Comments on: On the Gibson Guitar raid

By: Gibson Guitar agrees to $300,000 fine - Overlawyered

Gibson Guitar agrees to $300,000 fine - Overlawyered — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 04:45:04 +0000

[…] fine is well below the cost of mounting a legal defense in a case that had become a symbol of trigger-happy regulatory prosecution. [Nick Gillespie/Reason, Ann Althouse] Besides, Ted Frank […]

By: PointOfLaw Forum

PointOfLaw Forum — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 13:11:14 +0000

Gibson Guitars settles…

The guitar-maker, a living example of overcriminalization after a raid and threatened felony convictions for executives over technical violations of the Lacey Act, got an offer too good to refuse: a criminal enforcement agreement of a $300,000 fine, fo…

By: Excelsior

Excelsior — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 13:52:36 +0000

“We must make our election between economy and Liberty, or profusion and servitude.” ~Thomas Jefferson

By: asdfasdf

asdfasdf — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 09:30:52 +0000

It’s quite amazing how little mainstream media coverage there has been of the Gibson raid, particularly given the high profile of the company (or at least of its products). The lobster case, by contrast, was of a very obscure businessman; Anderson involved complex laws and an unpopular company; Hurwitz was again not that well known; popular opinion seems actually against Apple in the iBookstore case. Gibson, though, is a pretty simple case and a relatively popular company – yet not a peep.

Historically popular indignation has been a check on government power. That popular indignation – that sense in the populace that there ought to be limits to federal power – just seems absent now.

By: smart dude

smart dude — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 15:51:56 +0000

Darleen Click is 100% correct.

We are enslaved by overcriminalization. Where is Congress, the President or the Courts on this issue? If they are not at least talking about the problem, they ARE the problem.

By: Darleen Click

Darleen Click — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 13:24:08 +0000

The system hasn’t “strayed”. Creating criminals out of citizens who have every intention of being law-abiding is a feature not a bug.

It’s an easy form of controlling the populace. Make examples of people who for all intents & purposes were not engaged in any willful illegal conduct and this intimidates everyone else into timid submissiveness to whom ever is in power.

e.g. what is currently happening to Frank Vandersloot.