#14 The Big Report

This essay was first stamped into the courts on December 7, 2002, though was never officially read or accepted as evidence at the time of the verdict. I think as with all of these essays The report consists of this essay and a powerpoint presentation showing why the case was basically a farce. I had some hope that all that was needed was a little logic and reason. Unfortunately, this was never ever the case.

A short essay about this case.
1.
In any lie there must always be an element of truth. Without these little pieces of the truth, we would never believe that what we were hearing are anything but stories. But if you know what you are hearing is a lie, and you want to find what is the truth, perhaps it is in the bits of truth that we may find the real story. I contend that on May 15, 2002 Mr. Zareba intentionally hit me with his car. The reasons for my belief I include the documents that I give you today. It is also my contention, that not only was Mr. Zareba to blame in this incident, but that the style of the prosecution has been an extension of the original attack that has lasted, without stop for four months. In this text I wish only to express what I feel has happened to me and some reasons I believe why.

When I was a boy, I knew a friend who had a pellet gun, and I was very jealous. One day, I borrowed the gun from him to play with it and to see what it was like. I wanted to shoot. Because I needed a target I chose to shoot at a bird. The people who lived next door had a bird feeder. I waited until a small bird landed there to eat and I killed it. I am sure that before I pulled the trigger, all I was thinking about was the gun and how to use it. But when I saw the bird fall, I knew I had done something wrong. I took a hose and I sprayed the area with water to try and make things clean. And then I went and I hid the body so that no one would know what I had done. And then I gave the gun back to my friend. I didn’t like the results of what I had done.

I simply do not see that what Mr. Zareba has done is any different from this story. I think that Mr. Zareba attacked me purposely with his car. But when he missed me with his first pass, he realized he had done something quite bad. When he pulled to a stop in front of me, he was probably going to say something to try and make the situation go away. Probably he was going to show his badge and bully me with it. But I punched him in the face quite quickly, and this must have confused him. And then, when I rode to the KSP, he realized that if I told them the truth, he would be in some trouble. So, he drove quickly after me to try and cover for himself. And everything he has said and done since then has simply been to hide the truth and to save face for his original actions.

It is the opinion of my friends, that the reason he had attacked me with his car is because he is simply a mean man, and that he had only done this because of some personal problem on his part. They tell me that in Warsaw it is quite common for people in cars to give riders problems. But I am an American, and to my eyes Zareba has done this for money: There was previous damage to the right side of Zareba’s car ( I say this because from the papers I have of the experts damages), and what he intended to do was to bump me and say that this damage was my fault so I would pay him money. My friends say he was mean, I think, he did it for the money. There is also the thought that there was an element of the truth in what he said, and that the reason he attacked me was for trying to go in the lane ahead of him...

But for whatever reason he did what he did, he certainly knew it was a bad thing and that he wanted only that no one should know about it. And so he started talking. And when he told his version of the story to the police, because he was a cop, they listened to him and not to me. I went into a cage, and he went home. And also because he was a cop, the prosecutor decided to favor him in this case. And everything that has happened in the last four months has only happened to try and cover up for what Zareba did actually do on May 15th of this year.

2.
When the prosecutor got the case, he could see that because one of the people involved in the case was a policeman and the other was a foreigner, an American he had a difficult situation. However the problem was that there were two different stories and there was no real evidence that the policeman was right. And this presented some problems to the prosecutor:
1. Because Mr. Zareba was a policeman, it would be difficult politically to say that he was to blame.
2. Because I was an outsider, an American and for all intents and purposes, I must have looked like someone who does not receive much respect, to side with me would be politically bad as well.
3. If he backs Zareba, even if he looses, he is still seen as helping to defend his own.
4. If he backs me, the police have a problem because of this thing that Zareba has done goes against how the police would like to be seen.
5. But If he backs Zareba, because the facts are not good and there is little real evidence, the case would be very hard to prove.
6. So, to win without proof, he must gain a confession from me that I was to blame.

