A motorcycle rider is recording his ride with a helmet cam. He is cut off by an unmarked car from which somebody emerges holding a gun, orders the driver off the bike, and then identifies himself as a police officer. The driver gets a ticker. He posts the video on You Tube and pretty much forgets about the incident.
Thereupon he is served with a search warrant and charged with felonious recording; the maximum sentence is five years in prison. If not for undisclosed medical issues, he would have been arrested. It's illegal to record someone in MD without them knowing (unless you're Linda Tripp?). Apparently a helmet cam in plain sight does not qualify.
In a free country you do not threaten someone with five years in prison because he made the police look bad.
This will not stop until there are serious consequences for police and prosecutors--don't forget the prosecutor who is willingly joining the witch hunt--who abuse their authority. The rogue cop and the rogue prosecutor will get out of this scot free.
(Look at films from the 70s and 80s to see how scared people were about rampant lawlessness. We no longer live in such fear. But have we traded an unnecessary amount of liberty for the security we have? For that matter, how much security do we have when police abuse their power in the manner shown on the video?)
Oh, and why does it take two police cars and a drawn weapon to make a routine traffic stop?
Those police are working for us. Sure they are.
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