MI- State Police Armed Robbery
Donation protected
Most of you that have known me for several years know that I was in the hot tub business for a long time. I used to cover several states as a rep. I was married for 20 yrs and she filed for divorce in fall of 2004. It took two years to settle, but after the trial I was awarded the house and my kids. My oldest son started having extreme panic attacks and anxiety so bad that after he graduated he went almost two years to where he couldn't even walk out onto our deck. We had to have a counselor come to the home, once a week, for several years. In 2009, my ex mother in law was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer and was given 3-6 months to live. I looked for a house for her to move from Kentucky so I could have her closeby. She insisted that she wouldn't move without all of her dogs (12). I found her a nice home, that she bought, and my wife Amy, two friends, and myself went to Kentucky and moved her here. The cancer was inflammatory breast cancer but it had already moved to several places in her body, including several brain tumors. It had paralyzed one of her legs so she had a walker and couldn't get around by herself.
We went numerous times to cancer treatment centers in Chicago. We went to Indianapolis for radio surgery to zap some of the tumors out of her brain. We then found experts in those fields in Michigan so that we didn't have to travel so far. With my son's issues and taking care of her, her horses, and 12 dogs, her groceries and every ologist that you can think of, it was a 5 day a week responsibility. Needless to say, I couldn't work on the road anymore. I had to find another way to support my family and the other friends that were living with me, that had lost their homes because of the economy.
In late 2011 I built a huge structure in my backyard and started growing Medical Marijuana in late May of 2012 to pay the bills. I researched the laws to make sure that everything that I was doing would be totally legal. The state police came out a couple of times to inspect that I was totally legal and they confirmed that I was.
On Sept 28th, 2015 the State Police task force raided my home and 4 of my friends' homes simultaneously and took all of us to jail (including my two boys which had nothing to do with the grow). We were under our legal limit of plants. When I got out 3 days later I got home to find that they not only seized our entire garden, they had taken all of our vehicles, computers, cell phones, tv's, 4 wheeler, and had seized all of the money in our accounts and froze them. Even any business accounts that we needed to operate our everyday life with employees. They totally demolished our home. Every drawer was pulled out, dumped and the drawers thrown around. Pictures were taken off the wall, our couches tipped over and bottoms sliced open. Everything was taken out of closets and thrown everywhere. They had hit my miniature australian shepherd in the eye and my ex wife had to take her to the vet since we had no vehicle or money. Her eye has to be removed because the damage is too extensive.
Why????? Our plants were in total conformity. They had come to my home to inspect every year, and this time they came for money. They didn't destroi our plants. They used the tree baler to bale them and they had a semi haul them away. Michigan's laws are the worst in the nation for seizures. The police get to keep the money from seizures and they don't have to account for what they do with any of the money. Since there are over 200 dispensaries in the local area they can move it through those and keep all of the cash. It was just plain armed robbery!!!!!! The next week, it passed through the Michigan state govt to make seizures tougher and Gov. Snyder signed it into law in late October. We were served with court papers early October saying that we only had 21 days for a lawyer to file paper work to stop the sale of everything seized. If you don't you can never get it back, even if charges are never filed!!!!!! They hav not filed criminal charges but have filed the civil case to keep everything that they stole and try to get all of our homes. This case will take over a year and cost each of us at least $50k to defend or they get to keep it all. That's why they take everything you have so you have no way of fighting them. It's the most crooked situation I've ever heard of!!!! So they take your livelihood, your vehicles, your money, and tell you that if you can't hire an attorney right away you will never get your stuff back. All of us are in the same situation as far as not being able to go forward with a legal case. They are trying to extort money from us just to get our vehicles back so we can go to work. We haven't been charged but have to buy our vehicles back from them. I'm sure it will be the same way to keep our homes. We have to be able to pay our bills or we'll lose our homes to foreclosure. I've owned my house for 25 yrs. There are several of us that will have to figure out how to defend ourselves. They want to submit you....take everything from you....so that you don't have any choice but to plead out to something that makes their armed robbery look legit. http://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2015/10/21/taking-property-with-civil-forfeiture-just-got-harder-for-michigan-police-and-prosecutors/#3395b33f97c3
This is one of the news articles about my case. http://www.clarkstonnews.com/Articles-Opinion-c-2016-01-26-260681.113121-sub-Guilty-until-proven-innocent-in-Michigan.html
We went numerous times to cancer treatment centers in Chicago. We went to Indianapolis for radio surgery to zap some of the tumors out of her brain. We then found experts in those fields in Michigan so that we didn't have to travel so far. With my son's issues and taking care of her, her horses, and 12 dogs, her groceries and every ologist that you can think of, it was a 5 day a week responsibility. Needless to say, I couldn't work on the road anymore. I had to find another way to support my family and the other friends that were living with me, that had lost their homes because of the economy.
