and just so we can see how one sided the system of justice is when law enforcement commits the crimes as compared to when a citizen commits the crime....
http://www.wnd.com/2012/02/family-in-jail-for-eric-holders-crime/
The investigation into the Gunwalker scandal code-named “Fast & Furious”has passed the one-year mark. During that time Congressional investigators have put barely a chip in the stone wall established by Eric Holder and his Justice Department. So far, fewer than 20 percent of the documents requested by congressional investigators have been produced by the DOJ. There have been a couple of resignations and a few reassignments, and one Justice Department official has refused to testify on Fifth Amendment grounds, but so far there hasn’t been the slightest indication that anyone involved is going to spend a single day in jail.
In contrast, a family in New Mexico has now been languishing in jail for almost six months. They have been denied bail, and all of their assets have been seized.
Rick Reese had planned to retire from the business and close the store at the end of 2011 in order to make a run for sheriff of Luna County. Son Ryin was in the process of opening a store of his own in Las Cruces when the family was arrested. In fact, the ploy used by the ATF to effect their arrests was to call Rick and ask him to bring Ryin and the family down to the ATF offices to discuss Ryin’s application for a Federal Firearms License. The ATF office presumably has metal-detectors at the entrances, so it would be an easy way to ensure that the Reeses were unarmed at the time of their arrests.
Since late August the family, all of whom have plead not guilty and insist they will prove their innocence, has been incarcerated in separate facilities around the state. Ryin, 24, has been held in solitary confinement since he was assaulted by other prisoners shortly after his arrest. Remington, 19, was initially ordered to be released into the custody of his grandparents, but a judge reversed that order when prosecutors argued that the health-plagued youth was a flight risk.
Plans to have the entire family represented by one attorney were blocked by the court on the grounds that an attorney representing all of the Reeses would not be able to advise one or more to cut a deal in exchange for testimony against the others. That decision meant that private attorneys for each family member would incur an initial cost of about $100,000 – money the Reeses don’t have since all of their assets, from the inventory of the stores, to cash, bank accounts, vehicles, land and the coin collection Rick Reese has been building since he was a child, were all seized by the feds and are being sought in a civil forfeiture suit by the government.
Something else that came out in this hearing is the fact that Terri contacted the ATF about someone she suspected of engaging in straw purchases. It turned out the person she was reporting was working for the feds. The prosecutor dismissed the report as being a cover move by Terri after she learned that the family was being investigated.
The comparison between the way the Reese family has been treated and how federal agents and bureaucrats are being given a pass is chilling. If the Reeses are guilty, that fact should be proven in court – before the forfeiture trial – and they should be released on bail in the meantime as guaranteed in the Constitution. The same goes for those responsible for Fast & Furious. The truth must be disclosed, and they must be held accountable for their actions.