Your experience as an international tourist in a part of the US where the economy depends on tourism, and your experience in France, may differ from the kind of

Your experience as an international tourist in a part of the US where the economy depends on tourism, and your experience in France, may differ from the kind of experience that that lawyer was advising people not to get themselves into. US citizens (especially non-white ones) often have nasty experiences with the police. For example, the police in my own city are infamous for electrocuting people in order to extract false confessions.