Cannabis and Hemp Expert Witness/Author/Activist Chris Conrad Interview

 

Chris Conrad is a human encyclopedia when it comes to the history of hemp and cannabis. Rich delves into Conrad's illustrious background as an expert in cultivation who became a champion for reform. This wide ranging discussion covers every angle of why federal legalization is long overdue in the United States:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/8xomaxvrx8ywk0m/chrisconradinterview.mp3?dl=0 

Learn more about Chris at:

http://chrisconrad.com/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Conrad_(author)

https://oaksterdamuniversity.com/chris-conrad/

New Hampshire ACLU Exposes Fatal Flaws Behind Belknap County Attorney's Request For Gag Order in Amicus Brief

The Belknap County Attorney's office recently filed a request for an order to prohibit all pre-trial publicity. This is very familiar territory to me. Though I've asked so many advocacy groups to help in my previous efforts, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is the first agency to truly step in to file anything on my behalf.

The Amicus Curiae brief filed Friday by ACLU-NH is a master stroke of legalese. For those who don't appreciate the antiquated language of the law, I can put it in plain English for you. This brief proves that the County Attorneys office used junk law and bogus logic to seek their injunction, which would clearly represent a prior restraint against free speech. Even if the rules of professional conduct apply to me, which they don't, the rule cited by Deputy County Attorney Keith Cormier (3.6) wouldn't even prohibit my speech in this scenario if those rules were applicable to me. Their order would be too general in nature (overbroad) and too easily used to simply silence all my thoughts on the case rather than accomplish any clear and necessary objective on the State's behalf.

This passage says it all about the constitutional weaknesses exposed in this brief:

"Moreover, even if there were a basis to issue the requested order—which there is not—the proposed order is unconstitutionally overbroad. While the practice on commenting on open cases may feel unusual to attorneys and judges in New Hampshire, “the knowledge that every criminal trial is subject to contemporaneous review in the forum of public opinion is an effective restraint on possible abuse of judicial power. Without publicity, all other checks are insufficient: in comparison of publicity, all other checks are of small account.” Gentile v. State Bar of Nevada, 501 U.S. 1030, 1035 (1991) (opinion of Kennedy, J.) (ellipsis omitted) (quoting In re Oliver, 333 U.S. 257, 270-71 (1948)). “[T]he criminal justice system exists in a larger context of a government ultimately of the people, who wish to be informed about the happenings in the criminal justice system, and, if sufficiently informed about those happening, might wish to make changes in the system.” Id. at 1070."

In addition to the ACLU stepping in to help out, the bonehead move by these prosecutors to seek a gag order also brought some local newspapers out of the woodwork to report on my case. The Laconia Daily Sun published my initial letter to the editor as well as this follow up:

https://www.laconiadailysun.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/rich-bergeron-public-officials-cant-pick-choose-what-can-be-said-about-them/article_586fccb8-aa58-11ea-b03b-0303ddc17d50.html

Then the Union Leader stepped up to the plate with an article that included one of the best quotes from my objection to the gag order request:

“'Livernois and now his assistant, continue to misrepresent and warp the facts of this case and even the law itself to support their incessant need to silence Bergeron’s true accounting of how this case unfolded,' he wrote."

The tide is turning, and the court of public opinion is in session. The traditional courts are still shuttered. There's no word on when open, in-person hearings will be allowed again.

I fully support the decent, hard working people in local, state and national law enforcement agencies who are truly doing the best they can amid a nationwide backlash against the profession. What I can't support is abuse of power, negligent use of taxpayer funds to pursue a vendetta, and a useless prosecution like this one that is already backfiring on the County Attorney's office.

Ultimately I'm being accused of violating a set of rules I'm not even officially bound to follow by people who violated those rules repeatedly in this case. You can't make this shit up. Not only are these two prosecuting legal professionals subject to the very same rules they want to pin on me, they are considered especially liable when they break the rules. Rule 8.4 of these conduct requirements deals with "The Integrity of the Profession." The motion for a gag order itself violates the spirit of this rule. It's a deception, done out of a sense of revenge and abuse of power rather than on behalf of the community's best interests.

Cormier wrote this "pot-calling-the-kettle-black" fallacy into his bogus request for a court order:

"The purpose of Rule 3.6 is clear – it is to protect the integrity of the judicial system. Extra-judicial statements in the media strike at the heart of the fair and impartial administration of justice and threaten to undermine the integrity of the criminal justice system, and therefore cannot be allowed to occur."

Keith Cormier and Andrew Livernois are by no means examples of officers of the law standing up for integrity. They are attempting to bury the facts at every turn in this case. They are both just symptoms of a greater problem: protecting and thereby perpetuating bad police work. This kind of abuse and waste needs to end, and as the ACLU reminds us twice in this brief, Andrew Livernois is up for election this coming November. Maybe it's time for him to go back to private practice.

Andrew Livernois Doesn't Want any Publicity About His Misconduct

    Belknap County Attorney Andrew Livernois is doing his best impersonation of Forrest Gump, constantly running. He is running as hard as he can from the inconvenient truths that arose from a case against me that never should have been filed. He is so incredibly scared of the truth that he had his assistant file a motion for a court order to prohibit pre-trial publicity. 

     I think it had something to do with this Letter to the Editor I wrote in the Laconia Daily Sun. I sent it to Livernois on Wednesday morning (May 20th), and it was no surprise he had a motion before the court by Friday before 10 in the morning. 

     Let the battle begin, I say. This is First Amendment law. I've been working within those parameters for my entire career as a self-represented party. I've been subjected to injunctions in multiple jurisdictions. My published work is still in place, all over the Internet. 

