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> "For the first eight or nine years I was the most pulled-over man in America," he said. "It was constant." > Often officers simply wanted photographs. > Oth
by saghm 4mo ago
> "For the first eight or nine years I was the most pulled-over man in America," he said. "It was constant."
> Often officers simply wanted photographs.
> Other times they invented reasons to start a conversation.
> His favorite stop happened in a small mountain town in West Virginia.
> A traffic light turned red. Braithwaite stopped. The light turned green and he made a leisurely turn through the intersection.
> A few moments later, flashing lights appeared behind him.
> A police officer marched up to the banana and delivered the news.
> "'The reason I pulled you over, that light back there, you peeled out.'"
Their job is to take advantage of their authority to have fun at the expense of the time of citizens?
- williamdclt 4mo agoI'll happily live in a world where this is the extent of police authority abuse.
- tomalbrc 4mo agoIf only.
- teraflop 4mo agoIf you tolerate small abuses, and let people get accustomed to abusing their power in small meaningless ways, the abuses will only grow.
- lazide 4mo agoI can assure you, pulling over the banana stand is not the road to death camps. The death camps are.
- zmgsabst 4mo agoRoads don’t start at their end. And it didn’t start there in Germany, either banana cars or death camps.
- lazide 4mo agoEh, most roads start where other roads end or meet. The wheel turns, regardless.
- deleted 4mo ago[deleted]
- wat10000 4mo agoMaybe not death camps, but it is inextricably tied to real abuses. I don't see how you ban "driving while black" stops without also banning these.
- lazide 4mo agoYou also can’t ban these without making it impossible to stop 99% of real issues either. A giant banana car is the definition of unusual behavior, after all.
- mrguyorama 4mo ago"Unusual" behavior should not be justification for any police interaction. Society doesn't benefit from policing "Weird".
- lazide 4mo agoSociety (broadly) disagrees, and even trivial examples would have you agreeing with them if you thought it through. If a cop saw someone hiding in your bushes at 2am - stop and check it out, or nah?
- wat10000 4mo agoSociety broadly agrees, enough that it's illegal in the US to stop someone just for "unusual behavior." You have to have an actual concrete reason to suspect someone of a crime. Not that police always follow the law on this.
- lazide 4mo agoNot really, in the way you are using it. Only in specific edge cases and definitions, which I’m guessing you don’t know. And calling it ‘illegal’ is a stretch in 95% of them. Generally worst case any evidence gathered would just be inadmissible. After all, even if not a legal stop/detention, that doesn’t mean they committed a crime by doing it. But tell me, do you think any of these officers would have struggled to come up with probable cause to detain the driver of a giant banana car on a public roadway? Or any other ‘suspicious’ or ‘weird’ vehicle? Because I can think of at least 3 California vehicle codes off the top of my head that would likely apply, including CVC 26708, 24008.5, and 5201. And I’m not a cop. And all you need is an articulable and reasonable suspicion to detain. Stopping someone to chat (aka they can leave without penalty) is a much lower bar, though I doubt they did that. And you never answered my question.
- overfeed 4mo ago> ... the abuses will only grow. SCOTUS made race-based Kavanaugh Stops legal. Stipping a banana on wheels is a much lower bar
- kube-system 4mo agoThe problem isn't the severity of the infraction, it's the lack of respect for the rule of law, and an institutionalized acceptance of that practice. The prioritization of a respect for authority over a respect for the rule of law is notoriously problematic in small town america in very real ways.
- pak9rabid 4mo agoSounds like a fun way to make a lot of friends in law enforcement :)
- saghm 4mo agoRight, there's definitely not a bunch of pressure from the fact that they can throw you in jail for basically anything and probably get away with shooting you if they really wanted that would get in the way of a real meaningful relationship...