Persecuted for a Subaru, Smuggled it out of the... State

[Subaruist]

In about 1996 my '79 Brat was not running well enough to pass smog - at that time I still had to do the smog check.

So I wanted to set things right... I bought a nearly new engine from japan with just over 50,000 miles, and as nartually clean as it could be for not being cleaned up. I could have gotten a dual-carb racing engine too, but that would nto pass smog. (if only I knew....)

I also replaced the ENTIRE exhaust system. Only one tiny. tiny problem... one little hose in the smog system had no place to go, I had to cap it.

It made no difference in how it ran, and seemed to make no difference where smog would be concerned.

However, the DMV not only would not allow it to pass, even if it passed the actual smog check with flying colors, they claimed that I had "modified the engine" and as a result of various details of bureaucratic bull and crapola, the vehicle was now essentially cursed.

If I did anything with that hose, it really would be "modifying the engine", and I was not going to again replace a perfect engine to solve such a stupid technicality. I fought it, and fought it, and then could not drive it anymore legally, and lost my living because of it.

I found a guy with the 'Sovereign movement' who knew stuff that attorneys did not know, who tried to help me fight it legally.

Part of this was to not make a normal appearance in court, but a different kind that was perfectly legal but put things into our favor.

This guy helping me was known to them, and they hated him because he was putting them over a barrel.

When the Judge learned that I was the latest person who was going to mess up thier nonsense, and we presented a 2 inch thick stack of documentation detailing all the rules and laws they were either breaking or contradicting, he claimed that I did not appear, and sent a Sheriff with a unsigned dot-matrix prinout that they claimed was a warrant and was not. I was arrested in the livingroom of my own home like a criminal.

 

Although I had a spotless record going all the way back to kindergarten, the Judge at the alleged arraignment said in a loud voice that I was a threat (and whipered -to the court's jusrisdiction) as one of our points was about his jurisdiction. He labeled me as dangerous and a flight risk, and saw to it that in 3 weeks in jail I never saw the light of day, did not get any religious or other services; he also tried to get me put into the cells with the violent types or solitary, which did not happen.

 

This was for the charge of infraction failure to appear ona registration ticket - I was a danger to society! The judge also set my bail at $50,000.00 -yes, Fifty Thousand. The only person who had near that high of bail was the biggest speed cooker in the county, which was San Bernardino County, the largest county in the whole country. - and he only had $40,000.00 bail!

 

When I eventually got a court date, the local cops thought it would be amusing to turn the air conditioning up all the way and turn the couple of holding cells into effectively a freezer, and was quite unpleasent. Then me and everyone who came in on the same jail bus as me were given a mass strip search in the hallway, something never done before, as the cops were complaining about having to bother with it for people who had not serious charges or records, etc.They offered a plea deal, they wanted me to instead cop to a Misdemeanor failure to appear, with 1 year in jail, for which they would drop the traffic ticket for registration. - get that? I go from infraction to 1 year in jail, and they forgive a lousy traffic ticket in return! That was almost too much to believe. What the hell were they thinking? Why were they so intent on this revenge?

We rightfully and legally put the court on the defensive, and he wanted to be an avenging bully - that simple.

 

I told them that what they offered was ludicrus, and that it should be that they wanted me to plea to the ticket and not get the 1 year which was not even the charge in the first place. I did not take thier deal and back to jail I went for more of the same.

I managed to get some outside help, and we got a certain lawyer who they also hated, but who was better at getting results. First, when my second court appearance came, we dismissed the first Judge 'for cause', and then the second judge with "pre-emptory challenge" until they had to get a Judge from the next county. What we were doing was ticking them all off in two counties, and we topped that off by getting the story spread that they were doing all this to someone with no record or violations whatsever, and the talk was working and also ticking them off, but they were once again put over a barrel. My new attorney then threatened to personally sue them pro-bono for me of they did not release me within 24 hours.  They release me, at like 11:30pm, in the rain with nothing but my jeans, shoes, and a T-Shirt on.

 

This whole situation really pissed me off, and that in not a good thing no matter who it is doing it.

I decide that either I was going to start carrying a gun, and shoot the next SOB wgho ever tried anything like that again, or leave the State.

Over a 2 year period I had to live on food stamps and scrounge money any way I could, but tghen found various ways of either getting money out of the State or costing the State money, as much as I could drain any way I could do it. My last count was that I had burned California, San Bernardion County, and the City of Redlands for nearly $90,000.00 - all perfectly legal.

I then rented a Uhaul and a full car carrier, as they made it known to me that they would not let me take that vehicle out of the state, which they had no such authority or prescedent to do. So I completely covered my Subaru in black plastic and smuggled it out to Arizona.

Crossing the California border was onbe of the happiest hours of my life, and later getting my new license and registration with no problems and litttle cost.

 

For these and other reasons I am a patriot of Arizona even if I don't live there, and I hate California and hope to see it sink into the ocean or break up with the continental shelf with the big quake coming someday. Years later, when I left Arizona to come to Oregon, I went through Utah, Nevada and Idaho just so I would never again touch California soil.

 

Now my Subarus are exempt from smog, and that whole smogging bureaucracy anywhere can't touch me now!

I love my Subaru(s), and nobody is ever going to take 'em away from me!

[efseiler]

Well...just like Tarzan said...'There is the Law of Man...but also the Law of the Jungle'.

 

 

Damien

 

 

 

 

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Praise the Lord...and pass the Thorazine!

[Early Rider Steve]

Good read, I left California for Arizona but not quite so dramatic.

Edited April 24, 2014 by Early Rider Steve