How Hard Can You Beat a Man You Find Molesting Your Defenseless 5 Year Old Daughter?

By Attorney David Engler

The family of first generation Mexican immigrants lived in a small town named Shiner, Texas about 130 miles west of Houston.  The land is not easy to farm because the sun is so relentless and the soil rocky. 

But the extended family worked their farm and raised horses and crops enough to keep everyone fed. There was never enough money to buy  the newest  John Deere harvester or spend much money on building new barns. 

When Jesus, 47, who hung around the local hardware shop and the two beer joints at night offered to come shoe the horses for a few bucks, the young 23 year old father of two agreed. 

It was a Saturday in June and the work was going to be capped off with barbecued chicken on the grill.  He had plenty of Mesquite wood lying around to give it a taste like his Dad used to make it. Sunday was going to father’s day.  He would relax only then.

Around 3:30 pm Miguel heard a scream and at the same time a young neighbor boy turned the corner and yelled, a man had taken Angel from the house crying. Miguel could  recall the sprint to the barn from where he heard his daughter scream. Back along a pile of fencing, Jesus was on top of his daughter with his pants at his ankles.  By 4:30 pm the local coroner would pronounce Jesus dead. Miguel had landed the eight blows quickly to the head and neck of his daughter’s attacker. His five year old daughter was sobbing.

After beating Jesus Flores, the father called 911.

“I need an ambulance,” the father told the dispatcher, according to 911 tapes released by police. “This guy was raping my daughter and I beat him up and I don’t know what to do. This guy is fixing to die on me, man, and I don’t know what to do.”

“Come on! This guy is going to die on me!” he continued during the frantic, five-minute call. “I don’t know what to do!”

Emergency workers, as well as the daughter’s grandfather and aunt, tried to revive Flores but could not. Lavaca County Sheriff Micah Harmon said he found the distraught father crying, saying that he had not intended to kill Flores.

“He’s a peaceable soul, ” V’Anne Huser, the father’s attorney, said. “He had no intention to kill anybody that day.”

The local sheriff ruled it a homicide, because that is what it was.  In the low hills of Texas people talked straight. Within a day the local prosecutor presented the case to a grand jury that just as plainly said, Miguel was justified.

Being justified.  It is the doing of an act that no reasonable person would say should not have been done.  No one really needs a law book to read the defense laid out in Texas law that deadly force to stop a sexual attack is justifiable. Of course it is.  If Miguel’s wife had turned the same corner and seen this drifter raping her girl and her husband landing blow after blow; she would not have stopped it.  There is not a place in my mind where I can say he should not have delivered such a sure and swift justice.  The beauty of this story is the remorse shown by Miguel. No one would have ever blamed him yet he said he did not mean to kill. 

The father’s protection of his children knows no bounds.  For Miguel there will be nightmares.  But he shall forever be justified.

Attorney David Engler
Phone: 330-729-9777
http://www.DavidEngler.com Attorney Engler’s website
Areas of Practice: Family Law, Elder Law, Domestic Relations, Bankruptcy, Criminal

Also published on Family Fault Lines Blog http://familyfaultlines.com/

Government Seeks to Jail Facebook Critic….Happening in United States…..Actually Trumbull County!

By Attorney David Engler

A critic uses Facebook and Social Media to challenge government rule. The critic gains followers online. The government seeks to jail the critic.

 

FOUNDING FATHERS APPALLED !!!

This sounds like a rogue Mid-East nation or third world African state.

It is not.

This is happening in Trumbull County, Ohio.

A small businessman, Berry Meadows, who has run a septic installation company for many years had an argument with The Trumbull County Health Department.

TCHD is in charge of approving septic systems and responsible for approving installers.  The nature of the dispute is really not important. It has been the reaction of the government to quash any dissent that is down-right scary.

Mr. Meadows runs a company called Digging Dirt, LLC.  He is married to a very bright woman, Deanna, who assists in running their business.  They have three beyond adorable children and believe fiercely in the Word of God. What they thought was wrong, was a decision made by TCHD in conjunction with the State of Ohio EPA, or maybe on its own, to deny a septic system that Digging Dirt believed would produce a clean effluent and cost homeowners $3000 less per installation.  The Meadows believed the County had either directly or indirectly created a monopoly for one brand of septic system in the County and had cost the taxpayers of Trumbull millions of dollars.

