I am a former employee for the Town of Brookside and its police department. I worked as one of their dispatchers and I can only describe the experience as psychological terror. The employees are treated as bad if not worse than those stopped by the police. I quit after a year for many reasons, namely the corruption and horrid behavior. For over a year I told people the stories and no one believed me or thought I was just a disgruntled ex employee. It’s so nice to see justice on the way after having to sit back and see it go on for so long. Also, if anyone is curious, look up Mike Jones and his past. He is a known embezzler but was hired by Brookside despite this fact. If anyone is wondering where all this money is going then I can tell you - it’s going in his pocket and the mayor’s pocket. Thanks again for shedding light on this.
I for one am glad that you were able to get out of that hell hole. I think that you have been doing a better job than Sysiphus in relating this story. You have been vindicated. Please continue to provide assistance against this injustice. Evil wins when God men do nothing.
Exactly! my friend, trekidaho... Yep... when they know that everybody knows that they are AT FAULT or have BROKEN their OWN LAW, they will go into HIDING or SIMPLY RESIGN from their position... Why can't CIVILIANS do the same??? ROTFLMAO!!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Back in 2016, I had been a brick mason for years. My neighbors were the snooty type who would never talk to you about any potential issues, they'd just have the cops talk to you on their behalf. Well, I guess one day they got tired of the pallet of bricks in my backyard because they called the cops on me for "illegally dumping" off my dock. Yeah, me throwing bricks I paid for to do the job that keeps a roof over my head, in the lake. Tooootally. So I lived in a small town in Michigan, only about a square mile wide. Completely no-crime area until this new police chief steps up after the old one retired, suddenly every single kid is a hoodlum, every driver is suspicious, you see where this is going. Police chief himself responds to the call. Doesn't knock or anything, instead he just wanders into my backyard and starts taking pictures of my property without any sort of invitation. I was woken up by my girlfriend at the time that there's cops in our backyard, so I rush downstairs and into the threshold of my backdoor in nothing but my boxers and ask the officer, "Hey, you got a warrant?" His response: "I don't need a warrant to conduct a civil investigation-" blah blah blah. He tried stepping up to me so he could occupy the threshold of the door with me, at which point he would already be inside the house. So before he got to me I took one small step forward and locked us both out of my house. "Oh, you shouldn't have done that." So he puts me in cuffs, says I'm being arrested for interfering with a police investigation and resisting an officer, and that he needs to run my license. I told him that for obvious reasons I didn't have it on me, it's in my pants, so he adds additional charges for failure to identify and failure to possess a valid ID. He proceeds to tell me that he can make do with my vehicle registration, so I tell him that I don't have my keys either and my car is locked, and that I do not consent to my vehicle being forcibly opened and searched. Didn't stop him, he broke into my car and retrieved my registration and POI from the glovebox on his own. Takes me down to the police station IN my boxers, I'm released immediately after being booked, had to sign a bunch of stuff saying I'd appear in court (you bet your ass I was going to court over this, I told them as much). THEN had to have my girlfriend pick me up in my own car while I was forced to wait out front, still in my boxers. The two weeks go by with regular phone calls from this guy telling me that if I just apologize for disrespecting him and his authority, he'll drop all charges and we can go about our lives. No way in hell was I doing that, I told him every single time I had him on camera abusing his authority and violating my rights, and I'd see him in court. On the DAY before, he calls me first thing in the morning and says it's my last chance and he'd *really* like to put this whole thing behind us, probably because I wasn't backing down. I told him: "You know what? Fine. I gotcha. I'm sorry you think I disrespected you and your authority by knowing my rights. I'm sorry you think that my voicing my displeasure at being wrongfully detained and then arrested and driven into public in nothing but my boxers was crossing a line for you. I'm sorry you're getting cold feet about going to court when you were all about levying charges on me in the heat of the moment. I'll see you tomorrow morning." and hung up. We never got to court. Before the end of regular business hours that same day, the front desk lady at the local PD (who was honestly very nice and respectful, and we knew each other outside of her job, being a small town and all) called me in the early afternoon and told me that the department had dropped the charges against me and we wouldn't need to go to court. I was very appreciative of the fact that I didn't have to miss a day of work and thanked her for letting me know, but I wasn't done with him yet, so I asked her for the IA email address, and I get it. I then email a copy of the video my girlfriend had taken the entire time I was being detained, cuffed, arrested, and hauled off. I didn't find out until after she picked me up and she told me about it, because she remembered another incident we had where I told her to record police interactions because they will absolutely lie and they're encouraged to do it. I also asked for and received the email of the Department Commander, since he was the highest up in the department you could go that was still beneath the Chief with any reports, complaints, or grievances. Sent him a copy too. I then went to the official website for the town to get the email for the city council board, sent them a copy. AND for good measure I sent a copy to Channel 7. To make an already long story MUCH shorter, after waiting around a while and living life as normal, I find out that Chief isn't Chief anymore. I finally felt vindicated. I don't know if the video I sent to the news ever got any airplay, I don't watch the news like that, but I'm sure the bad publicity and reporters blowing them up for an investigation combined with it being an official city council topic of discussion on the docket played a role in the amount of pressure the town administration was under played a part. Funnily enough, after a little while, the town went back to normal. Police were sleepy instead of jumpy, they'd actually wave to you instead of follow you around, the local kids stopped getting into trouble for nonsense reasons, people stopped telling me about getting tickets or pulled over for the most victimless of infractions. Moral of the story: ALWAYS stand up to authority, especially when it's being abused. The only thing you do when you lay down and accept your fate is hand the opposition an easy victory.
Yeah I mean at this point the number of cases like this and worse abuse across the country I assume that cops judges and the rest are basically corrupt by default and we need to see evidence otherwise for exceptions.
@Baba Ganush issue at this point is for too long and far too many have decided that supporting other Police comes before integrity and duty to their community
@@Krzemieniewski1 The police officers and their supporters. It’s been proven that if someone has a vested interest in something they will go and vote for it more than someone who is against something.
@@SavingSally not surprising at all. Long story but I moved away and came back 10 years later. I got pulled over 3 times within a 30 day span. It was a total of 13 cops and a k-9 unit. I went and talked to the sheriff and threatened to get a lawyer involved... Luckily they left me alone after that.
On a recent trip to Birmingham, I saw several Hoover Police vehicles in the median on I22 near Brookside. They were still there hours later on the return trip. Someone explain that please.
This is the police force that needs to be federally investigated...now. The fact that the State has not stepped in, already. If you live near there, buy a dash camera that shoots in at least 2 directions.
Any officer that gives false testimony where video evidence proves this needs to be held in contempt of court, be referred to for criminal contempt as a charge, and needs to have all of their old cases/testimony reviewed and possibly those old cases re-tried at the police department's expense without the officer's testimony.
This reminds me of Philly cops and how there was so much corruption and extortion and other BS (that still happens) but the “highway patrol” in particular was pretty flippant about it. They rode motorcycles, wore Nazi style jackboots, and operated as more of a racist gang than anything else. I don’t know if it was the state or feds but after numerous scandals they actually got kicked off the major highways and the State Troopers took over. I don’t get why Alabama can’t do something similar.
The Feds? Like the FBI, which is currently beung used by the democrats to investigate and harass their political opponents, but never seem to charge them with any crimes? The DOJ is too busy labeling parents going to school board meetinngs aw shite supremacist domestic terrorists. There is no system of justice in this nation any more, we have a legal system that is as corrupt as any third-world shithole nation run by a dictator.
That’s what I was thinking. Dash cams showing front and back windows and preferably one that automatically uploads to the cloud or somewhere off site. You know they will destroy that camera and any footage stored only inside. Plus the tinier the better so they won’t know you have footage until you get to court. Frankly I’d request a change venue for the court but I doubt they’d do that.
The Institute for Justice has taken this on in a class action suit They had a first round victory in March 2023. Thank goodness for people in the IJ. They fight the seemingly unfightable. Thanks for getting this story out there!
And the solution is so simple too - all punitive damages imposed by any judge, or any police officer, and all proceeds of any asset forfeitures should by law be entered into the general fund of the federal government. No earmarking, as as non-local as possible, and with not singular identifiable cause which a police officer or judge might want to support. And if that's politically not possible as a law, then any steps in that general direction would help; i.e. perhaps on a state-by-state level. But frankly, states shouldn't be incentivized to fine their own citizen either, so while that's better than nothing, it's not great.
@@MoireFly lol no. The federal government had nothing to do with this. We have this thing called the constitution. The answer isn't centralized power 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
@@deusvult6920 So your objection to having money be pooled where the incentives for fraud are massively diluted by sheer scale is...? Furthermore, pooling collected fines does not centralize power to _issue_ those fines in any way. And what exactly does having a constitution have to do with the appropriateness of a policy? The constitution is a _means_ to an end, not a item of worship; it has exactly zero relevance to picking ideal policy; it may have relevance to the details of implementability. Which is fine - the point is to separate those that issue fines from the proceeds of those fines. It's not that important exactly where those proceeds end up as long as that's as non-earmarked as possible to avoid kickback schemes. If a state treasury collects em, rather any branch of state or local law enforcement: that's still hell of a lot better than things are now...
Sounds like kidnapping, assault, and falsifying police reports in the case of the grandmother. Might be different in Alabama, but I'm pretty sure police have to be wearing identifying materials if doing traffic enforcement. The whole department should be arrested and charged with racketeering.
@@johnstjohn4705 My thoughts too. Scary stuff. This police dept and mayor think they are being cute, clever, but hopefully the consequences quickly catch up with them when investigated for committing some very serious crimes.
In MI stopping someone from making a 911 (or any other call for that matter) is an additional "illegal wiretap" charge. These cops are unbelievable. They definitely need to be RICO'd.
It’s also what happens when people ignore their local elections and focus too much on who’s running on the state and federal level…..none of those state and federal politicians have any where near the effect on your life or LE than the local politicians do, and no politician lies and misrepresents their platform or beliefs as those on the local level because the media ignores most of them. Hell most voters don’t even know who the hell their local politicians are, much less what they stand for.
hey my friend... not turned into... it has always been that way since day one all across the United States of America coast to coast. It's just now these things are coming out in the open because of EASY ACCESS to TECHNOLOGIES. Everybody is recording everybody else even themselves.
@iTz Wuzzi *trust me and judges and cops just get bribed* All the time, but they will give the IMPRESSION that they NEVER ARE INFLUENCED by MONEY and that they are UNBIASED and FAIR... Yea Right... ROTFLMAO!!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣
I'm Melissa's husband. We are from not to far from brookside. I used to drive thru their with my buddies in front of the mall to get to Homewood skate park and damn do we have some shit stories. They are absolutely brutal. It was awful driving thru their but because of where we were coming from, it would effectively cook less our drive time to take another route. Its worse than Vincent when it comes to traffic violations. Which, around here, that's really saying something. 36 in a 35 = ticket. Seatbelt sitting underneath your ladies chest (you know what I mean) that's at least an attempted ticket. Newborn in the car and you need to reach back to help them, ticket. A buddy of mine actually got a ticket for not having his lights on when raining. Problem is, it wasn't raining amd haven't been for over an hour. The cop actually tried to justify it by saying the roads were still wet. Never even heard of that before. I didn't even know people actually got tickets over their lights even if it was raining. There's a lot more and frankly what I did say ain't even bad. Some of the residemts there are literally blackmailed and extorted by the cops. They cops would know when their payday was, pull them over, and take their cash under threat of a bogus arrest and getting their car towed. They are insane. Many times, the county sheriff and deputies had to go and literally rescue citizens from brooksides police.
This all starts because we take a police officer's testimony as fact. If he says you 'rolled through a stop sign', then you did, period. No need for evidence or anything so inconvenient. "All power tends to corrupt, absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely". With all the video capabilities out there, we need to stop this. Police should need to provide actual evidence: video, radar gun, etc. As in 'beyond a reasonable doubt'. Does anyone remember that?
When we have cases like former police officer Zachary Wester planting drugs in people's vehicles I definitely have a hard time with the notion that a cop's testimony should automatically outweigh any other witness's testimony.
@@UncleKennysPlace true, but those are held to preponderance of evidence standards. In a "he said, she said" battle, a civil suit tends not to be winnable.
I've been saying for a couple of years now that there need to be a entity to investigate the police misconduct that is not attached to the police in any way and have the ability to arrest just police in any wrongdoings. The police are too easily corrupted when they know they are going to be protected internally
Who’s going to govern it? We have the Legislative, executive and judicial branch but they all conspire to promote each other’s perversion. The Supreme Court drops the ball more often than not. We don’t need to police the cops. We need less cops because the ones we have generally suck.
@@RadDadisRad we absolutely have to police the cops or else we have effectively zero rights and we dont live in a nation anymore we just live under the thumb of feudal lords known as sheriffs
Complain on the judge instead. He's letting it happen. The Judicial Inquiry Commission, created under the provisions of the Alabama Constitution, is charged with investigating complaints of misconduct or professional wrongdoing on the part of judges.
Absolutely correct Geoff. The majority of the LEOs in the state of CT are CORRUPT to the bone. Being in a Blue state, they know that they are protected from the Governor and AG on down to their own Chief. It is time to GET RID OF THEM and replace them with people who have morals and ethics and truly do "Protect & Serve".
The police chief resigned.. and then got ticketed for speeding. He tried to use his badge to get out of the ticket, and has now been indicted for impersonating a police officer.
The police went from 50 tows to 789 tows in 2020 - when most people were quarantined at home and only essential workers went to and from work. Oh, and an occasional run to get food and supplies. The year that America was locked down, the police tow rate went up 1560%!!!!
But the cops will say aren't we doing a good job. oh ya they are doing a good job robbing people of there hard worked for paychecks. this town seems to do anything to justify the myth they are serving and protecting its the who they are protecting that is in question. it sure as hell isn't people who travel near their jerk water town. .gotta beware of the good ole boy system and its hangin" judges too. you will never get justice anywhere near that town.
The purpose of a citation(ticket) is to promote public safety. Ive worked in small towns for half my career. Where i work now the chief and mayor both have been ethical and neither have told me to write tickets. The last place i worked the mayor demanded we write tickets cause "the city needs money", told the chief to fire any officer that didnt write them. This mayor even told me personally [to write] the city needed money. I write approx 1 in 15 ppl i stop which may be couple a month. Our judge helps ppl by reducing fines and even dismissing some. Fyi, i prefer public relations. We work for the people. Our job is to protect people, property and keep the peace.
Thank you Joel for being a true police officer with character. Sadly officers and departments like this put good officers like you in jeopardy. People abused by the system become desperate and unpredictable. Be safe out there and thank you for your honorable service to your fellow human beings.
