Help Joe Keil and you'll sleep better tonight.

If you've been reading this blog for any time at all, you will recognize the name Spammon. He raises the bar when it comes to leaving witty commentary. I've feared getting fired more than once for reading them while at work and laughing so hard I cry a little. He's married to Linds, who has left her own zingers in the comment box and I completely (I never say this about anyone, mind you) "heart" her. If I ever found myself in Utah, I would make sure that we got together to hang out. They are totally my kind of people.

Spammon is hardly ever serious on his blog, "The Daily Rebuttal", but what I read over there tonight infuriated me on behalf of his family. See the following from his blog and then please sign the petition. I made a direct hotlink at the end:

"This is in regards to my Uncle Joe Keil, Associate Cabinet Minister of Samoa. As an American citizen, on September 9th, 2008 while on his way back to Samoa from Brussels, Belgium on a diplomatic mission to the EU, Joe stops in Branson, Missouri to visit with family. He is forcibly detained by agents of the US Immigration Customs Enforcement, (ICE) His possessions were both searched and seized. No warrant for the search or for his arrest was shown. Joe was subsequently placed in handcuffs and shackles and housed in a cell in Missouri. He was initially denied visits from family and friends except for his legal counsel the day after his arrest. He is charged with felony counts of illegally obtaining and illegally using a US passport, though he has provided documents to DHS agents to prove the validity of both his US citizenship and the legal use of the US and Samoan passports.

September 12, 2008. Joe is finally allowed a visit from his three daughters, who cried upon seeing their father, stripped of his dignity in a jail jumpsuit, cuffed and shackled. He was kept in this fashion anytime he was outside of the cell until Monday, September 14, 2008, when Sheriff Jack Merritt and Captain Clayton kindly ordered the removal of these handcuffs and chains. He also mentioned the kind treatment he received from Lt. Howell and others during his time in jail.

September 17, 2008. Joe posts US $10,000 bond and is released from jail. The terms of his release include restricted travel no farther than the western half of Missouri. Upon release Joe found that his personal effects are missing to include his: California drivers’ licenses, US Federal Aviation Administration issued airline pilot’s license, his original Social Security card and both his US passport and diplomatic Samoan passport.

You can read the full time line of his life including his birth, service in the U.S. Air Force, election of offices and up to the time of his arrest here.

My family has started an online petition to free him and drop all charges that have been brought against him.

CLICK HERE to sign the petition . All you have to do is enter your name, e-mail address, hit "submit" and you're done. It'll take 2 minutes, tops; and then you can go to bed tonight knowing part of your day was spent doing a totally selfless act. Besides that, it's probably the only free thing you're going to do this week. As of this posting, there are 541 signatures. Let's see how many more we can get on there. Pass this along to everyone you know.

**If you have a blog and want to post this, I'll even e-mail you the HTML coded stuff to save you some time. Leave me a comment or e-mail me (see right sidebar)!**