Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Gypsies, Tramps and Thugs

Would-be murder weapon: Fred Ensminger's pickup.

 "This guy ...  just tried to run my husband over!" exclaimed Arkansas  resident Cindy Nelson in a frantic  911 call on July 21. "Oh, my God -- he's shooting at us! Oh, my God!"

A few minutes later, Fred Ensminger -- the deranged assailant -- placed a 911 call of his own.

"This is Diamondhead 1106," Ensminger told the suddenly swamped dispatcher. I have been shot and I need medical at my front gate ASAP."

Ensminger is a recidivist criminal. Thanks to the fact that practically any bipedal simian with a pulse can become a police officer in Arkansas, Ensminger -- who just barely meets those criteria -- is employed by the Police Department of Diamondhead Arkansas, a gated community located south of Hot Springs.

A few minutes before Cindy Nelson told the 911 dispatcher that a "guy with a badge" was trying to murder her husband, she had passed Ensminger's pickup truck, which  was parked by the side of the road.
 
As Nelson started to go around the truck, Ensminger -- whose penchant for abusive behavior was notorious in Diamondhead -- pulled out in front of her. According to an eyewitness, Ensminger "stopped suddenly," causing Nelson to slam on her brakes to avoid a collision.

According to the witness, Ensminger climbed out of his pickup truck and began to harangue Nelson. She reacted by pulling around him and proceeding down the road. An infuriated Ensminger followed in close pursuit.

 With Ensinger's pickup truck looming in her rear-view, Nelson called her husband, Jerry Chambliss, and told him that she was being followed. She had no idea at this point that her stalker was an off-duty police officer.

After Nelson entered the gated community, Chambliss went into the driveway "with my arms up, palms out, hollering stop, stop, stop, what are you doing?" he later told investigators.

Ensminger gunned the pickup forward, striking Chambliss and knocking him down. He then compounded that act of attempted vehicular homicide by grabbing his 40 caliber Glock and firing several rounds into the garage. At some point Ensminger punctuated his acts of attempted criminal homicide by flashing his state-issued costume jewelry.

Chambliss raced into the house and retrieved a loaded 9mm handgun and returned fire, striking Ensminger in the shoulder and forcing the assailant to withdraw.

After Ensminger called for backup, Nelson made a second 911 call requesting a police officer. When the dispatcher replied that an officer was already on the premises, Nelson suggested that it might be worthwhile to send someone other than the person who had just perforated her home with gunfire.

"She [the dispatcher] kept telling me, `He's not the shooter-- he's a cop,'" Cindy Nelson related in an interview with Pro Libertate.  "I kept trying to convince her that's what was happening -- that this cop just opened fire on our home. They never did send anyone to help us, even though they did send people after he [Ensminger] called 911."

After the police arrived, Nelson continues, "they had us on the ground in handcuffs for thirty minutes. They also spent six hours searching our house -- with our consent, I guess. After that they didn't even take my husband with them; they just said `We'll call you if we need to ask some more questions.'"

Note well that right from the beginning it was clear that Chambliss had acted legally, and that Ensminger, the assailant, had committed a criminal offense. Despite this, the official stance of the Diamondhead Police Department was that Chambliss was a "suspect," and that Ensminger had fallen heroically in the line of duty.

The shootout between Ensinger and Chambliss was originally described by the Diamondhead Police and the local media as growing out of a "domestic dispute." Chief Pat Mahoney and Garland County Deputy Judy Daniel told Little Rock's Fox 16 News that they were concerned about their injured comrade, who had been stricken in the line of duty as he was "investigating" a purported episode of domestic violence.

That official lie is indigestibly rich in irony, given the fact that Ensminger -- a "gypsy cop" who has been repeatedly fired and punished for disciplinary infractions and criminal acts -- was himself arrested on a domestic violence charge in 2006. The victim in that assault, which took place in front of the police station in Alexander, Arkansas, was a female police officer.

"We are very happy that the officer is OK and extremely glad that the suspect is in custody," stated Deputy Daniel shortly after that heroic defender of public order tried to murder Jerry Chambliss. "It just makes it easier on everybody, the other officers, his family."

