I thought this was going to be the trailer for the Rambo reboot.
You have armed gangs running around with institutional impunity, seemingly all of it.
What you have there is commonly known as a Police State.
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I’m curious to know if civil forfeiture exists in any countries other than “the land of the free”?
I get the forfeiture part…it just doesn’t seem very civil.
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The surest way to avoid getting pulled over while DUI is to drive 5 over.
Unless it’s a country road or Chicago tollways. Then you better be doing at least 15 over.
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Sort of, but generally with courts a lot more involved, not cops just grabbing what they can.
In some places bribes serve the same purpose. Pay the cops, or else…
The last time I got pulled over and the cop asked “do you mind if I search the vehicle?” my replay was “As a matter of fact, yes I do mind” and he immediately grabbed his radio: “I need a K-9 unit here I have a refusal! Step out of the vehicle sir!”
So obviously refusing a search is suspicious behavior and therefore probable cause for a search…
Then an hour on the side of the road while the cops and dog “searched” my car, the first cop telling me “it’ll go easier on you if tell me now what you’re hiding before the dog finds it.” I watched the dog cop signal the dog to react and then say “he’s giving the signal he’s found something!” Lol
Eventually they gave up and left empty handed. I gave a parting “Sorry to waste your time!” to which the cop responded “Just doing our job!” Omg “THAT WAS SARCASM!” I shouted as they drove off, leaving my stuff all over the side of the road.
I guess I’m lucky they didn’t destroy my piece of shit car just for kicks, or, you know, shoot me. I avoid driving through that town now.
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Legally, it absolutely is NOT probable cause for a search. Unfortunately, they don’t need probable cause to bring the dog in. Having the dog sniff around the outside of your car does not require probable cause or a warrant. So yeah, if you refuse a search, and they still think you’re hiding something, they may very well bring the dog out, and the dog alerting on something will give them the probable cause they need to search your car. They really need to change when they allow the dogs to search. There is a mountain of evidence showing the dogs will alert whenever their handlers want them to. You can even see this at work in this video. The handler led that dog to the general area that bag of money was in, and you know that dog knew about bags of money, saw that, and was like, “oh boy! a bag! If I pick this up, I’ll get a ‘Good Boy’ now, and that means treats later!” I’d bet my life savings (which isn’t much, but still) that that dog would have acted the same if that had been a brand new, out of the box ziploc filled with brand new, out of the box Monopoly money. Anyway, I’m sorry that happened to you. It shouldn’t have. You still did the smart thing by refusing the voluntary search.
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Most of it will still be there, but… Wells Fargo account fraud scandal - Wikipedia
fuck Wells Fargo.
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I almost got searched while traveling through Missouri once. I was moving, and had my rental car filled to the roof with my things. I stood my ground, telling him how it took me more than a couple of hours to arrange everything just right in the car and that he was welcome to search it, but I expected him to put everything back the way he found it.
Go figure, he let me go without a search. My guess is that he didn’t want to go through the hassle, but it’s quite possible it was because I am not a POC.
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Yup. Found a roach in the ashtray of a rental car once. The weed kind, not the insect kind.
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As part of the law enforcement money grab and risk of injury to suspects, they should probably stop using dogs. If they can make a case that they are effective for cases other than search and rescue or explosives detection, fine. Otherwise, that funding should go elsewhere.
Police departments shouldn’t be operated for profit, either. The incentive to solve crime doesn’t have to be based on kickbacks. Not rewarding it would discourage a lot of their criminal behavior.
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Since I don’t smoke, I’ve never looked in a rental car ashtray. 
. Next time, I’m gonna need an extra hour to check out the vehicle…
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I’ve lived through this same infuriating experience. If you refuse a search they can detain you for a certain amount of time, I think 45 minutes? to wait for the K-9 unit to arrive.
When it happened to me I stepped around the van to see what was going on, but well away so’s not to be a threat, and saw the cop flicking a rag at the dog. When he saw me he got SO mad and started screaming, “get on the other side of the vehicle NOW! Get on the other side of the vehicle or YOU ARE UNDER ARREST!” It was really scary.
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This is exactly what comes to mind when I think of such criminal organizations (no, not the cops this time, the banks). WF should have been disbanded and the execs gone to prison.
Soon after the whole WF thing exploded in the news, there was an ad in the paper (yep, I get the local Sunday edition delivered like it was 1989). Over breakfast with my kids present, I spotted a full page ad from WF trying to say something like they’re nice people, really. I called the number and nicely told the rep that WF is criminal and I would never do business there and she should send my message up her management chain. My kids still remember that, must have made a real impression. (And should really watch what I do in front of them!)
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I think that was, perhaps unintentionally, excellent parenting. I’ve been proud of times my folks spoke truth to power, it’s good when those things resonate.
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Obligs…this should be mandatory viewing for everyone in America
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Very true. I remember an incident when my father was at a local bank and a teller refused to cash a check for no good reason. He’d had an account there for many years. So, he came home and he and my mother went back to close all of their accounts.
The teller tried to say they couldn’t give him the money immediately, but he insisted. They called the police and when an officer showed up, he greeted my mother first (she was a librarian who knew most people in town). I guess the teller wasn’t expecting that. So, they got the money and opened accounts at another bank. When we kids were older, they told us the story so we’d never accept treatment like that, and also to explain why we avoided banking there. Thinking back, my parents were members of a lot of clubs and community associations. Sharing that story probably cost that bank a lot of business. It closed about ten years later.
Let’s hope that stories like this highway robbery continue to spread, too. We have to keep up the pressure to defund and restructure policing to stop these abuses.
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I remember my mom, in the 80’s, being told by a salesman that she needed to go home and check with her husband before making the final decision to buy a car. She was earning more than my dad at the time. She asked the guy if men had to get their wive’s permission, while he was sputtering she left and got a similar car elsewhere.
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So that’s where that went. My bad. /s
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