Villain of the State?

Brandon Raub
Image courtesy: Facebook

I feel compelled to comment on the Brandon Raub case. Both the mainstream media and alternate media seem to be pandering to their own audiences while the reality of the situation is lost somewhere in the middle.

For those of you unfamiliar with the story, Raub is an ex-marine who was questioned by the FBI on the evening of August 16th, 2012. The FBI claims that local police officers were present on the scene to facilitate their "interview". The interview concerned Raub's political posts on his personal Facebook page. The police claim that, after speaking with Raub, they felt he needed psychiatric evaluation.

As of yet, Raub has not been charged with any crimes.

Under Virginia statutes § 37.2-808 through § 37.2-817, the police are granted authority by the state to detain people without charges for psychiatric evaluation for up to 72 hours, provided there is medical oversight. This is common practice in many states across the United States. It is intended to address situations where individuals have a “lack of capacity to protect themselves from harm or to provide for their basic human needs.” These types of laws also typically include those who pose an immediate risk to themselves, or others, due to an altered mental state from drugs, alcohol, head trauma, hypoglycemia, and schizophrenic episodes.

Image courtesy: mental-health-abuse.org

Under Virginia law, a person can only be detained for up to 72 hours. After that, a magistrate must rule on the case to extend the detention for up to 30 days. After the 30 days has expired, it is possible to extend the detention up to 180 additional days. Thereafter, the patient must be released from custody and any additional forced treatment must be on an outpatient basis.

Taking this into consideration, Brandon Raub is NOT being detained by any federal agency. Brandon Raub is NOT being detained indefinitely under NDAA. The maximum allowable kidnapping under these laws is 213 days.

However, there are still many unknowns with this case. Without being firsthand witnesses, we can only speculate. Allegedly, the FBI received several complaints concerning Raub’s posts on Facebook which prompted the initial questioning. Why did the police feel he was mentally unstable? Was it simply because they didn’t like his political statements on Facebook?

Dee Rybisi, the spokeswoman for the Richmond FBI field office stated, “It would be horrible for us not to respond to reports and complaints about threats from the public.”

Here is a phone interview with Mr. Raub from the institution where he is imprisoned:

I am not legally qualified to diagnose his mental status. But, for my layman ears, Raub sounds perfectly coherent and succinct in his dialogue.

So the question remains: what if this is a coordinated effort to silence a dissenter and instill fear in other freethinkers? If it is true that the government is using legal loopholes to kidnap people for thought crimes, I would contend that they are the threat to the public that spokeswoman Dee Rybisi is so concerned about.

-Slade Cole