I got a ticket for passing a line of slow cars going 50mph, I passed all of them going 80mph, merged back and got back to 65mph, but the officer still saw me and decided to pull me for going 80mph, for literally improving the flow of traffic... I just said fúck it and paid off the ticket
A small town near me (Porter , Oklahoma pop. 700) had a similar problem. Not much traffic through there, so the police were getting the locals for 1 mph over and a lot of other ridiculous tickets. They had a system where you could pay the fine to the officer right then with a credit card. ---The town voted to do away with the police department. End of problem.
they screwed up by ticketing locals it sounds like. you let the locals off scot free and ticket others while spending money on the town is how you succeed apparently
We were pulled over by them earlier in the year. The officer walked up to the side of my truck. I didn’t notice that my younger brother had put his badge on the top of my armrest so when he looked in the truck he was able to see it.. The officer had asked me for my license and registration. I asked him what did I do to get pulled over. He got extremely upset and he went to grab my door to open it. He got a little bit more upset when he found it was locked and he was not going to get it open. My brother opened his mouth and told him that under the law he was required to tell me the reason why he stopped us. He was starting to get a lot more upset when he got yelled at and told how to do his job. He started to tell us that we were both going to jail and that’s when he got a badge pushed into his face. I thought he was going to pull out his gun but my brother was already on the phone with the state troopers and they had someone on the way to us. He wasn’t sure when he saw the badge of a dea agent but when he was not able to tell if I was the agent or my brother. When the troopers got there they told us to go ahead and get back out on the highway if we didn’t want to wait for the sheriff to come out and explain why one of his officers was doing radar on the highway out of his jurisdiction. We got the officer’s name from the troopers and the number for the state’s attorney general. I filled out a complaint and my brother is going after the officer who stopped us to make sure that he is never allowed to be a officer anywhere else in the country.
I have heard there is a Federal Law that requires speed enforcement on a interstate highway be conducted by State Troopers, Highway Patrol or Sate Police Department. This was after a Congress Member's wife or daughter was raped by a guy in a car with a magnetic flashing red light on the roof pulled her over and raped her. That was back in 1973. They stated in that law how tall the letters must be on the patrol vehicle, and that undercover vehicles are not allowed to pull over people for traffic offenses. They must have fixed lights on the roof. And any state not approving this law will not get any Federal Interstate Highway Funding. That they can not pull over a car for doing 59 in a 55 zone, and that they must be 10% over the posted speed limit or 5 MPH over the posted speed, (if less). So no ticket if you are on Radar at 28 in a 25 zone.
There are plenty of other towns that do this same crap. We need to ban victimless crimes. There needs to be more reasons why a cop can write a ticket other than just because they can.
Exactly what we dealt with in Stringtown, Colcord, Big Cabin, and a few others here in Oklahoma. It got so bad the the FBI and DOJ got involved back in the mid 00’s and a judge, a police chief (Stringtown), as well as several officers and deputies were convicted of multiple crimes and were jailed. Stringtown was back it it in no time until the Oklahoma department of public safety completely removed their right to patrol any federal or state highways in their jurisdiction in 2019. Kiowa county officers and deputies have also lost their right to enforce traffic rules on any state or federal highways. Lots of scams out there, none worse than those perpetrated by government officials.
Yep...don't forget Kiowa and Savanna Oklahoma (north of Stringtown) bad enough for locals but killers for Texas and other out-of-state plates...it's a cash cow that just keeps on giving....//
@@garymackey850 There is several towns in Texas that are horrible. One I can't remember the name is on US 287 up near the Panhandle and several on US 59. I got stopped about 5 years ago in Tenaha Texas. Then there is Corrigan, Texas. In my situation in Tenaha I got so pissed off I came close to taking a swing at that idiot that stopped me. The thing that bothered me the most was the cop was more interested in how much cash I had on me. Mind you I was just stopped for doing 10 over. I finally told the cop all I had was plastic and maybe $40 in cash. During that time I was working on two different contracts and had to drive between Shreveport Lousianna and Lufkin Texas several times. After that day I went around Tehaha. I never have been back through there since I paid my fine.
Law enforcement in general is out of control!! There's a lack of accountability and consequences for their misconduct! GET A DASH CAM AND ALWAYS RECORD THE POLICE!!! THEY ARE NOT YOUR FRIEND, AND THEY'RE NOT HERE FOR YOU!
@@kkal1183 End qualified immunity and staff Internal Affairs with citizens who have no ties with law enforcement. This, law enforcement policing law enforcement isn't working
The Mayor, Judge, and every cop in that town should be arrested for violating the public's constitutional rights. They should do long sentences. This cannot stand in America!!!
This stuff needs exposure, thanks a million Steve! I was arrested on hearsay from an out of state individual and the officer charged me with assault on an officer and dropped me off at jail for processing even though I was calm, cooperative and everything with him and had done nothing or damaged nothing. It was a huge ridiculous ordeal in my life and turned me into an outspoken individual!
We used to have that problem in Oklahoma, then the state legislature passed a law where no more than 20% of a city’s income can be from tickets and fines, and 4 mph or less over the speed limit you can only get a warning. Those speed trap towns have shriveled up significantly!
@LeMarkD Yes, that is a good solution to stop this kind of behavior. Thanks! Sounds like even the county that Brookside was in was corrupt too. At this point the State has power to go in there and clean it up.
I feel that the ticketing authority should not get any revenue from ticketing (aside for court costs) as it is a perverse incentive, as seen in this story.
@@jamesonmiller8283 the way the state wrote the law was that they estimated how much income the small towns with major highways passing through their main streets might need to provide decent law enforcement based on average crime levels and officers per capita, then told them if they want more funds to police more then they need to increase taxes on locals. If it was really a problem locals would be ok paying more tax to have more policing, if it wasn’t really necessary then the people would push back against tax increases.
Between 20 and 26 years ago I was a traffic reporter for a local radio station. I was the only non cop performer, as we just drove around and called different police departments for wrecks, and other things. I started giving away police speed traps live when I saw them! Never a complaint!
This happens all over the country all of the time. Buy a good dash cam (forward and rear) that logs gps data and use it religiously. Exercise your rights to not incriminate yourself by not answering questions and to be free from warrantless searches. And ALWAYS record police encounters.
Nice idea but the judge doesn't have to accept your video evidence. Videos can be faked, you know (according to a Dekalb County (Georgia) judge anyway).
Under "normal" conditions I would agree with you and the suggested measures... but these are extreme and blatant .. So normal measures won't be adequate ..Just choose to not be a victim by refusing to make yourself available to play their game.. Drive around the community.. its cheaper than a ticket
It's sad but this is pretty tame compared to the corruption and criminality in my small town in Montana! It's really like the wild west before law and order was introduced!! The problem is there is no oversight, as our population numbers are so low, the culprits get away with their crimes because they are all in on it! Yes the cops, the judges, the news paper, anyone connected in the community is milking the system for all they can!!! We are entering a period of lawlessness in America which is destroying our civilization! I am still amazed that Trump doesn't realize the president's main job is the enforcement of the rule of law!!!!
The feds have filed a statement of interest in a civil suit brought against the Brookside Criminal Conspiracy Department, but they haven't, as far as I know, put boots on the ground to start a criminal investigation. They should. If you're going to get a federal RICO case out of any small town, Brookside is the one. This is a town that should be shut down, top to bottom. The Mayor, city council, prosecutors, every cop in the Department and clerks should all be under a full criminal investigation.
I grew up in this very town. They have spent years harassing my brother and now have him doing thousands of dollars in tree work to "pay down his fines". But he still seems to have to be doing multiple days of work without it being paid off. That town is a joke! And 55 reported crimes because they're not reporting it or they're involved in it. I stay out of that town as much as I can because of their harassment.
I do engineering consulting and personally have never been in this part of Alabama. However, someone I know worked a contract in that town a while back. He was born in Northern Alabama and has family in that town. Last I heard he had either already filed a lawsuit or was about to. Several of the cops there were harassing him, he has it all on video.
A cop driving a Dodge charger followed me from Spokane to Ritzville. Then he started aggressively closing the gap between us. I was twenty years old, driving a used car I bought with 2 years of minimum wage paychecks. I assumed the driver was trying to intimidate me for sport. So I maintained the exact correct speed limit. I got in the left lane, he sped up to drive parallel in the right lane. He refused to let me back into the right lane for 8 miles, and I was not willing to break the speed limit to pass him. He pulled me over and gave me an $80 ticket for remaining in the left lane without passing anybody for 8 MILES. My driver's license got yanked for that. The only ticket I ever got. I ended up homeless, living in the car. To this day, I never got my driver's license back. Thank you for raising awareness about this. Policing for profit is a destructive trend in our country.
When the people fear the government, there is tyranny, when the government fears the people, there is liberty.-Thomas Jefferson. I envy those who think these sort of things are isolated to small towns, but since misery loves company, I am hear to tell you that this rot has infected the whole country.
FACT!!! It is coast to coast... It is just that they haven't brought up in the open yet. I like how some people reason... *Well, if the news media is not talking about this, then this doesn't happen everywhere....* Yep... And look how these people were in COMPLETE shock when Jeffery Epstein shenanigans came out... *No way, politicians and/or gobermint officials would participate in this llegal activities...* Ummmm ... right... lol... 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Back in the 1970s there was a crooked police operation in Southaven, Mississippi. At the time, the legal drinking age was 18. There was a Navy training center and base in Millington, TN and the drinking age there and in Memphis, TN was still 21. These guys would target mainly servicemen by stalking in the parking lots of bars and pulling over vehicles with out of state plates. The problem was so bad the Navy had to put these establishments "off limits" for the service members on liberty. The officers there were paid by how many arrests they made. Conflict of interest, I think.
I was there in 1980 and it was pretty much the same they would actually grab you and steal your money beat the crap out of you and run off and this was the police
It never ends when it comes to citizens and police, does it? Here, in upstate NY (about 2 1/2 miles North of NY City), the local cops were asked, on multiple occasions, by the mayor, the city council, and some citizen's groups) to stand outside or sit in their cars near the free parking lot downtown, where the bars and restaurants tend to be. Every single time I'm aware that this has been contemplated - as far as I know, it's never been implemented - it's a tourist town, and the bar and restaurant owner's association has had more than enough clout to prevent the implementation of any such "program". Steve, I respectfully disagree with you regarding giving police (more) discretion than they have already. Any officer that writes a ticket for something that isn't a crime, and attests to having witnessed the commission under perjury, should be charged with perjury. Moreover, if, when writing and signing said ticket or attestation, the penalty they're assessed should be enhanced by the fact they were in possession of a deadly weapon; being "on duty" should be prima fascia evidence of being "on duty".
I believe the legal drinking age (off base) was 18 for beer, 21 for hard liquor. At least that was what it was when I was stationed in Biloxi back in 1972.
This is common in small towns, everywhere. Here's how it goes. Council spends all the money, needs more money, realizes raising taxes too much (because they're still going to raise taxes...can't miss an opportunity to get all the money) could hurt their re-election chances. Council looks into ways to make money. (Insert fly-by-night traffic camera companies here.) Council, through public safety director, tells appointed Police Chief to write more tickets, because tickets = $, and who is going to stick up for "unsafe drivers"? Police chief of course opts to continue feeding, clothing, and sheltering their family and sends the order down the chain to the sergeants, who are tasked with discreetly telling patrol to write more tickets without telling patrol to write more tickets. Strange things happen to departmental opportunities, such as K9 school, SWAT school, detective school, the assignment to which are now more dependent on "satisfactory traffic enforcement" (wrote enough tickets) appearing on the officer's quarterly eval than ever before. Mind you, no one mentions the dreaded Q word, because 'quotas don't exist and have never existed, and even if they did they would have been bad, evil quotas, so even though we're telling you your job will be made less fulfilling, if not outright more miserable, if you don't write enough tickets, it totally doesn't amount to a de facto quota. Trust us. We wouldn't do that.' And so, in small town America, the quota that isn't a quota continues under some other name, like "satisfactory traffic enforcement," at the expense of mostly out-of-town motorists, except for the part where the residents' homes, cars, and outbuildings are routinely burglarized because patrol was up on the main drag writing inspection sticker tickets, and all's well that ends with the council having more money to play with, without having to explain it at the polls.
Yup. There's a thousand little towns like this all over the US. Sleepy little towns with Boss Hogg police forces that are out to fleece everyone who lives or drives near the place.
It seems that some small towns have WAY more police on the pay roll than other nearby towns. The locals figure it out but tourists and travelers pay the price.
I live in Alabama just north of there, but there was more to that story. In 2020 the officers also drove unmarked cars and wore uniforms without the towns insignia.. Also, in Alabama on Interstates cities with less than a certain amount of citizens are not allowed to write tickets on the Interstate or patrolling. Driving in the left lane is allowed for any street, only access controlled Highways/Interstates. After this, the State of Alabama from the Senate pass a bill limiting the amount of money cities can keep from fines.
This is a perfect argument for why fines and fees need to go to the state and not let the local municipality keep the. That would tend to stop this kind of nonsense. BTW someone ought to put up a billboard at the last exit before this RICO town and direct folks to a detour around the town.
This was my exact thought, totally unmarked people trying to make you exit your vehicle. Someday one will get shot, And if it does happen I hope that driver has good dash cam coverage front and rear in HD at a minimum. That way when they inevitably end up in court they can show on video that person was not in any way displaying proof of being a law officer. Some places in the US have in fact made it illegal for unmarked vehicles and plain cloths officers to conduct traffic stops. Mostly for officer safety.
In SC there is a town called Pelion. Back in the 1960s the population was less than 1000 and the main source of employment was traffic tickets the speed limit. Dropped from 55 to 15 in less than 100 yards. Life was good until one night the State Highway commissioner (whose power in those days rivaled that of the governor) was stopped and ticketed. The next day the town’s charter was revoked so the police Town police no longer had any authority.
If I were involved in the investigation into this I'd take a good hard look at the circumstances of the previous mayors death a year ago. Kind of odd that the mayor passed away, then 5 minutes after his replacement and the replacements henchmen got installed things go off the rails. Sounds almost like the old mayor got "removed" for standing in the way of an extortion racket.
Public officials should be required to prove that they aren't corrupt at threat of death. The PEOPLE of the United States are innocent until proven guilty; our elected representatives are not.