     The most laughable aspect of this latest motion by the prosecution team is the thin legal argument it is based on. Attorney Livernois refused to meet with me prior to my arraignment, because he felt not being represented by counsel would complicate matters. He suggested the only way we could meet would be to wait for arraignment or get a lawyer. Now, although I have not attended law school and did not take a single legal class anywhere, suddenly I am expected to follow the rules of professional conduct for New Hampshire attorneys in regard to generating publicity for my case. 

     I am being treated as if I am a full-fledged attorney who passed the bar and swore an oath. Why did my standing change so drastically in just a few hearings? Also, when can I take on new clients?

     What's worse is the County Attorney and his young lackey Keith Cormier couldn't even come up with a single thread of applicable law to use as precedent cases. Cormier only cited two pro-se cases which had to do with those self-represented parties being required to abide by rules of procedure and motion practice. He does not have a single case in his pleading where a pro-se attorney was held to the same rules of professional conduct that a licensed attorney is bound to follow. The three First Amendment cases cited to supposedly prove a prior restraint is proper in this scenario are all relating to people who had practicing, licensed attorneys. There is no commonality, no similarly situated parties. 

    The most important question to ask here is why would a professional attorney like Andrew be all bent out of shape about a Letter to the Editor in the local newspaper? Why would he twist the law and seek to squelch the press if he had nothing to hide? Also, it is very interesting that the assistant county attorney refused to characterize my letter in negative terms.The most dismissive word he can find to use about my message is that it contained "brazen" claims. Well, excuse me for being brazen when I have 53 years of potential prison time hanging over my head. 

     The fact is, the truth is a very powerful force. I know from experience. I've ruined reputations and destroyed the credibility of financial criminals in my prior work as an investigative reporter. There are certain truths people are desperate to keep quiet. Some are just inconvenient patterns of thought or habits that people don't want their friends or relatives to know about. Other truths are deeper, more systematic, and more connected to waste, fraud and abuse. 

    The truth is coming out. Fact by fact, motion by motion, despite the delays and in spite of a biased and corrupt system of justice in this community. Stay tuned.  

Andrew Livernois and The New Hampshire Drug Task Force Are Wasting Your Tax Money on a FRIVOLOUS PROSECUTION!

 BELKNAP COUNTY--

      New Hampshire is an "island of prohibition" in New England, the one state where Marijuana remains highly restricted. Heavily regulated medical access to the drug is available, but the current governor will not budge on his anti-recreational stance. The legislature is still trying to present adequate bills aiming toward legalization, but Governor Sununu wants no part of taking any formal step toward the slippery slope to full legalization. 

      The local law enforcement scene is just as obstinate. While the state gets big payoffs from the government to assist with the crack down on opioids that have killed countless kids, your Drug Task Force is wasting ridiculous amounts of time (AND YOUR TAX MONEY!) on going after petty marijuana offenses. Show me the statistics of how many kids weed is killing, please. Show me where the urgent need to eradicate the use of this harmless drug really is, because I'm still trying to wrap my head around the amount of wasted resources that have gone into a case like mine.

      There was a months-long "investigation" initiated on false pretenses to set up the case for the County Attorney here. There were funds put out to pay all the officers involved in the controlled buys and minimal surveillance involved. Additional funds paid to set me up as the State of New Hampshire's marijuana delivery driver. They knew at all times that I was not by any means a drug dealer and did not ever have any significant supply on hand, so they purposely ramped up the charges in an attempt to force me to have to actually connect with the person I acquired their orders from in a time frame that would allow them to tail the real suspect. No evidence in the case points to any other independent sales outside of the ones the task force officers instigated. There is absolutely no evidence of any predisposition. 

     Additionally, these officers leveraged me with the deception of 1.) pretending to be colleagues of mine in the logging business and 2.) acting like they wanted to help me get my rented UHaul out of a ditch in the middle of a snowstorm. So they totally manipulated the situation to make me feel as if I owed them something for stopping to see if they could help me. During the first contact that led these officers to set me up for 6 felonies, there was not one single mention of marijuana. I actually gave the undercover officers my business card and offered to help them if I received any calls looking for loggers in the area they lied about originating from. The lies these officers used to justify this case included representing my record as having two convictions on it which were not convictions at all. Even if they had been convictions, they occurred multiple years ago and were not in any relation or connection to anything to do with drug sales. 

     Knowing these facts, because I told him personally (see my email chain with the Andrew Livernois, Belknap County Attorney) and warned him the case would fail, the local prosecutor decided to push this case to trial. I used an obscure but sensible and novel legal argument called "Outrageous Government Conduct" to get the case dismissed by the judge, but he completely denied the majority of my legal arguments. The completely backwards approach of the justice system, KNOWING I WAS GOING TO USE ENTRAPMENT AS A DEFENSE, was to claim none of my arguments had anything to do with whether or not I sold marijuana to undercover officers. 

     I wonder how any of these legal "professionals" even graduated law school if they think this case can survive an appeal if I lose my jury trial this summer. The problem with letting every major decision in this case hinge on whether or not I sold drugs to undercover officers is to completely ignore and look past the whole outrageous government conduct argument. Did these sales happen is the wrong question to ask under the circumstances. How did the government arrive at the decision to initiate these sales and was the resulting operation a proper use of governmental power, now that is the real question to ask. But, please, don't take my word for it. Consider the words of the County Attorney himself at my hearing on the motion to dismiss:      

https://www.dropbox.com/s/wxt8keeetfkrw3n/fairprocess.mp3

17:30 “The second argument he’s making is more novel. That’s this argument that he was subjected to Outrageous Governmental Conduct. As I explained in my pleadings, your honor, this is a defense that derives from the 14^th Amendment of the United States Constitution. And the idea, which makes sense, is that if the government engages in particularly outrageous conduct which shocks the conscience, that the court could dismiss those charges on a finding that the defendant was not subjected to a fair process.”

