"CRYSTAL'S FOLLY": CRYSTAL DUPRE (Publisher of The Meridian Star) orders DEPRIVATION OF RIGHTS to both black and white members/attendees of christ's church in action, preventing them from attending a public function for which they had paid tickets! MAYOR AND CAO INVOLVED IN DEPRIVATION OF RIGHTS UNDER COLOR OF LAW!

THE STORY:

 I.  ANTICIPATING A NIGHT OUT 

On September 30, 2008, four people were looking forward to going to the Temple Theatre in Meridian, Mississippi, to attend an event called “Sample the South.” It was a heavily promoted event, having been written up in the local newspaper, The Meridian Star, prior to the event, 3 times.  Not once, not twice, but 3 times.[1]  

The four people were Richard Lofton, Lucinda Johnson, Pastor Wade Demers, and his wife, Patricia Demers. Lucinda Johnson was particularly looking forward to meeting Robert St. John, the syndicated humorous food columnist, because she enjoys his articles. They were all looking forward to the event because it was a night out to sample the foods from many restaurants, and they all like to eat!   Also, they personally knew some of the restaurateurs.

They got dressed up and went downtown to the historic Temple Theatre, where the event was being held in the ballroom.  Richard Lofton and Lucinda Johnson waited in a long line, while Pastor Demers and his wife kept a brief appointment they had down the street.  They arranged to meet up back at the theatre shortly.  After waiting in the line for awhile, Mr. Lofton and Ms. Johnson finally got into the building.  There were people everywhere; it was crowded.   Richard Lofton was at the ticket table picking up the tickets, when simultaneously, all of a sudden, Crystal Dupre, the publisher of The Meridian Star, accosted Lucinda Johnson and ordered her to leave the building; she would not give her any valid reason.  Ms. Johnson had done nothing to warrant this.  Richard Lofton picked up the 4 tickets, and turned around to find Lucinda Johnson gone...he went outside and met up with his friends on the sidewalk, and shortly after that they were told by Crystal Dupre, the publisher of The Meridian Star, that they could not go in to the event. 

Lucinda Johnson has described the situation in a statement made from notes she wrote down directly after the event took place. She has told me that she is in the habit of doing this now, after so many government officials, law enforcement people, and media people over the years have lied and done so many unethical things to her and to her associates in the church, even to the point of having them falsely arrested in order to keep them quiet about crimes being committed by high level officials in government.

Ms. Johnson was involved years ago in producing 46 television shows exposing corruption in the State of Rhode Island. She is no stranger to the tricks that are pulled and the need of documenting the events so that the truth can be brought out.

II.  YOU NEED TO LEAVE, NOW 

To backtrack a bit to just before the event, Ms. Johnson relayed details of how, after standing in line for awhile with Richard Lofton, they got to the point where they were inside the building.  Crystal Dupre accosted Lucinda Johnson and said, "Lucinda, you’re not supposed to be here.  This is a Meridian Star event. You know that.” 

Ms. Johnson said, “No, I don’t; it’s open to the public. It said in the paper that everyone was welcome.” [2]

Ms. Dupre said, “NO, it’s a Meridian Star function and you have to leave.”

Ms. Johnson said, “But what did I do?” 

Ms. Dupre would not answer that question (of course), but told Ms. Johnson, “You need to leave, NOW, or I'll call the police!”

Ms. Johnson turned around and immediately exited the building.  Mr. Lofton, meanwhile, was still in line at the table getting tickets.  Because of the crush of people and the noise, and because he was facing the ticket table, he had no knowledge at that time of the scene that took place between Ms. Johnson and Ms. Dupre.

Ms. Johnson had come out the side door that went directly to where the event was being held, and walked down the block towards the front of the building where she had seen the pastor and his wife. She told them that Crystal had ordered her to leave.  They decided that they would simply walk back up to get their tickets and go in all together, as they had done nothing wrong and had paid tickets. 

He suggested that Ms. Johnson call the police for an escort in to avoid any further trouble, since Ms. Johnson had been harassed by Ms. Dupre. Ms. Johnson called the police, described the situation, and they said they would send someone over.  

Pastor Demers, his wife, and Ms. Johnson walked up the street and saw Mr. Lofton coming towards them with 4 tickets and 4 “goody bags.”  

I will now quote directly from Ms. Johnson’s statement: 

“Crystal Dupre came out as we were standing on the sidewalk, with a phone to her ear. Pastor Demers told her that we had already called the police. She came over to Pastor Demers, got right in his face, started telling him and us to move, and was being very pushy. Pastor Demers quietly said to her, ‘Who do you think you are?’ She said, arrogantly, ‘You KNOW who I am.’