Note how this description of  "everybody" refers exclusively to those employed as agents of government coercion. The "civilian" who used righteous force to repel Ensminger's criminal assault apparently didn't count. Mere Mundanes never do.

"Gypsy Cop" John Frederick Ensminger.
Following surgery to remove the bullet he had received as a consolation prize for finishing second in a shoot-out, Ensminger filed the predictably perjurious official report. 

Like too many others in his profession, Ensminger couples functional illiteracy with an unexpected gift for storytelling. He claimed to have observed Nelson driving erratically, and that she attempted to run him over when he displayed the trinket denoting his supposed authority. 

That claim was demolished by contradictory eyewitness testimony, which established that while Ensminger screamed at Nelson and wagged a finger in her direction, he never flashed his badge.

Ensminger offered a similarly mendacious version of his encounter with Chambliss. In the officer's account, he was confronted by an "angry unknown man" who slammed his hands on the hood of his car telling him to get out of the driveway.

In this depiction, Chambliss shot Ensminger without provocation, and the off-duty cop returned fire in self-defense. Once again, that account couldn't be reconciled with the evidence assembled during an investigation by the Arkansas State Police.

In his official report, state Prosecuting Attorney Steve Oliver concluded that Chambliss "was justified in using deadly physical force in the defense of himself and his wife on July 21, 2010.... Under Arkansas law, Mr. Chambliss was not required to retreat if he was not the original aggressor."

This of necessity means that Fred Ensminger, the "original aggressor," committed multiple acts of criminal assault, and thus be subject to prosecution -- correct?

Well, no.

Oliver ruled that Ensminger displayed "poor judgment in his aggressive pursuit of Ms. Nelson to her residence but he acted with the belief that he was justified under color of law."

This unsupportable, invalid  "belief" appears sufficient to exculpate Ensminger's repeated attempts to murder Jerry Chambliss. Oliver doesn't provide any other explanation for his decision not to file criminal charges of any kind against Ensminger, who not only remains free but (at least as of September 7) is reportedly still employed by the Diamondhead Police Department, even though he is currently enjoying a paid vacation (aka "administrative leave").

"Just because he has a badge he does not have the right to come down and kill citizens," Chambliss complained to Little Rock's Fox affiliate. According to Oliver, that state-issued bauble does indeed confer the authority to commit acts of discretionary murder. Oliver's report clearly suggests that if Ensminger had displayed his chintzy totem of official privilege during the highway confrontation with Cindy Nelson, Chambliss would be facing criminal charges.

"We've never had trouble of any kind with law enforcement before," Cindy Nelson remarked to Pro Libertate. "We're well-known here, and we've always been upstanding citizens. I'm a nurse, and my husband -- who served in the Navy -- has been a Real Estate broker and a candidate for office. My husband suffered severe bruising and other injuries after being run down. We never used to lock our doors, now we have three locks on every door and keep our cars locked at all times."

Chambliss is also undergoing treatment for what appears to be post-traumatic stress disorder. "This guy simply terrorized us," Cindy summarizes. She and her husband have some unfortunate company in Diamondhead.

"We're scared to have him in the community, quite frankly," commented Diamondhead resident Kimberly Gilsinger, whose children were threatened by the officer while swimming in a local lake. 

Hot Springs Officer Joey Williams assaults skateboarder.

In late June, just weeks before Ensminger attempted to murder Jerry Chambliss, Gilsinger and her husband filed a complaint alleging that the officer had threatened to kill her son and five other local boys, the youngest of whom was ten years old. 

Specifically, Ensminger allegedly said that "he would get in the water and drown every one of them if they didn't get out," Gilsinger recalled. The complaint also stated that Ensminger made a vague but unmistakable threat to shoot the kids. 

(Arkansas police seem to attract child predators: Three years ago a tonsured thug named Joey Williams was captured on video choking and otherwise assaulting several young skateboarders on the streets of Hot Springs. His employer, the Hot Springs PD, ruled that his felonious assault was "justified," not that the suspense was unbearable.)



