Anti-government activist James “James Freeman” Springer turned a simple traffic stop into an arrest on Wednesday as he was making his way home from the aborted Lexington Takeover in Mississippi.
Freeman had left the “Lexington Takeover” event Tuesday night to drive Shawn Buckner back to Oklahoma after auditor Buckner had a blow up with event organizer Ron Durbin. He was pulled over for “following too close” by Arkansas State Police, despite claiming to have adaptive cruise control activated as he drove.
The YouTuber refused to give the state trooper his license, registration and proof of insurance. He then called Buckner to arrange bond as he felt he was going to be taken into custody for refusing the orders of the state trooper. According to Freeman’s account, he ignored the state trooper to continue his call with Buckner despite the state trooper’s threat to break his driver’s side window and enter the car.
Freeman expressed his opinion on the two options he faced during the traffic stop. He could either shoot the police officer in the face and have other police come after him or he could pay the extortion fees that the police officer was demanding.
After eventually ending his call and complying with the state trooper, Freeman was taken into custody and his car was impounded. He was charged with obstruction of a police officer and released later the same day.
Freeman claimed that he was near the border of Arkansas and Oklahoma when the incident happened and “he was told” that State Police were doing “drug interdiction” in the area and were pulling over every car with out of state license plates.
The YouTuber was unsure if he would fight the ticket, as he felt it was easily provable that he had his adaptive cruise control on and that he was not “driving too close.” Freeman said he could make money off of fighting the charges, but it may be easier just to pay the fines involved as the “thugs” involved in the court system weren’t going to let him prevail.
Again, Freeman was on the way home from the so-called “Lexington Takeover” arranged by Ron Durbin of Guerrilla Publishing. Durbin had been hospitalized on Tuesday when he had an extended verbal disagreement with Shawn Buckner. Freeman volunteered to leave the takeover to take Buckner back to Oklahoma as the “Takeover” ended with the hospitalization of Durbin.
Durbin was released from the hospital on Wednesday. Durbin’s son Lee released the following statement on Durbin’s YouTube community page on Friday: “Hey, everyone, just an update. Ron is out of jail, went to court, and has a date set for January. The charge was trespassing. We just got back to OK, and I have to take him to his doctor to get a cath. I’ve been very busy, so sorry for not giving an update sooner. He will probably go live later to give a rundown, thanks.”
We’ll update both Freeman and Durbin’s stories as either goes live.
