Austin Steals Elderly Veteran’s House for Crime of Having Fallout Shelter

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


Again, why not allow him to remedy the situation instead of evicting and condemning his home? There could have been many different ways to handle it but they took it to extreme (IMO).

Where else are you reading on this?

reply to post by N3k9Ni


They didn't interrogate him for 10 hours. They kept him somewhere safe. He doesn't mention a SWAT team, he mentions cops. Read the less hysterical version posted a ways up in this thread. I could tell by the title this was going to be another nonsense fest with paranoid ATSers blowing things out of proportion. Then you throw in Alex Jones making a living off of the multitudes of morons that believe his half truths... A one sided story, an edited news clip... But of course the big bad govt. 'stole' his house for having a perfectly safe fallout shelter.

Originally posted by Domo1
reply to post by N3k9Ni

 

They didn't interrogate him for 10 hours. They kept him somewhere safe. He doesn't mention a SWAT team, he mentions cops. Read the less hysterical version posted a ways up in this thread. I could tell by the title this was going to be another nonsense fest with paranoid ATSers blowing things out of proportion. Then you throw in Alex Jones making a living off of the multitudes of morons that believe his half truths... A one sided story, an edited news clip... But of course the big bad govt. 'stole' his house for having a perfectly safe fallout shelter.

You mean the one that says this?

The visit triggered a search warrant at the home. Austin police and fire personnel, including members of the police SWAT team, bomb squad and fire search and rescue team, did a full sweep of the home Saturday, Matthews said. The warrant was executed shortly after 7 a.m.; neighbors were asked to leave, and the home was searched for more than four hours, Matthews said. Nearby Metz Elementary School served as the emergency crews' staging area.

How do you know he was not being interrogated? The OP article says that and the other article doesn't say otherwise.

reply to post by N3k9Ni


Oh. Oops. I could have sworn the only place where it mentioned SWAT was on infowars. In the video he says he was taken to the elementary school. I think he would have made a point about being interrogated. Perhaps he was though. I'm off tonight.

While the story is crappy let's make the distinction here the local government is the agressor here not the feds and while people hate on banks and hate the feds when it comes to homes considering no one in this country pays property tax to the feds but they do pay their county.

That little fact couple with local laws means they can do whatever the hell they see fit don't have to like it and for whatever reason if it was the modifications,

Still sucks for that guy

reply to post by Domo1


YOU NEED A FEW MORE RED PILLS IN YOUR COFFEE BUDDY....THERE ARE FAR BETTER AND MORE HUMANE WAYS OF TREATING PEOPLE.
I THINK YOU SOUND LIKE A GOVERMENT SHILL HALF THE TIME...
THE POOR OLD GUY COULDNT HAVE HAD THE CITY HELP HIM COULD THEY?
NO, THAT WOULD BE HONOURING THE ELDERLY GENTLEMAN WITH SOME RESPECT AND DIGNITY....THEY INSTEAD RAID HIS HOME WITH AN ARMED SWAT TEAM, AND INTERROGATE HIM FOR 10 HRS.....
THERE SEEMS TO BE A LOT OF HYPOCRACY IN EVERYTHING THE GOVERMENT DOES...COULD IT BE SIMPLY AN EXCUSE FOR GOV BOYS TO LINE THEIR POCKETS AND NOT A PUBLIC SERVICE AS TOUTED.....?I SURE THINK SO....................
TELL ME, IF THE GOVERMENT IS SO FOR AND OF THE PEOPLE....WHY ALL THIS CONSTANT VIOLENCE PRONE OVER REACTION BY AUTHORITY......EVERY UNUSUAL OR OUT OF THE ORDINARY CIRCUMSTANCE, THE SWAT COMES OUT AND THE GUNS ARE FLASHED ALL OVER AT THE POOR WATCHING PUBLIC AS THEY INTIMIDATE THE PUBLIC WHILE THEY OVER REACT TO SOME HARMLESS GUY....ITS JUST LIKE A BUNCH OF BULLY BOYS...COPS MY ASS.....

reply to post by chrismicha77


WTF!

(screams to self) !!!!! F!

Swat team for his poor old man. I swear. We deserve some bad things in our future. How in the F did we let this happen to our country.
Where is my country? This is some weird bizarro land copy.

