Michael Reichert of the Collinsville, Illinois Police Department, you picked the wrong Star Trek fan to mess with. I encourage those of you the least bit interested in basic American Civil Rights and the manner in which they are daily trod upon by law enforcement, to watch the following video in it’s entirety.
Now, I have known a lot of cops in my life. A lot. Some good, some bad, but all convinced of their own superiority over the “civilian” populace and all quite confident that they can and should be able to do whatever they want in the daily operation of their profession. Michael Reichert, complete with his own criminal record and basic bag of unethical traffic stop tactics, is a fairly average representation of what you get with a lot of crappy, ego driven cops. A guy who, on a slow day, is looking for the cheap thrill of busting an out of stater with a half a joint in his ashtray. It’s nothing too surprising.
It is, however, illegal, and a good example of everything that’s wrong with American drug laws and the people we have trained to enforce them.
Reichert is no different than his dog.
Trained and hardwired to receive tail wagging joy from sniffing out even the smallest amout of so called contraband and oblivious to any sort of remorse at producing a false positive and harrassing the innocent.
I’m quite sure that, after a nice evening of licking his own balls, he slept quite well on the night of December 4th, 2011. Maybe dreamed of busting a Babylon 5 fan with some Lemon Poppy Seed Muffin crumbs under the floor mats of their Volkwagen Golf. Who the fuck knows.
I do know it’s wrong. And that, like any dog, Reichert needs reprimand and retraining so he can stop shitting on the Wall to Wall Carpet of Freedom.
Kudos to Terrance Huff and his excellent dissection of the incident. The more this sort of thing is exposed the more hope we have that our basic civil rights might not be trampled on so often for such petty concerns.
