There are places where the culture embraces malfeasance in office as one of the benefits of ‘public service’. In Louisiana , for example, men wanted to become police or sheriff’s officers in order to use their badge to make money. This was implicitly encouraged by paying ridiculously low salaries and older cops telling younger ones to ‘get out there and make some money’ in response to complaints about wages. Malfeasance as a way of life may be less common yhan in the past but there are enough documented cases that shows the mentality is still around. The state police operating west of Lake Charles frequently stopped expensive autos on I-12 for no real reason (’Sir your car was wobbling. That could indicate narcotics hidden in special compartments. We are going to take your car for a through examination at the police garage.) There followed some kangaroo court hearing with a magistrate in which ‘sufficient cause’ was found to seize the vehicle. The costs of fighting this process was so high most individuals just signed the agreement to have their car taken and were not charged with any ‘violations’. To their credit 48 Hours did a long segment on this including trolling for a cop stop by driving high end Mercedes with out of state plates along the interstate. Sure enough the cops pulled John Quinones over for the ubiquitous ‘your car was wobbling’ excuse. A 48 hours camera crew was trailing Quinones car and suddenly it wasn’t some hand held camera but a full camera crew present while Quinones questioned to increasingly belligerent state police office about his specific justification for the stop and why he wanted to search a vehicle whose operators had done nothing remotely chargeable. the 48 Hours crusade went further ambushing cops who had bought seized vehicles for a small amount of money and the complaisant magistrates who also seemed to have very fine rides compliments of the seizure program. The publicity and light shown on this scam ended it and some state police resigned to go to work for local parish sheriff’s offices. But the mentality remains ingrained. Public office for private gain and ‘respect my authority’ even if I am an obvious pile of excrement continues to be alive and well here and other places.
This is why I use a dash cam. :)
There are a lot of youtube videos now of cops acting badly. In one case that comes to mind, an oncoming cop swerved into a guys lane, causing the guy to veer to the right to keep from hitting him. The cop then turned around and pulled the guy over for crossing the centerline and almost hitting the cop. The guy showed the cop his dashcam, and explained what happened and that he had it all recorded.
The dashcam isn’t foolproof insurance, but it’s pretty solid. They have to cross a whole different line to confiscate that. The sooner you know it’s all been recorded, the more likely they are to pursue a different victim.
Thanks for the great account!!!! Ping!
A county in Illinois (do I need to say that it was close to Chicago?) ran a similar scheme for while not too long ago. All out of state drivers, most pulled over for 2-4 MPH over in a 65 or 70 zone, all shook down for money or drugs or the car itself.
“The publicity and light shown on this scam ended it and some state police resigned to go to work for local parish sheriff’s offices. But the mentality remains ingrained. Public office for private gain and ‘respect my authority’ even if I am an obvious pile of excrement continues to be alive and well here and other places.”
BTW, such seizures can occur on mere SUSPICION of wrong-doing...and if there is later a “not guilty” result for the supposed underlying crime, the asset is STILL GONE (oh, you can sue to get it back...but good luck being able to afford to sue a municipality or state with unlimited (compared to you) funds.
I had a Western Civilization teacher in high school (late ‘70s) who said that a government had to be VERY careful about taking or destroying a person’s house - because most people have to literally work a lifetime to pay for it, and if it is taken or destroyed then a lot of people will feel that they have nothing left to lose.