Firing Back at the Jack Booted Thugs

Where I grew up in Missouri, we had a phrase for getting in someone's face about something. It was called telling someone "how to eat cabbage."

My wife reports that the version she heard while growing up in Alabama was telling someone "how the hog ate the cabbage."

Typical of Southerners. They always embellish things a little.

Anyway, yours truly is a bit fed up with the corrupt Republicans who run Shelby County and send bogus legal documents threatening to seize my house and have their deputies leave repeated harassing phone calls that have nothing to do with official or lawful business.

So I decided to tell someone "how the hog ate the cabbage." (See, I'm officially a Southerner now. I've adopted the Alabama version.)

I decided to start with Shelby County Clerk Mary Harris, who you might call the "Queen of the Jack Booted Thugs." After all, it was Ms. Harris who signed the writ of execution dated September 21, 2007, that started a long line of threats to seize my property.

Actually, I'm not so much interested in telling Ms. Harris "how the hog ate the cabbage." She's been around the Shelby County Courthouse a long time, and I'm sure she's well aware that it's a corrupt cesspool. But she benefits from the cesspool, making a nice state salary with nice state benefits, so she keeps her mouth shut and sends out documents that she probably knows are bogus.

More than anything, I wanted to try a psychological experiment on Ms. Harris. I've met Ms. Harris a time or two, and on the surface, she seems like a perfectly nice person. She impresses you as someone who has a conscience.

But I get the feeling that even relatively "good people" check their consciences at the door when they enter the Shelby County Courthouse for official duty. So I wanted to see if we could determine whether Ms. Harris has a conscience in her role as Shelby County Clerk. Do small matters like "due process of law," "equal protection," and "civil rights" mean anything to her? And how will she respond when confronted with clear evidence that she is involved in a clear scheme to violate someone's "constitutional rights"? How will that realization affect her, given that she almost certainly self-identifies as a "conservative" and "patriotic" person? In short, does Mary Harris have a soul?

Don't know if we will get answers to those questions. But here is my missive to Mary Harris. It spells out quite clearly what is going on among Republicans in Shelby County, Alabama. Let's see if Ms. Harris cares to respond.

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Ms. Harris:
I am in receipt of a writ of execution that you issued on Sept. 21, 2007, I assume based upon application by attorney William E. Swatek.

Subsequent to receipt of this writ, I received a notice of levy from Shelby County Sheriff Chris Curry, along with a notice of sheriff's sale, notifying me that my home (which is co-owned by my wife, not to mention our mortgage company) is going to be sold at auction on April 7 to satisfy a "judgment" in favor of Mr. Swatek's client, Mike McGarity.

I have a number of concerns about these documents and the events that led up to them:

* Rule 69 of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure requires that a writ of execution and notice of levy be accompanied by a "notice of right to claim exemptions." I've never received such a notice as required by law. Therefore, any action you or Sheriff Curry instigate is invalid under the law and is a violation of my rights to due process.

* Code of Alabama 6-9-211 requires that a certificate of judgment be recorded before a lien, execution, or levy can be carried out. I've received no indication that such a certificate has been recorded. Again, any action you or Sheriff Curry instigate is invalid by law and is a violation of my rights to due process.

* The judgment itself, upon which your writ is based, is void because my rights to due process were butchered by Judges J. Michael Joiner and G. Dan Reeves. (Greene v. Connelly, 628 So. 2d 346, Ala. 1993). Anyone with a beginner's knowledge of the law could look at the McGarity v. Shuler case file and see that Judges Joiner and Reeves repeatedly acted corruptly in my case, and that Mr. Swatek (who has an almost 30-year history of violating basic ethics of the legal profession) was the beneficiary of these corrupt rulings. I realize that you and Sheriff Curry are not the overseers of the judges and Mr. Swatek. But their actions have caused both you and Sheriff Curry to take actions that violate my civil rights. Perhaps you aren't concerned about that. In fact, I've not seen evidence that anyone at the Shelby County Courthouse cares about citizens' civil rights. But from where I sit, it looks like these judges and Mr. Swatek are leading you down a dangerous path.

* By the way, just so you know, since this "judgment" was entered some 3 1/2 years ago, Mr. Swatek has never called me or sent me a letter asking me to pay it. Evidently, even he knows it's bogus. But he used you and Sheriff Curry to start making threats at seizing my property. These threats did not begin until I started writing a blog last summer. I find that quite curious. Thought you might find it curious as well. Evidence strongly suggests you are being used in order to shut down a blog.

* The writ of execution in this matter has a check by the box that says "Exemptions as to Personal Property waived." What does this mean and who instructed you to write this? I've never waived any exemptions to my property. And as I said, Mr. Swatek has never even asked for the judgment to be paid and evidently has never taken the simple step of having a certificate of judgment recorded.

* Perhaps you and Sheriff Curry are as cavalier about constitutional rights as the judges are in Shelby County. But I thought I should give you fair warning that there are numerous problems with the threatening documents you have sent me. They are unlawful, invalid, unconstitutional, and fraudulent. Maybe that doesn't matter to you. But you can rest assured it matters to me.

Roger Shuler