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Bisbee woman harasses CBP Agents and gets slapped by YouTube.

by on Oct. 01, 2011, under Border Issues, Uncategorized

 

Activist Alison Bane (Miller) McLeod DOB 1963, photo from the video " Border Patrol in The Bushes"

Bisbee anti government activist, Alison Bane McLeod lives at 939 E Border Rd AZ (520-432-1476), a few miles east of Bisbee where she confronted Customs and Border Patrol Agents from the Horse Patrol in the process of apprehending illegal border crossers.  Holding a video camera McLeod approached the agents and was asked courteously, not to video their faces (this is on the film.) McLeod ignored their request, got closer with her video camera and began verbally heckling them and then asking questions.  She was repeatedly asked to stand aside and not film their faces or the face of the man in custody but simply ignored their requests.  One of the CPB agents then explained to her that they were not authorized to answer her questions and gave her the number at CBP headquarters where she could contact a public relations officer.  This is standard procedure for just about every agency from police to fire departments and many corporate entities.

McLeod took detailed video of the CPB Agents after being asked repeatedly not to video their faces, then irresponsibly posted a very derogatory video showing the CBP Agents faces on YouTube. YouTube removed the video.  The border in that area has become a very dangerous sector and it is definitely a reasonable request for CBP Agents to want to protect their anonymity and respect the identity of the man in custody.

McLeod states she has the right to video government officials in public but these men where government workers doing an assigned job. Professional multimedia reporters have the courtesy and respect for agents safety, and blur direct face shots if the video is of course not accusatory but still news worthy.    This video was neither, but if anything should prevail in the video, it would be how the CBP Agents handled the situation with a great deal of patients and professionalism in dealing with McLeod and the respect showed for the individual in custody.

This shoddy video is merely another piece in the No More Deaths campaign (Culture of Cruelty) to systematically assault  US Customs and Border Protection. McLeod was immediately  defended by the ACLU. Of course  McLeod did not include any personal information of her own in the video. McLeod’s information in this article came form public web search.

An interesting note is that McLeod had no concern for any rights but her own when she even used copyrighted music of the popular James Bond Series as the soundtrack for her video which the ACLU posted on their website with total disregard for copy right protection laws, the safety of CPB Agents or the rights of the man in custody.

 

ACLU Says Bisbee Activist Has First Amendment Right to Post Border Patrol Video on YouTube     

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Friday, September 30, 2011

CONTACT:

Alessandra Soler Meetze, ACLU of Arizona, (602) 773-6006 (office) or 602-301-3705

PHOENIX – In a letter sent Thursday to YouTube administrators, the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona criticized the online company for censoring a video of United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents arresting a man with a bloody nose.

The 5-minute video, dubbed “Border Patrol in the Bushes,” was taken by Bisbee activist Alison McLeod, who pulled out her video camera and started filming Border Patrol agents arresting an individual after she heard helicopters and saw several agents, on horseback and on foot, on her property on August 31st.  The video shows four CBP agents walking an individual in handcuffs through her property to a white CBP truck parked on a public road. McLeod posted it on YouTube on September 2nd where it received “hundreds” of views within hours. Ten days after the video was posted, YouTube officials took it down, citing privacy complaints by CBP agents.

“This is yet another example of a private online community trampling on our First Amendment rights and trying to exercise greater control over what we share and watch online,” said Alessandra Soler Meetze, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona. “People have the right to film government officials carrying out their duties in public places. By censoring this type of protected speech, YouTube officials not only violated their own guidelines, but they’ve managed to silence debate around U.S. immigration practices along the U.S.-Mexico border.”

According to YouTube, three complaints about the video were filed; two of them were posted by CBP agents. Within hours of the YouTube posting, a CBP supervisor showed up unannounced at McLeod’s doorstep, telling her 19-year-old daughter who was home at the time that he was inquiring about the YouTube video. The agent then offered to give McLeod and her daughter a tour of the Border Patrol facilities and the local search area.

