by Joe Kirkpatrick

Most of my readers recently saw a news report about Cleveland City Councilman George Poe, firing his gun at someone who was stealing his son's lawn mower. Who does George Poe think he is? Who can fathom in a civilized society someone actually shooting at somebody for stealing a lawnmower? The problem is we no longer live in a civilized society.

Starting with Miranda back in the 70's, a law abiding citizens rights have gradually been taken away and given to those who are not law abiding. It is as good thing George was a poor shot - had he wounded or killed the scum bag, who by the way was wanted in other counties on similar charges, he would have probably been sent to jail for life. Plus, the worthless criminal would have probably sued George for damages and gotten all of his assets. Plus, had the scum bag been shot and survived, he would have probably been able to draw disability for the rest of his sorry life as well.

I am in the process of building a house, and within the last ten months, I had two burglaries resulting in thousands of dollars in losses. In a burglary in April, one of the items they took was an air compressor which I had just bought to replace the one they stole eight months earlier In a recent article in the Cleveland Daily Banner, it was reported there have been 139 burglaries in Bradley County from January 1st through the end of April. Very few arrests have been made in these burglaries.

What happens when there is an arrest made? Last summer, in the news, there was a report of a major burglary ring being broken up that stretched from Sweetwater to North Georgia. Thousands of dollars worth of stolen property was located at a Cleveland man's house, which solved over thirty burglaries. What happened to him? I don't know. However, what I do know is he was in line behind me at Walmart last Saturday.

I had not been to court in years, but two years ago I had to have a man arrested who had taken $1000 from me to order a pool liner which he never ordered. I used to work in the court system back in the 70's, and I got a rude awakening by what I observed in my visit to the local General Sessions Court:

1. It's a new level of scum now - back in the 70's, the scum would dress up for court so they would look like something other than what they were. Today, they have learned that doesn't matter - nothing serious is going to happen to them regardless of how they look.

2. When the Assistant District Attorney got up and called the names of the cases on the docket for that day, close to half of them had not even bothered to show up.

3. I sat though several cases before mine was called, and virtually all of those cases, including mine, was dismissed upon them making restitution and paying court costs. So basically the court system has taught the criminals there is no real punishment for small thefts and burglaries.

4. A sign in front of the judge's bench said something like "Don't have sex with anyone you are not married to." I sat there thinking to myself, would a sign saying "Thou shall not steal" not suit this audience better?

5. Don't blame the Blacks and Mexicans for the crime problem here. About 97% of the defendants in court that day were scummy white trash.

Are the courts to blame? Is law enforcement to blame? No. Who is to blame then? The lawmakers who have voted in law after law taking away the right of a citizen to protect what is theirs.

Things have gotten so out of whack, there is no way we can put more people in jail. Right now, Tennessee's prison population is over 20,000, which is the equivalent to the whole population of Athens, Tennessee. In Georgia, there are 56,000 inmates in their prison system. With that many people incarcerated, we have to reserve our jails and prisons for the more "violent" offenders such as George Poe had he hit a bulls eye.

If we cannot incarcerate them, what can we do? Give the law abiding citizen back the right to protect what is ours.

Take away from the law any chance of these scum bags being able to pursue civil litigation against us for protecting what is ours. Allow us to have the option of deadly force when someone steals from us.

After a few of these scum bag thieves are shot during home thefts and burglaries, I guarantee you won't see 139 burglaries in the next four month period.

I've just got one question for Councilman Poe: Can you come house sit for me?


.