"I don't have to identify myself. Actually I don't. It's called 'common law'. You should read up on it."
An anti-mask Texas school board candidate got the shock of her life when she was arrested — despite her "right" to be there.
The bodycam footage from the Sunset Valley Police Department shows Lake Travis ISD hopeful Kara Bell lecturing two officers on how the law works... until they eventually lose patience and return the lesson.
The incident occurred on April 7, when police were called to an altercation at a Nordstrom Rack on Brodie Lane; employees claimed Bell had tried to enter a changing room without a mask; the worker claimed she shoved her way in before deploying the classic opening Karen gambit: calling corporate office.
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View StoryOutside, Bell insisted it was she who was assaulted... but refused to identify herself, making taking a report of the incident a bit difficult for the officers.
"It's my God-given right to be here on this planet, and you cannot tell me otherwise - correct?" Bell can be heard demanding, at the start of what would be a five-minute lecture.
Narrating the entire episode to someone on the phone amid bouts of emphatic head wagging and finger waving, Bell proposes the offending Nordstrom employee was actually racist.
"There was also another woman without a mask -- isn't that interesting how she only picked me? She only picked me, the white person. Not the Black person wearing a mask. Do you think it's a racist thing? I don't know."
"We're not here to talk about race," the female officer patiently tells her, in the video obtained by KVUE.
"Well you know what? It kinda seems like it's a racist thing when the Black woman doesn't have a mask on, but she comes after the white woman."
As she refuses to cooperate behind folded arms and pursed lips, the officer quietly lets her know that she actually already knows her name, prompting a furious response.
"How did you know my name was Kara Bell?" she demands.
"Because I heard you say it," the officer patiently explains. "You said it on the phone when you called 911."
"Don't Lie! You are lying to me!" she spits. "You are lying!"
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View StoryShe then cranks rant mode up to 11, animatedly explaining law enforcement to the law enforcement officers.
"First of all, I don't have to identify myself. Actually I don't. It's called 'common law'. You should read up on it. I do not. Okay?"
"I am a woman of God. This is much my right, as much as it is yours. This is my land as much as it is yours. I did not sign up for this. I am a Christian woman of God. And you are not going to put your disgusting rules on me, that are false, and not true. I will not have it. You understand that? I will. Not. Have it."
"I'm sick of being bullied, I'm sick of being lied to, and it's not going to happen any more. Do you understand? The CDC just released...."
And that's as far as she gets, before finally, some might say 4 minutes and 48 seconds too late, the officer finally steps in and slaps her in handcuffs.
"Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. OH MY GOSH!" is how the lecture ends.
Bell was given an assault citation, a Class C misdemeanor, punishable by up to $500.
She told officers she wanted to press charges against the Nordstrom employee, and completed a victim statement to that effect. According to the Austin American-Statesman, the employee initially was given a citation for assault by contact, but it was voided after two employee witnesses corroborated her testimony.
Nordstrom managers told police that earlier that day, a group of 10 to 12 people had also targeted the store by attempting to shop without masks on.
Police Chief Lenn Carter told the publication that Bell is part of a group that is planning another upcoming anti-mask protest, and that their activities are putting a strain on his 12-officer department.
"If they think they can come here and do that in our city anonymously, they can't," he said. "Our officers should be out there with crime prevention and responding to calls for help, not being used as political pawns or ploys for somebody's political ambition."
Bell is currently challenging incumbent Lauren White for a seat on the Lake Travis school board.