I get the impression that somebody has been a big fish in a small pond for long enough to forget the ‘in a small pond’ half of the phrase…
It isn’t exactly news that sheriff’s departments are a…deeply under-supervised… aspect of the criminal justice system; but merely almost never being subjected to relevant laws isn’t quite the same as actually having legal impunity. If you do piss off the feds (and getting uppity with the FBI and embarassing the State Department by harassing diplomats would definitely qualify) there is more than enough on the books for them to go after you with.
