a large fluffy pink penis-shaped pillow
(pictured below) was sufficient grounds to conduct a warrantless
search of my studio during a television show, a couple of the
female jury members smiled at me like they wanted one too. You've
heard of the Vagina Monologues? Well, this was the DiLDO DiALOGUES.
What a farce! What a bogus excuse to search my premises without
a warrant!
Big dildos and bogus excuses aside, Judge
Real tossed my case out of his court before it even went to the
jury. Pasty-white jowls quivering with repressed arousal and
full-blown fury, bony finger crooked in my direction, he snarled
that I was lucky I hadn't been killed on the night of February
26, 2000! He was not about to allow that jury to deliberate on
this case, knowing they would probably side with me against the
LAPD and award me damages. Essentially, he said that because
my broadcast studio and art gallery contained what he called
"pornography" (which is perfectly legal to own and
display privately in America), I had no rights. Therefore, after
this three- day courtroom wrestling match that I was destined
to lose (all my lawyer buddies were impressed that I had managed
to "go" three days with the Tricky Dick of Federal
Court), my case was dismissed.
Now, because I'm what some folks call
"stubborn" about civil rights, my case is under appeal
to the Ninth District Court. I am still in pro per, though at
this point, I've had some preparation, and I have some other
wonderful civil rights attorneys helping me.
Winning an appeal with the 9th District
Court is ridiculously rare. Only something like 2% of appeals
are granted. But, though it's a long shot, I will not just "let
it go." Why? Because it is simply too serious a breach of
my civil liberties and the rights of other Americans who are
just trying to conduct perfectly legal, private business or pleasure,
when police bust in, see an erotic object or photo, and use that
as an excuse to turn the place upside down and possibly worse.
So much for the First and Fourth Amendments in our Bill of Rights.
CLICK HERE TO READ THE BRIEF FOR MY APPEAL
As you'll see, parts of my appeal brief
(these are the parts with numbers preceding and following the
letters RT) refer to the transcripts from the first case that
Judge Real dismissed before the jury could deliberate on it.
We had to pay over $2000 to the court reporters for those transcripts,
and we will make copies of them available to those who really
want them. We ask for a $250 donation per full copy of all the
transcripts and the Excerpts of Record (court documents). If
you are indigent and can't give a donation, but would like to
see the transcripts and/or the Excerpts of Record, or if you
are a journalist writing about cases like this, please call Sabrina
at 213.749.1330, and we will make a copy of the transcripts available
to you.
As you'll see if you read them, some
parts of these transcripts are pretty exciting, others predictably
boring as any courtroom proceeding. Others are really worthy
of the name "The DiLDO DiALOGUES," and others show
me to be the naïve, utterly unprepared nonconsensual pro
per that I was. It's a little embarrassing for me to share
these transcripts with you, but it's important for all of us
to see just how our legal system functions, or dysfunctions,
when an American citizen seeks redress for the gross violation
of our civil rights.
NOW I NEED TO ASK FOR
YOUR HELP.
For the past 15 years, the Dr. Susan
Block Institute and The Dr. Susan Block Show have helped
thousands of men and women to enhance their sexuality and improve
their lives. We have made you think. We have made you laugh.
We have made you come. We have dedicated ourselves to sex education
and helping to bring people out of the Sexual Dark Ages when
ignorance was prized and information was scarce. It's been, and
continues to be, an amazing and rewarding adventure for all of
us here at the Institute. We are grateful, extremely grateful.
But even as we gain our rights to a better
life, sexually and otherwise, there are venomous fundamentalist
forces, from Islamist Ayatollahs to Christian Crusaders, working
against us, operating out of fear that they are losing their
grip on power. And they are! As science opens our minds and technology
brings us closer together, the world is becoming freer and more
accepting of human sexuality and all that goes along with it:
diversity, women's rights, peace, individualism, liberty and
the pursuit of happiness.
But there is always a backlash to growth,
and so we encounter these fundamentalist forces that oppose humane
evolution and freedom, feeding off the dark side of human nature.
These are the power brokers and warmongers, the leaders of the
world's largest corporations, their political lackeys and presidential
sons. These individuals and institutions no longer represent
the people. They don't even represent political interests. They
just represent their own personal interests. We're beginning
to see what "Family Values" really means. It means
money in the pockets of the Bush Family, the Rigas Family or
whichever Family's favorite son is spouting those political pieties
at the moment.
The only thing these institutions and
individuals have left to protect themselves against their continuing
loss of power to women, minorities and ethical hedonists is war.
