Michael Porschien
Regular Member
This post was originally deleted by editing, at the urging of multiple members of this thread. However, the time has come to go public about my ordeal, with as much detail as possible, so that more people can come to understand what happened the night of 8/30/12.
This was copied from my post on the OFCC thread about my arrest:
You may have already seen the video I took (until my phone was confiscated) of my open carry stop on 8/30/12. I am starting this new thread to give you some background, and more details, for a more complete story: I’m 22 years old and go to college in Youngstown, Ohio. Since I am a Pennsylvania resident and can’t get an Ohio CCW license, I decided to study open carry. After reading a number of articles and forums, I decided I would open carry, but if I was stopped by the police I would try to cooperate, rather than challenge. That didn’t work so well.
On August 30th, 2012, at around 10:40 PM, I openly carried my Beretta 92A1 9mm with the intention of walking to a nearby McDonalds to get a late dinner. About 5 minutes into that walk, (10:45), I was detained by Officer Menichini of the Youngstown City Police department. I say "detained" because the officer briefly pulsed his overhead lights as he was driving behind me. Up until that moment, i assumed the car i heard behind me was just another person traveling on the roadway. The video picks up just after the officer gets out of his car.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOSocHUR ... e=youtu.be
Immediately following the end of this video, I was pushed against the police cruiser and searched, by a Det/Sgt John Payne of the Youngstown City Police (the officer who took my phone from me), who found that I was carrying a Gerber paraframe 4 inch, non serrated, stainless steel finish pocketknife, clipped to the outside of my belt, behind my left handed holster. Analysis of the audio i received as a result of my records request shows that i was off in my estimation of the total detainment time between the pulsed lights and the formal arrest. It was about 25 minutes later, (not my initial estimation of 40-45) at 11:09, after sitting in the back of a police car listening to a number of officers discuss what they could charge me with, that I was charged with CCW for the knife, and a jaywalking ticket, presumably to give the officer RAS for the stop and search. During the intervening time, the officers had called YSU officials (on a line that was not recorded), as well as someone* in the police department, to discuss possible avenues of prosecution. Both of these calls occurred after i had been searched, and after i was put in the back of the car, without handcuffs, but also without being accused of a crime.
Being charged with a crime is not like in Law and Order. When you are charged with a crime, you’re handcuffed and tossed into the back of a police cruiser, with no seatbelt. You’re taken to jail and made to stand with your hands on a table while you are touched in inappropriate places by men you have never seen before. You’re tossed in a concrete room for hours, fingerprinted, photographed, and told you have mere hours to sleep and prepare for your arraignment. You’re told to plead with next to no counsel, and are asked, publicly, by a judge about your financial situation and ability to shell out thousands of dollars for an attorney. After all of this, you are told by that attorney to go home, to await the pre-trial. And then you wait.
Perhaps the cruelest part of all this is the waiting. It’s been two months so far, with my pictures online, my name plastered on the local news, and my record smeared with an arrest for a crime that I not only didn’t commit, but that the police had no RAS to stop me for in the first place. I’m still waiting, waiting and, frankly, hoping, that I made the right choice in how I acted during that initial encounter. My video, and the choices I made during it, are my only defense. It may be partly bitterness, and i apologize if so, but I can't help thinking that if I had acted differently, if I had flexed my rights, things may have turned out differently, and possibly for the better.
My hope is that my story will serve as a counter-argument to the assurances of others - that if you cooperate you will not be harassed further or charged, or that if you are, the charges will quickly be dropped. I also hope that those same people will be the first to step forward and assist me. As can be clearly seen, I was not only cooperative, but also reasonable and accommodating. I wasn’t committing a crime, I was hungry. I didn’t feel I had anything to hide, so I trusted the police to be as law-abiding as I was. But it’s clear that I was wrong to do so.
There have been two hearings so far – prior to the first, my court-appointed attorney asked me to waive time because she felt that the prosecutor would see that the charges against me were bogus – arising from police officers opposition to the act of open carry rather than actual law enforcement.. Unfortunately, that didn’t work, so at the hearing this past Tuesday, Oct. 23, I was asked to waive time again. This time my attorney told me that the prosecutor wanted to review my videotape. I asked her what my options were, and she said she could probably have it resolved quickly if I plead guilty to disorderly conduct. I didn’t feel that was an real option, and didn’t ask what would happen if I refused to waive time again, so I agreed.
Right now I feel like I’m being played with, that despite my cooperation I’m just the latest victim of police and prosecutors who either don’t know the law, or know it and use their protection (immunity) against those who do things they don’t like. I am working on getting the police report in a form that I can post, and also to get the radio transmissions to and from dispatch transcribed accurately.
I will be at work for the rest of the day, but will visit this page as often as i can in the coming days. In the meanwhile I’m open to all suggestions, and thank you.
