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Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please"

By Jeralyn, Section Civil Liberties
Posted on Mon Dec 05, 2005 at 03:59:40 PM EST
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Deborah Davis, the woman charged with a crime for refusing to show her identification to an officer while riding on a public bus in Denver, has a court appearance on Friday. There will be a rally at the federal courthouse in Denver to show support for her.

WHAT: Rally for Deb Davis' stand for the Freedom to Travel
WHEN: Friday, the 9th of December at 8:30 AM
WHERE: The steps of the Alfred A. Arraj U.S. Courthouse, 901 19th Street in Denver.

Information about her legal case is available here. Her side of the story is presented here. The statement of the Homeland Security Officer is here (pdf).

The Concord Monitor has a good editorial on Ms. Davis' predicament.

Deborah Davis, 50, whose four children include a 21-year-old son serving in Iraq and a Navy veteran, commuted daily from her home in Arvada to a job at a small business in Lakewood. The bus passed through the Federal Center, the site of a number of government offices, and on occasion federal officers would board the bus and demand to see the IDs of everyone, whether they were getting off at the Federal Center or not.

Ms. Davis, after a troubled weekend spent researching her rights as an American citizen, decided Sept. 26 to refuse. When she did, federal officers removed her from the bus, handcuffed her and put her in the back of a federal police car while they called higher authorities. They gave her two tickets and released her. She is due in court Dec. 9.

As to why it's wrong:

...the war on terror should not become an excuse to empower various authorities to demand to "see your papers please" any time, any place, without a shred of suspicion or justification.

My view: Demanding papers indiscriminately will not make us safer, only less free.

< Cop Turns Down Probation, Gets 20 Years | Lawyers: CIA Renditions are on Shaky Legal Ground >

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    • Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" | 22 comments (22 topical)
    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#1)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    It seems really simple. Having papers means you're okay with the man.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    What's the problem here? This lady refused to show identification and was not allowed to ride. She broke a rule and is paying the consequences.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#3)
    by learned hound on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    she broke a rule and is paying the consequences
    And what rule would that be exactly? Must be that old, well known rule that when told to do something by the man one had better be a good sheep and do it. Or else.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#4)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    What's the problem here? This lady refused to show identification and was not allowed to ride. She broke a rule and is paying the consequences. Maybe it's just me, but I'd say that the problem has something to do with the Fourth Amendment to the Consititution.
    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.
    She was not suspected of doing anything wrong and yet she was still required to show an official identification. To make it more problematic, bus riders are more likely to be poor than the general population and less likely to have a government ID. So, any requirement to carry one is de facto discriminatory.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#5)
    by Edger on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    tronpants writes:
    What's the problem here?
    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#6)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    I think a copy of your state and federal constitutions would be appropriate given the circumstances.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#7)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    Obviously, the rule is illegal procedure and she should have been told to move back five seats. (Still first down.) Even football referees can be overruled. Where is Mike Shanahan when Ms. Davis needed him?

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#8)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:40 PM EST
    Do you think it's going to stop at asking for ID's with these bastards? That's only the beginning. Anyone wanting their hair to stand on end need only read the Patriot Act word for word. Mark my word, we're going to see the arrest of authors, writers and artists for sedition. We're going to read of dissidents jailed in the same manner as Padilla, sans lawyer, charges, trial or visits by relatives. Americans branded enemy combatants, enemies of the state, for openly and loudly fighting the destruction of the Constitution. We'll one day long for the bygone era when the intrusiveness of the state was limited to demanding an ID. Soon the most vitriolic and caustic, the most meddlesome and troublesome among us will be rotting in jail.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#9)
    by SeeEmDee on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    In East Berlin in 1983 it was "Ihr papieren, bitte!" (Your papers, please!) only the word 'bitte' was said with a sneering contempt. I'm told that in Russia it was "Vasha boomaga!" and they didn't bother with the 'please'. I thought I and all those vets who served this country duing the Cold War did so to prevent that from happening here. Looks like I wasted my time after all. And to think that, during the 1990's, a lot of media were laughing scornfully about the supposed nutjob Militia types being concerned the Gub'mint was turning tyrannical. The media was crowing that that awful phrase would never be uttered here in the 'La-and of the Freee!', 'cause this here's 'Murikah', and real 'Murikans won't stand for it...just like 30 years ago, real 'Murikans believed that they'd never stand for random urine testing, no, not true blue 'Murikans! What's happening is nothing less than a form of fabianism, but this time it isn't a bunch of limousine liberal types engaged in piecemeal social engineering, but corp-rat fascists. But the results are always the same, regardless of ideological position on the political spectrum; it always leads to the same dreary place.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#11)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    kdog... I have to side with you on this one ol buddy. The only thing I can see here is that the bus passes through an area that might need extra security, but givin that... you either have a list and compare names, (one time) or... the bus goes around this area and not through it. Sounds like she has a good case to me.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#12)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    I would have said.... Papers? I don't have to show you any stinking papers!