So, the prosecutor made a decision to do what he thought was the best thing to handle this situation and pressed for Zareba and accused me of this crime. So now he needed a confession from me, or at least an agreement on my part to give Zareba some money so the situation would be closed. However, I never did agree to this. And this has been the cause of my problems here in Poland. All of the events that have occurred since have been a part of this original descision. The withholding of evidence, not telling the truth about hearings, the purposeful extension of the case, threats etc…

Normally, we call this a power play. Normally such a plan might have worked and the person being leveraged like this would capitulate and problem would go away. I think I was aware of the situation when I gave my testimony on the 16th of may when I say “if you let me go now, I will not press charges”. I think I understood what was happening and that I thought that this would be a fair deal. But I have not capitulated and there are some very good reasons on my part, perhaps things that the prosecutor was not aware of why I could never do this.
1. I had been attempting to establish something in Belarus. Both in the bikes and with a Russian language play. If I was to admit to such a crime, especially as I had not done it, I would be making future problems for myself in the region in terms of my reputation and my integrity. And this I simply could not do.
2. I simply didn’t have enough money to give to Zareba. What I had, was only a little money, and all of it was marked for bikes and expenses for the play. There simply was not enough to hand over to a cop just because he wanted it. Any money I gave to him, was money that came directly from my fiancée, my associates, my partners in Belarus, and my fiancées family. And I simply could not allow this.
3. I live by my reputation for honesty., I have established this reputation with hard work in New York, and elsewhere. I enjoy this reputation and I have earned it. I am also a playwright. And both the bikes and the writing require absolutely my personal integrity. If this should be lost for any reason, it would be infringing upon my ability to do these activities for the rest of my life. And so for this at least, I certainly could not lie.
4. I am a confirmed biker, and I am in the bike business. As a bike man I could never condone what Mr. Zareba had done to me when he attacked me with his car. This action abuses the cardinal issue of trust between the cars and the bikes. When you are on a bicycle, you are naked, but for your clothes, to protect you from a fall. And because it is dangerous to ride a bike on the street, there must exist a trust between the riders and the cars around them. And this trust is simply that the cars, so much bigger and faster then the bikes, must take extra care not to harm you when you ride. Without this trust that the cars won’t hit you, especially intentionally, biking would be impossible. At the moment when Zareba came from behind me with his car, he broke that bond of trust. He was using several thousand Kilos of steel to attack my body. And I had no defense for this attack at all. I am simply fortunate that he missed me the first time, because if he would have made contact, I would possible have been under the bus and possibly dead. This is why he got his punch in the face.
5. And finally, as this was technically an extortion, to agree to pay would be to open myself and others up for more of the same in the future. If I agreed to let this pass, I would be doing a disservice to my community. If I agreed, I was no better then the man who did this to me. And as a biker, an American, a Jew or simply a man, I could never agree to such a thing.
I have said many times when asked why I had done this that I had no choice. And this is the truth, I simply could not allow this to happen. So I have held my ground. But, nevertheless, the prosecution continued. I say that the goal of this prosecution was not the truth, but to get me to comply with the prosecutors wishes that I admit to guilt and make this problem go away. And this has been my dilemma.

3.
The prosecutor’s first step was to ask to have me jailed for three months. The judge didn’t agree that this was necessary and granted me bail. But this was no good for the prosecution, because if I was free to return to my life, I would not be under his control. And so he passed papers complaining about the bail. I was not happy about paying bail, but bail is returned when you come back, payments of extortion never get returned.

I was quite scared. I had only come for a few days to get a new visa and do some shopping, and now I was being pursued by the police for a crime I did not commit. I felt I could not stop them from doing what they seemed so intent on doing. But what I could do was to try and finish as much of the work that I could that I had started in Belarus. So, I called my fiancée, and on her vacation from work, she came to Poland and the two of us went to Gdansk to be together. We were there for about two weeks and during this time I finished the bulk work of the Russian play. During this time, papers were sent to my address at the youth hostel at 53a Karolkova street. These papers were about a hearing concerning the holding of my passport and the temporary arrest. Because I was in Gdansk, I didn’t get this paper because I wasn’t there to sign for it. This was my bad luck. However, I was back in Warsaw on the night of June 11, and I went to the embassy on the morning of the 12th. Mr. Foster Stolte talked to me there, along with one of the polish employees. I asked them for a courtesy phone call to the prosecutor to find out the status of my case. And what I was told was that the papers were sent to the courts, that it would take about a month to decide what they would do, and that I could expect my answer within a week. This information was not true. And because I was given false information, I didn’t know that there was a hearing scheduled for the 12th, which I would have attended.