“This is the reality of border enforcement for those of us living on the border,” said McLeod, who has been living on the border since 1997. “Rather than trying to intimidate residents like me who are simply trying to make CBP more accountable to the public, they should respect the rights of all people living on the border.”

The ACLU sent a separate letter to the CBP’s Tucson Field Office, arguing their involvement in trying to remove the video constitutes “severe government interference with McLeod’s constitutional rights.”

“Customs and Border Protection is now the nation’s largest federal law enforcement agency and it operates with total impunity, accountable to no one and with little government oversight,” added Meetze. “This video and CBP’s response to it underscores the need for greater transparency.”

Although YouTube has privacy guidelines that allow them to remove content where an individual is “uniquely identifiable,” the ACLU argues in its letter to both YouTube and CBP that public officials have no reasonable expectation of privacy while exercising their official duties in public places. The ACLU letter also points out that “nothing distinguishes McLeod’s videos from the hundreds of videos already on YouTube demonstrating various law enforcement activities.”

“YouTube boasts that it is the biggest news platform in the world,” wrote ACLU of Arizona Legal Director Dan Pochoda in his three-page letter to YouTube. “One of the goals of a free press is to hold government officials accountable for their actions. Granting law enforcement a de facto veto over materials they find objectionable or unflattering would violate and jeopardize that mission.”

The letter to YouTube asks the company to allow McLeod to repost her video and any future videos of government officials performing their duties. The ACLU also is asking CBP to stop interfering with McLeod’s efforts to videotape and photograph CBP activities on her own property or public land, and to rescind its complaints seeking the removal of the video from YouTube.

Click here to read the letter to YouTube.

Click here to read the letter to CBP’s Tucson Field Office.

 

A remake of the video titled Border Patrol in the Bushes Dos has been posted again on YouTube.

Update:  Alison McLeod now tries to silence this blog 


Karl W Hoffman 
Documentary Film Producer
Freelance Photojournalist
Multimedia Reporter
For information on photography exhibits and prints, lectures, interviews, photo usage, Border Tours and to order the documentary on DVD and view Living on the Border documentary trailer please visit: www.skullcreekmedia.com

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 1st, 2011 at 10:59 am and is filed under Border Issues, Uncategorized. Tags for this post: , , , , , , , , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  • R

    This is humorous, a private citizen on her own property apparently cannot film/video tape but the border patrol has a regular television show weekly, called “border wars’, the agents in that show seem proud to have their faces put on the show even having their names shown!:-) I guess depends on whether the video/film is edited by Border Partol advocates or unedited by a private citizen non professional just is key!:-)

    • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

      I’m really sorry to tell you this but there is a difference between a television show and actual life.  

  • R

    I think this whole border issue is being used by folks with “private agenda’s/motives” some for political gain, some for monetary gain, seems like a recent news story stated the governor and her cronies are making out like bandits in the private prison industry who love increased inmate numbers since a business cannot be profitable if “its business is not profiting and how could they profit if arrest rates went down”!:-)

  • R

     http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/10/01/reports-hispanic-students-vanishing-from-alabama-schools-after-immigration/?intcmp=trending

    In Alabama much like Arizona there is a economic factor, when droves of undocumented folks fled Arizona some went home due to no jobs, some went to other states some merely became nomadic and impossible to track, but one saw businesses which formerly were flourishing such as grocery stores, etc, closed their doors, apartment complexes became devoid of full capacities, desperately now offering 2/3 month free rent to draw in renters, offering all manner of fringe benefits to lure in a renter but alas if none exist all the incentives in the world will make something appear which does not exist! There is a reason why Arizona almost had to issue “IOU’s” recently on tax refunds, paying its debts, the GOP fiscal geniuses are not geniuses, just masters at playing on folks hate, racist leanings, tendencies! Now Alabama is having their school administrators terrified, one is reminded of the old corny saying of a “man who cut off his own nose to spite his face”, schools get funded by numbers of students, teachers get hired or laid off by numbers of students, same with school staff/administrators, now the ironic thing is the right wing xenophobes are feeling a tingle down their right wing legs but it will not last long when them higher tax bills come for supporting all them unemployed teachers, school staff/administrators, lost revenue in empty apartments, businesses losses due to fewer customers, them state property taxes/sales taxes don’t stop just because of no customers!:-) Some folks shoot themselves in the proverbial foot, and don’t have the good sense god gave a mule to know one don’t walk to good with a shot foot!

    • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

      I stared covering both sides of the border at the turn of this century. After several years into it I realized that: “Some times when you can’t find a solution to a problem, maybe there was no problem” KWH

  • R

    The smart money is on not allowing ones racists, bigots to run things and keep them in the corner like a unruly, misbehaving child for a time out! This anti-immigrant thing is age old, once it was the Irish, then the Chinese its been the Mexicans more than once, in 1930′s during the depression era a massive deportation occured, joke then was by lunch time many were back for lunch!:-) In 1980′s the darling of the right wingers gave amnesty to millions swearing it would be the snake oil to fix all that ailes you, but we all see some 30 odd years later cured nothing!:-) Fact is mankind has never cured or fixed poverty, not likey they ever will since the greedy, those with avarice/larceny in their free market fake compassionate right wing hearts just cannot help themselves, they will be trying to ride them camels throught the eye of the needle at the very bitter end!:-) All the time asking Jesus when did I see you poor, hungry, naked or sick and in prison!:-)

  • R

     http://www.kvoa.com/news/border-patrol-agent-arrested/

    Interesting story, proves a uniform or a alleged patriotic agenda does not always prove one is a patriot or a saint!:-) I think mankind has long been what we are tribalistic, motivated by our own greeds, avarice, much as our ancestors got angry when another tribe entered our hunting grounds usually nothing nice happened and one side was always claiming priority, superiority, authority over the claimed land, ironic once native american indians owned what we today claim is ours, once in biblical times variety of cultures, races owned Israel, 1948…..united nations decided out of guilt for the horror done to the jewish race in europe and their inactions to the run-up to world war II, a nation of Israel had to be given to them, one can argue they had a former 2,000 past deed to it, but then in same analogy do we give back the lands of america to the indians? I think one can find a argument for anything if one looks hard enough, in the end we all die, not one of us will take one grain of sand of any land anywhere with us!  

  • alohapuna

    “Bisbee woman harrasses CBP agents…”??!! Who’s harrassing who?! A person doesn’t have the right to question what’s goin on on her own property? She was treated as an intruder when asking reasonable questions. It’s rather scary.
    Anti-government activict? The wording of the above article shows a clear bias. 

    • C

      INA 287.  Read it.  Don’t complain.

  • Pamela Powers

    It’s inappropriate to publish a private citizen’s address and telephone number– as if inviting retaliation. 

    McLeod is exercising the same first amendment as we bloggers on the Citizen enjoy.  

    • qwerty

      “It’s inappropriate to publish a private citizen’s address and telephone number”

       ”Holding a video camera McLeod approached the agents and was asked courteously, not to video their faces (this is on the film.) McLeod ignored their request”

      Irony 

      • R

        Its amusing to see the upset at this ladies video, anyone ever watch the reality  ”oops shows” where they not only show their faces but often do back ground on the cops depicted, anyone but me aware of the weekly show “Border Wars”, seems to me they don’t hide them faces, names! It seems to me this lady was on her own property, doing what the 1st amendment guarantee’s she has the right to do, if one does not like living in a free country but prefer’s to live in a dictatorship, authoritarian/communist country might I suggest Russia, North Korea, Cuba or China? Folks with the mentality of these countries might better suit some than the “land of the free and brave”!:-)

        • C

          You fail to recognize the diffence between a T.V. show and brave men and women who flee from the spot light doing their job.  They don’t have to answer her questions.   INA 287 gives them the right to be on her land.  The 1st Amendment doesn’t give her the right to post their faces to the world when there is a bounty on their heads.