Ray Massey, President of the Diamondhead Property Association, told the Little Rock CBS affiliate that Ensminger "got a verbal reprimand and a warning" after committing what Gilsinger correctly describes as a "felony" by threatening to "harm or kill our children."

This was hardly the first criminal act Ensminger has committed in a career in law enforcement that began seven years ago.

Ensminger was fired little more than a year of being hired by the Shannon Hills Police Department. During that time he managed to shoot a suspect under dubious circumstances (the act was ruled "justified," as nearly all such shootings are) and a property theft charge. During that same busy 14-month span, reports THV-TV, "his record shows an assault case, which included a false statement to the police on Ensminger's part. That case eventually led to his firing."

He then migrated to the Alexander Police Department, where he was arrested on a domestic battery charge after he manhandled his girlfriend -- a fellow police officer named April Tirado -- outside the police station. Ensminger wasn't fired from that position; he was permitted to resign instead. Approximately a year later he was hired by the Diamondhead Police Department.

The Diamondhead PD refuses to release Ensminger's record, claiming that it is exempt from freedom of information laws because it is employed by a private entity, the Diamondhead Property Owners Association. It is more accurate to describe the POA as a "public-private" or corporatist body, since its police department -- as prosecutor Steve Oliver points out -- presumes to exercise coercive "authority" under "color of law," rather than simply protecting property rights pursuant to contract. If Ensminger were a Paul Blart-style private security guard, he would most likely be facing criminal charges.

John Frederick Ensminger, petty criminal and itinerant police officer, should be made the poster child for the problem of "Gypsy Cops" -- corrupt, abusive officers who drift from one agency to another, enjoying both immunity from prosecution and unassailable job security. This problem is particularly acute in Arkansas, where no certification of any kind is required to become a police officer.

To become a licensed practicing cosmetologist in the State of Arkansas, an applicant must pass a state board examination and complete 2,000 hours of specialized training. For an investment of 600 hours an applicant can qualify to work as a manicurist or instructor.

While Arkansas strictly regulates those who cut hair or paint nails in private, voluntary transactions, it imposes no training or licensing standards whatsoever on armed people clothed in government-issued costumes and the supposed authority to inflict lethal violence on others.
Another view of the heroic Joey Williams in action.

"The second night I ever put on a badge and gun I was riding in my own car," recalls Crittenden County Chief Deputy Tommy Martin. At the time, Martin was 21 years old and hadn't spent so much as a minute inside a police academy classroom, notes Jill Monier of Memphis's Fox News affiliate.

"According to Arkansas state law, officers do not have to be certified for up to a year after they're hired," observes Monier. "The Commission on Law Enforcement Standards and Training says they can get an 8 month extension on top of that. So for almost 2 years, an officer can patrol the streets, by his or herself, and enforce the law without having any kind of training."

Understandably, this system is a boon to  "gypsy" cops. Each time a "gypsy" cop finds a new gig in Arkansas, his 12- to 20-month grace period begins all over again; in this way, officers can be enforcing the "law" for years without receiving certification of any kind.

Ensminger, who couldn't legally cut hair or manicure nails in Arkansas, remains licensed to kill. 

Incidentally ...

... Scott Horton, who hosts the indispensable AntiWar Radio program, was kind enough to invite me on as a guest last Friday.

Once again: Thank you.

I continue to be amazed and humbled by the generosity so many of you have shown to me and my family. Thank you so much! 








Join me each Saturday evening from 8:00-11:00 Mountain Time for Pro Libertate Radio on the Liberty News Radio Network.











Dum spiro, pugno!

16 comments:

Deliverance Banjos said...

Note to self: stay out of Arkansas at all costs. Go through Oklahoma.

Lemuel Gulliver said...

Mr. Banjos,
It's the same everywhere. Oklahoma won't be any better. The culture of thuggery and oppression by these lard-assed jackbooted stormtroopers is everywhere in Amurrika. You might as well say: "Note to self - stay out of Amurrika at all costs...go through Canada." Except I'm not sure the RCMP is a whole lot better.
- Lemuel.