But even though I was not there, the judge decided that jail was not necessary, but decided to keep my passport. But, because there was false information about the meeting given, now there was another lie to cover for. And so, over the next few weeks, everyone who had any contact with the prosecutor urged me to give the prosecutor my “real” permanent address in Poland. This was the American embassy, my courier friends who spoke to him, and anybody who had contact about me through the America embassy. These requests I didn’t understand, because I had no such place. And I didn’t feel it was in my best interest to lie. It was not until only a few days ago, that a friend read to me the whole of the letter from the courts telling me about the hearing. I don’t speak or read polish. It is my opinion that the reason this “real” address was so needed was because if there was such a thing, then the fault of the missed meeting would be switched to me, vindicating the prosecutor for the lie about the meeting. If the note had simply gone to the wrong place, this was my fault, and the lie about the meeting as told to the embassy was moot. And this really made the prosecutor angry, because when I wouldn’t capitulate to this lie, the time frame from the psychological examination of the 15th of June to a promised meeting with a court appointed attorney was changed from two weeks wait, to five.

4.
At that meeting, there was no attorney present, so there was no consultation and no advice as to the situation or even what was proper legal procedure. I was never told that the attorney was notified a month before. I was never told what the meeting was about, or what the consequences of simply allowing the case to close. A translator read the documents to me that day and this was all. But my attorney was not there, and gave me no information other then that he was complaining about the documents. If I knew then what I know now, I would have simply allowed the books to close.

I feel that my attorney did this to me purposely only to extend my stay. I say this because of several reasons
1. when the meeting of august 30 came, he tried to make the same complaints even though I specifically told him at the time not to.
2. To this day, I have never had one meeting concerning procedure, or form, or time lines from them.
3. I have never been represented by an attorney at any meting or hearing or questioning.
4. When I have asked questions about procedure or time, I have been given false or no information.
5. When actually attending a eeting in which there was a chance to question Mr. Zareba directly, I was not given and warning for this meeting, and my acting attorney asked only one question.
6. That they have continuously told me that the case against me is all that they care about in terms of my defense.
So, I say that because of the original crime was committed by a policeman, there has been an attempt to cover up what has been done. Because there was no evidence, the cover-up has not always been legal. And because the cover-up was seen as a local matter I have not even gotten any legitimate defense in my case. And at the time of this writing (the English) I have only today been told who the judge in my case is. This information did not come from my attorney.

5.
In Zareba’s accounts, he always starts his story’s by saying that there was an initial meeting, where I was changing lanes and got in his way and that he must brake and signal. And always after this we go immediately to where he is the first one parked in line and there are several cars behind him. I am always in front at the start, and then behind only a moment later. I think that this time gap, is the flaw in his story that indicates what he did actually do; attempting to hit me and then sliding to a stop in front of me. But in the big picture of his story, this non-moment is unnecessary because all Zareba really wants to say is that the biker is all at fault. But because a lie needs that little piece of truth in it to seem real, this detail becomes important and he puts it in. He is using a piece of the truth to try and make a lie go away: something happened before the biker hit him. He did this same thing in the third meeting when he explained away his water damage and the not-by-hand right side of the car damage by changing his story to account for new information. He did this in his second account when he added the chunk of truth about being too close to the bus, probably because he was told that he must account for a motive for the biker. And, this was probably his plan at the junction when he skidded to a stop in front of me. But always in his stories, he has done nothing.

In his first statement to the prosecutor, Mr. Zareba was not talking about parking too close to the bus or complaining about the biker riding between the cars. To read his first statement, the one written without the help of the prosecutor, we see a very scared man who only wishes for us to know that it was all the fault of the big bad biker and that he wanted some money from him. In the final statement of the account, he says only that we must understand one very important thing: he didn’t do anything wrong. “There was no contact” he says. Twice. “ I didn’t touch him with my car” he says. And even his final word: “Before this event, nothing happened, I didn’t do anything.”

I say Mr. Zareba very, very much did do something. What Mr Zareba did was to attack me with three weapons. First he used his car, when he tried to hit me with it and then pinned me with it to the bus. Second he used his policeman’s badge, to make sure that my story was not heard. And third, he used along with the prosecutor, the very system he was supposed to be defending, the time consuming bureaucracy of the law, as a tool of extortion to help cover for these lies. I believe he did what I say he did, and that the system knowingly aided Mr. Zareba.