     Only someone who was protecting people he considers friends and allies would act the way Attorney Livernois acts in this case. It is no coincidence that Livernois was the Gilford, New Hampshire Attorney when the town was sued in relation to a Drug Task Force raid gone wrong. Livernois covered up the case by settling with the plaintiff in an agreement designed to "buy peace."

     That is relevant information to my case, but the jury will never hear it. It's been excluded from any and all discussion that Livernois had any such history with the DTF, even though two of the officers involved in that case will be witnesses in my own. 

     It is no coincidence that Livernois argued in open court that this case was just a "run of the mill undercover operation" that was "no different from any other undercover buy operation you see." He will not be able to prove that lie when the jury hears the real facts of this case. There were multiple glaring errors and examples of official government misconduct. These errors did not just land in the lap of the task force. They also rest squarely on the shoulders of the county attorney. This man lied repeatedly in this case, refused to allow any meaningful cooperation on my part to eliminate leaks in the local justice system, and obstructed justice by seeking to exclude evidence at my trial that would incriminate people within law enforcement that were involved in my case. 

     Belknap County Attorney Andrew Livernois accused me of using the fact that there were law enforcement leaks in my case as a "ploy" or a trick to gain some kind of favor in this case. As someone who saw his father's life ripped apart by a government leak (who was brutally murdered for cooperating), that whole idea is ridiculous. I would not invent something as serious as this. I even made serious attempts to derail those leaks, but Livernois interfered with that process and made it impossible to trust him. Then he had the nerve to say (again, in open court) at one point that all the evidence on outrageous government conduct that I raised could be brought up at trial:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/yxq5ykcugqfcbc1/raiseitattrial.mp3

19:40  “It’s still far too early to even raise that defense at this point because your honor doesn’t have the facts before you of what actually transpired in this case. There will be a trial presumably in this case, and at that trial you will be able to determine the facts, a jury will be able to determine the facts, but you will hear the evidence in that case, your honor. And if the defendant wanted to raise that claim, that somehow the government engaged in outrageous conduct, and therefore he was not treated fairly, he can raise it at trial.”

     That statement was another bold-faced lie from Livernois, because he later successfully moved to exclude the vast majority of the pertinent evidence he claimed would be coming out at trial. It also turned out the idea that I could raise the Outrageous Conduct Defense at trial was another bold faced lie from Livernois. The judge agreed with my contention and interpretation of the law, which required a judge to make the decision on Outrageous Government Conduct before trial. He denied that motion and a motion to reconsider.

     Now take a hard look at what this County Attorney pulled to execute this whole fiasco. All that is nothing but tricks, tactics, and ploys to avoid being called out for what he actually is: a key part of this heavily poisoned process that is continuously wasting your tax dollars on frivolous, victimless "crimes." If he actually opened his eyes and looked at the real facts of this case before he bulled forward to a grand jury with this garbage, this article would not have to be written. Your money would not be thrown out the window for a completely lost cause. 

     A trial will only incur more expenses for the state, but Livernois does not care about spending your money wisely. He's in it to win it, whether it's a fair process or not, whether the case makes any difference at all in the local crime scene or not. He has to protect his friends and the sacred system, which is so full of integrity that at last check, the State of NH received a D- grade for Judicial Integrity (2015). 

  

     Here are a few of the real relevant questions that make the whole case pointless if the answers are no: Was this case initiated, pursued, executed and then consummated in this courtroom in a process that was respectful of my due process rights? Were the the rules, protocols, training and procedures of law enforcement all in alignment to suggest I was actually a worthy target in the first place and deserved to be prosecuted with impunity? Was the entrapment scheme (justified or not, successful in the eyes of the operators or not) actually permissible under the legal parameters commonly followed in similar cases in which convictions are routinely secured?

     It makes no difference that the sales for which I’ve been charged with allegedly occurred during a series of deliveries made directly to the Drug Task Force Agent who initiated this entrapment scheme. They were not independent acts subsequent to the inducement, but were part of a course of conduct which was the product of the inducement. Additionally, it was the DTF agents and their unit command who made a distinct effort to increase the amount of the alleged sales. I never asked anyone to buy more of anything. This was done not exclusively to prosecute me for these felony sales, but in an effort to get to a bigger fish by me testifying against that person or me leading them to him.  

     The state’s representatives here are getting away with playing the victim card, like I’m trying to bring some oppressive and unconventional hammer down on them. In reality, all I want to do is expose the truth. I want to argue a legal theory that even Attorney Livernois admits is a novel one. 

     There has to be evidence of predisposition PRIOR to the police interaction. Before the government came on the scene:

 

The function of law enforcement is the prevention of crime and the apprehension of criminals. Manifestly, that function does not include the manufacturing of crime. Criminal activity is such that stealth and strategy are necessary weapons in the arsenal of the police officer. However, `A different question is presented when the criminal design originates with the officials of the Government, and they implant in the mind of an innocent person the disposition to commit the alleged offense and induce its commission in order that they may prosecute.' Id., at 372, quoting Sorrells v. United States, 287 U. S., at 442. (Emphasis Added)

Mr. Justice Roberts in Sorrells put the idea in the following words:

The applicable principle is that courts must be closed to the trial of a crime instigated by the government's own agents. No other issue, no comparison of equities as between the guilty official and the guilty defendant, has any place in the enforcement of this overruling principle of public policy. 287 U. S., at 459.