 “At one point during this, I called the police again to see if they were sending someone.  The dispatch lady said, ‘Yes.’ I told her we were being harassed, and she asked by whom.  When I told her it was Crystal Dupre and what she was doing, the dispatch lady seemed shocked.” 

A police car arrived, and Ms. Johnson went up to the responding police officer (L.K. Cannon) and told him that she was the one who called, but then she let Crystal Dupre talk to the officer first. I quote again from Ms. Johnson's statement:

“Crystal Dupre came up and started telling (the policeman) that an attorney's office had contacted us and that there was an injunction against us, and that we were not allowed to go in to any Meridian Star event.  (BERACHOT’S NOTE: THIS WAS A LIE.  CRYSTAL DUPRE LIED TO THE POLICE.  THERE WAS NO INJUNCTION OR ANY LEGAL ACTION OF ANY KIND, AND THERE IS NOT TO THIS DAY.)

“I told the officer that this was not true and that there was no legal action, just a lawyer’s letter which contained lies about us. 

“At one point when I was talking to Officer Cannon, another couple of policemen came rushing up to Officer Cannon and took him aside, and one said, excitedly, ‘This is from the chief, he said: “Get them outta here.”’ 

“There were four officers all together until a fifth one, Patrolman Miller, came later. The four officers were:

                         -L.K. Cannon (first responder)

                        -D.D. Wilburn (said chief says to “get them outta here”)

                        -D. Willis

                        -E.C. Shirley 

“After Officer Cannon and Pastor Demers spoke for awhile, we began to leave. A man, who was standing with Crystal Dupre, demanded that we give them our tickets back, but we said no. 

“Please note that after we left, we immediately called Police Chief Dubose, at approximately 5:38 pm central time, and Sharon his secretary at the time, said that he was not there, he was in a meeting at city hall at the mayor’s office.” 

III.  MAYOR SMITH’S OFFICE GAVE THE ORDER 

In a meeting with Meridian, Mississippi Police Chief Benny Dubose two days later (Oct. 2, 2008), Chief Dubose himself provided (to Lucinda Johnson, Pastor Demers, and Mrs. Demers), more details of what happened that evening.  At the time when the 4 individuals were attempting to attend the public event (shortly after 5 pm), Chief Dubose happened to be in a meeting at the Meridian City Hall, with none other than Mayor John Robert Smith and Ken Storms, Meridian’s Chief Administrative Officer. 

Chief Dubose told Ms. Johnson, Pastor Demers, and Mrs. Demers that, on the night in question, Crystal Dupre called the mayor and said something to this effect: “The Demerses are here--what  should I do?”  Ken Storms spoke to her and said, “Call the police.” 

One might ask why Crystal Dupre would be calling the mayor, after hours, in a situation like this. (When Mrs. Demers asked the chief this question, he said, “I guess they’re friends.”) 

This puts together for us what happened when Crystal Dupre had the phone to her ear after removing Ms. Johnson and telling the four people they could not go in.  It appears that Ms. Dupre felt confident that her threat to Ms. Johnson had scared her away, but when faced with the fact that Ms. Johnson and her three friends were at the door with their four paid tickets, she didn't know what to do, so she called the mayor.

Chief Dubose also provided the explanation for the other officer who rushed up to Officer Cannon and said, excitedly, “This is from the chief—he said, 'Get them outta here.'” 

The chief told Ms. Johnson and the Demerses that, after the phone call between the mayor’s office and Crystal Dupre, the chief called the supervisor on duty at the police station, James (J.C.) Lewis, and said, “You know who Wade Demers is?”  Lewis said, “No.”  The chief said, “It’s the guy with the beard who comes in to see me.”  Lewis said, “Oh, yeah.”  The chief said, “Well, they are at the Temple Theatre. You need to take care of it.”   Remember that the chief of police acts under the direction of the mayor. 

Patti Demers said to Chief Dubose that he should have had his officers investigate the situation properly and get all the information from both parties, instead of just believing Crystal Dupre and arbitrarily forbidding us from attending the event on her “say so.” 

(After all, she did lie.  There was no injunction, there is no injunction to this day, and there was and is absolutely no kind of legal action/document of any kind in existence as described by Crystal Dupre to the police officer.  She made that up in order to use the police to enforce her and the mayor’s desire to get rid of these people.) 

