**PLAY THE GAME OR BECOME THE GAME Part 2**

When I got to city court to try to fight the ticket I noticed Eddy was already there and he was sitting next to the city attorney Steve Hollaway . I sat down and waited for a few minutes before the city attorney made a motion with his hand for me to come over to his table. We both told our side of what had happened and I began showing the city attorney the police report where Eddy had threatened to burn the house down that Heather Mulligan lived in. I also showed a copy of the protective order that I had placed on Eddy over the threats that he had made toward me and the look on Eddy’s face was real hateful. I told Steve that the protective order should have been made permanent since Eddy didn’t show up to contest it. I told him about what Eddy had done inside the court clerks office and about the counterfeiting in Southgate. The city attorney then told me that if I didn’t plead guilty to the disturbing the peace charge that I would never have a friend at the police station again. I told him that I didn’t think it was right for Eddy to get away with everything like he was and I wanted to plead not guilty. When I said that Steve told me that he would ask the judge for drug testing and jail time if I pleaded not guilty. I told him that I didn’t have any drug charges and I asked him how much jail time I was facing. He didn’t answer me right off so I went ahead and repeated my not guilty plea. This seemed to infuriate him and his face turned red. He looked at me and said with an angry voice get over there as he pointed to some chairs on the other side of the court room. He called the police officer to the stand that had placed me under arrest and this officer is a really nice guy by the name of Joel Pierce. Steve asked Joel several questions and then it was my turn to cross examine Joel. I asked Joel if he had any kids and he said yes. I then asked him what he would do if someone was harassing his family and Steve objected to my question. At this time I stated that I had no more questions. Judge Brown asked if anyone else had anything to say before he made his decision. No one said anything and the judge said that he was finding me guilty but he was reducing the fine in half. The city attorney told the judge that I had already paid the whole amount when I posted bond and Judge Brown said that a check for 77 dollars would be mailed to me. The judge asked if there was anything else and I asked the city attorney if he was going to ask for drug testing and jail time. Steve said no and I was satisfied with the verdict the judge handed out because I was in fact guilty but I felt like I needed to at least get a couple of words in. I believe that Judge Brown is one of the most fair men in this town and I thanked him for giving me half of my money back as I was leaving the court room.

A few days later I got served papers for a protective order that Eddy had placed on me. I decided to try to talk to the local F.B.I. agent about what Eddie had gotten by with at the Beckham County Court House and I was extremely curious how he got all those felonies erased. I called agent Brad Thompson at 580-225-6000 and he is our local F.B.I. field agent. I told Brad who I was and I explained that I would like to setup a meeting to talk about a few things. He wanted to know what was going on and I told him about a few of the things that had happened. I told him that I thought that someone from the drug task force had told Eddy to jack with us because of information that I had learned about the corruption in this county and he got very defensive. He told me that he worked with these guys and there was no corruption in Beckham County. I could tell that I wasn't going to get any help from Brad but before we disconnected he said he would look into some of these things and also said he would setup a meeting with me soon. After I got off the phone with Brad I called the Oklahoma City F.B.I. to see if I could find out anything from them. I spoke to an agent and he told me I should call the local agent in Elk City. When I told him I had already spoken to Brad and he told me there was no corruption in Beckham County he said so you don't trust the local F.B.I. huh. Before I could say anything Brad came on the phone and told me that our meeting was canceled and said that I didn't have enough credibility to ask questions about corruption. It was kind of scary how Brad all of a sudden came on the line like this and there wasn't much doubt that he was listening on the line the whole time that I was on the phone with the F.B.I. in Oklahoma City. Brad hung up on me after he finished saying what he had to say and I felt really shocked by what had just happened.

