You may well be asking yourself: What does this have to do with a law-abiding civilian from California? Believe me, I have been asking myself the same question.
As I wrote in another post, for the last 15 months I have repeatedly gotten into strange conversations with members of law enforcement who seem to be expecting me to express racist or anti-Semitic views. They also seem to expect me to be some sort of deranged criminal, instead of the quiet, law-abiding woman that I am.
It has taken me quite a while to figure this out, but I believe that Tammie Lee Lawson, habitual criminal, may have stolen my identity. She and I are have the same hair, eye and skin color, we are the same height, and we are close to the same age (she is 12 years older that I am). While I don't think that our faces look that much alike, they look similar enough that she may have been able to pass herself off as me in person.
If I am right about this, God help me, because that would mean that I am at risk of being deported via rendition, too, even though I was born on U.S. soil (and therefore have birthright citizenship) and I have never committed a crime in my life. At any moment, I might be "disappeared," like a political prisoner in Argentina in the late 1970s.
While I sort this mess out, I have decided to post this blog: at least this way, I will be able to refer confused members of law enforcement to this page, rather that spend an hour or two trying to explain it all verbally (although I have been doing that, too).
Hopefully, I will get this catastrophe sorted out soon. I've always felt sympathy for ordinary civilians who end up on the TSA's "no fly" list as the result of having the same name as some obscure terrorist, and now I find myself in a similar predicament.
One other note: It must be a coincidence that my risk of being renditioned has increased now that I have begun publicly expressing concern about my safety (along with various other
concerns).
Elizabeth Walter,
San Diego, California