When Mrs. Demers told Chief Dubose he should have had the situation investigated, he agreed with her. He said, “You’re right.  I called the supervisor and he was supposed to go down there himself and he didn’t—he sent someone else.”  (We at The Arm of Justice personally doubt that it would have made a difference, but we understand that the chief had to come up with something.) 

IV.  BERACHOT’S THOUGHTS

This is just something that came to mind as I was putting this together. This type of thing makes it obvious that there is no such thing in reality as equal protection under the law. If you have social status, wealth, position of any kind, etc., it appears that you can call the police and use them as your “thugs” to carry out violation of people’s civil and constitutional rights. 

And, the really sad (and disgusting) thing to me is that the reason these people get away with doing this is because all of YOU won’t say or do a thing about it! The people at the Mississippi Writers Guild did it when Terrence Roberts used the police to remove two innocent people from their meeting .  None of the Writers Guild people said a word.  They don’t care.  Unless it was happening to them, they are not going to do or say anything.  No one has said anything about what Crystal Dupre did, either, in conjunction with Mayor Smith, when she used the police in the same fashion. (See "INJUSTICES ABOUND ALL AROUND THE TOWN!" BLACK MAN IN MERIDIAN, MISSISSIPPI DENIED ACCESS TO PUBLIC EVENTS AND RESTAURANTS! HIS RELIGIOUS BELIEFS CAUSE THE DISCRIMINATION!)

And no one else in that city or anywhere else has spoken up or anything of the kind (regarding the serious crimes that have been committed against this church, including the burning of their building with no proper investigation by the police), with very few exceptions. When one gentleman was brave enough to say something, all of a sudden he mysteriously dropped out of the mayoral race and says he can’t speak up anymore on behalf of these victims.  It sickens me that I have had to get involved to the extent that I have had to, because the people who should do something “look the other way.” 

V.  FUN “BRAIN THING” TO TRY

Let’s think about how it would go down if the situations were reversed.  Let’s say it was Lucinda Johnson, or Pastor Demers or Patti Demers or Richard Lofton who LIED to the police to try and get Crystal Dupre or the mayor in trouble.  I wonder what would happen to THEM?  I wonder what would happen to them if they even tried to CALL the police on those individuals?  We already know. 

 VI.  IMAGINARY INJUNCTIONS AND OCEANFRONT PROPERTY IN ARIZONA

Also, regarding this imaginary “injunction” that Crystal Dupre came up with, there was never any such thing! Crystal Dupre made it up. The Meridian Star and Crystal Dupre retained a law firm who sent one 1-page LETTER, to Ms. Johnson and the Demerses, containing falsehoods.  A LETTER is NOT an injunction or any kind of legal action!

I have seen this type of letter before.  It is an attempt to intimidate people who have knowledge of crimes by high level officials to "shut up" and stop trying to bring those crimes to light.  It is terrible that someone can tell a lawyer something that is not true and get that lawyer to "sic 'em."  Just shows you what money and power can do. 

It is quite interesting to me that Ms. Dupre was that desperate to keep the truth out of her newspaper, and that she is such a puppet of the system that this is the length to which she would go to please her string-pullers.

The Arm of Justice responded to the law firm with several letters detailing facts to counteract the lies that were in that letter. This law firm has never proceeded with any legal action, and, in fact, “backed off" totally after receiving the correspondence containing the facts. They also claim to not represent Ms. Dupre and The Star anymore. 

If Crystal Dupre, The Meridian Star, or the lawyer's office had had a leg to stand on, they would have proceeded in court.  They have NO evidence of any kind against the Demerses, Ms. Johnson, Mr. Lofton, or anyone else who attends Christ's Church In Action.  And, my theory is that they wouldn't dare bring them to court, not only because they have no evidence that these people ever did anything wrong, but also because then all of the truth would come out regarding the crimes they have committed.

One final interesting note:  It seems Ken Storms has bought the “imaginary injunction” theory, also…although he claims he never used the word "injunction," he tried to mislead Mr. Lofton in a meeting he had with him (on Friday, April 3, 2009) into that theory as a reason that what Crystal Dupre and he did was legally sanctioned, as opposed the fact that what she did was illegal! Terrible. 

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See also "INJUSTICES ABOUND ALL AROUND THE TOWN!" BLACK MAN IN MERIDIAN, MISSISSIPPI DENIED ACCESS TO PUBLIC EVENTS AND RESTAURANTS! HIS RELIGIOUS BELIEFS CAUSE THE DISCRIMINATION!