Mr. Grigg,
You ever notice how they love to dress up in black uniforms, tight pants and knee-length jackboots? I mean, how pathetic. Trying to imitate the Nazi SS by dressing up like little boys and playing at being assholes. They just don't have either the fashion style or the cold bloodless evil of the Nazis, but give them credit, they do try really hard.
-Lemuel.

PS: Here's the best part of it all: When one of these hyenas persecutes a taxpayer, the taxpayer has to spend his own money to pay a lawyer and seek justice, from a thug whose salary is being paid out of taxpayer funds, in a court which is being paid for by taxpayer money, in front of a judge being paid by the taxpayers, and if the city loses and has to pay a fine, it gets passed on in higher taxes to the taxpayers by the city government, whose salaries are being paid by the taxpayers. The entire system is just an endlessly excruciating series of pitiless anal penetrations without lubricant, by the parasite classes upon the working classes, who actually do productive work and try to raise their families and walk their dogs in peace.

And come November, we are supposed to go out and ourselves select the pig-faced dickheads who want a chance to feed at the public trough? To select our own persecutors who will do us up the rear end for the next two-to-four years?

My, what a bunch of well-trained circus poodles we all are.

Time to take a page from French history, and bring back the guillotine. I want to see the color of their juice when they go to meet Jesus. And I want to see them dressed in their fine black costumes, so onlookers know who and what is being purged from the earth, like an elimination of oversized turds.
- Lemuel.

duelling banjos theme said...

Canada or Mexico is the choices? I guess I'll stay here in the golden disneyland gulag utopia. Are we still God's gift to the world?

Isaac said...

Maybe Mr Chambliss was trying, but shooting to kill might have been the best option in this situation, and it would have been well justified. Along with ridding the planet of a homicidal tyrant, it would have served as notice to other thugs that the free-for-all isn't on quite yet. Maybe next time.

Susan said...

Nothing like your local Gestapo at work. SEIG HEIL!

Anonymous said...

i wonder if the JBS still has that campaign of "support your local sheriff"?

i'm at the point where city police forces ought to be done away with and we should only have sheriffs. at least this guy is elected. counties could then cover the city jurisdictions, leaving the mayor without a henchman in blue...or brown....or whatever color.

rick

Cody said...

"i'm at the point where city police forces ought to be done away with and we should only have sheriffs. at least this guy is elected."

I am not sure if this would be much of an improvement. One of the reasons why the police have become so thuggish is because a substantial number of voters WANT the police to be "tough on crime." This is a phenomenon that Will very astutely wrote about in his article on "Punitive Populism."

http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2009/08/plague-of-punitive-populism.html

When I discuss police brutality with my (mostly conservative) friends and family members, I am often shocked by just how far many of them will go to defend even the most heinous acts committed by police officers.

As Will has pointed out, many Americans (particularly conservatives) very firmly believe in Lenin's Who/Whom dictum. One of the reasons why most American conservatives support state torture and police brutality is because historically they have been the "who" and others (e.g. Muslims, blacks, Mexicans) have been the "whom."

That is all beginning to change, of course. Now the police treat EVERYBODY like garbage. Will conservatives finally wake up? I hope so, but I have my doubts.

Anonymous said...

What about the Pastor in Spokane, Washington who was shot to death on Church property last week? The cop immediately left the state on vacation before being interviewed by the PD he worked for... I bet like all the fatal shootings of people in that state nothing will happen.

Anonymous said...

What Cody wrote seems about right, and my experience as well.

Lenin's Who/Whom dictum - always and everywhere, it seems

The dark skinned people I know, when they are convinced they cannot do something quite legal with ease, or at all, sometimes say "You can do it, you're white." (or do they also mean, I don't look like a poor person or a stereotypical criminal?). Things as simple as taking back a shirt for a cash refund (with a reciet!) without getting hassled, but that is slowly changing to the worse,... or is that for the better?

In the U.S., from the petty to the deadly, Lenin's Who/Whom dictum is the arbitrary law of the land. I am also beginning to think this is the U.S. version of a bribe, it has to be paid well in advance, acceptance of "payment" does not mean approval.

I am under the impression this is mostly due to, as the judge said, "If The Constitution doesn't mean what it says, then it doesn't mean anything at all."