What the video does not talk about is the misdemeanor charges, and FELONY charges..They are illegal DRUG charges!!!! Small town infested with DRUGS and CRIME, that has been OVERLOOKED for decades. They also patrol 1.5 miles of I-22 because Jefferson County only has ONE officer to cover about a 40 square miles are, that includes I-22. The State and County RARELY patrol I-22, which is a PIPELINE for illegal drug and human trafficking from Atlanta to the Memphis area, and further northwest. Brookside Police STOP illegal drugs from heading to a town near you, by enforcing the law on I-22 and in their small town. The people who say they didn’t commit a crime, are flat out liars. Most of these big dollars are also from Brookside PD performing felony arrest warrants. These are some of the bravest police officers out there, doing their job for pennies. They could easily sit and eat donuts all day, but they are highly trained, unlike the surrounding towns, and should be appreciated and thanked for cleaning up the small town and stopping the illegal drugs from coming to a town near you.
Wow..... that is exactly what my sister told me about the cop at the corner as she reached the stop sign. She saw him, he saw her. She made sure to stop, but still he claim she ran the stop sign. This is odessa texas.
Dash cam. Two words that will save a lot of pain. My son had a 2 week old Charger, which he worked very, very hard to afford. A person in an expensive truck backed into him then claimed my son rear ended him and he had neck injuries. My son had a dash cam with front and back cameras. Guess who won, my son.
We live in an amazing country don’t we, where people are more then happy to lie, steal, and cheat and never feel bad about it. Sounds like most cops now days too, f*&$ing disgusting. Like we are headed back to the BC days
Forbes did an article on Brookside. I was going to post a screen shot of the article headlines but can't. It warmed my heart to read it. Especially since some of the dirty cops were arrested!
This is by definition extorsion. I hope the little old lady wins her case. Hopefully this will bankrupt the town. This is clearly not legal. The entire police force and mayor need jail time.
For a town that small, someone should hide several cameras in the high traffic areas. That way there will be evidence of their corruption. The Chief, Officers, and Judge need to be behind bars.
If I were wealthy I would drive through, get my ticket, and make it my life's work to destroy that town's government...completely bankrupt it and destroy the reputations of all involved...create a private foundation dedicated to doing this to corrupt towns like this..
@@hakimcameldriver Those stocks they had on the town common centuries ago. Where criminals had their head and hands locked into it. We need to bring those back... pronto.
I grew up in a small town with out of control police. When my brother bought his 1st car, he left school to find his tire was flat. While putting air in the tire and trying to figure out what happened a resident told us a police officer flattened the tire. This same cop later wrote my brother a ticket while we were leaving. The ticket was written for not having a state inspection sticker in the window. My brother fought the ticket and won because the car had just been purchased and was still on temp tags and had until the tags expired to get the inspection. The local magistrate was outraged with these officers after hearing all the facts from my brother and I. We were lucky because we worked for the magistrate doing logging and farm work and he knew we were honest kids. He chewed out the officer for flattening the tire and dropped all charges.
In our yuppie suburb area the police wanted at will warrantless searches for teens. They made pre-consenting to searches a condition of parking in the school parking lot, then put up no parking signs for an entire mile(!) around the highschool. And then gave all of us teens in class parking tickets. Because of course they did. Later they'd call students down to have their car searched 'because drug dogs alerted' who hadn't driven that day. Basically if you were one of the poors (didn't dress preppy, or didn't drive a late model car) you were searched.
Again another example of revenue generation. Not having a state inspection sticker has absolutely nothing to do with public safety whatsoever. It proves once again it's all about the money.
I hope that this town suffers some real consequences for their actions. I had read the articles you reference in this piece. I really enjoyed listening to your take on things. Thank you.
I'll bet you had to re-write your comment and bite your tongue with the final edit. But I get exactly what you most likely really wanted to say. Yup, those tornadoes hit the wrong towns a few weeks ago.
NM has a state law ⚖ saying NO plain clothes or unmarked vehicles, SUVs can do traffic enforcement. No nonsense traffic tickets. Only police Lts or above can approve a traffic stop in plain clothes. Unmarked 🚔.
Yes, I agree it's not just the south or Alabama. And I saw the comment about Missouri. I am a resident of Missouri and I was being questioned by a city cop and I was calm and nonaggressive answering all his questions and he moved around behind me and did a bulldozer like maneuver into the small of my back and I was violently hit and pushed at a quick pace until I ended up on the hood of his cop car. He then stood up and started yelling, "Did you guys see that?", "Did you guys see that?", talking to the other officers that had just arrived on the scene. He then stated, "this guy was resisting arrest". The other two officers replied with "no". He charged me with resisting arrest, which was later dropped in court. He was a punk and if the situation were different, I would easily schooled him on his crooked ways.
Thank you for bringing this to more people’s attention, being my home state. This is disgusting to say the least. There’s another interesting article about ankle monitors in this series. It’s worth taking a look. Also, the author does great work, you should check out more of his writing.
I'm from Brookside, In the year before this story, they pulled me over probably 20 times. Most times most times they let me go, once they gave me 2 tickets for wreckers driving and failure to yield for emergency vehicle. They are the only department to pull me over in the last 10 years. We are now down to 2 cops and a supervisor.
A couple of decades ago, there was a small town in Missouri, with no interstate near by, that was doing pretty much the same thing with speeding tickets. (the town was in a depression, the speed limit was 55 except at the town where it was 35, or less) They would stop people for one MPH over. And the town was making big bucks from the tickets. Untill they stopped a state representative. He went back to the capitol and had passed a law limiting the persentage of revenue a town could make on traffic tickets. The town reduced their police and only had one police car when all was said and done.
Did it happen to be Macks creek? They were known to be super bad years ago along Highway 54. They have no police force at all nowadays, but have heard all the stories from back in the day since i live about 20 miles away.
There were similar cases last decade in Ohio and Florida. In the end, the legislatures of both states dissolved the towns and turned them into unincorporated area of the county. No city, no police force.
@@KalebKronic Yep, that was Mack's Creek. They were so bad the legislature passed a state-wide law prohibiting towns and cities from using more than a certain percentage of their revenue from fines for operating expensed. I think the limit they set was 45% (still pretty high); Mack's Creek was getting close to 90% of theirs from fines. And, to no one's surprise, an audit of their finances found some significant irregularities in their books. It was so bad the residents voted to disincorporate and they are no more.
Does anybody remember Hacienda Village near Fort Lauderdale? The state of Florida ended up revoking the city charter. It no longer exists. Same sort of thing as this case.
Sounds like a police dept in Iowa 30 years ago. The police chief dismissed for mental reasons. One officer fired and one quit. A three man police force.
Same thing happened to me. Cop said I had run a stop sign and I really had stopped. He pulled me over 4 blocks and two more stop signs past the intersection. There was no way he could have even seen me at the time I went through that intersection. He intensely interrogated me on where I was headed, where I was coming from, why I was in the neighborhood,, etc. It would have cost me much more in lost wages to fight it than to just pay. There are deceptive and abusive police officers everywhere. Standards to get that job need to be increased.
In Missouri we have the Macks Creek Law (2015) which as a result of speed trap enriched towns limits the percentage of revenue a community can make from traffic tickets to 10% of their total budget. Anything in excess goes to the state so the community has less incentive to run speed traps. How well this reigns back small towns is questionable...
I've dealt with a town like this. One of their plows had knocked down a speed limit sign where it dropped. They were pulling over everyone on their stretch of highway (not interstate just a 2 lane US highway.) I went to the courthouse to fight it and found out there were dozens of other people there for the same thing. Turned out it was $150 to fight it or $160 to plead guilty and have them not report it to insurance or the state and expunge it if you didn't get another ticket for a year. And they had some insane rule, supposedly, where you had to use their public defender in traffic court and couldn't have your own lawyer. Needless to say everyone was spending the extra $10 to just not deal with it.
And it's always rubbed me the wrong way that they could basically say, even if the court decides you're 100% innocent, that you still had to pay them either way just to fight it. Even if you did nothing but drive through the town you could be out $150 with basically no recourse.
Alma, Texas is modeling after Brookside. How can non residents shut this crap down? Where is the judicial review of the dollar signed eyes of the judge?
They _bought an APC?!_ When they don't even have a SWAT Team to use it?! It's not military hardware, but... this is raising all kinds of red flags, and ringing _serious_ alarm bells for me.
They _dont_ have a SWAT team? JFC yeah that is a big red flag. If they had a SWAT team that would probably throw up a much smaller red flag, but if they DON'T, Jesus Christ. At least now I know never to get within 20 miles of that town.
in my town in the '70s drug smugglers, state politicians, former and current police had a farm or compound and they had an apc with a 50 cal machine gun. crazy, but it was all crazy. eventually some went to prison and others went further up in their careers. one got a police academy named after him
I would like to hear a follow up to that lady that was harassed and arrested for turning on her headlights. I think she should take them all the way and get a hefty compensation. If none of the cars or officers are marked, they should be required to wait while the person calls 911 to verify them, they should have no problem with that. They should not be stealing the person's phone and destroying it. That is exactly what a illegitimate officer would do.
In Pagedale Mo. The city was restricted from funding themselves with these kind of traffic tickets. So they created new city laws and ordinances and ticketed residents for non matching curtains, barbecues in their yards, more than 3 people in a yard, old paint....these towns and police forces and courts should all be sued into submission.
People can just vote these tyrants out of office. Not exactly the same thing, but I read many stories about HOA boards being regulation nazis. The problem was that no one took any interest in being on the HOA board so some old lady control freak would get on and make everyone's life miserable. I actually did sis on an HOA board. Many of the violations that came up during our meetings were illogical and I convinced the other member to dismiss them. I remember silly things, like someone put brick edging around a tree in their yard. Another was for painting their driveway. They used a color that was light gray and only slightly different shade than concrete driveways there. The owner had stains on the driveway and was trying to make it look nice. It did. There were citations for putting trash cans out the night before trash day. Just lot of stupid things that the HOA management company's inspector would find.
It is a fairly simple process to disincorporate a township. The voters put it on the ballot and disolve their city government. Law enforcement then cedes to County Sheriffs and fire is handled by fire control district and bond levies. It works.
@@justkelly6992 not as easy as you thibnk, if you start the rocces, the coprup cops and sytme arrst you for fake crtimes.. thse town are jsut mob towns.
My roommate had his car impounded for nearly a year from this police department. He is part of a federal lawsuit against that police department that is still ongoing a year later.
I went to court just before Christmas in a town like this. There was so many people at court that bailiffs were yelling out the front and back doors. The judge was so pissed that he asked every one there who was guilty, 2 stud up. He dismissed the charges on everyone else with a Merry Christmas
It happened to someone I know, He was stopped in a small Florida town, on radar, for speeding. 5 miles above the speed limit. It so happens that he works for the federal communications department. Back in his office he checked the towns radar and emitting devices permit. They had no permit issued or applied for. He had a fine of 25K $ imposed to the hick town for operating a radar device without a federal permit. It's not everyone who can retaliate legally against these money grabbing police departments.
Traffic fines should go to federal government. This would remove fine incentive for small towns. In UK all fines go to Central government, hence no local incentive.
That's exactly what I was thinking. There's another way too. I believe it was in the '60s. A shitsburg in Georgia, located near the Florida border, had a scheme to make money the old fashioned way - they stole it from everyone passing through with out-of-states license plates, among other things. Things got so bad the Governor (Lester Maddox)? got involved and the bottom line was the town's municipal license was terminated. Poof, no government, no cops, no tickets, no more bullshit.
Don't they? Around here, the city cops can't do a damn thing on the highway - you could speed by them and they cannot do anything except radio it in to the OPP.
The question hung in the air like a cloud of uncertainty. Wasn't I-22, the road mentioned in this city, a federal interstate freeway? And if so, could any person who received a traffic ticket on that road file a claim against the city in federal court? The potential legal implications loomed over the conversation, casting a shadow of doubt and worry. Steve, would you be so kind to respond. Thank you sir.
In my recent memory, no less than twice the Louisiana State Police have had to go into two small towns and take over the police departments for this very problem. The corrupt departments would trump up civil asset forfeiture if they saw a vehicle on the interstate that they would like to own. This was during the days when the big Shamu looking Impala SS’s were being made in the 90’s. What got them caught were the Mexicans who would transport towed auction cars back down over the border. These guys knew that they were being targeted, so would carry cash to pay “fines” directly to the local cops right there on the shoulder of I-10. Then one of the drivers called the State Police. Game over. Nearly the entire department was arrested in one town. Hell, even the old show 20/20 (I think it was) did an expose’ on another I-10 town in Jefferson Davis Parish because the corruption was so rampant. Legislation should be enacted to prevent profiteering by local small town police. For a while, Louisiana legislation did introduce a bill that prevented local cops from patrolling interstates. We rejoiced, but the State Sheriff’s Association prevented passage. Same with marijuana legalization. The Sheriff’s Association flat out said that they make far too much money off of marijuana arrests to ever legalize it.
We've got a small town near us where that happened--our Highway Patrol had to take them over, get rid of all the local cops. Crazy thing is, the town was so tiny, maybe 700 people, but they had something like 10 cops. Due to small county roads, if you wanted to get to the county seat, my town, you had to go through this tiny town or go approximately 40 miles out of your way and double back. My own town has around 2,500 people, and we have a big PD, plus the Park Police, county sheriff headquartered here, National Park Patrol Division AND the local tribe has their own police department, the Lighthorse Police. We are SUPER law enforcement-heavy. Oh I almost forgot that Fish and Game has an office here too, LOL, with F&G officers. I guess it wasn't hard to find enough officers to cover that tiny little town when they kicked the police department out.
@@Gandalf721 It’s not a particular sheriff. It’s the head of the Louisiana Sheriff’s Association with hundreds of regional sheriffs who all share the same opinion. Lots of legal personal revenue kickbacks from LACE offenses. It pays to police, as they often say behind closed doors. An officer may have a normal salary of $65K, but he can triple that through some of Louisiana’s policing programs.
@Bobb Grimley It's crazy and completely unacceptable. The Institute for Justice is already suing other cities for practices like this because it's impossible to get a fair trial when the judge knows that more than half his paycheck comes from the fines and citations issued by the local police.
I agree totally with you Steve. I'm a retired LEO. Gaining reasonable compliance of the law by the public doesn't mean being a ticket writing fool or cops breaking the law. Judge needs to be investigated also. Lawsuits waiting to happen.
I'm looking forward to the follow-up story from Steve that discusses the federal indictments for everyone in this town's government. On the other hand, in today's America, I'm not holding my breath.
I hope so, but federal intervention into state and county matters is also a double edged sword. I wish the state of Alabama or the county (I believe it’s Jefferson county) would bring charges and get results so the feds didn’t get involved. The problem with the federal govt. getting involved is while it can effect very real and fast change, it also sets a President that the federal government has power that renders the autonomy of states to operate under their own laws that fit the people pretty much useless. The reason a lot of small towns and counties with low population density end up under the “good ol’ boy” system because locals would rather deal with the corruption and allow “outsiders” to be violated so they can retain a way of life the federal government is trying to take away.