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#13)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    I would have broke out with a rendition of the national anthem. Special emphasis on "Land of the FREE"

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#14)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    SeeEmDee As a resident of the South, I thought you might like to know it's not "murikah," but rather "murkah," the key distinction being two syllables instead of three. Obviously this is a flagrant violation of the 4th Amendment, but I wonder if there's the political will to end this. I'd imagine a request for papers would disproportionately single out specific skin colors (as Pansauce alluded to, poor folk don't always have ID, and they tend to skew towards the blue end of the spectrum), and in W's Murkah, only rich white Christians are above suspicion.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#15)
    by Tom the Barbarian on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    As much as I hate to say it I doubt she will prevail in court. Look at this site to see how a similar case went, complete with the video from the police car showing the entire episode.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#16)
    by roy on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    In addition to the Constitutional and gut-feel justice arguments, there are practical problems here. Bus riders don't control the route the bus takes. Unless they are regular riders, they probably don't know ahead of time that they'll be riding through a security-sensitive area. Even if there are signs posted, who reads busses to check whether they might get arrested? I assume police accept out-of-state IDs at face value, which means anybody who really wants to get close to the secured area can easily use a fake ID to do so. So the policy is not only unconstitutional and unfair, it's stupid. And, I've been in the South for 20 years. At our most slurred (i.e. drunken Arkansas farmer) the most we do is leave the "i" out of America. And maybe pronounce the "e" as more of a long "a" than a short "e", which isn't unique to the South. Maybe the confusion comes from our tendency to move vowel sounds from the beginning of a word to the end of the previous word. We do pronounce the first "A", but it might come a little early. So the phrase "at America" comes out "ata Merica", while a Notherner might sharpen the "t" to make the word separation more obvious.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#17)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    In the America I know and love...all you need to ride the bus is exact change. If that is not the case, then this is not America. The rats stole it when we weren't looking.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#18)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:41 PM EST
    Kdog, "The rats stole it when we weren't looking." Exactly the problem. I truly believe that most people are not looking. If the situation doesn't apply to them then why should they bother.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#19)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:42 PM EST
    I don't know if anyone else noticed it but in the incident report it was originally a rent-a-cop who made the id request. And then there was the "she always complied before" language. My favorite though is the she presented a defensive posture and became belligerent. Sounds like the old, we're not arresting her for not giving up her id; we're arresting her for resisting. What I didn't see was any reasonable suspicion for an arrest? Compliance with signage, what kind of crap charge is that.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#20)
    by Johnny on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:43 PM EST
    Why does Deborah Davis hate America? Doesn't she know that giving up any semblance of freedom is the only way to maintain public safety? What's next? Will she refuse to over-spend in a crumbling economy?

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#21)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:43 PM EST
    99% of us would just show our ID to avoid the hassle. This woman is a better person than 99% of us. She cares enough about America to put up with a massive inconvenience to fight this injustice. I think I'm in love.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#22)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:43 PM EST
    After having read the incident report by the arresting officer, I find it hard to believe the arresting officer is an American citizen.

    Re: Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" (none / 0) (#24)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:43 PM EST
    kdog, "99% of us would just show our ID to avoid the hassle." I disagree. 99.99% of the US population would just show their ID to avoid the hassle. Sorry to split hairs, but .01% of the population is about 29,782. Even that number may high. She is definitely a better person than me in this respect.

    Just Say No to "Your Papers, Please" | 22 comments (22 topical)