~End copy
*:The audio of this call was recorded, and will be released to youtube later today, with an on-screen transcription of what was said. Check back in an hour or two.
This was copied from my post on the OFCC thread about my arrest:
You may have already seen the video I took (until my phone was confiscated) of my open carry stop on 8/30/12. I am starting this new thread to give you some background, and more details, for a more complete story: I’m 22 years old and go to college in Youngstown, Ohio. Since I am a Pennsylvania resident and can’t get an Ohio CCW license, I decided to study open carry. After reading a number of articles and forums, I decided I would open carry, but if I was stopped by the police I would try to cooperate, rather than challenge. That didn’t work so well.
On August 30th, 2012, at around 10:40 PM, I openly carried my Beretta 92A1 9mm with the intention of walking to a nearby McDonalds to get a late dinner. About 5 minutes into that walk, (10:45), I was detained by Officer Menichini of the Youngstown City Police department. I say "detained" because the officer briefly pulsed his overhead lights as he was driving behind me. Up until that moment, i assumed the car i heard behind me was just another person traveling on the roadway. The video picks up just after the officer gets out of his car.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOSocHUR ... e=youtu.be
Immediately following the end of this video, I was pushed against the police cruiser and searched, by a Det/Sgt John Payne of the Youngstown City Police (the officer who took my phone from me), who found that I was carrying a Gerber paraframe 4 inch, non serrated, stainless steel finish pocketknife, clipped to the outside of my belt, behind my left handed holster. Analysis of the audio i received as a result of my records request shows that i was off in my estimation of the total detainment time between the pulsed lights and the formal arrest. It was about 25 minutes later, (not my initial estimation of 40-45) at 11:09, after sitting in the back of a police car listening to a number of officers discuss what they could charge me with, that I was charged with CCW for the knife, and a jaywalking ticket, presumably to give the officer RAS for the stop and search. During the intervening time, the officers had called YSU officials (on a line that was not recorded), as well as someone* in the police department, to discuss possible avenues of prosecution. Both of these calls occurred after i had been searched, and after i was put in the back of the car, without handcuffs, but also without being accused of a crime.
Being charged with a crime is not like in Law and Order. When you are charged with a crime, you’re handcuffed and tossed into the back of a police cruiser, with no seatbelt. You’re taken to jail and made to stand with your hands on a table while you are touched in inappropriate places by men you have never seen before. You’re tossed in a concrete room for hours, fingerprinted, photographed, and told you have mere hours to sleep and prepare for your arraignment. You’re told to plead with next to no counsel, and are asked, publicly, by a judge about your financial situation and ability to shell out thousands of dollars for an attorney. After all of this, you are told by that attorney to go home, to await the pre-trial. And then you wait.
Perhaps the cruelest part of all this is the waiting. It’s been two months so far, with my pictures online, my name plastered on the local news, and my record smeared with an arrest for a crime that I not only didn’t commit, but that the police had no RAS to stop me for in the first place. I’m still waiting, waiting and, frankly, hoping, that I made the right choice in how I acted during that initial encounter. My video, and the choices I made during it, are my only defense. It may be partly bitterness, and i apologize if so, but I can't help thinking that if I had acted differently, if I had flexed my rights, things may have turned out differently, and possibly for the better.
My hope is that my story will serve as a counter-argument to the assurances of others - that if you cooperate you will not be harassed further or charged, or that if you are, the charges will quickly be dropped. I also hope that those same people will be the first to step forward and assist me. As can be clearly seen, I was not only cooperative, but also reasonable and accommodating. I wasn’t committing a crime, I was hungry. I didn’t feel I had anything to hide, so I trusted the police to be as law-abiding as I was. But it’s clear that I was wrong to do so.
There have been two hearings so far – prior to the first, my court-appointed attorney asked me to waive time because she felt that the prosecutor would see that the charges against me were bogus – arising from police officers opposition to the act of open carry rather than actual law enforcement.. Unfortunately, that didn’t work, so at the hearing this past Tuesday, Oct. 23, I was asked to waive time again. This time my attorney told me that the prosecutor wanted to review my videotape. I asked her what my options were, and she said she could probably have it resolved quickly if I plead guilty to disorderly conduct. I didn’t feel that was an real option, and didn’t ask what would happen if I refused to waive time again, so I agreed.
Right now I feel like I’m being played with, that despite my cooperation I’m just the latest victim of police and prosecutors who either don’t know the law, or know it and use their protection (immunity) against those who do things they don’t like. I am working on getting the police report in a form that I can post, and also to get the radio transmissions to and from dispatch transcribed accurately.
I will be at work for the rest of the day, but will visit this page as often as i can in the coming days. In the meanwhile I’m open to all suggestions, and thank you.
~End copy
*:The audio of this call was recorded, and will be released to youtube later today, with an on-screen transcription of what was said. Check back in an hour or two.
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