@@J.R.in_WV but we don't want pple to have to live under laws that "fit" some of the people very well & the others not at all, right? what "way of life" is it that states protect & federal govt can take away? the right to have locally corrupt officials impose differential enforcement for rich & poor, black & white, does not seem like the states rights we're looking for when folks speak of states rights & way of life they are speaking code, in my experience
I got pulled over as I pulled into an autozone once, I was pulling into Autozone with a headlight out, it went out while i was driving and I went straight to the parts store, as I was pulling into a parking spot and getting out a police car came up behind me and wrote me a ticket for failure to maintain my car, this was Arlington TX, it happens in the big ones also. I told the officer is was pulling in to get a headlight and was informed that didn't matter and the moment my headlight went out I should have pulled to the side of the road and requested a tow. Like WTH
Its not just small town police, its also some county sheriffs. A few years ago, I took a drive from my home in Las Vegas down to the western end of the Grand Canyon. The road into and out of the area is a two lane blacktop. On the way back I was doing the speed limit, which was 50 mph. As I came over a hill and could see beyond, there was a 25 mph sign and a Mojave county sheriff deputy sitting on the other side of the road. Classic speed-trap, and that is EXACTLY what it was, the deputy even admitted that it was. The way the 25 mph sign was situated, there was NO way, short of dynamiting the brakes and skidding, of dropping 25 mph before passing that sign, and the fact that the deputy was sitting there, waiting for victims to fall in his trap made it a sure thing, even if the cop had denied it. I signed the ticket and commented, "great little trap you got here", deputy just smiled. Mojave county is one of the largest AND poorest counties in Arizona. Apparently they feed their budget with speed traps.
After watching this channel for some time, I get the impression that a lot of problems could be fixed by simply doing away with the American rule and switching to "loser pays". In this case, if the town lost every case on appeal and had to pay all the fees and costs attached to that, the financial incentive would quickly disappear.
Cities lose very seldomly in court. Lots of people (a) don't have the money to try and fight the charges, (b) don't have the time to take off work to try and fight the charges, or (c) don't live in the town and can't afford to go there half a dozen times to fight the charges. Even if the city did have to "loser pay," they'd still come out very net cash positive.
@@starsfan6878 I'm not sure I can follow the logic. As to cities rarely losing (I haven't fact-check that claim but let's accept it for argument's sake), that would probably apply to "normal" cases, not outlandish tickets such as these. And it could be that they win so often simply because few people choose to fight which is exactly what we're trying to fix here. In regards to (a): If the lawyers know that they'll get paid by the town in the end, we can presume that they'll be happy to take on any such slam dunk case. It's easy money, after all. As to (b) and (c): It's my understanding that if you're represented by an attorney you don't actually have to be present at the proceedings when you're fighting a ticket. But even if you had to be there in person and take time off work for it: That would simply be another reimbursement you'd be entitled to under "loser pays". Here in Germany, for instance, where it is "loser pays", if you win the case you (in general) can get compensated for any loss of income incurred by being there during the trial.
Well it requires people to have the guts to stand up and fight back and hold them all accountable. No one wants to do it and that's why they act this way and have gotten away with it for so long. Who is going to change their evil ways if there is no punishment or reprisals to worry about, regardless if how vile or disturbing the crime being committed is? It's only when you know your ass WILL BE handed to you when you mess up, that make people begin to act right.
You're assuming fair and impartial Judges. These are local judges with ties to the local government. Knowing the town will have to pay if they lose will increase the odds of the town winning.
I guess Alabama isn't really worried about tourism. This is very important to know. One drive through the wrong town can destroy or even end your life.
A perfect example of how small government & law enforcement can be fallible & malicious. It’s so frustrating to hear people defend these groups as if they are incapable of wrong doing. Power corrupts.
@@jj18057 they both have their pros & cons. A larger government in theory would have more oversight & regular auditing. For example, whenever you hear about embezzlement it is always small companies or small town governments.
@@EvilVacuum But when you hear of cops acting like gangsters, extortion, beatings, killings, it's usually in really large departments like New York City, Philly, Phoenix, Baltimore or in the state police, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Louisiana being good examples.
You know I'm always throwing the term " goose stepping" around when it comes to officer corruption. Especially when it's accepted and encouraged by their superiors. This department has to be the worst I've heard of, EVER. So much for pride. These cops should be ashamed to even wear a uniform.
That's part of the problem They aren't wearing uniforms, this sounds more like a Militarized take over of a Less Than Podunk Town which has Turned into very large swaths of Alabama, and especially the what used to be a functioning bunch of small towns ,but that was back in the 50's and 60's when coal mining was the main source of any form of wealth back then. And all of these small departments need to have their hand me down armored up ex military vehicles taken back until a very great need for them can be proven. And The US Department of Justice needs to be jumping in and looking at these baseless actions quickly and rooting out the corruption that obviously is going on here. . This is chit that occurred back in the 50's and needs to be squashed Like the 🪳 cockroach that it is becoming. And I'm sad to say that I, have relatives in the areas around Birmingham. Haven't been back there since 1969 and have no plans to ever return either. Lock Them all Up !
I used to live in CT and at one time there was a lot of questionable or downright illegal activity by the state police using unmarked cars, including blatant entrapment.
In Arkansas there was rapist who impersonated a cop in an unmarked car. He was known as the "blue light rapist". The governor of Alabama banned the use of unmarked LEO cars as a safety precaution. That was changed a few years later and now a large percentage of LE cars are unmarked or only marked on one side.
This sounds to me like a town that is desperately in need of some RICO charges. I was pulled over by a cop in Jefferson county CO for flashing my lights at another car. Ironically, this was right after the 7th court ruling that cops don't have the power to do that, there is no law, no rule, no regulation, that gives them that power, and that it is, in fact, a violation of your first amendment rights of communication. I told the DA on the phone that this is CLEARLY illegal, that they should know since it's their JOB to know that this IS a violation, and that not only are they NOT stopping cops from doing it, they are profiting off of it as well. I then asked him if this didn't sound an awful lot like a good RICO case, and he admitted that it did. I didn't have the money to fight the ticket (weed possession before we got CIVILIZED), but I should have just turned them into the feds anyway. Cops are crooked. It's the nature of humanity. There is a FINE line between a slasher and a surgeon, it's just a matter of temperament and reason. Same with cops and crooks. A VERY fine line, and WAY too many of them step over it. It looks like the entire town's cop department needs a good cleaning, from top to bottom. This is LITERAL highway robbery. It needs to be treated as such.
If you fought it, your weed possession couldn't stick, because that all happened as a result of an illegal traffic stop! Wish you could have fought it. They count on only a few people being able o fight the illegal stops. As for them trying to say they didn't know the law changed, what is it we always hear? "IGNORANCE OF THE LAW IS NO EXCUSE!"
You have a way with words. Too many cops do step over the line. The biggest drug bust around North Alabama was a Louisville cop flying a twin engine dope plane full of Colombian coke, The DEA chased him as he flew over the Tennessee River throwing out 80lb duffel bags of cocaine. My friend found 2 (160lbs), turned then in. Another was found at a wild slasher party at a local motel, and another was found with his body when he tried to parachute out, but smashed into the ground instead. His best friend was also a cop, and was the assistant to the Governor of Kentucky. The head of the Kentucky DEA was also involved. Nothing was proven on the Governor. Then there was the Alabama judge who was caught flying a plane load of marijuana. He had sentenced a man to 17 years for less than an once of weed earlier in the same week. The Judge had a pistol with him that was taken out of the evidence room, that was used by the Mayor to kill his wife's lover. So much for chain of custody of evidence. You are right, it's a fine line. The Police need our help so badly. I've seen the Police shoot and kill a man, and I've seen their lack of competent training cost another man his life when a shoplifter managed to get behind the wheel of a police cruiser. When the Police chased her, she was running about 130 mph when she hit a 15 year old girl who was just learning to drive. The "accident" killed her dad. Same thing happened a year almost to the day in the same town. (Fayetteville TN.) No fatality the first time. Fayetteville NC, same day another woman got the best of a cop, stole his car from him. No fatality. The Police really need better training.
@@lisagrafton2529 If I had the money that every lawyer wanted, I would have. Couldn't convince any of them that I had a winning case, in spite of there being one less than a month before.
@@wilfredvanvalkenburgh2874 When I was in Florida in the early 80's, I knew a guy who got busted with 45 pounds of weed and 7 pounds of hash. When he was charged, it was for 5 pounds of hash and 35 pounds of weed. Things have only gotten worse since then, and nationally. This is not a society, this is a wealth redistribution free for all.
I am a former employee for the Town of Brookside and its police department. I worked as one of their dispatchers and I can only describe the experience as psychological terror. The employees are treated as bad if not worse than those stopped by the police. I quit after a year for many reasons, namely the corruption and horrid behavior. For over a year I told people the stories and no one believed me or thought I was just a disgruntled ex employee. It’s so nice to see justice on the way after having to sit back and see it go on for so long. Also, if anyone is curious, look up Mike Jones and his past. He is a known embezzler but was hired by Brookside despite this fact. If anyone is wondering where all this money is going then I can tell you - it’s going in his pocket and the mayor’s pocket. Thanks again for shedding light on this.
I for one am glad that you were able to get out of that hell hole. I think that you have been doing a better job than Sysiphus in relating this story. You have been vindicated. Please continue to provide assistance against this injustice. Evil wins when God men do nothing.
Yeah it sounds like organized crime from the top. The rest of the sycophants are forced to go along or leave.
WHO?!
Yes, I too hope that IS NOT your real name
Respect from Ireland my friend
Apparently the Police Chief resigned a couple days ago. Thank you Steve for helping to shed the light on these criminals.
Exactly! my friend, trekidaho... Yep... when they know that everybody knows that they are AT FAULT or have BROKEN their OWN LAW, they will go into HIDING or SIMPLY RESIGN from their position... Why can't CIVILIANS do the same??? ROTFLMAO!!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Wow that's pretty big news for a small corrupt town. Now hopefully they hire from the outside to replace him.
@@cme98 I'm sorry but isn't that what your 2nd amendment is for?
Maybe the town found someone that was even more crooked than that police chief that just left... Lol
Not only him, but 7 other officers have also resigned. Not sure how many are left, but it's probably still too many.
absolutely disgusting. this is why everyone should have a dash cam installed
They would have ripped her dash cam off and destroyed it no ddoupt,
Johnny five o - Exactly!! Btw addicted to both of your channels!! Your phone calls to redress our government are hilarious and awesome!
@@Cryton12345 the footage can be uploaded to a server though. They cannot rip that out.
Yes, I have 3 in my car, some stream straight to the internet and offsite storage so destroying the dashcam won't destroy the video
And use the footage in court against the police.
Back in 2016, I had been a brick mason for years. My neighbors were the snooty type who would never talk to you about any potential issues, they'd just have the cops talk to you on their behalf. Well, I guess one day they got tired of the pallet of bricks in my backyard because they called the cops on me for "illegally dumping" off my dock. Yeah, me throwing bricks I paid for to do the job that keeps a roof over my head, in the lake. Tooootally.
So I lived in a small town in Michigan, only about a square mile wide. Completely no-crime area until this new police chief steps up after the old one retired, suddenly every single kid is a hoodlum, every driver is suspicious, you see where this is going.
Police chief himself responds to the call. Doesn't knock or anything, instead he just wanders into my backyard and starts taking pictures of my property without any sort of invitation.
I was woken up by my girlfriend at the time that there's cops in our backyard, so I rush downstairs and into the threshold of my backdoor in nothing but my boxers and ask the officer, "Hey, you got a warrant?" His response: "I don't need a warrant to conduct a civil investigation-" blah blah blah. He tried stepping up to me so he could occupy the threshold of the door with me, at which point he would already be inside the house. So before he got to me I took one small step forward and locked us both out of my house.
"Oh, you shouldn't have done that."
So he puts me in cuffs, says I'm being arrested for interfering with a police investigation and resisting an officer, and that he needs to run my license. I told him that for obvious reasons I didn't have it on me, it's in my pants, so he adds additional charges for failure to identify and failure to possess a valid ID. He proceeds to tell me that he can make do with my vehicle registration, so I tell him that I don't have my keys either and my car is locked, and that I do not consent to my vehicle being forcibly opened and searched. Didn't stop him, he broke into my car and retrieved my registration and POI from the glovebox on his own.
Takes me down to the police station IN my boxers, I'm released immediately after being booked, had to sign a bunch of stuff saying I'd appear in court (you bet your ass I was going to court over this, I told them as much). THEN had to have my girlfriend pick me up in my own car while I was forced to wait out front, still in my boxers.
The two weeks go by with regular phone calls from this guy telling me that if I just apologize for disrespecting him and his authority, he'll drop all charges and we can go about our lives. No way in hell was I doing that, I told him every single time I had him on camera abusing his authority and violating my rights, and I'd see him in court. On the DAY before, he calls me first thing in the morning and says it's my last chance and he'd *really* like to put this whole thing behind us, probably because I wasn't backing down. I told him: "You know what? Fine. I gotcha. I'm sorry you think I disrespected you and your authority by knowing my rights. I'm sorry you think that my voicing my displeasure at being wrongfully detained and then arrested and driven into public in nothing but my boxers was crossing a line for you. I'm sorry you're getting cold feet about going to court when you were all about levying charges on me in the heat of the moment. I'll see you tomorrow morning." and hung up.
We never got to court. Before the end of regular business hours that same day, the front desk lady at the local PD (who was honestly very nice and respectful, and we knew each other outside of her job, being a small town and all) called me in the early afternoon and told me that the department had dropped the charges against me and we wouldn't need to go to court. I was very appreciative of the fact that I didn't have to miss a day of work and thanked her for letting me know, but I wasn't done with him yet, so I asked her for the IA email address, and I get it.
I then email a copy of the video my girlfriend had taken the entire time I was being detained, cuffed, arrested, and hauled off. I didn't find out until after she picked me up and she told me about it, because she remembered another incident we had where I told her to record police interactions because they will absolutely lie and they're encouraged to do it. I also asked for and received the email of the Department Commander, since he was the highest up in the department you could go that was still beneath the Chief with any reports, complaints, or grievances. Sent him a copy too. I then went to the official website for the town to get the email for the city council board, sent them a copy. AND for good measure I sent a copy to Channel 7.
