Ohio authorities stormed a farm house in LaGange Monday, December 1, to execute a search warrant, holding the Jacqueline and John Stowers and their son and young grandchildren at gunpoint for nine hours. During the raid the Ohio Department of Agriculture and police confiscated over ten thousand dollars worth of food, computers and cell phones. The Stowers’ crime? They run a private, members-only food co-op. While state authorities were looking for evidence of illegal activities, the family was not informed what crime they were suspected of, they were not read their rights or allowed to make a phone call. The children, some as young as toddlers, were traumatized by armed officers interrogating the adults with guns drawn.

The Morning Journal, a newspaper serving northern Ohio, reported that the Stowers were believed to be operating without a license. However, the Stowers claim that the food co-op they run does not engage in any activities that would require state licensing. Friends of the Stowers openly question why such aggressive tactics were necessary to investigate a licensing complaint. The Ohio Department of Agriculture has apparently been chastised by the courts in previous cases for over-reach, including entrapment of an Amish man to sell raw milk, which backfired, when it became known that the man gave milk instead of selling it to a state undercover agent, refusing to take money for what he believed to be a charitable act. The Amish literally interpret the Gospel of Matthew (5:42) to “give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.”

This is all about the government not getting their “cut”, kinda like the mob thugs who shake down the liquor store owner on the corner. What is happening to our country?

Lorraine Henderson

The regional director of Homeland Security, Customs, and Border Protection was charged today with repeatedly hiring illegal immigrants to clean her Salem home after one cleaner wore a wire during an undercover investigation.

Lorraine Henderson is the director of the Port of Boston, overseeing 190 armed federal officers who patrol major airports and shipping terminals in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. “She’s supposed to be deporting aliens, not hiring them,” said Assistant US Attorney Brian T. Kelly, chief of the public corruption unit. Agents arrested Henderson at her Salem home at 8 a.m. Standing this afternoon in US District Court in Boston, she wore jeans and a gray sweatshirt and did not enter a plea to a charge of encouraging an illegal immigrant to remain in the country. If convicted, she faces as much as 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

According to an eight-page affidavit unsealed today, Henderson had employed a Brazilian woman to clean her home for $75 to $80 every few weeks for several years. “You have to be careful ’cause they will deport you. Be careful,” Henderson told the housekeeper in a conversation Sept. 9, 2008, that was recorded on the wire. “Wow, wow, if you leave they won’t let you back … you can’t leave, don’t leave … ’cause once you leave you will never be back.” After the conversation that day in her Salem home, Henderson increased the woman’s pay from $75 to $80, according to the affidavit. The housekeeper, whose name was not included in the affidavit, agreed to wear a wire after being approached by a special agent with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

So she is stupid and cheap. And the beat goes on.