Who the hell said we need to look for terrorists amongst our elderly? Are they retarded? Why not send swat to raid the drug houses they Know exist, or anywhere they know real crime exists.

I want to explode. This is one of our guys. You know. The people who gave it all. To all you servicemen. Look.

This is how much your government loves you. This is your future old age. When you can't do crap about it. You will become a victim of public safety.

Go bush huh?

reply to post by stirling


I am a government shill. I actually agree the SWAT team was a bit much. That being said, I have no idea what people were claiming they saw in the guys house. Perhaps the neighbors reported a meth lab or bomb making materials.

I wonder what inspired the gentleman to dig out this shelter. Considering the foundation was less than 600 square feet and the hole was allegedly going into the neighbors yard in spots I'm surprised the house is still standing at all. It's sad this guy may lose his house, but in the end I believe the authorities acted appropriately.

reply to post by chrismicha77

Again, why not allow him to remedy the situation instead of evicting and condemning his home? There could have been many different ways to handle it but they took it to extreme (IMO).

How CAN it be remedied? If he built his bunker using concrete, the city inspectors have absolutely no way of knowing whether it's up to code - are the walls thick enough? Where (if any) are the reinforcement rods? Did he use welded wire fabric in the slabs? How thick are the slabs? Did he have a structural engineer size the load-bearing members to handle the weight of the ground/home above it? And a hundred more issues pertaining to just the safety of the structure. He obviously did none of that by bypassing the building department when building his illicit underground bunker. His bunker may even affect the structural integrity of the neighboring homes, depending on how close he tunneled to them.

I assume that what prompted the first visit by city inspectors was a complaint by a neighbor, it says the man gave them permission to look in his home, and when they found just how large and deep his underground tunneling went, and perhaps the guns and 55-gal drums down there, they called in the police and bomb squad - as a SAFETY PRECAUTION because at that point they had NO IDEA what sort of person they were dealing with. For all they knew he had a meth lab down there, or a bomb factory. They erred on the side of caution. I don't think there is a city out there that would have reacted differently.

I work in architecture and deal with city building departments and building codes all the time. IMO, the city is facing a real dilemma, they simply have NO WAY to determine the adequacy and safety of what this man built when he tunneled out the earth beneath his home. You can't just shovel dirt back into the hole, and unfortunately he may have doomed his house to the wrecking ball because that is the only way to assure safety for the neighborhood. He's also lucky he didn't his a gas line with all his digging.

Sucks to be this guy, but he got caught by the city building an illegal structure*, at BEST they'll fine him and make him remove the structure (how, exactly, that can be done is anyone's guess), at worst the city will condemn the property and raze the structure.

* It's not illegal because it's a so-called "bunker", but rather it's illegal because it's not properly engineered, and approved by the city building department to assure it meets zoning and building codes.

ETA: One possible saving grace, assuming the city engineers deem the house hasn't been structurally compromised is they could potentially fill the hole/tunnels using pumped in concrete. You can't just shovel dirt back in there since there would be no way to compact it properly. Concrete pumped in using a vibrator to assure no air pockets is about the only real option to retain soil stability.

I totally agree with some of the comments on the OP's Infowars link:

Francis Marion says:
May 9, 2012 at 5:39 pm

Everybody remember the entity called “Code Enforcement” is controlled by
the “United Nations Universal Property Maintenance Code”.

This is used worldwide to CONDEMN PROPERTIES bankers want to STEAL
off individuals for whatever reason they choose.

This CRIMINAL United Nations “Code Enforcement” racket is FORCED on
cities and towns by the FEDS and their “matching funds”. If a municipality
chooses NOT to allow the U.N. to RUN THEIR TOWN the Feds simply with-
hold gov’t matching funds.

Francis Marion says:
"You can smell Freemasonry all over these kinds of Kindergarten monkey shines.

Their rituals and occultic “punishments” would be hilarious if they did not cause
so much heartache to so many innocent people.

First off NOBODY had a right to ANY DISPUTE over what Mr. Del Rio was doing
in his OWN HOME in his OWN BASEMENT, since it wasn’t harming anyone else.

