After New Jersey state troopers arrested Rebecca Musarra for remaining silent, they informed her, “You have the right to remain silent.” That should have been a clue that something was amiss with their legal justification for hauling her off to jail.
According to a federal lawsuit filed by Musarra, a Philadelphia attorney, and dashcam footage recently obtained by NJ Advance Media, Trooper Matthew Stazzone pulled her over for speeding on October 16 and asked for her license, registration, and proof of insurance. She handed over the documents but did not respond when Stazzone asked her a question. He repeated the question several times, becoming increasingly agitated and warning her that she would be arrested if she did not answer. Here is the vitally important question that Stazzone kept asking: “Do you know why you’re being pulled over tonight?”
In other words, Stazzone was trying to get Musarra to incriminate herself. She declined to do so. Mind you, she did not say, “I decline to answer on the grounds that it may incriminate me,” or “I am asserting my Fifth Amendment right to remain silent.” But she did eventually identify herself as an attorney, saying she was not legally required to answer Stazzone’s question. Unimpressed, he proceeded to handcuff and arrest her with the assistance of another trooper, Demetric Gosa.
When Musarra asked if she was being arrested for remaining silent, Gazzone replied, “Yeah.” Gosa added, “Yes. Obstruction.” New Jersey defines obstruction of justice as impeding the administration of the law “by means of flight, intimidation, force, violence, physical interference, or through any independently unlawful act.” Sitting quietly in your car while a cop asks if you know why you were pulled over does not fall into any of those categories.
Musarra says she was patted down twice, taken to the state police barracks in Washington, and placed in a holding cell, where she was handcuffed to a bench. After a supervisor, Trooper James Butler, watched the dashcam video, he realized there was no legal basis for the arrest. According to Musarra, Butler said “a mistake was made, and to chalk it up to training, and that [Stazzone] was just a rookie.” She was released two hours after the traffic stop. She was neither charged nor cited.
A state police spokesman told NJ Advance Media the incident is under investigation. “In the event that problems are identified,” he said, “training and/or disciplinary measures are implemented where appropriate.” In response to Musarra’s lawsuit, the state argues that Stazzone and Gosa “acted in good faith and without fraud or malice.”
Gail Matriarchal Mindset
• Relationships are ultimate
• Reproduction of these relationships is core competency
• Truth is objective and applies to everyone
• Recognizes that much cannot be known
• Accepts that much cannot be understood
• Truth is revealed and received progressively
• God is the source and revealer of wisdom
• Faith and trust are essential
• Belief is relational and personal
• Assumes existence of God
• Description of God: focus is on the relationship with God— “Our Father”
• Kingdom of God begins in this life
• Eternal life begins now and is about our relationship with God
• Focuses on community
• Thought process: I need to
understand enough to allow me
to respond, apply, do, follow
• Appreciates mystery
• Believes in supernatural, unseen world
• Believes in spiritual warfare
• Dependent/interdependent mindset
• A disciple does what the mentor does and becomes like him
Eric Patriarchal Mindset
• Knowledge is ultimate
• Production using this knowledge is core competency
• Truth is subjective and owned
individually
• Believes truth is knowable
• Believes understanding is
essential
• Once discovered, truth rarely
changes
• Wisdom is discovered and
owned by men
• Proof, empirical evidence is essential
• Belief is intellectual and requires proof
• Believes if God exists, His existence can be proved or disproved
• Focus is on the attributes or characteristics of God
• Kingdom of God is detached from this life
• Eternal life happens after death, if at all
• Focuses on the individual
• Thought process: Let me see what I think and feel. If I cannot
completely understand, or thinkdifferently, am confused, or if I
don’t feel “right,” then I’m stuck and cannot move forward
• Appreciates facts and knowledge only, with no tolerance for mystery
• Believes only in what can be experienced with the senses
• Thinks spiritual warfare is “superstition”
• Self-sufficient mindset
• A disciple knows what the mentor knows and does not
have to be like him
The differing mindsets sustain division of labor which on the whole makes humanity richer. Insisting only one reign supreme is an impoverishing authoritarian overstep.
Love it when they mess with someone who knows the law; hope she wins a boatload of money in the suit. Of course it will only come out of the hides of overburdened NJ taxpayers, not the piggies responsible.
Just looking at those geeks in their latter-day Hugo Boss Stormtrooper outfits makes the bile rise…
” In response to Musarra’s lawsuit, the state argues that Stazzone and Gosa “acted in good faith and without fraud or malice.” What is it that they tell us peons? Oh yeah, ignorance of the law is no excuse – unless you have a badge, apparently. I’m also sure that if Musarra was in fact speeding, she was doing it “without fraud or malice”, but I don’t imagine they’ll cut her any slack for that.