  • bobfox321

    The CBP was performing a criminal investigation. She was clearly impeding a criminal investigation but was treated and respected kindly. Does not matter that it was her property. When law enforcement is in active pursuit of a suspected criminal, the courts have ruled and clarified that they may cross into private property.

    She was clearly in the wrong in publishing this video of this active investigation in progress closely enough that those agents could be identified by the enemy (illegal aliens, cartels, gangs or other criminals).

    They could have, should have, arrested her after they warned her the first time. Mindless, ignorant people such as these, are almost for certain part of the liberal, socialist, bleeding heart leftists that are tearing our country apart. 

    I wonder who she would call if some illegals came knocking on her door in the middle of the night? 

    • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

      She will call the smuggling group No More Deaths to come help the illegals along their way. Through their system of churches they will get deep into the country with all the benefits that can be milked form US Taxpayers. Any trouble along the way call the Mexican Consulate, the direct number is in the No More Deaths Field Manuel. 520-975-5832 along with the El Salvador Consulate 520-287-9405 and the Guatemalan Consulate 602-200-3660

    • R

      You ought to apply for a job in a russian gulog, or a chinese re-education camp, am sure they would love your ideology and fervor there, but sorry us American patriots don’t live in a country where one can be arrested with impunity on ones own property, when it does happen the cops, law enforcment officers face criminal and civil penalties, the reason they did not arrest her is they likely knew she was the property owner, was doing nothing “illegal” and her arrest might compound issues instead of make them better, obviously they had more intelligence and wisdom than you!:-) One often see’s idiots who cut off their own noses to spite their own faces, obviously these border partolmen did their job, saw no sense in “arresting a legal US citizen for excercising her 1st amendment rights!:-) I am always amused at idiots who think they know everything and know nothing!

      • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

        Better take a good look in the mirror my friend.

        • R

          http://palatine.patch.com/articles/teacon-organizer-absent

          Tea partier’s are so funny, amusing, they truly think everyone is drunk on that right wing snake oil, cure all that ailes you stuff!:-) The above tea party organizer was denigrating a democrat for infidelity in his marriage all the while hiding his arrest for propositioning a prostitute while he was married, its ok now, him and his wife are ok with it, he is back to preaching the right wing righteousness, how they are the salvation of America!:-) I don’t need a mirror to see the timber in my eye, all the while trying to remove a splinter from my brothers eye! I do love the hypocrisy of the self professed righteous, who claim to know all and know nothing!:-) Folks with solutions solve things, folks without them merely sit around and complain, whine & cry 24/7!:-) Its kind’ve like the tea party freshman congressman who said on MSNBC he was blocking raising the debt ceiling due to his great concern and care for his kids, low and behold post his great care comment it comes to light he is a dead bead dad, owed in excess of $100,000 back child support, won his election on the fact he lost his home to foreclosure, bankruptcy, and he is going to fix America’s economy when he could not handle his own personal finances? I think if you believe that you ought to buy some of this prime swamp land I got or how about a deed to some prime acreage on the moon?:-)

    • leftfield

      Reading your post, Bob, I can read between the lines and see all the usual signs of an anti-American mindset:  respect for authority over respect for individual liberites; dismissive of free speech; fear (manifested as xenophobia, fear of liberals, fear of a loss of order and predictability in life); anger; scapegoating (towards liberals); name-calling.  All very unpatriotic and, dare I say, fascist.

  • R

    The video camera, video phone camera’s have brought many a unethical, immoral law enforcement officer to his/her just karma in America, its a new world we live in no longer can a lie be always the end of a controversy, a example was the LA subway shooting where a man was being arrested, shot while laying on his stomach, had not the video existed, the officers might have gotten away with a concocted story of a “justified homicide” as they often did pre-video camera/phones! The beating of Rodney King ended the days of “he said she said” being the issue and some judge deciding whom to believe!:-) Is not technology wonderful!:-)

    • C

      Did they do that? Did they shoot someone?  Did she video tape them hurting anyone? ….. Oh.  Ok.  She didn’t.  Also, AN unethical, AN example.

