[BDSM-LegalIssues] Re: New book -- good but disturbing
Hi all,
I'm currently re-reading the book, this time with highlighter and
multi-colored pen in hand. This is turning into one of those books
that I'm seriously studying.
To recap a bit, the author is a former career police officer and FBI
agent. He was active in an FBI swat team and interviewed killers
such as Wayne Williams -- the Atlanta boy murderer. The author is
now a criminal defense lawyer in Florida.
He goes on at some length about how police officers are evaluated by
their supervisors, and in particular addresses that many supervisors
have a "many arrests = doing good police work" type of thinking in
how they evaluate the officers under them. After all, arrests -- and
traffic tickets, and suchlike -- can be objectively graphed and
charted. It just plain and simply looks good in reports. He also
notes that there is *no* particular benefit to a police officer in
doing things like helping citizens. It's all about making arrests,
don'tcha know?
Further, and even more disturbing to me, is his in-depth analysis
about how once arrests are logged into the NCIC computer network,
they are in there essentiallly forever (he points out that local
judges have no jurisdiction over federally maintained records), and
how the arrest record can affect how the arrested person is dealt
with for the rest of their lives. He also notes similarities
regarding people who have been in contact with "social services" as
well.
(Footnote: my privacy rights attorney friend notes that there is not
even a requirement that the info in NCIC be *accurate*. Therefore
somebody can be adversely affected by *inaccurate* NCIC info and have
no recourse. Yeeks!)
Here is a brief quote from page 39: "The electronic plantation is
less visible than the criminal justice plantation, the social
services plantation, or the rice and cotton plantations of centuries
past. Nonetheless, it's real. Employers, schools, and government
agencies would rather not hire someone who has been arrested, or whom
the social service has lableed as "troubled." Lendors would rather
not make a loan or a mortgage. Credit cards? Forget about it.
Landlords, ditto. Why entrust rental property to someone who's been
arrested?"
While I think he's on a bit of a rant here, he's apparently not on
all that much of a rant. I fear that there is way, way too much
truth in his words, and this emphasizes his central premise about how
incredibly important it is to not get arrested in the first place.
He devotes the last two-thirds of the book to giving detailed
instructions as to what to say and not say, do and not do, when
stopped by the cops either on while walking on the street or driving
in your car. All of it seems right on the money to me, and all of it
is highly similar to material in similar books such as "Beat The
Heat" and "Busted: Drug War Survival Skills." Carson's book,
however, provides some excellent information not found in the other
books because those other books weren't written by former cops.
As to this book's relevance to BDSM-related matters, it's relevant
because what we BDSMers do leads us to have occasional encounters
with the police. (NCSF teaches workshops on how to act in such
situations, doesn't it Leigha?) Given this reality, it's especially
important for us to have some clues as to "the rules of engagement."
Again, the book is titled "Arrest-proof Yourself" by Dale Carson --
and co-writer Wes Denham. In my opinion, it has joined "Beat The
Heat" on the required reading list for anyone interested in these
issues.
Best regards to all,
Jay Wiseman, JD (and part-time law school prof)
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posted by Annja Sue at
10:03 AM
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