The next day I went to see the district attorney at the Beckham County Court House and I talked to Dennis Smith himself. I told him about the situation and he said that he didn't make the laws he only enforced them. I told him that I was concerned about the charges all getting erased on Eddy's case especially since he had a protective order on me. I told Dennis Eddy had pointed a gun at me and threatened to burn my house down. Also I told him Eddy had parked behind my wife at Walmart where she couldn't back out and he just did so many other things that the police should have put a stop to. He told me that he would check into some of this and I shook his hands with him on my way out of his office. While I was at the court house I saw a friend that worked there and she told me that the sheriff had put a restriction on Eddy. I asked her what she meant and she said that Eddy could never come inside the Beckham County Court House again without an escort from a deputy sherriff. I thought she was joking but sure enough it was true because a few days later when I got to court to appear on the protective order Eddy came in the court room escorted by a sheriff deputy. I couldn't believe it and an awful lot of bizarre things were happening. I think the sheriff was angry that Eddy was able to get all the charges erased and he was going to make sure that eddy behaved himself from now on while he was inside the court house.

A judge from Custer County by the name of Judge Weadon was temporary taking Judge Haught's place and the judge was the wife of the head Oklahoma Highway Patrol over Beckham and Roger Mills County. The judge asked about the night I had gotten arrested for the disturbing the peace and I explained what had happened in detail including the names I had called Eddy on the phone. I had then said that Eddy was definitely no saint and I found it absolutely incredible that he had to be escorted into the court house by a deputy sheriff because of what he had done inside the court clerks office. The judge asked Eddy if he had anything he wanted to add and he said that he wanted her to make a decision on a permanent protective order right then because he didn't want to come back later on. Judge Weaden told Eddy that he was winning and she couldn't issue a permanent order at the time. She set another date for us to come back and I think the whole thing was an embarrassment to the court system.

When the next court hearing rolled around Eddy was doing a couple of weeks in jail over the possession of a forged instrument charge he had got over the counterfeiting incident and I think the only reason he even had to do these few weeks was because the detective that had arrested him went out on a limb to make sure the charge stuck. He was the same detective that had told me that Eddy was just a little slippery the day I had met with him at the Elk City Police Department and I believe that he wasn't the only member of law enforcement that was angry about Eddy being so slippery by using blackmail.

Judge Haught had to ask a deputy to have a jailer bring Eddy over from the jail so we could have the hearing on the protective order. After Eddy was brought in Judge Haught asked him what he wanted to do and Eddy said that he wanted to drop the protective order. He also said that he held no animosity toward me and the judge said he was lifting the protective order. As I walked out of the court room I couldn't help but to think that this was all some kind of twisted game that had gotten way out of hand and I think if Eddy hadn't got in trouble inside the court house that all this would have ended up way worse. The more I thought about all the things that Eddy had got away with the more questions I had about all this. Eddy had got away with all those felonies inside the court house, threatening to burn me and others out of their homes, counterfeiting, waving a gun at people, jacking with my wife and kids, and he even has to have a deputy escort him inside the court house from now on but he still had enough credibility to put a protective order on me. I believe anyone can see a very troubling picture with all this and I'm convinced he was blackmailing somebody very powerful to pull all this off.

To me this place is like a million piece jigsaw puzzle and its seems as though I have put together the outside but getting the inside pieces to fit are much more difficult. I didn't have anymore run ins with Eddy after this but I was constantly having to deal with a lot of games being played by many others involved in the corruption. 2006 was a real bad year because my dad died and he was a very wise and respected man around here. He was eighty one years old when he died and he had lived a great life. I wish I would have learned a lot more from him when I was younger and he could do so many different things. Toward the end of 2006 the games got more difficult and I believe the people that are in control of this town were trying to persuade me to give up my taxi service by making things as hard as possible without being too obvious. Sometimes I would go on over a dozen calls and spend hours on the road but I wouldn't make any money because I believe the phone was being controlled so I would only get calls from certain people. Either the person would already be gone, they would cancel when I would be almost there, or they would do something really irritating like say oh I forgot my wallet. Its not possible to have as many difficulty's as I did without someone giving orders to make it happen that way. One trick that was constantly played was someone would call every few minutes to see how much longer it was going to be before I arrived and when I did arrive they wouldn't answer the phone or was no where to be found. I would take off and as soon as I would get a few minutes away they would call back to say sorry I'm ready now or something similar to that. This behavior became very common and what a cruel way to do someones business.