  • R

    This illegal alien issue is a age old issue, during the 1930′s a president ordered a massive round up, deporation, some even were legal just had no papers at time got caught up in the round up, but the joke then was by lunch time most were back for lunch!:-) In 1980′s the darling of the right wing/republican party gave amnesty to millions, swore it would be the right wing snake oil fix to cure all that ailes you drink of the day! Now here we sit 31 some years later still debating, arguing on what will fix a unfixable issue “poverty and human migration to flee from it”! Borders are man made, designed, and no country on the face of the planet has sealed one 100%, the closest one did was the Berlin Wall and even then their attempts to keep folks in failed, some got out, and futility of it and time ended it! China with all their authoritarian abilities, immorality in human rights violations cannot fix their issues with fleeing, starving North Koreans, as long as mankind has folks living in abject poverty, folks will attempt to find a better life, its in our genes from our ancient ancestors who when one “hunting ground” became devoid of wild game, food sources became nomadic and often entered other “tribes” hunting grounds and often anger and violence occured sometimes not, but mankind in his base nature is not a saint, nor a humanitarian when it comes to greed, avarice, we tend to be not so nice!:-)

  • R

    Fences, troops, guns, might slow down border crossings, but human nature is hard to suppress where there is a “will there is a way”, and where one finds poverty and plenty one tends to go to the plenty versus the poverty!:-) No rocket scientist thinking is needed, when Mexico solves their poverty issue their citizens will stay home! Now I am not taking any bets on them fixing their issues nor us finding a solution for them since we cannot fix our own poverty issues!:-)

    • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

      I agree that it will probably take generations now because the Migrant worker has become the cash cow for both governments.  A good start would be to get rid of self serving clowns like Pearce and Grijalva. 

      • R

        Comparing Pearce to Grijalva is like comparing manure to a non favorite food!:-) I do believe I would prefer to digest a non favorite food to a plate of manure!;-) No solutions exist for root cause of human migrations, poverty, civil/domestic strife, injustices by corrupt governments/leaders, when mankind fixes the human weaknesses such as greed, avarice, sadism, all manner of evil mankind is capable of then a utopia exists, and if anyone thinks mankind can create a utopia on this old earth after all these thousands of years of trying and failing good luck on that fantasy!:-) I live in reality, the here and now, thank my god but for the grace of god there go I……

  • R

    Now being realistic imagine a America with no crime, no illegal aliens just for a moment of fantasy! Imagine all them unemployed police officers, corrections officers & US Immigration agents, border patrol agents, of course they would be on unemployment or welfare, being supported by tax payers, since folks have to eat, have a roof over their heads, does anyone imagine magically all these employed government folks will just mysteriously disappear with their families in tow to some utopian never never land?:-)

    • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

      Actually there would be more creative jobs in all areas of manufacturing and services. Can you even imagine if there was no military budget and how that money could be invested in a positive future.

      • R

        Let’s see the “reality show cops, border war’s is not reality television”?:-) How funny, spin another one that one is not selling to good, but no doubt you sincerely believe that right wing tea party rhetoric snake oil your peddling!:-) I don’t indulge, nor partake of that stuff, its mind damaging!:-)

  • R

    In life one always has two choices, the lesser of two evils, since all choices have some degree of evil in them, mankind has never been perfect nor shall we ever be! Its like folks always see women as saints, incapable of evil, wrong doing, and men always the evil  culprit, but Eve did lure Adam to bite into the forbidden fruit and got them both kicked out of the gardden of Eden!:-) Today we see women pedophiles, murderer’s, robber’s thieves, did they just suddenly appear today, no only modern technology catches what has always existed, just we are catching them due to technology, science, often women murder via poison, secretively, not always but more often than not, is modern society cause of all these female teachers molesting the boys and girls under their care? No modern science, techonolgy is catching them, exposing them, mankind is no saintly creature not one of us will enter the kingdom of heaven unless via Jesus Christs salvation, since none can reach the father “God unless first going through the son”!:-) No utopia exists nor will it exist on this plane of existence!:-)

    • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

      R, You need to get a blog here at the TC.