Whatever may be the demerits of the defendant or his previous infractions of law these will not justify the instigation and creation of a new crime, as a means to reach him and punish him for his past misdemeanors. . . . To say that such conduct by an official of government is condoned and rendered innocuous by the fact that the defendant had a bad reputation or had previously transgressed is wholly to disregard the reason for refusing the processes of the court to consummate an abhorrent transaction. Sorrells v. United States, supra, at 458-459.

Several federal courts have adopted the objective test advanced by Mr. Justice Roberts and Mr. Justice Frankfurter, or a variant thereof, focusing on the conduct of the government agents, rather than the "predisposition" of the particular defendant. See, e. g., United States v. McGrath, 468 F.2d 1027, 1030-1031 (CA7 1972); Greene v. United States, 454 F.2d 783, 786-787 (CA9 1971); Carbajal-Portillo v. United States, 396 F.2d 944, 948 (CA9 1968); Smith v. United States, 118 U. S. App. D. C. 38, 44, 46, 331 F.2d 784, 790, 792 (1964) (en banc); United States v. Chisum, 312 F.Supp. 1307 (CD Cal. 1970). Cf. United States v. Morrison, 348 F.2d 1003, 1004 (CA2 1965); Accardi v. United States, 257 F.2d 168, 172-173, n. 5 (CA5 1958); United States v. Kros, 296 F.Supp. 972, 979 (ED Pa. 1969).

     Attorney Livernois did not recognize that this case represented the worst possible situation for him to confront in a presidential election year. 2020 will be an earth-shattering year for marijuana reform, especially if a Democrat is elected to the presidency. The majority of candidates running on that ticket will not only legalize the drug for recreational use, but they will also expunge all convictions. These are the official platform positions of the vast majority of Democratic candidates. As I said at the beginning of this case, it is a "lost cause" that drives the whole fiasco. Marijuana prohibition as we know it is over. The balance of interests have changed.

     These times call for unique and dedicated efforts to refuse to keep laying down and accepting the lies our government keeps telling us. The justice system is not working for anyone when it interrupts an honest man's life and forces him to defend spurious charges that the government manufactured. The only lives being improved by this whole scenario are that of the lawyers, judges and agents involved who are collecting their steady paychecks for ignoring the old "innocent until proven guilty" mantra.   

The Crooked, Corrupt Law Enforcement Officers of Belknap County, NH EXPOSED!

   

County Attorney Andrew Livernois (left) is a liar. He lied to a judge in my case, in open court TWICE. Yet, the judge keeps right on ruling in his favor, just about ignoring every good point or statute or precedent case I bring up. What's worse, the judge just filed an order excluding all evidence of law enforcement corruption and leaks who were feeding information directly to the target the Drug Task Force wanted me to roll on.Since I didn't cooperate, they brought the full force of the law down on me even though I was only targeted to help them get a bigger fish who proved "untouchable." Now the state of New Hampshire is prosecuting a pawn and acting like I'm a kingpin.

I planned to elicit details on the leaks and the DTF failing to follow their own written policies during the trial, but this judge just made it clear he wants no part of actually getting to the bottom of any criminal acts perpetrated by officers of the law. Nope, we'll just let them keep leaking and interfering with investigations.

Attorney Livernois lied on two separate occasions in this case. First, he informed the judge that I "had the right" to raise Outrageous Government Conduct as a defense AT TRIAL. The judge's most recent ruling clearly delineates that was a bold-faced lie. Additionally, when asked in open court if I ever offered a counter-proposal to his suggested plea agreement, Attorney Livernois lied and said I never did. The communications I will be publishing a link to at the conclusion of this article reveal without any "reasonable doubt" that I did, in fact, offer a proposal of my own. Rather than explain that to the judge, Livernois lied and said there was no response.

The problem with this Belknap County Attorney is that he has no respect for the fact that there are certain people who end up trapped in the justice system who simply do not belong there. Rather than recognize that fact and remedy it, he just plugs on blindly, treating the most insignificant crime here like the biggest drug sting in state history. The reality is, law enforcement leaks and corruption made it absolutely impossible for me to cooperate. At the same time, I can certainly make the case that my charges were only ramped up so that the Drug Task Force agents could get closer to the target they wanted me to roll on. When they did finally follow and investigate the true big fish, they couldn't get anything on him because of LEAKS that I was willing to expose in court. Now, I will have to expose those leaks here.

Two law enforcement officers, one from within the Drug Task Force itself, actually gave direct information to the real target to help him avoid prosecution. If I did decide to cooperate, that would mean certain death, because the guy they really wanted carries a gun, and he's not afraid to use it if it means keeping himself out of jail for 30+ years. But the judge on my case doesn't seem to give a crap that this DTF agent and another officer from the County Sheriff's Department both betrayed their duty to protect and serve. This judge literally just does not want to hear anything about it.

That is just unacceptable. These are active officers of the law, and who knows if this is the only criminal enterprise they are protecting? They made it impossible for me to give the DTF and the State of New Hampshire any kind of win in this case. And now this judge is giving them a total pass to keep obstructing justice.

Andrew Livernois does not have the best interests of the citizens of New Hampshire in mind. YOUR TAX DOLLARS are being totally wasted on him prosecuting this useless case. Your hard-earned money is directly supporting active corruption being totally covered up by this abuser of his authority. Belknap County Residents, if you really want to see who you actually elected as your County Attorney, read some of the key communications the jury in my case will never get the chance to see right here:


https://nhdrugtaskforce.blogspot.com/p/andrew-livernois-belknap-county-attorney.html 

backup link:

https://www.slideshare.net/fightnewsunlimited/andrew-livernois-belknap-county-nh-county-attorney-email-chain


And here's a few samples of the Livernois emails that are included in the above document:

If you didn't lie, you took the word of the first person you asked. Every attorney, civil or criminal, has a duty to truly investigate the facts of his case. You've failed in that duty. 