Apparently, for one, the word, restricted, means something different to those who rule than what Webster says it does.

When the police treat EVERYBODY like garbage,... so far, it's sporadic enough that both liberals and conservatives in the middle and upper classes (and even some of the poor) all too often will say, "It's due to a bad apple in the force. It's still not happening to, "us", it's happening to some other person, and they probably deserved it."

Not to mention those Christians who say, "If it happens to you, you deserve it."

I don't understand that.

Ruined from the top down and the bottom up.

liberranter said...

Will conservatives finally wake up? I hope so, but I have my doubts.

To bet that "conservatives" will wake up in mass numbers to reality is the ultimate sucker bet.

Derfel Cadarn said...

The first sign of a collapsing civilization is when the law does not apply equally to all citizens.As this is not the first time this blowhole has abused his position to threaten or injure other citizens where are our courts and other LEOs? We are always assured that these thugs are a small minority of our wonderful crop of LEOs why is it that no one sees or does prevent these thing from happening.Your freedom is an illusion, the fix is in, these actions can no longer be tolerated.All that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.Stand up and fight for what is right.

BD said...

Lemuel wrote: Here's the best part of it all: When one of these hyenas persecutes a taxpayer, the taxpayer has to spend his own money to pay a lawyer and seek justice, from a thug whose salary is being paid out of taxpayer funds, in a court which is being paid for by taxpayer money, in front of a judge being paid by the taxpayers...

On, it's better than that. I don't know if the FOP contract has changed but back in the 1980s in Columbus, Ohio cops got pretty much a free ride on any legal matter via the taxpayers. I worked with a woman who was married to a cop:

(1) when the couple purchased a rental property the legal details were paid for by the PD's legal plan, ie taxpayers.

(2) a few years later the couple divorced . Guess who paid for the cop's lawyer. You got it: taxpayers.

Mister Spock said...

Lemuel Gulliver:

"lard-assed jackbooted stormtroopers"

"playing at being assholes"

"anal penetrations without lubricant"

"pig-faced dickheads"

"do us up the rear end"

"elimination of oversized turds"

Wow. Where was the "Yours in Christ" on that one, LG?

I did see your comment/request in the other thread, and I may get to it later this weekend. In the meantime, clean up your mouth.

Lemuel Gulliver said...

Mr. Spock,

I'll clean up my mouth when they clean up their act. My mouth is the least of their worries - when We The People set up the guillotines and break out the pitchforks and AR-15's they will have more to worry about than my mouth.

As for your tender sensibilities, you remind me of John Kerry. When in 2004 Presnit "The Bonobo" Bush told some barefaced outrageous lie about Kerry, the press asked for a response, and Kerry answered, "Well, in my opinion the President's statement is not entirely congruent with the truth." No wonder the sad sack moron lost the election. No wonder Obama is going to lose in 2012. No wonder the Dems are going to lose the House and Senate this year. They pussyfoot around vital issues like a bunch of wilting pansies. Like little girls at a convent school, terrified of what the nuns will think if they express an honest opinion.

When it stinks like pigshit, and it's brown like pigshhit, and it's squishy like pigshit, I will call it pigshit, not "Products of Porcine Alimentary Peristalsis."

My mouth is mine, and I will use it to the best effect I can. I'm not asking you to kiss me on my filthy mouth. I will say whatever it is I want to say, so long as Mr. Grigg sees fit to print it.

Yours in Jesus,
Lemuel.

PS: Regarding that other post - forget it. I'm bored with those people already. I'm not going back to pick over last week's breakfast. Let's drop the question, till Mr. Grigg posts another story that is relevant to those issues.

tazman said...

Right f'ing on Lemeul!

I can't say I "Yours in Jesus" as it is incongruent on how I view Jesus, but I will say:

Yours in universal love,
D

Marie Lynette said...

~~ with respects to Cher ~~

Gypsies .. Tramps & Thugs:
We beat up all the people that pay our wages.

Gypsies .. Tramps & Thugs:
And evry night, defenseless people lie down .. and we punchem thru the ground.