To make an already long story MUCH shorter, after waiting around a while and living life as normal, I find out that Chief isn't Chief anymore. I finally felt vindicated. I don't know if the video I sent to the news ever got any airplay, I don't watch the news like that, but I'm sure the bad publicity and reporters blowing them up for an investigation combined with it being an official city council topic of discussion on the docket played a role in the amount of pressure the town administration was under played a part.
Funnily enough, after a little while, the town went back to normal. Police were sleepy instead of jumpy, they'd actually wave to you instead of follow you around, the local kids stopped getting into trouble for nonsense reasons, people stopped telling me about getting tickets or pulled over for the most victimless of infractions.
Moral of the story: ALWAYS stand up to authority, especially when it's being abused. The only thing you do when you lay down and accept your fate is hand the opposition an easy victory.
Just letting you know after 2 years I read and enjoyed your novel
Well done sir.
@@claybear1199don’t throw out any spoilers, I’m halfway through.
@@kristofevarsson6903 Where was his decapitated body found?
FTP
Earning the hate every day
The mistrust put into people by corrupt cops, judges and elected officials like this can never be undone.
Yeah I mean at this point the number of cases like this and worse abuse across the country I assume that cops judges and the rest are basically corrupt by default and we need to see evidence otherwise for exceptions.
@Baba Ganush issue at this point is for too long and far too many have decided that supporting other Police comes before integrity and duty to their community
But who is voting corrupt officials over and over again?
@@Krzemieniewski1 say it with me aliens 👽
@@Krzemieniewski1 The police officers and their supporters. It’s been proven that if someone has a vested interest in something they will go and vote for it more than someone who is against something.
I'm from a small town in Alabama. This story is on point. Morgan county cops/ court system are one of the dirtiest institutions you can find.
I got a bogus ticket there too. Dashcam made the difference for me.
@@SavingSally not surprising at all. Long story but I moved away and came back 10 years later.
I got pulled over 3 times within a 30 day span. It was a total of 13 cops and a k-9 unit. I went and talked to the sheriff and threatened to get a lawyer involved... Luckily they left me alone after that.
On a recent trip to Birmingham, I saw several Hoover Police vehicles in the median on I22 near Brookside. They were still there hours later on the return trip. Someone explain that please.
Russell County is another one that is a money court!
The numbers in this story are insane!
This is the police force that needs to be federally investigated...now. The fact that the State has not stepped in, already.
If you live near there, buy a dash camera that shoots in at least 2 directions.
Any officer that gives false testimony where video evidence proves this needs to be held in contempt of court, be referred to for criminal contempt as a charge, and needs to have all of their old cases/testimony reviewed and possibly those old cases re-tried at the police department's expense without the officer's testimony.
"The fact that the State has not stepped in, already." Forget it, Jake. It's Alabama.
This reminds me of Philly cops and how there was so much corruption and extortion and other BS (that still happens) but the “highway patrol” in particular was pretty flippant about it. They rode motorcycles, wore Nazi style jackboots, and operated as more of a racist gang than anything else.
I don’t know if it was the state or feds but after numerous scandals they actually got kicked off the major highways and the State Troopers took over. I don’t get why Alabama can’t do something similar.
The Feds? Like the FBI, which is currently beung used by the democrats to investigate and harass their political opponents, but never seem to charge them with any crimes?
The DOJ is too busy labeling parents going to school board meetinngs aw shite supremacist domestic terrorists.
There is no system of justice in this nation any more, we have a legal system that is as corrupt as any third-world shithole nation run by a dictator.
That’s what I was thinking. Dash cams showing front and back windows and preferably one that automatically uploads to the cloud or somewhere off site. You know they will destroy that camera and any footage stored only inside. Plus the tinier the better so they won’t know you have footage until you get to court. Frankly I’d request a change venue for the court but I doubt they’d do that.
The Institute for Justice has taken this on in a class action suit They had a first round victory in March 2023. Thank goodness for people in the IJ. They fight the seemingly unfightable. Thanks for getting this story out there!
Policing for profit is rampant and the fact that other jurisdictions and appellate judges cast a blind eye, is utterly repulsive.
I love your description of the practice as being "utterly repulsive"! Nail on the head my friend!
And the solution is so simple too - all punitive damages imposed by any judge, or any police officer, and all proceeds of any asset forfeitures should by law be entered into the general fund of the federal government. No earmarking, as as non-local as possible, and with not singular identifiable cause which a police officer or judge might want to support.
And if that's politically not possible as a law, then any steps in that general direction would help; i.e. perhaps on a state-by-state level. But frankly, states shouldn't be incentivized to fine their own citizen either, so while that's better than nothing, it's not great.
@@MoireFly lol no. The federal government had nothing to do with this. We have this thing called the constitution.
The answer isn't centralized power 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
@@MoireFly how about we just do away with fines entirely? Seems obvious that a financial incentive to convict creates a conflict of interests.
@@deusvult6920 So your objection to having money be pooled where the incentives for fraud are massively diluted by sheer scale is...? Furthermore, pooling collected fines does not centralize power to _issue_ those fines in any way. And what exactly does having a constitution have to do with the appropriateness of a policy? The constitution is a _means_ to an end, not a item of worship; it has exactly zero relevance to picking ideal policy; it may have relevance to the details of implementability. Which is fine - the point is to separate those that issue fines from the proceeds of those fines. It's not that important exactly where those proceeds end up as long as that's as non-earmarked as possible to avoid kickback schemes. If a state treasury collects em, rather any branch of state or local law enforcement: that's still hell of a lot better than things are now...
Sounds like kidnapping, assault, and falsifying police reports in the case of the grandmother. Might be different in Alabama, but I'm pretty sure police have to be wearing identifying materials if doing traffic enforcement. The whole department should be arrested and charged with racketeering.
My thoughts exactly.
@@johnstjohn4705 My thoughts too. Scary stuff. This police dept and mayor think they are being cute, clever, but hopefully the consequences quickly catch up with them when investigated for committing some very serious crimes.
Sounds like the mayor, prosecutor and judge who preside over this traffic court has some serious questions to answer too.
In MI stopping someone from making a 911 (or any other call for that matter) is an additional "illegal wiretap" charge. These cops are unbelievable. They definitely need to be RICO'd.
@@gizmo5601 And some jail time to serve.
I know I've said it a million times, but this is what happens when the law is turned into a profit center.
Another word for this is "Fascism"
It’s also what happens when people ignore their local elections and focus too much on who’s running on the state and federal level…..none of those state and federal politicians have any where near the effect on your life or LE than the local politicians do, and no politician lies and misrepresents their platform or beliefs as those on the local level because the media ignores most of them. Hell most voters don’t even know who the hell their local politicians are, much less what they stand for.
hey my friend... not turned into... it has always been that way since day one all across the United States of America coast to coast. It's just now these things are coming out in the open because of EASY ACCESS to TECHNOLOGIES. Everybody is recording everybody else even themselves.
@iTz Wuzzi *trust me and judges and cops just get bribed* All the time, but they will give the IMPRESSION that they NEVER ARE INFLUENCED by MONEY and that they are UNBIASED and FAIR... Yea Right... ROTFLMAO!!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣
@iTz Wuzzi what right have we given up?
I'm Melissa's husband. We are from not to far from brookside. I used to drive thru their with my buddies in front of the mall to get to Homewood skate park and damn do we have some shit stories. They are absolutely brutal. It was awful driving thru their but because of where we were coming from, it would effectively cook less our drive time to take another route. Its worse than Vincent when it comes to traffic violations. Which, around here, that's really saying something. 36 in a 35 = ticket. Seatbelt sitting underneath your ladies chest (you know what I mean) that's at least an attempted ticket. Newborn in the car and you need to reach back to help them, ticket. A buddy of mine actually got a ticket for not having his lights on when raining. Problem is, it wasn't raining amd haven't been for over an hour. The cop actually tried to justify it by saying the roads were still wet. Never even heard of that before. I didn't even know people actually got tickets over their lights even if it was raining. There's a lot more and frankly what I did say ain't even bad. Some of the residemts there are literally blackmailed and extorted by the cops. They cops would know when their payday was, pull them over, and take their cash under threat of a bogus arrest and getting their car towed. They are insane. Many times, the county sheriff and deputies had to go and literally rescue citizens from brooksides police.
This all starts because we take a police officer's testimony as fact. If he says you 'rolled through a stop sign', then you did, period. No need for evidence or anything so inconvenient. "All power tends to corrupt, absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely". With all the video capabilities out there, we need to stop this. Police should need to provide actual evidence: video, radar gun, etc. As in 'beyond a reasonable doubt'. Does anyone remember that?
When we have cases like former police officer Zachary Wester planting drugs in people's vehicles I definitely have a hard time with the notion that a cop's testimony should automatically outweigh any other witness's testimony.
EVERY driver needs a dash camera! It is your word against theirs. Be smart and have your own evidence
Also, power attracts the corruptible.
Realize that most traffic infractions _are not crimes,_ but are civil infractions.
@@UncleKennysPlace true, but those are held to preponderance of evidence standards. In a "he said, she said" battle, a civil suit tends not to be winnable.
“A band of thieves need only call themselves a government and their crimes become legal”
~F. Bastiat
I've been saying for a couple of years now that there need to be a entity to investigate the police misconduct that is not attached to the police in any way and have the ability to arrest just police in any wrongdoings. The police are too easily corrupted when they know they are going to be protected internally
Who’s going to govern it? We have the Legislative, executive and judicial branch but they all conspire to promote each other’s perversion. The Supreme Court drops the ball more often than not. We don’t need to police the cops. We need less cops because the ones we have generally suck.
@@RadDadisRad we absolutely have to police the cops or else we have effectively zero rights and we dont live in a nation anymore we just live under the thumb of feudal lords known as sheriffs
@@RadDadisRad Tax paying citizens.
Complain on the judge instead. He's letting it happen. The Judicial Inquiry Commission, created under the provisions of the Alabama Constitution, is charged with investigating complaints of misconduct or professional wrongdoing on the part of judges.
Absolutely correct Geoff. The majority of the LEOs in the state of CT are CORRUPT to the bone. Being in a Blue state, they know that they are protected from the Governor and AG on down to their own Chief. It is time to GET RID OF THEM and replace them with people who have morals and ethics and truly do "Protect & Serve".
The police chief resigned.. and then got ticketed for speeding. He tried to use his badge to get out of the ticket, and has now been indicted for impersonating a police officer.
The police went from 50 tows to 789 tows in 2020 - when most people were quarantined at home and only essential workers went to and from work. Oh, and an occasional run to get food and supplies. The year that America was locked down, the police tow rate went up 1560%!!!!
The quarantine in the South was very different than much of the country.
I would bet their is a relationship between police and the tow. Mayor probably owns the truck.
@@SatansSimgma your must be physic.
That's mind boggling
But the cops will say aren't we doing a good job. oh ya they are doing a good job robbing people of there hard worked for paychecks. this town seems to do anything to justify the myth they are serving and protecting its the who they are protecting that is in question. it sure as hell isn't people who travel near their jerk water town. .gotta beware of the good ole boy system and its hangin" judges too. you will never get justice anywhere near that town.
The purpose of a citation(ticket) is to promote public safety. Ive worked in small towns for half my career. Where i work now the chief and mayor both have been ethical and neither have told me to write tickets. The last place i worked the mayor demanded we write tickets cause "the city needs money", told the chief to fire any officer that didnt write them. This mayor even told me personally [to write] the city needed money. I write approx 1 in 15 ppl i stop which may be couple a month. Our judge helps ppl by reducing fines and even dismissing some. Fyi, i prefer public relations. We work for the people. Our job is to protect people, property and keep the peace.
Unfortunately as one of the good co[s, you don't receive the praise you do. Thank you for upholding your oath.
I hope you wrote the dirty mayor a ticket cause it sounds like he deserves one.
I woulda sat outside city hall for the mayor to get in his car then lit his butt up with every obscure charge possible.
Thank you Joel for being a true police officer with character. Sadly officers and departments like this put good officers like you in jeopardy. People abused by the system become desperate and unpredictable. Be safe out there and thank you for your honorable service to your fellow human beings.
I got a ticket for passing a line of slow cars going 50mph, I passed all of them going 80mph, merged back and got back to 65mph, but the officer still saw me and decided to pull me for going 80mph, for literally improving the flow of traffic...
I just said fúck it and paid off the ticket
A small town near me (Porter , Oklahoma pop. 700) had a similar problem. Not much traffic through there, so the police were getting the locals for 1 mph over and a lot of other ridiculous tickets. They had a system where you could pay the fine to the officer right then with a credit card. ---The town voted to do away with the police department. End of problem.
they screwed up by ticketing locals it sounds like. you let the locals off scot free and ticket others while spending money on the town is how you succeed apparently
I've heard of porter... What happened to those cops once power was removed?
@@BobbyGeneric145 - They probably found jobs in other departments.
Nothing but removing and hanging the corrupt cops won't cure.. public officials should get public punishment..
As long as they can write tickets over petty victimless crimes no problem will be solved.
We were pulled over by them earlier in the year. The officer walked up to the side of my truck. I didn’t notice that my younger brother had put his badge on the top of my armrest so when he looked in the truck he was able to see it.. The officer had asked me for my license and registration. I asked him what did I do to get pulled over. He got extremely upset and he went to grab my door to open it. He got a little bit more upset when he found it was locked and he was not going to get it open. My brother opened his mouth and told him that under the law he was required to tell me the reason why he stopped us. He was starting to get a lot more upset when he got yelled at and told how to do his job. He started to tell us that we were both going to jail and that’s when he got a badge pushed into his face. I thought he was going to pull out his gun but my brother was already on the phone with the state troopers and they had someone on the way to us. He wasn’t sure when he saw the badge of a dea agent but when he was not able to tell if I was the agent or my brother. When the troopers got there they told us to go ahead and get back out on the highway if we didn’t want to wait for the sheriff to come out and explain why one of his officers was doing radar on the highway out of his jurisdiction. We got the officer’s name from the troopers and the number for the state’s attorney general. I filled out a complaint and my brother is going after the officer who stopped us to make sure that he is never allowed to be a officer anywhere else in the country.
I hope this worked as planned, as you said.
I have heard there is a Federal Law that requires speed enforcement on a interstate highway be conducted by State Troopers, Highway Patrol or Sate Police Department. This was after a Congress Member's wife or daughter was raped by a guy in a car with a magnetic flashing red light on the roof pulled her over and raped her. That was back in 1973.
They stated in that law how tall the letters must be on the patrol vehicle, and that undercover vehicles are not allowed to pull over people for traffic offenses. They must have fixed lights on the roof. And any state not approving this law will not get any Federal Interstate Highway Funding.
That they can not pull over a car for doing 59 in a 55 zone, and that they must be 10% over the posted speed limit or 5 MPH over the posted speed, (if less). So no ticket if you are on Radar at 28 in a 25 zone.
