Stolen Trailers

By Daniel Greenfield —— Bio and Archives July 10, 2010

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Say you're 82 years old. Say that you see two people a third of your age with criminal records stealing your trailer. Say that you run out to stop them and they almost run you over. You fire two shots. The thieves are let go, and you find yourself facing life in prison. It's not a hypothetical scenario.

Admitted thieves are going free, while an elderly Wheat Ridge man is facing the possibility of spending the rest of his life behind bars, all, he says, for trying to defend his property and his life. 82-year-old Robert Wallace said in February that he looked out his window and saw two men hooking his flatbed trailer up to their pickup. He yelled at them to stop, but they sped away, stealing his trailer. He told police he fired two shots at the pickup. Minutes later, police say 32-year-old Damacio Torres dropped 28-year-old Alvaro Cardona off at a hospital emergency room with a gunshot wound to the face. Torres did not stay to talk with police, but they caught up with him later. According to court documents, he admitted he and Cardona stole the trailer. Wallace did not want to talk on camera, but when we asked him if the two men threatened him he said, “They almost ran me over.” The Jefferson County DA’s office said that neither Torres nor Cardona have been charged with anything at this point, even though Torres confessed to the crime. However, the homeowner, Wallace, is facing twelve felony counts, including four counts of attempted first degree murder. If convicted, he could spend the rest of his life behind bars. Sources say Torres and Cardona are believed to be in the country illegally and both have an arrest record. Cardona's record includes public fighting and numerous traffic offenses like driving without a license or insurance. Torres's record includes agricultural trespassing as well as a 2005 arrest for aggravated motor vehicle theft for which he was given a plea bargain to a lesser crime. Sources say Torres is also under investigation for being part of a major auto theft ring.

and updated...

Wallace now faces twelve felony counts, including four counts of attempted first degree murder, for what he described as an act of defending his property and his life. If convicted, he could spend the rest of his life in prison.

But then, why prosecute car thieves and criminals... when you can prosecute a senior citizen for defending himself against two potential Obama voters... once "Immigration Reform" passes. Mind you, this is not exactly the first time Jefferson County DA Scott Storey has been caught wrongfully imprisoning the elderly. According to Storey's site though he listens to the community and fights against crimes committed against the elderly

Community involvement is a priority of Scott's administration. He knows that a good district attorney must listen to the community in order to best represent its citizens. He has developed crime prevention and intervention initiatives using community partnerships focusing on crimes against the elderly

A final coda

Torres's record includes agricultural trespassing... Besides the fundamental injustice to Mr. Wallace, the passage I quoted is interesting in a disturbing way. In the Denver area it is a common practice to allow legal and illegal aliens to plead to the lesser charge of 'agricultural trespassing' to avoid being deported. Gov. Ritter, while Denver district attorney, allowed 152 cases to be plead in this manner.

What is this all leading up to? The old idea that a man's home is his castle has to be disposed of to make way for unlimited state power. If a crime is being committed against you, defending yourself makes you a worse criminal than the actual criminals. That's because the state fears its citizens, more than it fears "agricultural trespassers". A illegal crime wave from Mexico is the problem of the citizens. Citizens standing up to them, however, is a threat to the authority of the political leadership. And must be crushed. The new paradigm is that a man's home is his prison. A tightly regulated prison, covering everything from how he can construct and repair the house to what he can have in his refrigerator and how he can educate his children. In a free society prisons are for criminals because the ultimate punishment for abusing freedom is to be deprived of it. In a totalitarian state everyone is already in prison by virtue of being under state authority. Jail is a means of maintaining stability, by moving people from a prison with less supervision, to a prison with more supervision. The freedom to defend yourself is one of the basic rights of a free man or woman. It means recognizing that they have the right to their property and person. A system that denies the right to self-defense is implicitly stating that they have the right to neither. The bitter irony is that we're talking about this on the same week as 234th anniversary of independence.