Man who dug space under home sues city

Owner says private property is being taken; crews set to start filling pit today.
Published: June 10, 2010 (Two years ago)

Joe Del Rio, the retiree who excavated a huge pit underneath his East Austin home that prompted a raid by SWAT and bomb squad officers last month, is suing the city for taking his private property by filling in the hole, his lawyer said Thursday. Source

Did they give any reason the article omitted, such as that the shelter rendered the structure unstable or something on the lines of that. Way I saw it, most people built the shelter under their garden instead of under their house.

And finally is it just this one house, or is Austin looking to get a whole batch of property in the area where the mans house was, for whatever project?

i blame alex jones...

i don't know this, but think considering the situation and the fact he is in austin, this is an alex jones fan boy.

19 fire arms and granades??? i am not saying that it is illegal for him to have the firearms (i think they were returned) but the fact that he has such a cache of weapons screams paranoid alex jones fan.

this was not a ww2 structure. this was recent.
look at the diagram, there was no way this house was going to survive some of the storms austin gets.

the fact that he went under the neighbors yard at points also mean that he is compromising his neighbors due to his delusional paranoia...

they should not have taken the house IMO, but they should have filled it with concrete and sent him the bill...
i wouldn't feel so strongly about it if he was only endangering himself, but at this point he is endangering his neighbors...

Originally posted by baphomet420
i blame alex jones...

i don't know this, but think considering the situation and the fact he is in austin, this is an alex jones fan boy.

19 fire arms and granades??? i am not saying that it is illegal for him to have the firearms (i think they were returned) but the fact that he has such a cache of weapons screams paranoid alex jones fan.

this was not a ww2 structure. this was recent.
look at the diagram, there was no way this house was going to survive some of the storms austin gets.

the fact that he went under the neighbors yard at points also mean that he is compromising his neighbors due to his delusional paranoia...

they should not have taken the house IMO, but they should have filled it with concrete and sent him the bill...
i wouldn't feel so strongly about it if he was only endangering himself, but at this point he is endangering his neighbors...

You could say that about any prepper, are all of the AJ fan boys? There are preppers who would give a small army a run for their money.

She said the deepest part of the bunker was 35 feet below the surface.

Travis County property records show a 586-square-foot home was built at the address in 1927

I think this sums up the real problem here. It wasn't that he was building an underground bunker, it was that he removed darned near all of the supporting soil under the foundations of his small home and rendered it a danger. I've done Hearts and Hammers work on homes of that era in TX, a 1927 home of that size probably had Bois D'Arc stump footings on grade as the supporting structure. It's a pier-and-beam structure, but the "piers" are just stumps sitting on the ground. You can't just go excavating under something like that without causing major potential structural problems. It sounds like concerned neighbors notified code enforcement. Obviously he didn't have a permit for this, so they're obligated to investigate it.

Among the items recovered from the home were several weapons, inert grenades and 55-gallon barrels, which turned out to be empty, Matthews said.

Sounds like when they investigated, they saw drums, weapons and grenades. Of course code officials don't know a live grenade from an inert one, so they in turn had to call in the police. That's what "escalated" this into the arrest and questioning of the owner. Sounds like they determined he wasn't a danger and released him though.

Note that the above quotes are from a 2010 article. The City probably notified him that he needed to repair the damage he had done and he didn't, so now it's 2012 and the City fixed it and billed him. He apparently couldn't pay, so they took his home.

I don't see a conspiracy here. It's a sad and unfortunate situation to be sure, but the homeowner is to blame for it, not the City.

Anything pertaining to Alex Jones at this point should be labeled fiction. The guy has zero credibility.

Originally posted by edgecrusher2199
Anything pertaining to Alex Jones at this point should be labeled fiction. The guy has zero credibility.

Actually, AJ brings a lot of good information to the public. Can everything be believed that he says? NO!

Originally posted by edgecrusher2199
Anything pertaining to Alex Jones at this point should be labeled fiction. The guy has zero credibility.

Actually, AJ brings a lot of good information to the public. Can everything be believed that he says? NO!

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


Fill it in with concrete and be done with it.

Let's guess what'll happen next, the rest of the neighborhood will have something close to the same as the properties are then sold to a developer who is in tight with TPTB in Austin and greased enough palms.

What a LOAD!

Derek

He should contact the ACLU and other agencies. I'd bet the ACLU would have a field day with this one, and by the time it's over with their lawsuit, he'd have one heck of a new house...