1. African Americans
2. Muslims
3. Mexicans
4. Illegal aliens
5. Frankenstein
6. Homosexuals
7. Opioid addicts

If you’ll play along with an open mind and objective perspective, you’ll probably find it very easy to see who the REALLY evil people are in the narrative. And, once you’ve run out of things to consider, give some thought to this: Suppose we knew where every single person convicted of drunk driving lived. Would that make anyone any safer?

DALLAS, N.C. — The Gaston County Sheriff’s Office is squashing social media rumors of a registered sex offender halfway house in the middle of a popular Dallas neighborhood that left families worried for their children’s safety.

Deputies said the rumors started after residents in the Summey Knoll subdivision reported two registered sex offenders were living in a house less than 500 feet from a registered daycare, which is illegal.

Assistant Chief Deputy Garry Williams said the sheriff’s office had initially approved the men’s request to live in the neighborhood, unaware of the daycare’s existence, which is located in an unmarked house.

Williams said investigators determined the men were living too close to the daycare and ordered them to leave.

One man did leave, but investigators said the other man, George McDowell, lied and said he also left the neighborhood.

“My deputies, doing some further investigation, found that he was still staying in the Summey Knoll development,” Williams said.

Deputies arrested McDowell, but investigators said false rumors continued to spread on Facebook that the house McDowell had lived in was a halfway house to rehabilitate sex offenders.

“Unfortunately that’s a common occurrence in today’s society,” Williams explained. “Everybody wants to go to social media to vent and post things.”

Wiliams said he’s not aware of any type of halfway homes for sex offenders in North Carolina.

Kyle Creed is a father who lives in the Summey Knoll neighborhood.

“A lot of concerned parents, obviously,” Creed said. “But, we all understood some of it to be rumor.”

Still, deputies are hosting a community meeting Thursday at 7:00 p.m. in the Dallas Civic Center behind the police department to answer questions and dispel rumors about the case.

NBC Charlotte also spoke at length with McDowell’s mother who said she wasn’t aware of the halfway house rumors until the TV station brought it to her attention.

McDowell’s mother said the social media rumors were false, and the home is her primary residence. She insisted her son moved out of the neighborhood immediately after being ordered to by deputies.

McDowell is facing two felonies for failure to register related to falsification of verification notice and sex offender residence violation. He’s expected to have his first appearance in court on Thursday afternoon.

Source: WCNC

Doesn’t that amendment prohibit unreasonable seizures and arrests without “probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the … persons … to be seized?” I believe it was taught at some point in law school–probably in con or crim law–that the Bill of Rights have been incorporated by application of the Fourteenth Amendment (see the Wiki on Incorporation Doctrine).

Or how about the North Carolina Constitution?

Section 19 reads: No person shall be taken, imprisoned, or disseized of his freehold, liberties, or privileges, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any manner deprived of his life, liberty, or property, but by the law of the land.

So, this WBTV story out of Gaston County begs a host of unanswered questions. Chief among them is the simplest: By what law of the land does Sheriff Cloninger possess the authority to quarantine citizens for several hours on Halloween?

Now it may well be that this annual tradition only applies to individuals who remain on some form of court-ordered supervision. After all, according to the article, only 102 registrants gathered together on Tuesday night. A cursory glance at the state maintained registry displays 445 sex offenders residing in Gaston County. This begs another question, why do reporters continue to perpetuate a myth about who is actually required to abandon their freedoms on Halloween?

Requiring registered sex offenders who remain under court-ordered supervision to gather at a central location MIGHT be reasonable at Halloween. It is most likely lawful if such a requirement is reasonably related to the rational purposes of supervised probation.

However, ANY citizen of North Carolina who is no longer on probation or supervised released is presumed to be restored to full citizenship with all the rights and privileges that flow from, and are enshrined by, the state and federal constitutions. And that means that no authority exists whereby a citizen (or group of citizens) may be unreasonably “taken, imprisoned . . . or exiled” and nobody may be unreasonably seized except upon a demonstration of probable cause (that a crime has been committed), and, only then, by warrant issued on the basis of sworn testimony particularly describing the person(s) to be seized.

This is so fundamental and essential to our system of laws and liberty that it’s amazing how many individuals in law enforcement and the media appear totally clueless about it.

So, again, are there ANY attorneys in Gaston County who happen to recall anything from their days in law school about the Bill of Rights or the Constitution?  How many more years are you planning to let this lawless sheriff act as if he is, himself, the law?