So they took their dispute to the social media. They create a group site on Facebook called Trumbull County Septic News and it immediately gets followers. The Meadows do some digging of their own into ‘how things work’ and discover some real dirt!

They uncover what they believe to be a pattern of favors for friends of TCHD.
They fight to get public records. They sue TCHD for failure to provide the records. 
They ask for records to either prove or disapprove whether the Health Commissioner actually works the hours he is contracted to provide.
It’s a sweetheart job the health Commissioner holds and he refuses to release records that would show when he shows up to work.  He claims that such records pose a security risk.  Mind you that we are talking about a local health department and not the NSA.

The Trumbull County Septic News starts to take off.  The Meadows post the rants of the Health Commissioner, Dr. Enyeart on the website.  They post video of the entire meetings.

Kaboom. 

The Meadows ask for records that show the possibility that the local Sheriff got favorable treatment for a property with a non-compliant septic system. The property is owned by the Sheriff’s son and maybe there is nothing wrong, except Mr. Meadows asked for the records. 
He then asks for the records of the Board’s attorney who gets $3250 per month for a part-time gig.  The records show that the Board’s attorney didn’t have to pay up front for an inspection like most citizens. Once again maybe everything is kosher with the process, but it looks messy.

What happens next is straight from China’s or Syria’s play book of how to deal with a critic:

First call him crazy to anyone that will listen.

Next do not allow him or her to speak at the public meetings.
The local board hires the Sheriff’s office to post an armed guard and stand over seemingly anyone who has the temerity to make a public record request. 
Dr. Enyeart himself asks for the guard to be present at the Health Department.
And then when the subtle forms of intimidation do not work…..seek to imprison your critic.

 Amazingly the very top of the Sheriff’s chain of command gets involved with the case and seeks out a customer of Digging Dirt from 2007 that had a dispute.  The customer does not seek criminal charges but rightfully was claiming that they deserved a refund. They take their contract dispute to civil court and name Wells Fargo as a Defendant since they believe Wells Fargo released money in 2008 that should not have been released.  But the Sheriff’s office takes a contract case that is nearly 5 years old and charges Berry Meadows with felony Theft by Deception! 

The Health Department posts the newspaper article of my client’s arrest on its government website!

The high ranking Sheriff’s official then finds another customer of Digging Dirt and uses that case to file a criminal complaint for Theft by Deception. 

In Ohio and every other jurisdiction Theft by Deception is used when someone promises to do something that they have no intention of ever doing or delivering something that they cannot deliver in order to get someone’s money.  Digging Dirt had been doing hundreds of quality installs. This was not the scam of the door to door siding salesman taking a deposit then skipping town.

It is not coincidental that after months of posting damaging information about the Health Department and possibly the Sheriff’s office that a criminal charge is initiated, investigated and brought by the Sheriff’s office on civil matters that were very old.

What is amazing is that the local government officials could not contain themselves from understanding that their actions are nothing short of strong armed goons going out of their way to quiet opposition. 

This government and others are going to have to come to grips that they need to treat their social media critics with the same deference they treat the traditional news media.  I know they might like to jail a reporter or two, but it is against the law. 

Why can’t they look at their great government jobs and benefits and be happy to have them, instead of risking all of it to put some small businessman out of business and in jail.  Our framers of the Constitution called it the First Amendment for a reason.  They didn’t think to place it eighth or fifteenth or forget to list it at all.  It is the First Amendment and it guarantees that we will have free speech. Here is the entire First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Oops maybe the local Health Board forgot about petitioning of government for a redress of grievances. Get used to it government.  Facebook, Twitter and blogs is part of the new press.  Do not try to jail your critics.  Try listening to them. Act like you understand that the truth will always come out.

Attorney David Engler
Phone: 330-729-9777
http://www.DavidEngler.com Attorney Engler’s website
Areas of Practice: Family Law, Elder Law, Domestic Relations, Bankruptcy, Criminal

Also published on Family Fault Lines Blog http://familyfaultlines.com/ and on eGuardianship.com http://eguardianship.wordpress.com//