What you need to remember is I am a reporter and investigator first and a lawyer only by last resort. I have the ability to find information you think it would be impossible for me to acquire. It's called research. Like, for instance, the attached manual. If I can find that manual with no formal authority or license to be given access, don't you think I can get the policies and procedures you and your DTF buddies are hiding? 

I know they exist, and if you did your homework, you would know you've been hoodwinked, too. Your friends are lying to you now. They are throwing YOU under the bus. 

I am giving you the courtesy of informing you of these facts so you can avoid ruining your reputation and subjecting yourself to years of civil legal wrangling by going to trial. I'm not hoping to work with you at all at this point. As I've said countless times, I don't trust you. You've blown a few chances to end this sensibly, and I will not feel the least bit bad about calling you out for the way you've disrespected me every step of the way. I want a trial. I can win a trial. 

Dozens of people I've dealt with in my investigations followed the very same pattern you are following with this case. It was primarily because they all had a great deal to hide that I could easily find if I looked hard enough. Also, it was because I set the correct conditions for them to make mistakes. I made them trip themselves up, and I'm doing that to you here with better results than ever. It's time for you to make your retreat and give up on this useless war you are waging. You will never win.  

The only offer you will ever get from here on out is this one: 

I will sign a formal agreement that I will not file a civil suit of any kind against you or any representative of the state attorney general's office (including the DTF)... 

IF: you drop all charges against me voluntarily with no conditions.

I would also consider giving up any legal right to publicize this case or the events surrounding it if you surrender this senseless effort sooner rather than later. 

The day the trial starts, this offer goes away. This is the only "reasonable" offer you will ever receive. I don't give a damn if you think I need to consult with my standby counsel to come up with something you will agree to. This is not about ending the case on YOUR terms. You had the chance to do that, and you blew it. 

I know you better than you think I do, and I already know from our email chains that you are a man who values your reputation for integrity, and when the judge sees an accused criminal exhibiting more integrity than you and your DTF buddies it is going to be hard for you to have to confront that you are indeed a documented liar. You are also doing the bidding for liars and not even bothering to check their facts. It's going to be embarrassing to you when a jury hears all about your unethical behavior that all the gutless public defenders you face are too afraid to call you out for. 

I told you all this would happen, though, didn't I? You kept right on chugging trying to convict me at all costs, because I needed you to do that. I knew you would do that. Make it a federal case. The bigger the better. Use the whole weight of the government to squash me. I'll only benefit because it will show you are dropping a nuclear bomb to kill an ant. Why would you do that? Because the coverup is worse than the crime. And I need to be punished because I wouldn't kill myself. 

I'm not giving you all these opportunities to change your mind about this case and me because I hate you or want to see you suffer, Andrew. Honestly, I'm trying to save your hide and give you a graceful way to stop the madness. It's the only olive branch you will ever get from me. I haven't had the chance to appreciate why Judge O'Neil takes your every word as gospel, but Caroline tells me you are a good guy overall. I just know you haven't been one when it comes to this case, and I know my approach brought that side out of you. It's one of those unfair advantages I have as a self-represented party. I've found out that often the "disadvantages" we have in the way of being discriminated against by the process can be far outweighed by capitalizing on the freedoms enjoyed by a pro-se party that an at-bar attorney does not have. 

People hear that I'm representing myself and they expect a blithering idiot making himself look silly for trying. Everybody loves an underdog who steps up and shows he's more than capable of doing the thing nobody expects him to be able to do. No matter what way you think the case is going now, you've already lost this trial. I'm willing to make these concessions purely out of courtesy for the hard work you've put in to get where you are. I know you have a thankless job and sometimes you can get caught in a situation like this when you think it's all for some great purpose and progress toward a genuine goal. Unfortunately, you landed on a dud of a case and it's hopeless to pursue it any further. I know my attitude's made it very hard for you to give me any kind of a win, but you need to remember I'm just doing my job, too. Spending time in a jail cell is not going to help me out at this stage of my life. Probation is useless when I'm already a productive member of society. I run a business. I employ people in this community. I serve the public need. I'm not a dealer by any stretch.

Also, the war on drugs is going to end when it comes to marijuana, and every conviction will be expunged if a democrat gets elected to the presidency next year. 

Even Joe Biden: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzXg2JASFfU

https://www.businessinsurance.com/article/20191121/NEWS08/912331786/House-committee-clears-marijuana-legalization-bill

So, the times are changing. Just like I told you at the beginning of all this. And I know you are a democrat. It will be tough to find someone you can vote for who doesn't want to decriminalize weed.

I plan to seek jury nullification as a vein of my defense as well, the third prong. Do you really want to take your chances at trial with all these potential land mines you could step on? 

I know it's going to suck for you, but do the right thing and end this. Blame the task force. They honestly fucked up on this one, and you just tried to pick up the pieces and make a case where there wasn't one to make. I can forgive and forget all that if you just step up and admit it and walk away now, before it's too late and you destroy yourself. I really don't want to see that, but I'll make it happen if you force me to. 


==================

Mr. Bergeron:

With all due respect, the reason why this case is going to necessarily go to trial is because you will not engage in any meaningful discussions about a possible plea bargain, and instead choose to simply throw around accusations and incendiary language.

I certainly recognize that this case is not one of the most serious that my office handles, but if you are not willing to look at the situation somewhat objectively and dispassionately, and instead insist on an “all or nothing” approach, then there is nothing to do but take it to trial. 

You know what you did; you know that you sold marijuana on six different occasions to an undercover police officer.  I understand that you think it’s not fair that you were targeted by DTF, and you think you were entrapped.  But the fact remains that you did what you did.  And so the question is – what is a reasonable punishment for someone who engages in that behavior, given that it is still a crime to sell marijuana in this state. 