I say what he has done is the following:
1. He attacked me from behind with his car while I was riding my bike.
2. He made false accusations against me.
3. He blamed me for previous damages to his car in the hope of collecting money.
4. Because of his actions and statements I have been purposely and illegally held in Poland for four months so far, for a crime I did not commit.
5. I have been held apart from a place where I was happy, had a serious relationship, and had made plans to continue there in my lines of work.
6. I have been psychologically abused.
7. I have been made somewhat paranoid because of the constant threats and accusations I must endure every day. This from the prosecution and also from the people who would come to talk to me about my situation and give their opinions day after day after day…
8. I have been lied to.
9. I have been forced to live in an unnatural living situation, where I had no privacy for an extended period of time.
10. I have been denied access to information.
11. Because I had to pay for this stay, I am now completely without money.
12. Because I am without money, I have lost any chance of establishing the business I began.
13. Because of this, my partners lost their money that was intrusted to me.
14. And along with this any hope that they would have had for the enterprise and any good it would have done their lives.
15. My fiancée has been… abused in ways a woman should never be abused: she lost a man, a friend, a companion, my financial support and whatever hope would come with such an arrangement.
16. Because of this action, We have seen each other for all of twenty days over the last four months. That she still supports me at this time is most all that I have in terms of my own hope.
17. Her son lost a male figure in the house, and was forced to have this situation fed to him in the form of his mother’s pain.
18. And this applies as well the whole of my fiancées family who lost a provider as well as a friend in the household.
19. My own parents, now in retirement and facing health and money issues of their own, have had to deal emotionally with their son having to participate in the debacle as well as a lost investment they could not afford.
20. My friends and my colleagues in the west have had to deal with this situation and how it affects our relationships. And this applies to my reputation and my integrity and even questions of my ability to control my own physical actions. Regardless of outcome I may never be able to restore or rebuild any of these relationships.
21. I have been completely removed from a life I was happy with.
22. Because I have lost all of my money in this, I am now personally in debt to some friends from Poland who have sustained me while I was here.
23. In every moment of every day for four months I have to deal with how I am being extorted from and that I have to fear jail and a ruined future for something I have not done.
24. I have had my property stolen from me (My computer) because I was obligated to stay in a place where one should only be for a few days at a time.
25. I have had to do work on this case, such as this paper, for no other reason then to defend myself against these false charges. I have no idea how many hours or how many papers I have written...
26. I have had to do this work alone because of my attorneys inattention or personal opposition to defending me. Or directly that he was working against me.
27. I had my Russian language play delayed for months because I was not there to do the work that needed to be done in person.
28. Because to me, this has been a false imprisonment in a place I had no business with other then a five day shopping trip, I feel have been robbed of all my happiness of life or any sense of joy or laughter. I now have days of almost suicidal depression because of this.
29. I have been forced into conversations with people who were simply stealing from me and given no choice because of my “situation” to give them access to me.
30. Because of the lifestyle I have been forced to lead, my physical health has begun to fail in ways that I worry if I can ever restore.
31. I have been called a liar far too many times.

6.
So, concerning the incidents of May 15 is all false. This but a game of extortion and coercion Mr. Zareba should never, ever have hit me with his car. What he did was the single most horrible thing a man in a car can do to a biker. To have tried to cover up for this And after I was taken, I say that to have used the legal system of Poland as a tool of coercion is unjust and detrimental to the very trust that people have concerning their relationship to its authorities.

This entire case has not been a legitimate and rigorous pursuit of the truth, but about coercion, lies and abuse. I say that this case has been a cover-up started to simply hide the facts of the real crime. This must stop now. What Mr. Zareba did by using his badge to silence me was purely an abuse of his authority as a policeman. I say It has been going on for far, far too long. I say that what has happened is that I have been attacked, and that this attack has used three weapons:
1. Firstly he used his car, when he tried to hit me and then pinned me to the bus.
2. Second he used his badge, that he was a policeman to make sure that my story was not heard.
3. And third, he used the very system he was supposed to be defending and the time consuming bureaucracy of the law as a tool of extortion.

I believe Mr. Zareba has had a lot of help in this. And I believe that the system knowingly aided Mr. Zareba in simply trying to hide a really stupid and senseless action on his part. I think that everything that has happened to me in the last four months is only because of the attempt to cover-up the true facts in this case. I believe I should be vindicated in this, that I compensated for what has happened and that mine, and all the lives of all of the people I am connected to who have been hurt by this be restored. I believe that the real guilty party’s should be punished, and that it should be made clear to everyone that such things that have been done should never be allowed to happen again. That the people who are involved are in a position of public trust shouldn’t make them immune for their actions, but even more responsible. The original situation was bad, but the actions that have followed have only made things worse.
This case is about a breach of trust. This trust is the thing that we must all feel in our lives in order to have what we call society or civilization. The breaking of this trust has been the biggest crime of all. The right thing must be done. I believe what I have done, and what I am now doing is what I feel and believe is the right thing to do. This trust must be restored.

Adam Goodman
Tuesday, October 01, 2002