Broward Cty, FLA, Starts ARRESTS And FINES For 'Mask Violators'

P. Gardner Goldsmith | July 30, 2020
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In an example of how far the aggressive, authoritarian, and utterly lawless political class is prepared to go in their Tsarist zeal to make free individuals bow to their statist philosophies, Plantation, FLA police Monday handcuffed, arrested, and took away fitness center owner Michael Carnevale, accusing him of failing to comply with an “emergency order” issued by Broward County Manager, Bertha Henry.

According to Lisa J. Huriash, reporting for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, Carnevale engaged in the horrific transgression of not making his clients don a mask in accordance with the Henry-dictated dispatch.

Which, apart from the larger national and state-scale constitutional problems, is profoundly Kafkaesque.

This is a gym. Under Henry’s orders, the government arrested the owner for not making a client wear an oxygen-restricting mask while exercising.

 

 

Writes Ms. Huriash:

Florida House Rep. Anthony Sabatini, Carnevale’s attorney, said he believes his client was the first person to be arrested for not complying with the mask mandate in Broward. 

The crime is a misdemeanor. And, what a coincidence, the police invasion came shortly after Carnevale filed suit to stop Broward County harassment.

It came days after Carnevale filed a lawsuit in which he argues the county’s emergency orders have interfered with ‘his personal livelihood, liberty and business enterprise.’

Carnevale is not dissuaded. And his attorney is on fire.

‘It’s a bogus law,’ Sabatini said. ‘What they charged him [with] was somebody inside your business was not wearing a mask, and you didn’t ask fast enough. Only in the insane world of Broward County would this make sense.’

And the insanity is even more alarming. As Huriash explains, because some bus riders refuse to wear masks, Broward Country Sheriffs Deputes will be dispatched to step onto buses (how wonderful for the time-tables of the riders) and inspect. Unless people have “permission” in paper forms from the government to go “mask-less”, there could be some unpleasant consequences.

Non-compliant riders will get warnings, and if they refuse to comply, they could be ordered off the bus.

And “repeat offenders” could be arrested and fined. If the civilians resist? As with all government edicts, the agents of the state are licensed to use force to make them submit.

Beyond the growing tide of reports showing that N95 masks are not effective in stopping the Wuhan Coronavirus and could cause more problems, there is a key, fundamental point to be stressed in the midst of this “Emperor’s New Clothes” lawless LARPing being committed by bureaucrats, politicians, and the cops who blindly follow their devastatingly perverse commands.

There is no provision in the US Constitution or Florida Constitution allowing this. In fact, this is private property, and the customer-owner relationship is a private contract, engaged through voluntary means. The Constitution of the United States forbids the bureaucrats and police in Florida from interfering in the fulfillment of that private peaceful contract, and Section Two of the Florida Constitution explicitly “insures”:

All natural persons, female and male alike, are equal before the law and have inalienable rights, among which are the right to enjoy and defend life and liberty, to pursue happiness, to be rewarded for industry, and to acquire, possess and protect property…

This action by “County Manager” Henry and the armed agents of the bureaucracy was an invasion of a private business. The threats against bus riders are not founded in any justified argument. 

The stage players have to cease and desist. For the sake of common sense, for the sake of their oaths to their vaunted constitutions, and for the sake of whatever tiny freedoms people have left.

The need for change is immediate and desperate.

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