Until you are willing to have a reasonable conversation about that question, this case will continue toward the inevitable trial.

As for why I do not respond to all of your wild accusations in front of Judge O’Neill – I see no need to respond.  I know the truth, that there is no merit to your insults and accusations, and I know that Judge O’Neill does not put any stock in those claims either, as he is able to observe how I run my office and prosecute cases day in and day out.  So I choose not to waste the Court’s time in responding.  Things will be different in front of the jury, as you will see. 

This case is not personal to me, Mr. Bergeron.  I am simply doing my job.  You were arrested by DTF following a lengthy investigation, and those charges were brought to me to prosecute.  I have pursued this case in the same way I would any other drug sale case, and will continue to do so.  You have an absolute right to a trial, and if that is what you want, that is what you will get.  If you would prefer to resolve this case some other way, then make me a realistic counter-offer.  If you have questions about what sort of counter-offer would be “realistic”, you should confer with Attorney Smith on that point.

Yours truly,

Andrew Livernois

=======================

I want a trial, Andrew. I want you to have to do the work to try to make this stick. And, it was you who refused the first and only discussion that would have made me a cooperator instead of an adversary. You betrayed any trust I could have had in you when you refused to speak to me unless I had an attorney. Now you know what it's like to want to resolve something without jumping through a bunch of ridiculous hoops, but the other side won't let you.

I have thought this through, and I don't have to or need to sit down with you at this point. I don't trust you, and I don't think you care enough about this case in the first place to really pursue it with any genuine passion. Take it to trial. That's fine with me. I want that more than anything. That is my opportunity to put all the pieces together and show that the DTF is a broken organization that learns nothing from their mistakes, even when lives are lost, or in my case when a life is at risk. 

You did offer to allow a continuance with my father's death, but the point is I don't want this hanging over my head. This almost got me killed. Officer Beaulieu doesn't deserve to be able to skip out on his responsibilities to press this case if he thinks he did good work. I want it ended, and the only way to do it without getting killed for cooperating at this stage since you won't lift a finger to eliminate the leaks, is to win my trial. I'll make that case, and you will look back and regret snubbing me when I first wanted to meet. I bet you already do. That was truly the worst mistake you could have made. 

Taking it to trial will be the next worst mistake, but I'm looking forward to watching you make it. I have revelations that will come out in cross that will shake the system from the ground up. 

No Fool For a Client

What first began as a completely impossible uphill battle against the system is starting to come around for this untrained amateur attorney taking on the State of New Hampshire. Facing 6 felony counts and up to 30 years in prison, I fought back against a lying county attorney, a disorganized drug task force and a judge that gave the prosecutor far more credit than me.

Since the Motion to Dismiss and the resulting hearing on that motion, so much happened that changed the whole landscape of the case. I lost the motion to dismiss (I will be filing a motion to reconsider soon), but it appears there was a mistake on my part in explaining the facts. I put a sentence in an important pleading that insinuated the first cold text from Drug Task Force Officers came the night they first saw me on the side of the road. The reality was that text came weeks later, not the same night these guys saw me stuck in a snowbank.

At any rate, I won a motion to suppress by submission. The County Attorney admitted with no argument that I never had my rights read to me and that he did not intend to use anything from the day of my arrest as evidence. So he tapped out on that one. I also filed a Motion to Recuse, which was summarily denied, but that will actually work out in my favor.

Next, I filed a motion to compel discovery. I wanted the policies, procedures and training materials regarding the targeting of controlled buy subjects by the Drug Task Force. I also wanted the same materials regarding avoiding entrapment. I have to give all the credit to my standby counsel for suggesting that I ask specifically for "policies and procedures."

It just so happened there was a disastrous raid organized by the state Drug Task Force around 7 years ago that left a police chief dead and a number of other officers wounded. The aftermath of that raid featured a review board put together to examine what went wrong.

The review committee determined that the DTF “is significantly lacking” in proper policies and procedures pertaining to their daily operations, while also lacking proper equipment and tactical training for officers to do their jobs. Further, the review committee concluded, “clear, written policies” are absent, leading to team members who “are granted license to develop their own methods of operation, which exposes the entire organization to unacceptable levels of inconsistency, and therefore risk and liability.”

I included this article in one of my pleadings after being told by the county attorney that he reached out to the DTF and found out they had no such policies and procedures. Well isn't that wonderful? So 7 years have gone by since this organization was first told to develop adequate policies and procedures, and they still have none regarding targeting people for controlled buys and avoiding entrapment? Sounds like a recipe for more than a few lawsuits.

So the bottom line is even when people die and get seriously injured due to this unit's disorganization and lack of training, the state's drug task force can't really figure out how to change for the better. They are still making the same mistakes. Still suffering from the same symptoms of failing leadership.

The motion to compel isn't in the decided column yet, but it should be very soon.

Next came one of the most pathetic flurry of motions I've ever seen. The county attorney sought to exclude: all communications between himself and I; all mention of a prior DTF case where he represented the Town of Gilford as a co-defendant with the DTF; all mention of the raid described above and the resulting review of the DTF; and all mention of the government leaks which compromised the investigation from the jump.

He even sought a motion to continue the trial because his main witness needed more time for paternity leave.

What this attorney does not realize is that it doesn't really matter when this trial is. He's followed a pattern I actually predicted he would follow. Everyone I ever investigated who got caught in lies and cover ups did the same thing. Character is consistent across the board when it comes to attorneys like Livernois. All of them tend to fight too hard for all the wrong reasons when they get cases that have serious weaknesses. I've painted him into a corner on purpose, and he'll destroy himself fighting his way out of it. Since he knows he has no shot at getting a guilty plea out of a jury if they hear all the facts, he's going to try to exclude all the ones that make him look bad. It's just the kind of thing attorneys do that make people hate all attorneys equally.