Therefore, America has a war for everything. Now we've got the
War on Iraq, which is part of the War on Terrorism (though nobody
can point to a relationship between Saddam and Osama). We also
have the War on Crime, which, though it's put two million people
in prison in this country, hasn't kept us from having one of
the highest crime rates in the world. It's created a mammoth
police state that can roam anywhere, search you at will, arrest
you if it suits them, threaten you, beat you and shoot you for
looking the wrong way. Or wearing a lot of jewelry. While one
LAPD officer held a gun to my head, another told me I shouldn't
wear so much jewelry or it could be mistaken for a weapon which
would mean they might shoot me. The policy of the Los Angeles
Police Department is "SHOOT TO KILL." Well, it is a
war. Another American War on It's Own People.
Then there's the War on Drugs (while
half our children are being drugged by government authorized
drug pushers), and the War on Smoking (all the money won from
the cigarette companies was stolen to cover government budget
deficits). Topping it off is the War on Sex that justifies some
25 armed and dangerous police officers invading a peaceful, law-abiding
television broadcast for no legal reason. What do all of these
wars add up to? A War on the Constitution of the United States.
A War on our Bill of Rights.
Of course, if you want to defend your
rights in America, it now takes a military budget. Since most
of us have been impoverished by the current American regime to
the point that we can hardly make ends meet, and many of us are
relegated to work we hate just to live and love a little, very
few of us have the money or power to bite back.
But some of us can fight back. And if
we fight together, we can fight harder and more effectively.
We have the power to reach out to millions of people, we have
the power to be independent of the system, we have the power
to defend ourselves intellectually against the constant lies
of a dying and broken bureaucracy that is now little more than
a war machine. We have the power to say "STOP," you've
gone too far, you've stepped beyond your right, you are stepping
on "MY" rights, you are stomping on "MY"
Constitution. That I won't allow. Not without a fight.
When police entered, occupied and searched
"my" broadcast studios two years ago, like they enter
dozens of homes, stop thousands of cars, invade billions of personal
e-mails, find out what books people check out of libraries, arrest
hundreds of citizens at will and simply terrorize others without
answering to anyone, it reminded me of how precious is the light
of our enlightened society, our society that holds up its Bill
of Rights as a beacon of liberty to nations around the world,
and how if we allow these police actions to continue and worsen
without redress, we will find our brilliant, liberating light
faded to a darkened bombed-out shell of what was once the most
vibrant democracy in history.
The Constitution no longer protects us,
because the judges are part of the police department (at least
most of the judges are; there are some great ones). Judge Real
is not the only Tricky Dick on the bench. Thus, there are only
two things that protect us against this kind of insidious despotism:
LAWYERS and MONEY (and yes, the two are symbiotically related),
a very thin line between freedom and the gangsterism of our police
force.
So, our lawyers need money. Not a lot
of money. But still, they need more money than we have. Therefore
we turn to you, the thousands of friends, fans, business associates,
brothers and sisters, lovers and sinners that have been so giving
and caring over the years. The people we've broken bread with,
made love to, and those that we travel with along the same road,
as well as those whom we've never met, but who know us through
the Internet or HBO.
We are asking for your donations to help
defend all of our rights against massive government intrusions
in all of our lives. We are at the front lines of this battle
every day. If one person loses their rights, we all lose our
rights. People in government must understand that we may not
all fight back, but some of us will. And if we don't give up,
we will win. You
can donate through paypal by clicking here and scrolling down
to the donate link at the bottom of the page.
You can also donate by calling our office
anytime at 213.749.1330. Ask for Sabrina. Thank you for your
donation. If you cannot afford to donate at this time, we understand.
Then, please tell a friend who can. Please don't put this off.
We need your help NOW. Or, if you prefer, you can make your donation
by joining us BACKSTAGE
or calling our Telephone Sex Therapy service: 310.474.5353. Make
giving a pleasure!
love & liberté,
Susan Block, Ph.D.
Dr. Susan Block
is a sex educator, host of The Dr. Susan Block Show and author
of The 10 Commandments of Pleasure. Visit her website at http://www.drsusanblock.com.
If you'd like to contact Dr. Susan Block
with questions, comments or contributions, please email liberties@blockbooks.com
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February
1 / 2, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
Railroading
Rosenthal; PeeWee and the Sex and the Sex Police
Jeffrey St.
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Dian
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Former NASA Engineer: "I Fucking Warned Them"
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Jung & the Shuttle: Symbol &
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Dave
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Report from Istanbul: the Peace
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Iraqt-Up: At Peace Rallies, Hundreds
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Jeremy
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Live
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Songs of Protest
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An Immodest Proposal
Lawrence McGuire
Poker at Camp David
Adam
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Just
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Read
Whiteout and Find Out
How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
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by Alexander
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and Jeffrey St. Clair
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