Another Case of Gov Abuse
We hear about it everyday. This government office is corrupt, or that elected official is dirty. But we always think that there are avenues to pursue, legal remedies to these people. That is what the US government is all about, right? Freedom from persecution, rights of the individual, the State not having absolute power over our lives. Well, I am a living example that when there is corruption in government, noone at higher levels truly cares enough to investigate.
Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Ron Glick. I am a 34 year old single father of a 12 year old boy who I have raised since he was an infant, since he was five on our own. Seven years ago, I set up a youth recreations program that focussed on promoting educational games and activities amongst youth. And for the last two years, I have been dating Mara Pelton, who has two daughters of her own. We even set up a business together in our town of Kalispell, Montana, to allow for the youth program to have a full time facility. Life was on track until July of this year, 2003.
Jerry and Dixie Nezat are Mara Pelton's parents. And as it is ofttimes in relationships, Mara's parents do not like me. For whatever reason - I am not rich, I am not the "right" person for their daughter, whatever their reasoning - they decided to eliminate me from Mara's life.
On July 9, 2003, Jerry and Dixie asked to take one of the granddaughters, Lavitia Pelton, alone to their house. This had been a request made over and over again for over a week and a half. They wanted to have Lavitia visit alone, allegedly to do house work for them. Each other time they had asked, Mara and I had been too busy to comply with their request, even though the request seemed rather odd in that they did not want the youngest granddaughter visiting, just the eldest. At any rate, on the above date, it was agreed to let Lavitia go with her grandparents.
That evening, after spending six hours alone with her grandparents, Lavitia made a sudden and unprecedented allegation - she claimed I had molested her! It took months to find out what really transpired that day, but one thing I knew to be true was that I had never molested Lavitia and I knew Jerry and Dixie were somehow behind the allegation.
What came out months later was that when Lavitia was three years old, she had witnessed her mother, Mara, nearly be raped by a man named Shane, a family friend. Something in things Dixie said to Lavitia during the day triggered that memory, but the memory did not emerge completely. Instead, Lavitia internalized the memory and saw herself as the victim. When she confessed this partial memory to her grandmother, Dixie insisted the memory was of me and convinced Lavitia to press charges against me. When the full memory surfaced months later, Lavitia was wracked with guilt over the harm she had caused and acknowledged I had never molested her.
To make a long story short, a report was filed and an investigation was launched on the initial night of July 9. As nerve wracking as a false allegation of this nature was, especially to a single father running a youth recreations business and nonprofit organization, it was made even worse - the reporting officer with the Kalispell Police Department, Myron Wilson, tampered with the witnesses, Lavitia and Mara Pelton, by telling them I had a prior record for child molestation, when I have no record of any sort whatsoever. Additionally, threats were made to Mara Pelton that if she did not dissolve all ties to me, her children would be taken away. The intent had been to compel negative testimony against me and to discourage people who might testify on my behalf from allying with me by intimidating the witnesses into believing me a criminal by nature and to be afraid to continue to associate with me.
When I discovered the tampering, at least as was done to Mara since I avoided contact with Lavitia during the investigation, I did what I thought was the proper legal action - I first asked of the presiding detective over the case, Doug Overman, why Myron Wilson would have done this. Doug Overman denied the officer would have done such a thing since it was obvious I had no prior record. Next, since it seemed obvious the Police Department would only continue denying that it happened, I sent a letter demanding damages for the action.
When an Officer lies to witnesses to coerce testimony, it is a felony. Noone has the right to tamper with witnesses, not even law enforcement. Unfortunately, most people do not realize this and accept that Police lie and that's just a fact of life. A police officer can mislead, hypothesise, even make assumptions - but the moment that Officer tells a witness something that is not true or threatens a witness to compel the witness to change his or her opinion and/or testimony, it becomes a crime.
In response to my demand, my business became swarmed upon by various government offices making demands of me and my business. Most of the demands were simple enough, if unwarranted in that no other business in my area was being asked to comply with these requirements. Finally, after months of inspections from the Fire Marshal that just continued to get more and more outrageous, I finally sent another letter to the City demanding the harassment stopped. That, at least, has happened.
Finally, in October, I was informed that the Police investigation was concluded. Detective Overman told Mara Pelton the case was closed and that no charges would be filed since his belief was that if it did happen, it happened while I was asleep (a point I did not agree with, but if it got the case closed, who was I to argue?). I confirmed additionally with the school counseler, Mary Jane Foxx, and the Kalispell Junior High School staff that they had also been told the same thing. Tana Ryggs with the Montana Municipal Insurance Agency, who was handling the claim for the city, had also been informed that the case was closed and no further action would be taken (in fact, her office could not process a claim until the investigation was closed and the reason she contacted me was to begin the claim process). I also called and confirmed for myself with the Police Department that the case was closed. Mara also received a letter from the Child Protective Services around this time that their investigation was also closed.
Continued in Part II