He'll hang on the "I'm just doing my job" excuse but step all over the honest application of the law while doing it.

I came into this process spitting mad and trying to explain my whole case at the arraignment. Since then I made quite a few adjustments to my attitude and my approach. I'm ready to empanel a jury and move forward, but the prosecutor is now trying to delay things and hide the truth.

I'm the last person anyone should try to hide the truth from. I know just where to find it. I know from experience that the truth always shines through in the end. I'll continue to fight to expose the truth while they perpetrate their lies, and we'll let a jury decide. Stay tuned.     

MOTION TO DISMISS HEARING FULL AUDIO

Listen to the first major hearing on the case here, and please weigh in with your thoughts in the comment section:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/g9v7nlrb1kyqdjl/richfirsthearingbelknap.wma

Read the full motion to dismiss documentation below:

Defendant's Motion to Dismiss Indictments Filed by Belknap County Attorney Andrew Livernois from Rich Bergeron

OPERATION STICKER SHOCK

If you want your tax dollars to stop being wasted on useless investigations and prosecutions like mine, please spend $10 to buy a bumper sticker to support our cause. It will be very expensive to put on an adequate legal defense under the circumstances where I am forced to take this case to trial. Place your bumper sticker where bumper stickers typically go, or do us a favor and place it somewhere prominent where a ton of people can clearly read it and register that they need to follow up and check out the website. If the judicial system of the state of New Hampshire will not come to their senses, the court of public opinion has to be the equalizer. Please help and buy a sticker today by clicking on the image below:

Where are Your Taxes Going? The Cost of Arresting the Wrong Guy

Imagine you are stranded on the side of a busy road, just far enough off the shoulder to not be in the way of any traffic. First, a police officer stops and talks to you. You have help coming but he keeps insisting you get a wrecker. You tell him you can't afford that. The next people who stop say they'd love to help but they don't have any chains. They have a nice truck though, and they claim to be loggers after you tell them that's what you do. They look the part, beards and flannel jackets, so it makes sense.

So, this all happened to me last winter. I gave these two fellow "loggers" business cards and tell them if they ever need firewood customers in their area (outside my range) I would refer the outliers to them.

Finally the third time is the charm. One selfless hero in a lifted old POS truck comes along and parks right in the middle of the road after the police officer left me to deal with another incident. Only one impatient A-hole decides to lay on the horn but eventually drives around. The random stranger throws one end of a chain to me and it's around an anchor point on my vehicle in 2 minutes. He connects the other end to his truck and I drive right out of that ditch with ease. I give him a business card and get a random text a couple weeks later from a guy I think is him. It's not, and it turns out to be one of the guys who didn't have chains.

Next thing you know, despite having not a single criminal conviction on my record, I wind up being set up for 6 Special Felonies for allegedly selling less than a half pound of marijuana over 6 different occasions. Then I find out it's all been designed to infiltrate the operation of someone they think I will give up on a silver platter. I don't cooperate once they arrest me a month after the last transaction. Then I find out the real target has two leaks in law enforcement. One is in the Sheriff's Office and the other is right in the Drug Task Force itself. So, now I'm the target, framed as being a drug dealer who should spend over 20 years in prison for a set of crimes the government manufactured against me without doing any investigation into my background.

Your tax dollars paid for a massive investigation that produced zero results. You employed multiple law enforcement agents to waste their time on an investigation that was always doomed from the start due to pervasive leaks within their own ranks. You paid for these officers to purchase these "drugs," have them shipped to a lab and tested by paid professional experts, and put into evidence in the form of written statements confirming that it was pure Cannabis, a plant that is changing the face of medicine and legal in half the country as a recreational product.

Before this "investigation" even started, Officer Jared Beaulieu lied about my record in a sworn affidavit. You would think he would be up on perjury charges or at least be subject to my cross examination and be asked to explain how this lie made it onto the court's official paperwork presented at arraignment. Beaulieu insisted the record showed I had two convictions on my record, one in the state of New Hampshire that was ACTUALLY an acquittal for an assault that occurred because a former business partner stole my wood splitter.

The judge in the assault case ruled that I had the right to use "reasonable force" to retrieve stolen property. There are zero convictions on my criminal record. I have never spent more than an overnight stint in jail for youthful indiscretions that had NOTHING TO DO WITH DRUGS. It is entrapment all the way, and YOU will be paying for the trial in August if you let the madness continue. The reputations of the leakers and the officers who turned a blind eye to them will be raked across the coals. The system will be crucified, as it should be for building and sustaining and then capitalizing on a ridiculous amount of tainted, wasted evidence to prosecute meaningless crimes and ruin an honorable man who contributes positively to his community. Meanwhile people die every day of overdoses from much harder, much more dangerous drugs.

NH taxpayers need to stop paying for this madness and to tell the county attorney to stop wasting so many of his resources on prosecuting people that never should have been set up in the first place. Call Belknap County Attorney Andrew Livernois at 603-527-5440 or email him at: alivernois@belknapcounty.org and tell him to stop wasting your tax dollars on good people like me and start cleaning up the Opioid crisis.

DON'T LET THIS CROOKED NH DRUG TASK FORCE AGENT FOOL YOU INTO THINKING HE IS YOUR FRIEND

The officer you see above (bearded during undercover operations)  has no problem turning honest, hard working people into felons based on false information. He misrepresented my criminal record in my case to get his arrest warrant and never bothered to do any preliminary investigation to see if I was pre-disposed to sell marijuana. The judge on the case thought it was sufficient that Belknap County Attorney Andrew Livernois simply mentioned the fact that I really had no convictions whatsoever on my record at the arraignment. This was despite the fact that multiple agents of the NH Attorney General's office signed off on a warrant and an entire investigation that was based on statements containing false information that any one of them could have checked and verified for themselves. 

