All Stolen Valor Is Equal. But Some Stolen Valor Is More Equal Than Others.
We all know the SCOTUS recently invalidated the Stolen Valor Act of 2005, forcing Congress to revise and reenact it. That happened last year.
So, merely making false claims about one’s military career isn’t in general unlawful today. You have to do so for the purpose of fraud to break the law.
But it seems that’s not the case for all similar acts.
Maybe I’m misreading this article. But if I’m reading it correctly, it leads me to believe that falsely claiming to be a retired cop in Oregon Washington state is illegal.
“It’s quite appalling, it’s upsetting,”said Oak Harbor Police Chief Edgar Green. . . . “We’re very proud of what we do and work very hard at what we do, so to find someone who comes along and just takes that for granted and pretends to be one of us, that’s upsetting.”
No sh!t, Chief Green. Those who are veterans – and particularly those who are military retirees – feel exactly the same way about false military claims. We find that crap kinda “appalling” and “upsetting”, too. Those false claims about military service bother a vet for precisely the same reasons that false claims of being a police officer (or a retired police officer) bothers you.
Hmm. Falsely claim to have the Medal of Honor? That’s OK. Falsely claim to be a retired cop, and tell someone “Call 911”? Oh, no – can’t do that. Apparently, that’s illegal.
Someone’s gonna have to ‘splain that to me. I just don’t “get it”.
Category: Legal, Military issues, Veterans Issues
And I wondered when the chickens would come home to roost. 😉
Gee, so I guess that also means that I can’t claim to be a retired WV state trooper but I can make terroristic phone calls to people living in WV with relitive impunity? How special.
hmmmm. I wonder if it would be legal for me to stretch my arms and shoulders at the bar while muttering “yeah, I’m a retired supreme court justice”
I remember a while back, a guy gave a cop the finger. He was arrested and the Judge said that giving someone the finger was a right and he could not be arrested for doing that. Case was dismissed. At the end of this, the same guy gave the Judge the finger and was arrested for contempt of court. Sentenced to 10 days in jail.
Basically, as long as you don’t try your crap on me or about my career, it’s fine.
I heard the same story here in my town. Now that I’ve heard it from you, I think I’ll file that away with the story of the guy that tried to kill himself by throwing the buffer out the window with the too long cord tied around his neck. Supposed to have happened in the rotation just before mine, I heard.
I’m not sure if you were kidding.
One is a federal law that someone took the time to argue all the way up to the Supremes. The other is a completely different state law. This case may be turned over on appeal or maybe not.
SV got overturned because it’s not illegal to lie in order to get a pat on the back. The state law is to keep people from acting in the capacity of a police officer. Those prosecuted under the old SV act were not running around trying to command a platoon. That would still be illegal.
Um, Loach . . . did you miss the part about the guy being arrested because he claimed to be a RETIRED police officer at the scene of a fight and told another passer-by to call 911? That’s what the article says in plain black and white. It very strongly implies if not states outright that he was arrested for claiming to be a retired policeman, not for impersonating a currently-serving cop.
I don’t have much problem with laws against impersonating a cop. Those laws pass the common sense test.
I do have problems with laws treating retired LEOs differently than other citizens. IMO, the provisions of the Law Enforcement Safety Officers Act of 2004 extending nationwide concealed carry authority to retired LEOs was a serious mistake. If retired LEOs had to put up with the same degree of risk everyone else does, maybe they’d be vocal as hell about getting many of those manifestly stupid restrictive concealed carry laws in liberal states changed. Instead, they’re “special” – so they get to exercise rights the rest of us don’t have.
Former LEOs are just that – former LEOs. They’re not still serving the public as cops.
I grew up in Oak Harbor. As far as I know, it’s still in Washington state.
xbradtc: you are correct, and that error is now corrected above. Due to recent events I apparently had “Oregon preoccupation syndrome”. (smile)
No sweat, big guy.
FYI, Oak Harbor really is a great little town. And home to a major Navy air station.
They treat the military right. And while all small towns have their petty political issues, OH is better than most.
And you might recall the kerfuffle about a veteran attending a town council meeting and getting into an argument with a councilman about whether concealed carry should be permitted at meetings. The mayor and city council argued that it should.