Sounds as if the people of Alabama would be best served by dissolving this township.
I was thinking the same thing. Unincorporate this town and be done with it.
@@kd5you1 definitely
There are plenty of other towns that do this same crap. We need to ban victimless crimes. There needs to be more reasons why a cop can write a ticket other than just because they can.
@@dvferyance Traffic violations are not victimless crimes. Dangerous driving kills pedestrians, passengers, other drivers, does property damage
@@gavinjenkins899 sometimes they can be like if someone runs a red light in the middle of the night when the nearest car is miles away.
Exactly what we dealt with in Stringtown, Colcord, Big Cabin, and a few others here in Oklahoma. It got so bad the the FBI and DOJ got involved back in the mid 00’s and a judge, a police chief (Stringtown), as well as several officers and deputies were convicted of multiple crimes and were jailed. Stringtown was back it it in no time until the Oklahoma department of public safety completely removed their right to patrol any federal or state highways in their jurisdiction in 2019. Kiowa county officers and deputies have also lost their right to enforce traffic rules on any state or federal highways. Lots of scams out there, none worse than those perpetrated by government officials.
Yep...don't forget Kiowa and Savanna Oklahoma (north of Stringtown) bad enough for locals but killers for Texas and other out-of-state plates...it's a cash cow that just keeps on giving....//
EVERYONE in Oklahoma knows about Stringtown!
Asher, Hulbert, Bernice
@@garymackey850 There is several towns in Texas that are horrible. One I can't remember the name is on US 287 up near the Panhandle and several on US 59. I got stopped about 5 years ago in Tenaha Texas. Then there is Corrigan, Texas. In my situation in Tenaha I got so pissed off I came close to taking a swing at that idiot that stopped me. The thing that bothered me the most was the cop was more interested in how much cash I had on me. Mind you I was just stopped for doing 10 over. I finally told the cop all I had was plastic and maybe $40 in cash. During that time I was working on two different contracts and had to drive between Shreveport Lousianna and Lufkin Texas several times. After that day I went around Tehaha. I never have been back through there since I paid my fine.
@@scittw22 I forgot about Hulbert. I remember hearing how bad they were. Also Warr Acres is really bad.
Law enforcement in general is out of control!!
There's a lack of accountability and consequences for their misconduct!
GET A DASH CAM AND ALWAYS RECORD THE POLICE!!! THEY ARE NOT YOUR FRIEND, AND THEY'RE NOT HERE FOR YOU!
Agreed, It's a systemic problem. What's the solution?
@@kkal1183 End qualified immunity and staff Internal Affairs with citizens who have no ties with law enforcement.
This, law enforcement policing law enforcement isn't working
@@kkal1183 And, all police body cam and vehicle camera footage should go straight to a public website. Where it is saved for 5 years.
and it starts with the doj, most corrupt.
The Mayor, Judge, and every cop in that town should be arrested for violating the public's constitutional rights.
They should do long sentences.
This cannot stand in America!!!
This stuff needs exposure, thanks a million Steve! I was arrested on hearsay from an out of state individual and the officer charged me with assault on an officer and dropped me off at jail for processing even though I was calm, cooperative and everything with him and had done nothing or damaged nothing. It was a huge ridiculous ordeal in my life and turned me into an outspoken individual!
Thank you for speaking out.
We used to have that problem in Oklahoma, then the state legislature passed a law where no more than 20% of a city’s income can be from tickets and fines, and 4 mph or less over the speed limit you can only get a warning. Those speed trap towns have shriveled up significantly!
@LeMarkD Yes, that is a good solution to stop this kind of behavior. Thanks!
Sounds like even the county that Brookside was in was corrupt too.
At this point the State has power to go in there and clean it up.
I feel that the ticketing authority should not get any revenue from ticketing (aside for court costs) as it is a perverse incentive, as seen in this story.
@@jamesonmiller8283 the way the state wrote the law was that they estimated how much income the small towns with major highways passing through their main streets might need to provide decent law enforcement based on average crime levels and officers per capita, then told them if they want more funds to police more then they need to increase taxes on locals. If it was really a problem locals would be ok paying more tax to have more policing, if it wasn’t really necessary then the people would push back against tax increases.
And many citizens painted “speed zone ahead” signs all over, even on parked semi trailers.
20%, unbelievable
Flashing lights to warn other drivers isn't illegal but interference with a 911 call definitely is!
Depends on where you are
There is case law, in Florida, that flashing headlights is 1A free speech. A different jurisdiction, but 1A is 1A.
And they also would have pulled her over for not having her lights on. /s
In many states, blinking your brights to warn of police ahead is against state law.
And the article describes the officer seized the lady's phone and destroyed it. That's a 5th Amendment violation right there, an illegal taking.
Between 20 and 26 years ago I was a traffic reporter for a local radio station.
I was the only non cop performer, as we just drove around and called different police departments for wrecks, and other things.
I started giving away police speed traps live when I saw them!
Never a complaint!
This happens all over the country all of the time. Buy a good dash cam (forward and rear) that logs gps data and use it religiously. Exercise your rights to not incriminate yourself by not answering questions and to be free from warrantless searches. And ALWAYS record police encounters.
Remember what Steve said "your video is evidence".
Nice idea but the judge doesn't have to accept your video evidence. Videos can be faked, you know (according to a Dekalb County (Georgia) judge anyway).
Judges in small towns don't care about your video. Cost so much to fight it.
Under "normal" conditions I would agree with you and the suggested measures... but these are extreme and blatant .. So normal measures won't be adequate ..Just choose to not be a victim by refusing to make yourself available to play their game.. Drive around the community.. its cheaper than a ticket
It's sad but this is pretty tame compared to the corruption and criminality in my small town in Montana! It's really like the wild west before law and order was introduced!! The problem is there is no oversight, as our population numbers are so low, the culprits get away with their crimes because they are all in on it! Yes the cops, the judges, the news paper, anyone connected in the community is milking the system for all they can!!! We are entering a period of lawlessness in America which is destroying our civilization! I am still amazed that Trump doesn't realize the president's main job is the enforcement of the rule of law!!!!
Sounds like racketeering laws should be applied.
The feds have filed a statement of interest in a civil suit brought against the Brookside Criminal Conspiracy Department, but they haven't, as far as I know, put boots on the ground to start a criminal investigation. They should. If you're going to get a federal RICO case out of any small town, Brookside is the one. This is a town that should be shut down, top to bottom. The Mayor, city council, prosecutors, every cop in the Department and clerks should all be under a full criminal investigation.
Public-Sector Criminals are destroying our Liberty and Freedom. "All Politics Is Local> Vote-Change-change-change..Vote - vote - vote...
Lol exactly!
The government allows them to get away with it, what does that tell u.
I grew up in this very town. They have spent years harassing my brother and now have him doing thousands of dollars in tree work to "pay down his fines". But he still seems to have to be doing multiple days of work without it being paid off. That town is a joke! And 55 reported crimes because they're not reporting it or they're involved in it. I stay out of that town as much as I can because of their harassment.
This is slavery
Work will set you free!
I do engineering consulting and personally have never been in this part of Alabama. However, someone I know worked a contract in that town a while back. He was born in Northern Alabama and has family in that town. Last I heard he had either already filed a lawsuit or was about to. Several of the cops there were harassing him, he has it all on video.
@Ross Radford Salty Army is Legion
Time to move and stay low until the statue of limitations expire.
A cop driving a Dodge charger followed me from Spokane to Ritzville. Then he started aggressively closing the gap between us. I was twenty years old, driving a used car I bought with 2 years of minimum wage paychecks.
I assumed the driver was trying to intimidate me for sport. So I maintained the exact correct speed limit. I got in the left lane, he sped up to drive parallel in the right lane. He refused to let me back into the right lane for 8 miles, and I was not willing to break the speed limit to pass him.
He pulled me over and gave me an $80 ticket for remaining in the left lane without passing anybody for 8 MILES.
My driver's license got yanked for that. The only ticket I ever got. I ended up homeless, living in the car. To this day, I never got my driver's license back.
Thank you for raising awareness about this. Policing for profit is a destructive trend in our country.
When the people fear the government, there is tyranny, when the government fears the people, there is liberty.-Thomas Jefferson.
I envy those who think these sort of things are isolated to small towns, but since misery loves company, I am hear to tell you
that this rot has infected the whole country.
FACT!!! It is coast to coast... It is just that they haven't brought up in the open yet. I like how some people reason... *Well, if the news media is not talking about this, then this doesn't happen everywhere....* Yep... And look how these people were in COMPLETE shock when Jeffery Epstein shenanigans came out... *No way, politicians and/or gobermint officials would participate in this llegal activities...* Ummmm ... right... lol... 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
@@1USAUSA corruption all the way up
Back in the 1970s there was a crooked police operation in Southaven, Mississippi. At the time, the legal drinking age was 18. There was a Navy training center and base in Millington, TN and the drinking age there and in Memphis, TN was still 21. These guys would target mainly servicemen by stalking in the parking lots of bars and pulling over vehicles with out of state plates. The problem was so bad the Navy had to put these establishments "off limits" for the service members on liberty. The officers there were paid by how many arrests they made. Conflict of interest, I think.
Desoto County is still as crooked as ever. Probably worse.
San Diego CA police had similar issues. Next door National City was know as Nasty City for a reason.
I was there in 1980 and it was pretty much the same they would actually grab you and steal your money beat the crap out of you and run off and this was the police
It never ends when it comes to citizens and police, does it? Here, in upstate NY (about 2 1/2 miles North of NY City), the local cops were asked, on multiple occasions, by the mayor, the city council, and some citizen's groups) to stand outside or sit in their cars near the free parking lot downtown, where the bars and restaurants tend to be.
Every single time I'm aware that this has been contemplated - as far as I know, it's never been implemented - it's a tourist town, and the bar and restaurant owner's association has had more than enough clout to prevent the implementation of any such "program".
Steve, I respectfully disagree with you regarding giving police (more) discretion than they have already. Any officer that writes a ticket for something that isn't a crime, and attests to having witnessed the commission under perjury, should be charged with perjury. Moreover, if, when writing and signing said ticket or attestation, the penalty they're assessed should be enhanced by the fact they were in possession of a deadly weapon; being "on duty" should be prima fascia evidence of being "on duty".
I believe the legal drinking age (off base) was 18 for beer, 21 for hard liquor. At least that was what it was when I was stationed in Biloxi back in 1972.
This is common in small towns, everywhere. Here's how it goes. Council spends all the money, needs more money, realizes raising taxes too much (because they're still going to raise taxes...can't miss an opportunity to get all the money) could hurt their re-election chances. Council looks into ways to make money. (Insert fly-by-night traffic camera companies here.) Council, through public safety director, tells appointed Police Chief to write more tickets, because tickets = $, and who is going to stick up for "unsafe drivers"? Police chief of course opts to continue feeding, clothing, and sheltering their family and sends the order down the chain to the sergeants, who are tasked with discreetly telling patrol to write more tickets without telling patrol to write more tickets. Strange things happen to departmental opportunities, such as K9 school, SWAT school, detective school, the assignment to which are now more dependent on "satisfactory traffic enforcement" (wrote enough tickets) appearing on the officer's quarterly eval than ever before. Mind you, no one mentions the dreaded Q word, because 'quotas don't exist and have never existed, and even if they did they would have been bad, evil quotas, so even though we're telling you your job will be made less fulfilling, if not outright more miserable, if you don't write enough tickets, it totally doesn't amount to a de facto quota. Trust us. We wouldn't do that.' And so, in small town America, the quota that isn't a quota continues under some other name, like "satisfactory traffic enforcement," at the expense of mostly out-of-town motorists, except for the part where the residents' homes, cars, and outbuildings are routinely burglarized because patrol was up on the main drag writing inspection sticker tickets, and all's well that ends with the council having more money to play with, without having to explain it at the polls.
You sir, have totally nailed it!
Good explanation
Yup. There's a thousand little towns like this all over the US. Sleepy little towns with Boss Hogg police forces that are out to fleece everyone who lives or drives near the place.
"spends". LOL. "steals" more like it.
It seems that some small towns have WAY more police on the pay roll than other nearby towns. The locals figure it out but tourists and travelers pay the price.
I live in Alabama just north of there, but there was more to that story. In 2020 the officers also drove unmarked cars and wore uniforms without the towns insignia.. Also, in Alabama on Interstates cities with less than a certain amount of citizens are not allowed to write tickets on the Interstate or patrolling. Driving in the left lane is allowed for any street, only access controlled Highways/Interstates.
After this, the State of Alabama from the Senate pass a bill limiting the amount of money cities can keep from fines.
This is a perfect argument for why fines and fees need to go to the state and not let the local municipality keep the. That would tend to stop this kind of nonsense. BTW someone ought to put up a billboard at the last exit before this RICO town and direct folks to a detour around the town.
That's actually a fantastic idea.
I bet billboards down there are cheap too
No, fines need to be donated to crime related charities.
@@evilmike74 crime related charities? Don't know if I want my hard earned cash going to big don and his goons 👍
If you think that the towns wouldn't make some agreement with the state about the distribution of those excess funds that's a fantasy.
"Production" is actually one of the popular euphemisms that police departments use for what normal people would call 'quotas'
...plus ' performance standards ' and ' goals'.
Maybe they should remember that Alabama is an open carry state. Unmarked person in an unmarked vehicle is a threat.
Exactly. Doing what they are doing is a good way to end up like Buford Pusser's and his wife....
This was my exact thought, totally unmarked people trying to make you exit your vehicle. Someday one will get shot, And if it does happen I hope that driver has good dash cam coverage front and rear in HD at a minimum. That way when they inevitably end up in court they can show on video that person was not in any way displaying proof of being a law officer.
Some places in the US have in fact made it illegal for unmarked vehicles and plain cloths officers to conduct traffic stops. Mostly for officer safety.
In SC there is a town called Pelion. Back in the 1960s the population was less than 1000 and the main source of employment was traffic tickets the speed limit. Dropped from 55 to 15 in less than 100 yards. Life was good until one night the State Highway commissioner (whose power in those days rivaled that of the governor) was stopped and ticketed. The next day the town’s charter was revoked so the police
Town police no longer had any authority.
they need some 1st amendment auditors to record the speed traps and get arrested so they can make a federal case of it.
If I were involved in the investigation into this I'd take a good hard look at the circumstances of the previous mayors death a year ago. Kind of odd that the mayor passed away, then 5 minutes after his replacement and the replacements henchmen got installed things go off the rails. Sounds almost like the old mayor got "removed" for standing in the way of an extortion racket.