Everyone in the chain of command just took Beaulieu's word that I had multiple convictions instead of bare charges that were not in any way related to drugs of any kind. Beaulieu didn't even know how to use the computer system and check a criminal record, did no real preliminary investigation or surveillance to determine if I was any kind of drug dealer, and admitted to "cold" texting me to see if I would sell him marijuana. My final text to Beaulieu was "YOU ARE A FUCKING LIAR!" He offered no response or defense. 

This man's lies ruined my life after he pretended to befriend me and then his "real" friends in the NH DTF tried to turn me against someone capable of killing me if he was facing a lifetime in prison. I also discovered leaks in my case, and I was never the real target. Law enforcement officials from two different agencies were feeding the real target information. 

I did my best to highlight the major issues in my case, but the judge refused to acknowledge the real facts after my extremely detailed motion to dismiss sat on the docket after the hearing "under advisement" for over a month. The judge waited for the case to wind up being an indictment, even though I filed my motion days after my arraignment. My name has been relentlessly dragged through the mud based on lies that Officer Jared Beaulieu told to initiate this investigation. 

The judge also made not one mention in his order of my fear for my life and the fact that the County Attorney said he could meet with a lawyer right away if I had one but not with me if I was self represented. I could not meet with him, he said, until I made an appearance in the court. My concerns for meeting with him had nothing to do with wanting consideration on my case, it was an urgent request related to my safety, and Andrew Livernois did nothing but stonewall my efforts to report the leaks to other law enforcement agencies. He insisted he could meet with me after the arraignment, but that was too late. He'd already betrayed my trust ten times over by that time. 

I tried to seek the earliest possible relief through the best possible method to dispatch the case on the merits of my argument. It was actually a method the judge suggested to me in open court only to shoot it down later when he had the facts to support a full dismissal. The bottom line is I never should have been arraigned. The case is that flawed, and it all started with this irresponsible and reckless officer making the decision to set me up for six special felonies when he found me on the side of the road stuck in a snowbank and pretended to try to help. 

How about you help out with real crime, Jared? How about you help apprehend real criminals you actually investigate before you randomly find them down on their luck and coerce them into breaking the law to support a lost cause? How about you target the drugs that are killing people, not the ones getting approved in one state after another for recreational use?   

New Hampshire needs to stop devoting so much time, energy and money to cases like mine that are doomed from the start because some young, gung-ho cop makes a rookie mistake that ruins an honest man's life. Nothing is gained either here, not one iota of progress toward any stated mission of the NH Atorney General's Task Force. It's a waste, a fraud on the court, and a ridiculous game being played at the expense of my future. They want to put me in jail for up to 20+ years for allegedly selling less than a half pound of weed. This wouldn't be happening without me refusing to cooperate with the same law enforcement agency that decided it was a good idea to set me up and then immediately tried to fry me because I didn't cooperate. 

Somehow the State of New Hampshire's backward legal system cannot see the forest through the trees. They can't see how it is just outright wrong and fundamentally a violation of due process to put someone with no criminal record into this entrapment scheme when the whole investigation is compromised from the start by leaks supporting the target. Then when he does not want to cooperate with a compromised investigation, the book is thrown right at him. It defies logic, but the judge on this case seems to think this is the normal mode of operation for law enforcement and there is nothing that rises to the level of misconduct here. 

New Hampshire's judicial system will keep protecting liars like Jared Beaulieu and their illegitimate investigations until someone finally recognizes that putting innocent people through ordeals like mine simply cannot be tolerated in a free society based on fairness and justice. The effort to educate the masses starts here. Please like and share this post, and please leave comments, even if just to say, "keep fighting!"

WELCOME TO NHDRUGTASKFORCE.COM

This site is designed to expose the state of New Hampshire's hopelessly misguided mission to crack down on the illegal marijuana trade. As opiates and heroin/fentanyl in particular continue to devastate New Hampshire communities and result in a spate of fatal overdoses, the amount of attention, money and time the NH Attorney General's drug task force is spending on marijuana investigations is troubling.

County Attorney Andrew Livernois happens to be the town lawyer involved in the last civil case where the Drug Task Force itself was sued for being overzealous in their efforts to destroy a local business and ruin the reputation of the property owner. Livernois represented the town of Gilford (also sued by the property owner) and sat in on depositions of key witnesses that laid the scandal bare. Town representatives and the DTF itself clearly made efforts to make sure the business would never open again after the DTF's work to expose drug sales at the establishment and multiple other agencies being invited in on what should have been a focused, narrowly targeted warrant to be executed in a professional manner by DTF agents only. Instead, liquor commission members were invited. The code inspector was there. Town selectmen were there. It turned into a real "raiding party" and the Town of Gilford settled out of court to "buy peace."

Much of the cannabis product for sale on New Hampshire's streets is medical grade and legally sold in states that allow for recreational use of this federally controlled drug. Some of it comes from as far as California. All three US states bordering New Hampshire have recreational use laws for marijuana, but New Hampshire (thanks to our out-of-touch governor) remains steeled against any change beyond decriminalizing possession of 3/4 of an ounce.

The video above explains what happens when police officers have a crisis of conscience and realize the people they are busting for marijuana are actually decent human beings who deserve much better treatment.

As this site develops, it will focus on how New Hampshire is a truly backward state when it comes to pushing even the most ridiculously flawed and tainted marijuana cases, like one the author of this site faced himself. Stay tuned.