      • R

        No, have no ambitions for such trivia, plenty of folks have these ambitions, I am retired twice once military, second pirvate industry/self employed, don’t need to have a blog to express myself, or excercise my 1st amendment rights, some blogs/bloggers are ideologically driven, like the local high priest of ahteism, who allows only atheistic leaning commentary or religious zealots to comment on his site, since a normal christian with no axe to grind, no agenda, who does not care if atheist’s, racist’s, bigot’s exist due to they are like flies, part of the scheme of things, eat the unmentionable and bother folks, I merely live on this earth and don’t wish to own anyones mind, change anyones mind, merely here excercising my freedoms!:-) Is not america wonderful?

      • R

        It is nice to imagine utopian existences, no crime, no need for law enforcement, no need for military, but alas in the real world, crime exists, law enforcement is a necessary evil when one has to choose between the lesser of two evils, same applies with military, one could elminate them, be invaded and occupied, so one has to choose the unfortunate lesser of two evils again! I do love it when someone helps me with my point and does not even realize it!

        • http://www.livingontheborder.com Karl W Hoffman

          I do realize that you have a point here, but I don’t know that law enforcement is a necessary evil. It is just a mechanism that keeps us safe from the evil we create. Living on this planet is defiantly an educational journey and we learn more from evil because we have to survive. If we had to base our growth of knowledge on utopia we would not progress very far at all. Now let me ask you this. If we are to honor our teachers, do we honer evil?

          • R

            I guess I am a bit confused to see  how teachers and law enforcement connect?:-) No one with good sense would advocate for anarchy except it seems the tea party who think no government is a solution to our modern day woes!:-) Some teachers like some law enforcement do their jobs not out of some twisted nature but have a desire to serve, but that being said, pedophiles both male/female seem to seek jobs as teachers to further a twisted inner demon they serve, same applies to law enforcement, sadist’s seek employment where they can excercise their twisted inner demons, guess the beauty of exposure of video’s, text message sources, audio recordings the modern technology exposes true motives of folks, if one has nothing to hide why fear a video, audio or text message being made public? If one is doing a legal, legitimate task they were hired to do whether they be a teacher or law enforcement then one has nothing to fear but fear itself, a very wise old president often stated that quote!;-)

  • R

    We are a nation of 300 plus million folks in a world of 6 billion plus, of which many live in desperate poverty, civil injustices, ruled by cruel dictators, communist/facsist leaders who demand absolute obediance, is it not wonderful but by the grace of god there go we……!

  • DC

    I don’t see a problem with the video or CBP’s response.  She’s got a right to take the video and the agents/organization involved have a right to request their faces not be shown.  The agents acted professionally and she didn’t really work hard to provoke them as well…..
    Where’s the issue? 

  • R

    If one watches the “Border War show”, names, faces, voices are depicted with no worries, no fears, but its a controled thing, no doubt a agreement between border patrol and media doing the show how to depict the border patrol in best light, as heroic, now being seen in a pirvate citizens video with a poverty stricken illegal with a bloody nose is not as exciting, heroic as a load of guns/drugs, but begs to ask how did he get the bloody nose, did he trip and fall or did someone get a bit over zealous or were they expressing some deep sadism tendencies and did not want the video being depicted on a uncontroled media outlet where they could not control it?:-)

    • C

      You’re exactly the kind of person who hates cops.  You get pulled over, cops fault.  Cops ask you a simple question, you want your rights read.  But the moment you need them, someone enters your home, your car is stolen, you’re mugged, you call them and praise them.  As soon as they leave, they didn’t do their job because they didn’t catch the guy.  GO AWAY!

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