Public officials should be required to prove that they aren't corrupt at threat of death.
The PEOPLE of the United States are innocent until proven guilty; our elected representatives are not.
they forced him to eat red meat until he got bowel cancer
I certainly hope that this story prompts an FBI investigation.
The FBI won't look into police departments that kill Black children. Do you really think they will investigate traffic claims?
What the video does not talk about is the misdemeanor charges, and FELONY charges..They are illegal DRUG charges!!!! Small town infested with DRUGS and CRIME, that has been OVERLOOKED for decades. They also patrol 1.5 miles of I-22 because Jefferson County only has ONE officer to cover about a 40 square miles are, that includes I-22. The State and County RARELY patrol I-22, which is a PIPELINE for illegal drug and human trafficking from Atlanta to the Memphis area, and further northwest. Brookside Police STOP illegal drugs from heading to a town near you, by enforcing the law on I-22 and in their small town. The people who say they didn’t commit a crime, are flat out liars. Most of these big dollars are also from Brookside PD performing felony arrest warrants. These are some of the bravest police officers out there, doing their job for pennies. They could easily sit and eat donuts all day, but they are highly trained, unlike the surrounding towns, and should be appreciated and thanked for cleaning up the small town and stopping the illegal drugs from coming to a town near you.
@@boosted10speed hahaha 🤣😂 the chief of police stepped down
Wow..... that is exactly what my sister told me about the cop at the corner as she reached the stop sign. She saw him, he saw her. She made sure to stop, but still he claim she ran the stop sign. This is odessa texas.
An example of cops earning the hate.
But I bet they get bonuses too.
They never learn do they? I guess they don't care if they are hated by the general public.
Dash cam. Two words that will save a lot of pain. My son had a 2 week old Charger, which he worked very, very hard to afford. A person in an expensive truck backed into him then claimed my son rear ended him and he had neck injuries. My son had a dash cam with front and back cameras. Guess who won, my son.
Thank God for that dash cam! I’ve recently installed one in my vehicle as well…it should honestly be an option in vehicles today!
We live in an amazing country don’t we, where people are more then happy to lie, steal, and cheat and never feel bad about it. Sounds like most cops now days too, f*&$ing disgusting. Like we are headed back to the BC days
That isn't going to do you any good if the judge is crocked you should still get a dash cam though
You should have looked up the civil rights lawyer from West Virginia he is great. He sues on civil rights violations and has a detailed UA-cam channel
Doesn't matter if the judge doesn't care.
You can’t tell me this doesn’t happen in enough states to warrant a class action lawsuit.
Unfortunately qualified immunity puts a stop to any prosecution. End qualified immunity now. Until it ends, stuff like this will continue.
They knew the law and made up laws, QI should not protect them.@@Kathyskollectables
It does, some places worst.
Forbes did an article on Brookside. I was going to post a screen shot of the article headlines but can't. It warmed my heart to read it. Especially since some of the dirty cops were arrested!
This is by definition extorsion. I hope the little old lady wins her case. Hopefully this will bankrupt the town. This is clearly not legal. The entire police force and mayor need jail time.
This is organized crime! A RICO case , get the FBI in on it !
@@robertdillon9989 Are you kidding? The FBI is at the top of the "crooked" heap?
For a town that small, someone should hide several cameras in the high traffic areas. That way there will be evidence of their corruption. The Chief, Officers, and Judge need to be behind bars.
If I were wealthy I would drive through, get my ticket, and make it my life's work to destroy that town's government...completely bankrupt it and destroy the reputations of all involved...create a private foundation dedicated to doing this to corrupt towns like this..
YOU DON'T JAIL CORRUPT POLITICIANS, JUDGES OR COPS, YOU HANG THEM IN THE TOWN SQUARE.. SEND A MESSAGE.
@@hakimcameldriver Those stocks they had on the town common centuries ago. Where criminals had their head and hands locked into it. We need to bring those back... pronto.
I grew up in a small town with out of control police. When my brother bought his 1st car, he left school to find his tire was flat. While putting air in the tire and trying to figure out what happened a resident told us a police officer flattened the tire. This same cop later wrote my brother a ticket while we were leaving. The ticket was written for not having a state inspection sticker in the window. My brother fought the ticket and won because the car had just been purchased and was still on temp tags and had until the tags expired to get the inspection. The local magistrate was outraged with these officers after hearing all the facts from my brother and I. We were lucky because we worked for the magistrate doing logging and farm work and he knew we were honest kids. He chewed out the officer for flattening the tire and dropped all charges.
In our yuppie suburb area the police wanted at will warrantless searches for teens. They made pre-consenting to searches a condition of parking in the school parking lot, then put up no parking signs for an entire mile(!) around the highschool.
And then gave all of us teens in class parking tickets. Because of course they did.
Later they'd call students down to have their car searched 'because drug dogs alerted' who hadn't driven that day. Basically if you were one of the poors (didn't dress preppy, or didn't drive a late model car) you were searched.
@@seanclark8452 Sounds like I'm unconditional requirement for parking at school.
Again another example of revenue generation. Not having a state inspection sticker has absolutely nothing to do with public safety whatsoever. It proves once again it's all about the money.
I hope that this town suffers some real consequences for their actions. I had read the articles you reference in this piece. I really enjoyed listening to your take on things. Thank you.
I'll bet you had to re-write your comment and bite your tongue with the final edit. But I get exactly what you most likely really wanted to say. Yup, those tornadoes hit the wrong towns a few weeks ago.
yes that there police are disbanded and can never have one again.
@@TerryMundy ehhhh I don’t think we should wish total destruction on people who are likely to be suffering under this regime to begin with.
@@JeremiahDouglas are you sure🤔
I hope Mike gets what he deserves but us over at the fire department we had nothing to do with this
I've always been told to call 911 before stopping for an unmarked car, especially at night, so that's crazy that they charged her for doing that
NM has a state law ⚖ saying NO plain clothes or unmarked vehicles, SUVs can do traffic enforcement. No nonsense traffic tickets. Only police Lts or above can approve a traffic stop in plain clothes. Unmarked 🚔.
Excellent idea!
You do that in brookside and they will get you for that say you made a call that wasnt a emergency..
In my state, it is a crime to prevent someone from calling 911.
It's a crime everywhere
Police are rarely charged with crimes
Yes, I agree it's not just the south or Alabama. And I saw the comment about Missouri. I am a resident of Missouri and
I was being questioned by a city cop and I was calm and nonaggressive answering all his questions and he moved
around behind me and did a bulldozer like maneuver into the small of my back and I was violently hit and pushed at a
quick pace until I ended up on the hood of his cop car. He then stood up and started yelling, "Did you guys see that?",
"Did you guys see that?", talking to the other officers that had just arrived on the scene. He then stated, "this guy was
resisting arrest". The other two officers replied with "no". He charged me with resisting arrest, which was later dropped in court. He was a punk and if the situation were different, I would easily schooled him on his crooked ways.
I’m so glad Brookside is getting exposed I have been through there many times thank you for doing a piece on this Steve
It's a return to the olden days when you had to be aware of highwaymen. Now, the crimes are perpetrated by the government.
I wouldn't exactly call these corrupt pigs "government "
Thank you for bringing this to more people’s attention, being my home state. This is disgusting to say the least.
There’s another interesting article about ankle monitors in this series. It’s worth taking a look. Also, the author does great work, you should check out more of his writing.
I'm from Brookside, In the year before this story, they pulled me over probably 20 times. Most times most times they let me go, once they gave me 2 tickets for wreckers driving and failure to yield for emergency vehicle. They are the only department to pull me over in the last 10 years. We are now down to 2 cops and a supervisor.
Brookside police use all black UNMARKED police cars when sitting on I-22. Real piece of work that town.
yea a lot of towns do that but you can always tell if its a cop if ya radar detector goes off lol
A couple of decades ago, there was a small town in Missouri, with no interstate near by, that was doing pretty much the same thing with speeding tickets. (the town was in a depression, the speed limit was 55 except at the town where it was 35, or less) They would stop people for one MPH over. And the town was making big bucks from the tickets. Untill they stopped a state representative. He went back to the capitol and had passed a law limiting the persentage of revenue a town could make on traffic tickets. The town reduced their police and only had one police car when all was said and done.
Did it happen to be Macks creek? They were known to be super bad years ago along Highway 54. They have no police force at all nowadays, but have heard all the stories from back in the day since i live about 20 miles away.
There were similar cases last decade in Ohio and Florida. In the end, the legislatures of both states dissolved the towns and turned them into unincorporated area of the county. No city, no police force.
@@KalebKronic Yep, that was Mack's Creek. They were so bad the legislature passed a state-wide law prohibiting towns and cities from using more than a certain percentage of their revenue from fines for operating expensed. I think the limit they set was 45% (still pretty high); Mack's Creek was getting close to 90% of theirs from fines. And, to no one's surprise, an audit of their finances found some significant irregularities in their books. It was so bad the residents voted to disincorporate and they are no more.
Yes, Mack's Creek. They disincorporated over it, so they're no more thank goodness.
That’s why we have a 3mph variance in WI by law.
Does anybody remember Hacienda Village near Fort Lauderdale? The state of Florida ended up revoking the city charter. It no longer exists. Same sort of thing as this case.
Sounds like a police dept in Iowa 30 years ago. The police chief dismissed for mental reasons. One officer fired and one quit. A three man police force.
We need to collect data on all police departments so this type of abuse can be stopped.
Yes Steve, this town has been violating people's rights, and it's been getting worse. Thank you for this video.
We need to stop profit policing.
Same thing happened to me. Cop said I had run a stop sign and I really had stopped. He pulled me over 4 blocks and two more stop signs past the intersection. There was no way he could have even seen me at the time I went through that intersection. He intensely interrogated me on where I was headed, where I was coming from, why I was in the neighborhood,, etc. It would have cost me much more in lost wages to fight it than to just pay. There are deceptive and abusive police officers everywhere. Standards to get that job need to be increased.
Time to open season on the mayor, chief & PD. CRIMINALS WITH BADGES deserve whatever happens to them.
In Missouri we have the Macks Creek Law (2015) which as a result of speed trap enriched towns limits the percentage of revenue a community can make from traffic tickets to 10% of their total budget. Anything in excess goes to the state so the community has less incentive to run speed traps. How well this reigns back small towns is questionable...
Pleasant Valley has found ways to code tickets as other infractions
I've dealt with a town like this. One of their plows had knocked down a speed limit sign where it dropped. They were pulling over everyone on their stretch of highway (not interstate just a 2 lane US highway.) I went to the courthouse to fight it and found out there were dozens of other people there for the same thing. Turned out it was $150 to fight it or $160 to plead guilty and have them not report it to insurance or the state and expunge it if you didn't get another ticket for a year. And they had some insane rule, supposedly, where you had to use their public defender in traffic court and couldn't have your own lawyer. Needless to say everyone was spending the extra $10 to just not deal with it.
And it's always rubbed me the wrong way that they could basically say, even if the court decides you're 100% innocent, that you still had to pay them either way just to fight it. Even if you did nothing but drive through the town you could be out $150 with basically no recourse.
@@bigdougscommentary5719 you figure it out genius.
@@donmills10 Expect to lose.
@@machintelligence depends...
@@machintelligence :laughs: you need cognitive skills to understand my comment. Sorry, you don't have any.
Alma, Texas is modeling after Brookside. How can non residents shut this crap down? Where is the judicial review of the dollar signed eyes of the judge?
They _bought an APC?!_
When they don't even have a SWAT Team to use it?!
It's not military hardware, but... this is raising all kinds of red flags, and ringing _serious_ alarm bells for me.
It's going to be the zombie apocalypse and we are the zombies
They just want to be prepared for their unintentional oppression of the public. Nothing to see there
They _dont_ have a SWAT team? JFC yeah that is a big red flag. If they had a SWAT team that would probably throw up a much smaller red flag, but if they DON'T, Jesus Christ. At least now I know never to get within 20 miles of that town.
in my town in the '70s drug smugglers, state politicians, former and current police had a farm or compound and they had an apc with a 50 cal machine gun. crazy, but it was all crazy. eventually some went to prison and others went further up in their careers. one got a police academy named after him
yes, the town is in the u.s.a. :)
I would like to hear a follow up to that lady that was harassed and arrested for turning on her headlights. I think she should take them all the way and get a hefty compensation.
If none of the cars or officers are marked, they should be required to wait while the person calls 911 to verify them, they should have no problem with that. They should not be stealing the person's phone and destroying it. That is exactly what a illegitimate officer would do.
Brookside doesnt have any unmarked cars but they have ghost decals which can be difficult to see
@@buddysystem4207 that is the same thing as unmarked
@@swooopg true but legally there is a difference
@@buddysystem4207 That needs to change.
@@glintinggold 100% imo they should be made to stand out such as the police in the UK (I believe it is) withe the bright yellow cars
In Pagedale Mo. The city was restricted from funding themselves with these kind of traffic tickets. So they created new city laws and ordinances and ticketed residents for non matching curtains, barbecues in their yards, more than 3 people in a yard, old paint....these towns and police forces and courts should all be sued into submission.
People can just vote these tyrants out of office.
Not exactly the same thing, but I read many stories about HOA boards being regulation nazis. The problem was that no one took any interest in being on the HOA board so some old lady control freak would get on and make everyone's life miserable.
I actually did sis on an HOA board. Many of the violations that came up during our meetings were illogical and I convinced the other member to dismiss them.
I remember silly things, like someone put brick edging around a tree in their yard. Another was for painting their driveway. They used a color that was light gray and only slightly different shade than concrete driveways there.
The owner had stains on the driveway and was trying to make it look nice. It did.
There were citations for putting trash cans out the night before trash day.
Just lot of stupid things that the HOA management company's inspector would find.
It is a fairly simple process to disincorporate a township. The voters put it on the ballot and disolve their city government. Law enforcement then cedes to County Sheriffs and fire is handled by fire control district and bond levies. It works.
Sued is to nice, they need real punishment
@@justkelly6992 not as easy as you thibnk, if you start the rocces, the coprup cops and sytme arrst you for fake crtimes.. thse town are jsut mob towns.
My roommate had his car impounded for nearly a year from this police department. He is part of a federal lawsuit against that police department that is still ongoing a year later.
I went to court just before Christmas in a town like this. There was so many people at court that bailiffs were yelling out the front and back doors. The judge was so pissed that he asked every one there who was guilty, 2 stud up. He dismissed the charges on everyone else with a Merry Christmas
In Arkansas, A police department that gets over a certain percentage of their revenue through tickets can be de-certified as an agency.