I was stationed for three years at Whidbey Island. Loved it there, Oak Harbor really is a great small town.
Well maybe the Secret Service isn’t doing its job to save Obama but here’s your chance to help the guy:
http://media.y8.com/system/contents/13365/original/Falling_Obama.swf
Damned Old Fart’s Disease strikes again. I posted this on the wrong article. Should be on Hondo’s piece about the White House.
The sweet irony. A police chief is butthurt because someone claimed to be a retired LEO. I recently argued with a LEO about this very thing. He claimed that lying about military valor or being a service member was different, not nearly as bad, as lying about being a LEO. His “argument” was that soldiers don’t carry guns every day and LEOs do. He went further to claim that their lives were in danger every day, even going so far as to claim that his life was in mortal danger at every traffic stop he ever made, as if every person he had contact with were criminals bent on doing him bodily harm. What that had to do with SV is beyond me.
Fairly obvious that the cop was not prior service. I’m surprised that he didn’t throw in the threat of IEDs when leaving the donut shop.
Hondo, You’ve nailed it down well – again. Bald fact tho, is that until The Feds override all States laws this kind of thing is gonna be common.
Your broader point I kinda have to disagree with. Specifically: A drunk in a bar, or an ass elsewhere who claims unearned military credentials is a mere annoyance from this seat. Yeah, he/she is a fraud by the dictionary definition, but as long as they don’t steal money, etc from deserving vets I’ll just hate ’em, and try to ignore ’em.
Oh, AND make fun of them.
Actually, I think you missed my point entirely, Zero.
Regarding free speech: the Federal courts have ruled that free speech trumps private lies. I can accept that, even if I don’t like the end effect. I think it should be within the Federal Government’s right to forbid wearing unearned military decorations, as the Federal government created them and arguably thus “owns” them. But free speech is precious enough that short of fraud I can hold my nose and accept the result.
What irks me about this case is that precisely the same thing appears to be happening here – a guy lied about previous employment as a LEO (specifically, he falsely claimed to be a retired LEO) – and he’s apparently being prosecuted for that vice actually impersonating a serving LEO. How free speech doesn’t forbid that also is beyond me.
Federal law does override state law regarding free speech issues. The SCOTUS has ruled that the 1st Amendment is binding on states as well as the Federal government.
Yet in Washington state apparently such a restriction of free speech regarding former LEO claims is OK, but one about military status or decorations is not. Someone will need to ‘splain that one to me, ’cause as I said above I’m not “getting it”.
Bottom line, (rephrased – I deleted a comment) is that you should check out the causes of The Civil War.
Reading Bruce Catton has shaped my view.
Probably WAY more than you were going for, but States Rights impacts the issue you raised.
Regardless of the cause(s) (and they are both multiple and have been argued interminably over the past 150 years), the Civil War answered two questions definitively and permanently. The first is that omission of any mechanism for a state to secede voluntarily in the US Constitution was intentional, and means a state cannot unilaterally do so. The second is that the Supremacy Clause means precisely what it says.
This latter point – along with SCOTUS decisions that later held most (but, regrettably, not all) of the restrictions on governmental action contained in the Bill of Rights likewise to be restrictions on the actions of states and localities – is the only outcome of the Civil War that is pertinent here. All other results and effects stemming from that conflict are completely irrelevant to this discussion.
States do not today and never did have authority to ignore or nullify Federal law; the Supremacy Clause made that plain the day the Constitution became effective. Even the states forming the Confederacy during the Civil War accepted this point. They elected to attempt secession vice remain in the Union and chance being forced to accept future laws they might not find to their liking.
The SCOTUS has ruled that the 1st Amendment is one that is binding on the states as well as the Federal government. The SCOTUS has also ruled that lying about one’s military record is a Constitutionally-protected activity, provided one does not do so to defraud. Ergo, I fail to see how Washington state thinks it can criminalize an individual merely lying about being a retired policeman. Based on what I’ve seen here, that’s what Washington state seems to be doing: criminalizing the mere claim of being a retired LEO.
As I’ve said multiple times: someone will have to ‘splain the difference to me. I ain’t “getting it”.
Maybe ChubbyLiar will pull up stakes and Move to Oak Harbor and run his suck about being a retired Swat Lt.
In that case id have no problem with HIM being taken down,,,HARD.