In late 2011 I built a huge structure in my backyard and started growing Medical Marijuana in late May of 2012 to pay the bills. I researched the laws to make sure that everything that I was doing would be totally legal. The state police came out a couple of times to inspect that I was totally legal and they confirmed that I was.
On Sept 28th, 2015 the State Police task force raided my home and 4 of my friends' homes simultaneously and took all of us to jail (including my two boys which had nothing to do with the grow). We were under our legal limit of plants. When I got out 3 days later I got home to find that they not only seized our entire garden, they had taken all of our vehicles, computers, cell phones, tv's, 4 wheeler, and had seized all of the money in our accounts and froze them. Even any business accounts that we needed to operate our everyday life with employees. They totally demolished our home. Every drawer was pulled out, dumped and the drawers thrown around. Pictures were taken off the wall, our couches tipped over and bottoms sliced open. Everything was taken out of closets and thrown everywhere. They had hit my miniature australian shepherd in the eye and my ex wife had to take her to the vet since we had no vehicle or money. Her eye has to be removed because the damage is too extensive.
Why????? Our plants were in total conformity. They had come to my home to inspect every year, and this time they came for money. They didn't destroi our plants. They used the tree baler to bale them and they had a semi haul them away. Michigan's laws are the worst in the nation for seizures. The police get to keep the money from seizures and they don't have to account for what they do with any of the money. Since there are over 200 dispensaries in the local area they can move it through those and keep all of the cash. It was just plain armed robbery!!!!!! The next week, it passed through the Michigan state govt to make seizures tougher and Gov. Snyder signed it into law in late October. We were served with court papers early October saying that we only had 21 days for a lawyer to file paper work to stop the sale of everything seized. If you don't you can never get it back, even if charges are never filed!!!!!! They hav not filed criminal charges but have filed the civil case to keep everything that they stole and try to get all of our homes. This case will take over a year and cost each of us at least $50k to defend or they get to keep it all. That's why they take everything you have so you have no way of fighting them. It's the most crooked situation I've ever heard of!!!! So they take your livelihood, your vehicles, your money, and tell you that if you can't hire an attorney right away you will never get your stuff back. All of us are in the same situation as far as not being able to go forward with a legal case. They are trying to extort money from us just to get our vehicles back so we can go to work. We haven't been charged but have to buy our vehicles back from them. I'm sure it will be the same way to keep our homes. We have to be able to pay our bills or we'll lose our homes to foreclosure. I've owned my house for 25 yrs. There are several of us that will have to figure out how to defend ourselves. They want to submit you....take everything from you....so that you don't have any choice but to plead out to something that makes their armed robbery look legit. http://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2015/10/21/taking-property-with-civil-forfeiture-just-got-harder-for-michigan-police-and-prosecutors/#3395b33f97c3
This is one of the news articles about my case. http://www.clarkstonnews.com/Articles-Opinion-c-2016-01-26-260681.113121-sub-Guilty-until-proven-innocent-in-Michigan.html
Organizer
Darryl Berry
Organizer
Oceola Township, MI
