This has been going on forever.
I don't know if the DEA still does this, but they used to ROUTINELY arrest and take money from people carrying what they considered "excessive" amounts of cash in airports.
How did they know?
Some people pay for their tickets and flash a roll when paying. Ticket clerks were paid a "finders fee" to turn in passengers.
The victim would then have to sue to get his money back and prove that he earned it through legal means and was not involved in the drug business.
"Are you surprised that this happened?"
Me?
Not at all.
Insight on how to respond to "fishing expedition" type questions from the so called authorities.
Click here to see a very informative video by a US Law Professor who explains - Why you should never answer questions you are not legally required to answer
http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/342.html
The question "Are you surprised that this happened?" is essentially identical to the standard first question of Soviet Russia's KGB in interrogations during Stalin's purges:
ReplyDelete"Have you formed a hypothesis about why we are interrogating you?"
And then any answer the "suspect" gave would be used to incriminate him. It's a Catch-22 situation, and absolutely THE ONLY way out of it is the right to remain silent.
Here's a personal example which I can safely share because the case was solved: In 2001, IN AMERICA, I was awakened one morning by a loud knock and two men showing me their detective badges. They were local police detectives. So, being a lawyer AND a man who respects the Rule of Law (not all lawyers do, but I do), I let them in.
(But kids, I mean all you non-lawyers out there, "don't try this at home!")
I knew that by law they had to tell me the reason for wanting to talk to me, so I immediately asked them, and they told me: A woman had gone missing the previous day, and she was last seen near my place of residence, which was a free-standing house near a river.
At that point I still didn't realise I was a suspect, but I figured it out after I offered them coffee and they refused and they continued to swagger around my residence, while their sneering voices dripped with scorn and contempt.
Before they told me the name of the woman, they asked me if I'd had any visitors recently. "No." I asked for the woman's name; they told me her name; I'd never heard of her before. (To this day I've never met or seen her.) But all that mattered was that she was a "missing person" who was last seen near my residence.
I lit a cigarette. They asked me why. "Are you nervous?" "Of course I'm nervous, because this is a serious matter." "Why do you think it's serious?" "Because a woman has gone missing and you're asking me about it. Look, I'm a lawyer, and I'll help you any way I can."
Etc etc. Well, most of their questions were NOT about material, factual details which might help to find the woman, but about my personal character.
They asked me what I did for a living. I told them I was a lawyer and my most recent job was teaching Law in Russia, and I had recently returned to America, but at the moment I was temporarily out of work.
"Why are you out of work?"
"Because I had to leave my job in Russia just recently, and I haven't yet found a new one."
"Why did you have to leave Russia?"
"Because Russia's government is hostile to Americans. It's been that way for over 50 years. You HAVE heard of the Cold War, haven't you?"
"You say you're a lawyer? Where are your diplomas? Why aren't your diplomas hanging on your walls?"
"I left them behind in Russia."
(Sneering) "You expect us to believe that? Why would you take your diplomas to Russia and then leave them there?"
"Because Russian bureaucrats prefer to see original diplomas, but then I had to leave Russia very fast with just one suitcase. I had to pack quickly and get out overnight."
"You sound paranoid about Russia. Is that why you're out of work now? Maybe because your interviewers see some kind of mental illness in you?"
"I've had no interviews since I returned from Russia."
"Maybe that's why? Because you're mentally ill?"
"How could anyone diagnose mental illness from my cv?"
"If your cv says you taught Law in Russia, then yeah, that sounds pretty unbelievable!"
Etc etc...Then they asked me for permission (I give them credit for asking) to search my residence. They actually knocked on the walls to see if any were hollow, with secret compartments. They looked under my bed. (Stupid: IF a dead woman's body were there, it would have begun to stink.)
Finally, near the end of their visit, I put on my jacket. It was late October in the American Northeast, and I'd left the door open for a breeze. One of them said, "It's not cold! Why are you putting on your jacket?"
Good God. I went through THIS, IN AMERICA! America's founding fathers took up arms against the British Army for LESSER violations of basic liberties! In America in circa 2000, simply putting on your jacket in October was grounds for suspicion. (It's even worse now; this event happened BEFORE Sept 11 2001!) Sam Adams would turn over in his grave.
Epilogue: The missing woman was found the next day, alive and well. She was bipolar, aka manic-depressive; she had been under medication for bipolar disorder for many years, but one day she went off her medication, and she just happened to be near my residence when she had a manic episode. In her psychotic state, she had stolen an kayak (a kind of canoe) and she took a (stolen) kayak ride up the river. Then the next day, when she came to her senses, she explained her insane "adventure" to the police.
And that's the only reason why I was exonerated as a suspect for her "murder". If she had never been found alive again - as she was the following day - I'm sure I would be in prison for her "murder", today. Just because a truly, clinically psychotic woman happened to go missing near my residence, and because the police thought I was "weird".
Oh, and after I was informed that the woman had been found (ALIVE AND WELL), I was also informed that the police had ransacked all of my trash - set out for the garbage truck to pick up - they had ransacked and looked through all of my trash, to find evidence to incriminate me for murder.
To this day, I have never received an apology from those AMERICAN police detectives!
Therefore I agree with the American law professor whom Isabel has cited here, AND I will add:
"Don't even expect basic courtesy from any American police! Because in the eyes of American police of today, everyone is presumed guilty, ESPECIALLY anyone who seems, to them, to be the slightest bit 'unusual'"...
...which means the eccentric Ben Franklin would probably be in a Federal prison today.
PS, correction, this event happened in October 2000, NOT 2001.
ReplyDeleteIt happened in 2000, BEFORE America's police state metastasised after Sept 11, 2001.
On Sept 11, 2001, I was living in a different place from the one where this incident happened. This event happened in Oct 2000; sorry for my typo error.