It happened to someone I know, He was stopped in a small Florida town, on radar, for speeding. 5 miles above the speed limit. It so happens that he works for the federal communications department. Back in his office he checked the towns radar and emitting devices permit. They had no permit issued or applied for. He had a fine of 25K $ imposed to the hick town for operating a radar device without a federal permit. It's not everyone who can retaliate legally against these money grabbing police departments.
Traffic fines should go to federal government. This would remove fine incentive for small towns. In UK all fines go to Central government, hence no local incentive.
Sounds like the feds need to go after the department with RICO charges
That's exactly what I was thinking.
There's another way too. I believe it was in the '60s. A shitsburg in Georgia, located near the Florida border, had a scheme to make money the old fashioned way - they stole it from everyone passing through with out-of-states license plates, among other things. Things got so bad the Governor (Lester Maddox)? got involved and the bottom line was the town's municipal license was terminated. Poof, no government, no cops, no tickets, no more bullshit.
Using the Federal Government is like trying to take a hungry bear for a walk without a leash. Best you can do is point it the right way and hope
No need for the feds. Sounds like the sheriff knows there is a problem. He should be able to take care of it.
"Here's where it gets really crazy. . . " Steve, it was really crazy way before that! This is nuts!
Time for the federal DOJ to get involved.
Also, state police should patrol interstates.
Don't they? Around here, the city cops can't do a damn thing on the highway - you could speed by them and they cannot do anything except radio it in to the OPP.
The question hung in the air like a cloud of uncertainty. Wasn't I-22, the road mentioned in this city, a federal interstate freeway? And if so, could any person who received a traffic ticket on that road file a claim against the city in federal court? The potential legal implications loomed over the conversation, casting a shadow of doubt and worry. Steve, would you be so kind to respond. Thank you sir.
One has to wonder just how much longer this town will have it's charter! Seems State and Feds may be having a field day with some corruption there.
In my recent memory, no less than twice the Louisiana State Police have had to go into two small towns and take over the police departments for this very problem. The corrupt departments would trump up civil asset forfeiture if they saw a vehicle on the interstate that they would like to own. This was during the days when the big Shamu looking Impala SS’s were being made in the 90’s. What got them caught were the Mexicans who would transport towed auction cars back down over the border. These guys knew that they were being targeted, so would carry cash to pay “fines” directly to the local cops right there on the shoulder of I-10. Then one of the drivers called the State Police. Game over. Nearly the entire department was arrested in one town. Hell, even the old show 20/20 (I think it was) did an expose’ on another I-10 town in Jefferson Davis Parish because the corruption was so rampant.
Legislation should be enacted to prevent profiteering by local small town police. For a while, Louisiana legislation did introduce a bill that prevented local cops from patrolling interstates. We rejoiced, but the State Sheriff’s Association prevented passage. Same with marijuana legalization. The Sheriff’s Association flat out said that they make far too much money off of marijuana arrests to ever legalize it.
We've got a small town near us where that happened--our Highway Patrol had to take them over, get rid of all the local cops. Crazy thing is, the town was so tiny, maybe 700 people, but they had something like 10 cops. Due to small county roads, if you wanted to get to the county seat, my town, you had to go through this tiny town or go approximately 40 miles out of your way and double back. My own town has around 2,500 people, and we have a big PD, plus the Park Police, county sheriff headquartered here, National Park Patrol Division AND the local tribe has their own police department, the Lighthorse Police. We are SUPER law enforcement-heavy. Oh I almost forgot that Fish and Game has an office here too, LOL, with F&G officers. I guess it wasn't hard to find enough officers to cover that tiny little town when they kicked the police department out.
Sounds like Gretna! I always make sure I avoid that town when I go to New Orleans.
Florien and New Llano are 2 in Louisiana it happened to. I live in the area of both...lol
@@Gandalf721 It’s not a particular sheriff. It’s the head of the Louisiana Sheriff’s Association with hundreds of regional sheriffs who all share the same opinion. Lots of legal personal revenue kickbacks from LACE offenses. It pays to police, as they often say behind closed doors. An officer may have a normal salary of $65K, but he can triple that through some of Louisiana’s policing programs.
Half the city's total income? That's insane.
I read that as half the cities total crime. I was both confused and amazed.
@Bobb Grimley It's crazy and completely unacceptable. The Institute for Justice is already suing other cities for practices like this because it's impossible to get a fair trial when the judge knows that more than half his paycheck comes from the fines and citations issued by the local police.
I agree totally with you Steve. I'm a retired LEO. Gaining reasonable compliance of the law by the public doesn't mean being a ticket writing fool or cops breaking the law. Judge needs to be investigated also. Lawsuits waiting to happen.
Why is it that so many issues like this seem to be coming out of the South?
I'm looking forward to the follow-up story from Steve that discusses the federal indictments for everyone in this town's government. On the other hand, in today's America, I'm not holding my breath.
I hope so, but federal intervention into state and county matters is also a double edged sword. I wish the state of Alabama or the county (I believe it’s Jefferson county) would bring charges and get results so the feds didn’t get involved. The problem with the federal govt. getting involved is while it can effect very real and fast change, it also sets a President that the federal government has power that renders the autonomy of states to operate under their own laws that fit the people pretty much useless. The reason a lot of small towns and counties with low population density end up under the “good ol’ boy” system because locals would rather deal with the corruption and allow “outsiders” to be violated so they can retain a way of life the federal government is trying to take away.
@@J.R.in_WV but we don't want pple to have to live under laws that "fit" some of the people very well & the others not at all, right? what "way of life" is it that states protect & federal govt can take away? the right to have locally corrupt officials impose differential enforcement for rich & poor, black & white, does not seem like the states rights we're looking for
when folks speak of states rights & way of life they are speaking code, in my experience
If this was in a democratic majority state you know Fox News would be running a full week of non stop coverage on this
I got pulled over as I pulled into an autozone once, I was pulling into Autozone with a headlight out, it went out while i was driving and I went straight to the parts store, as I was pulling into a parking spot and getting out a police car came up behind me and wrote me a ticket for failure to maintain my car, this was Arlington TX, it happens in the big ones also. I told the officer is was pulling in to get a headlight and was informed that didn't matter and the moment my headlight went out I should have pulled to the side of the road and requested a tow. Like WTH
Its not just small town police, its also some county sheriffs. A few years ago, I took a drive from my home in Las Vegas down to the western end of the Grand Canyon. The road into and out of the area is a two lane blacktop. On the way back I was doing the speed limit, which was 50 mph. As I came over a hill and could see beyond, there was a 25 mph sign and a Mojave county sheriff deputy sitting on the other side of the road. Classic speed-trap, and that is EXACTLY what it was, the deputy even admitted that it was. The way the 25 mph sign was situated, there was NO way, short of dynamiting the brakes and skidding, of dropping 25 mph before passing that sign, and the fact that the deputy was sitting there, waiting for victims to fall in his trap made it a sure thing, even if the cop had denied it. I signed the ticket and commented, "great little trap you got here", deputy just smiled.
Mojave county is one of the largest AND poorest counties in Arizona. Apparently they feed their budget with speed traps.
After watching this channel for some time, I get the impression that a lot of problems could be fixed by simply doing away with the American rule and switching to "loser pays". In this case, if the town lost every case on appeal and had to pay all the fees and costs attached to that, the financial incentive would quickly disappear.
The government is so incompetent that's why our judiciary screwed us with the immunity crap.
Cities lose very seldomly in court. Lots of people (a) don't have the money to try and fight the charges, (b) don't have the time to take off work to try and fight the charges, or (c) don't live in the town and can't afford to go there half a dozen times to fight the charges.
Even if the city did have to "loser pay," they'd still come out very net cash positive.
@@starsfan6878 I'm not sure I can follow the logic. As to cities rarely losing (I haven't fact-check that claim but let's accept it for argument's sake), that would probably apply to "normal" cases, not outlandish tickets such as these. And it could be that they win so often simply because few people choose to fight which is exactly what we're trying to fix here.
In regards to (a): If the lawyers know that they'll get paid by the town in the end, we can presume that they'll be happy to take on any such slam dunk case. It's easy money, after all. As to (b) and (c): It's my understanding that if you're represented by an attorney you don't actually have to be present at the proceedings when you're fighting a ticket. But even if you had to be there in person and take time off work for it: That would simply be another reimbursement you'd be entitled to under "loser pays".
Here in Germany, for instance, where it is "loser pays", if you win the case you (in general) can get compensated for any loss of income incurred by being there during the trial.
Well it requires people to have the guts to stand up and fight back and hold them all accountable. No one wants to do it and that's why they act this way and have gotten away with it for so long. Who is going to change their evil ways if there is no punishment or reprisals to worry about, regardless if how vile or disturbing the crime being committed is? It's only when you know your ass WILL BE handed to you when you mess up, that make people begin to act right.
You're assuming fair and impartial Judges. These are local judges with ties to the local government. Knowing the town will have to pay if they lose will increase the odds of the town winning.
75+% of Nebraska ticket fines go to the schools, the rest are court fees. Law Enforcement gets 0% of any fine money.
They really need to throw these town officals into prison
Into the public guillotine
Drag them out of the offices and string them up trees.
@@1x1HealthyEnergybyAndrew Calm down, Robespierre.
@@Strideo1 Alright, alright. We'll use _private_ guillotines.
I guess Alabama isn't really worried about tourism. This is very important to know. One drive through the wrong town can destroy or even end your life.
A perfect example of how small government & law enforcement can be fallible & malicious. It’s so frustrating to hear people defend these groups as if they are incapable of wrong doing. Power corrupts.
On the other hand the small town government is easier to change. Big city corruption is deeply entrenched.
The civilian drowns in violence of the state
@@jj18057 they both have their pros & cons. A larger government in theory would have more oversight & regular auditing. For example, whenever you hear about embezzlement it is always small companies or small town governments.
@@EvilVacuum But when you hear of cops acting like gangsters, extortion, beatings, killings, it's usually in really large departments like New York City, Philly, Phoenix, Baltimore or in the state police, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Louisiana being good examples.
@@joepenfield, or Latimer County, OK back in the day.
You know I'm always throwing the term " goose stepping" around when it comes to officer corruption. Especially when it's accepted and encouraged by their superiors. This department has to be the worst I've heard of, EVER.
So much for pride. These cops should be ashamed to even wear a uniform.
That's part of the problem They aren't wearing uniforms, this sounds more like a Militarized take over of a Less Than Podunk Town which has Turned into very large swaths of Alabama, and especially the what used to be a functioning bunch of small towns ,but that was back in the 50's and 60's when coal mining was the main source of any form of wealth back then. And all of these small departments need to have their hand me down armored up ex military vehicles taken back until a very great need for them can be proven. And The US Department of Justice needs to be jumping in and looking at these baseless actions quickly and rooting out the corruption that obviously is going on here. . This is chit that occurred back in the 50's and needs to be squashed Like the 🪳 cockroach that it is becoming. And I'm sad to say that I, have relatives in the areas around Birmingham. Haven't been back there since 1969 and have no plans to ever return either. Lock Them all Up !
Bang bang,
In the state of California a speeding ticket cannot be written from an unmarked car. Which prevents at least some of this chicanery.
I used to live in CT and at one time there was a lot of questionable or downright illegal activity by the state police using unmarked cars, including blatant entrapment.
In Arkansas there was rapist who impersonated a cop in an unmarked car. He was known as the "blue light rapist". The governor of Alabama banned the use of unmarked LEO cars as a safety precaution. That was changed a few years later and now a large percentage of LE cars are unmarked or only marked on one side.
This sounds like organized crime Police Chief and mayor should be charged under RICO
This sounds to me like a town that is desperately in need of some RICO charges. I was pulled over by a cop in Jefferson county CO for flashing my lights at another car. Ironically, this was right after the 7th court ruling that cops don't have the power to do that, there is no law, no rule, no regulation, that gives them that power, and that it is, in fact, a violation of your first amendment rights of communication. I told the DA on the phone that this is CLEARLY illegal, that they should know since it's their JOB to know that this IS a violation, and that not only are they NOT stopping cops from doing it, they are profiting off of it as well. I then asked him if this didn't sound an awful lot like a good RICO case, and he admitted that it did. I didn't have the money to fight the ticket (weed possession before we got CIVILIZED), but I should have just turned them into the feds anyway.
Cops are crooked. It's the nature of humanity. There is a FINE line between a slasher and a surgeon, it's just a matter of temperament and reason. Same with cops and crooks. A VERY fine line, and WAY too many of them step over it. It looks like the entire town's cop department needs a good cleaning, from top to bottom. This is LITERAL highway robbery. It needs to be treated as such.
If you fought it, your weed possession couldn't stick, because that all happened as a result of an illegal traffic stop! Wish you could have fought it. They count on only a few people being able o fight the illegal stops.
As for them trying to say they didn't know the law changed, what is it we always hear? "IGNORANCE OF THE LAW IS NO EXCUSE!"
You have a way with words. Too many cops do step over the line. The biggest drug bust around North Alabama was a Louisville cop flying a twin engine dope plane full of Colombian coke, The DEA chased him as he flew over the Tennessee River throwing out 80lb duffel bags of cocaine. My friend found 2 (160lbs), turned then in. Another was found at a wild slasher party at a local motel, and another was found with his body when he tried to parachute out, but smashed into the ground instead. His best friend was also a cop, and was the assistant to the Governor of Kentucky. The head of the Kentucky DEA was also involved. Nothing was proven on the Governor. Then there was the Alabama judge who was caught flying a plane load of marijuana. He had sentenced a man to 17 years for less than an once of weed earlier in the same week. The Judge had a pistol with him that was taken out of the evidence room, that was used by the Mayor to kill his wife's lover. So much for chain of custody of evidence.
You are right, it's a fine line. The Police need our help so badly. I've seen the Police shoot and kill a man, and I've seen their lack of competent training cost another man his life when a shoplifter managed to get behind the wheel of a police cruiser. When the Police chased her, she was running about 130 mph when she hit a 15 year old girl who was just learning to drive. The "accident" killed her dad. Same thing happened a year almost to the day in the same town. (Fayetteville TN.) No fatality the first time. Fayetteville NC, same day another woman got the best of a cop, stole his car from him. No fatality. The Police really need better training.
@@lisagrafton2529 If I had the money that every lawyer wanted, I would have. Couldn't convince any of them that I had a winning case, in spite of there being one less than a month before.
@@wilfredvanvalkenburgh2874 When I was in Florida in the early 80's, I knew a guy who got busted with 45 pounds of weed and 7 pounds of hash. When he was charged, it was for 5 pounds of hash and 35 pounds of weed. Things have only gotten worse since then, and nationally. This is not a society, this is a wealth redistribution free for all.