RebKell's Junkie Boards

[pilight]

Way back in 1990, I was arrested at an anti-Gulf War rally in Jacksonville FL. I was never charged and they released us the next day.

Today, here in Macon, there's a welcome home parade for some local reservists who are coming back from Afghanistan. I had some business to attend to downtown, so I was walking that way when a man called me out by name (first and last). I was surprised to be addressed, then I turned and saw a two guys I did not know dressed in suits. I didn't say anything and he asked me if I was Mister Brown. I said yes, and he asked me if I was the same Mister Brown who was arrested in Jacksonville. I said yes again, and then he started asking what I was doing downtown. At that point I figured I better find out who these guys were and what they wanted. Long story short, my name was on a list of people who live here and might try to disrupt the parade. The FBI had even distributed my picture (albeit several years old) along with who knows how many others.

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The truth is like poetry

Most people hate poetry

[Realcomplicated]

Hi Mister Brown, I'm Ms. Brown

[sambista]

double post. see below.

[sambista]

swear to god, pilight, that's just about the scariest shit i've read here in a long time. we're talking about 20 years ago. TWENTY. if they have the resources to home in on you like that after 20 years - AND consider you a viable threat, in li'l ole macon, georgia - where the FREAK are the resources hunting down genuine suspects? why are osama bin laden and his crew (offshore and onshore) so freakin elusive?

what the freak.

[sbjules]

[caune]

[StevenHW]

[braveniler58]

No wonder the Government sucks.

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Phoenix Mercury fan for life!

[Huskie]

Eeegads. Is J Edgar Hoover still alive and back in charge?

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See you in Vegas!

[StevenHW]

[Richyyy]

pilight, did they let you carry on with whatever you had to do downtown, or were you required to leave the area until a day without a welcome home parade?

[icey23]

WOW thats crazy WELCOME TO REBKELL UNDERCOVER PEOPLE.

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WIN THE DAY

[pilight]

[PUmatty]

And this is the best country in the world, folks ... or so I am told at least.

[bridgehere]

Of course, Mr. Brown's nefarious plans could have been thwarted by the
FBI's alertness.

[TonyL222]

Ya gotta admit this is kind of impressive. Facial recogniton technology seems to have matured to the point where it can pick a "suspect" out of a crowd and apply an appropriate "aging" algorythm to it.

How would the FBI know that Mr Brown did not have a nefarious plan?

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This I command you, love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one�s life for his friends.

[bridgehere]

[norwester]

On one hand, that's pretty chilling and crazy. On the other hand, they let you go about your business, so they were actually doing their job rather well, I think. If someone like Mr. Brown ran into the parade with a bomb, later we'd excoriate the FBI for having records that he could have been a threat (i.e. had a history of anti-war activity) and not acting on it. As long as they just asked you a couple of questions and let you go on your way, I don't necessarily have a problem with it.

But it must be freaky to have something like that (having an FBI file) confirmed in so concrete a way. Weird.

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Don't you know the plural of "anecdote" is "data"?

[Howee]

[sambista]

[beknighted]

Once you're in the files, you're in the files until you die, but I have to say it strikes me as peculiar that one arrest for an anti-war rally would be sufficient for them to put you on a list of people to watch for in the future. Mostly, it seems like a waste of resources.

The alternative explanation above, that the list of potential people to worry about in Macon is pretty small and that there wasn't much else for the local agents to do, strikes me as entirely plausible. You know, if you're supposed to make a list of the 10 most threatening people, in some places you're going to run out of real threats around number 3, but that doesn't stop them from filling out the rest of the list.

The bottom line is that FBI agents, like all law enforcement, are paid to be suspicious, and their general view of the world tends to be that anybody who hasn't colored completely within the lines is a risk. That attitude, in the long run, is why there's no way to completely end abuses by law enforcement agencies, and I'm not sure there's any way to get rid of it and still have an effective police force.

[ArtBest23]

It'still spooky when they know who you are and details about you when you haven't identified yourself and don't expect it.

Couple years ago my wife and I were taking a vacation. Amtrak from NY to Toronto, Trans Canada train to Jasper and Vancouver, and then fly home.

Now, Amtrak had our names, but no car or seat number, and it was a long train. We could have been seated anywhere on it. Nonetheless, at Niagra Falls, three ICE agents, in full body armor and carrying assault rifles, walked right up to us and addressed us by name, asking a slew of questions with great detail such as why we had one way tickets to Toronto.

I guess our answers were adequate because they didn't search us, unlike a fellow passenger, a woman traveling alone, who had her suitcases completely emptied onto a table in the cafe car.

I still to this day think it was very creepy how much they knew, and still don't know how they identified us and knew exactly where we were seated. I could have understood the questions if they had come after looking at our passports, but they knew us by sight before we provided any ID.

[norwester]

I know that there's an FBI file on me. But I've never had the experience of having been picked out of a crowd while going about my business. It would be unnerving.

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Don't you know the plural of "anecdote" is "data"?

[jammerbirdi]

On the other hand I am happy to learn that you've been arrested.


Gotta put those priors in your file!

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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17

[jammerbirdi]