It's stunning how dictatorial the so called land of the free can become.

I live in the US. When I first read the story, I thought, "man, what country is this story from?." I was surprised I saw the reference to the 5th amendment.

I'm glad my neighborhood isn't like this! The only really annoying ordinance that I know about (so far...) is no parking on the street between 2AM and 5AM (annoying because I often have friends over during that time period and my driveway is about a 30% grade--people hate parking on it)