From Behind the Orange Curtain

We were stopped by Pottawattamie Co., Iowa, sheriffs late last night on our way home, in by far the sketchiest traffic stop I have ever personally witnessed.  Everything turned out OK, but it served as a reminder to me, and hopefully to all of you, of the importance of knowing your legal rights and practicing talking to law enforcement agents… one more excuse to keep it in the back of our minds at least.  A lot of us are becoming sloppier with security culture, and with DNC/RNC coming up and probably lots of rad direct action being done in the next year for DSP and other campaigns, it is invaluable to know what to do when stopped by police.  Midnight Special Law Collective has a good guide to dealing with police (http://www.midnightspecial.net/materials/dealingwithpolice.html), and I encourage local USAS groups to organize “Know your rights” workshops with the ACLU, NLG, or other similar groups in your area.

The 3 most important things you should take away from this experience are:
*NEVER CONSENT TO A SEARCH. EVER.
*Remember the magic words: “Am I being detained, or am I free to go now?”
*Cops operate on fear and intimidation, and use our lack of knowledge of the law to obtain information about ourselves or others we normally wouldn’t give them.  And all the practice in the world doesn’t help much when you’re in the cop car and being grilled.

So what happened… I was driving through Iowa on I-80, around 1:30 am.  Pottawattamie County is just on the Iowa side of Omaha.  I was going about 75 in a 70 zone.  I saw a sheriff’s deputy parked on the shoulder, so I slowed down and moved over a lane.  I saw the car pull out and follow me for a few minutes, then speed up until he was behind me and put on his lights.  From the time I passed him until I got pulled over, I was doing exactly the speed limit.  When he got out of his car, he didn’t come to my window, but to the rear passenger’s window, where xxx was sitting.   He proceeded to ask for all of our IDs. This should have been the first sign of things to come: by going to that window, I wasn’t in a position to talk to the officer about why I was pulled over, and he had strategic power to get me out of the car and isolate us.  Additionally, I’m not sure xxx and xxx needed to give their ID, but in this case I don’t think it did much harm.

I was asked to step out of my car and stand between my car and his, supposedly so he could talk to me about why he pulled me over (he could have talked to me at my window, drivers must give a lane of space for emergency vehicles pulled over, and this was satisfactory when I’ve been stopped in the past).  I initially assumed I would be field tested for drunk driving; I clearly wasn’t drunk and assumed it was just routine.  Really, what he wanted was to interrogate me away from the other two.  He asked where I was going, I told him the truth: Madison.  He asked where I was coming from: I said Boulder.  Why was I there?  I was visiting some friends and I had some family in the area (in Denver and Co. Springs).  I didn’t see the need to talk about being at a labor conference, and thought my answer would be satisfactory considering I assumed it would be a traffic stop/citation.

I was told I was going a little fast, and that he would just be giving me a warning.  He asked me to sit in the passenger’s side of the squad car.  I’m not sure if this was necessary to comply with on my part, since I clearly was not being detained (warning).  While I was in the car, he ran all three IDs through the computer, as he told me it was to make sure there weren’t any outstanding warrants, which I assured him there were not.  He told me “it looked like you were goin’ about 75 back there, but then you saw me and hit the brakes, because I only clocked you at 67 or 68.”  Remember, the speed limit was 70 (and don’t we all hit the brakes when we see cops?)  He asked me more questions; he asked if there were any narcotics in the car, and there weren’t.  He then asked me a bunch of kinda bullshit questions, like where are you from, what I did in school, etc.  I think this was partly to keep me a little on edge, but also to get me prepped so he could catch me off guard later.  He also asked me about xxx’s immigration status (citizen), since he has a weird Dutch name, and about my Russ Feingold for Senate 2004 bumper sticker.  After all the IDs cleared, he told me he was going to return the IDs to the other guys.  LIE.  I realized he had me in the squad car so, like before, he could interrogate them without me hearing.  Obviously, I could give them their own IDs back after I got my warning.

He came back, and asked me about the conference.  Shit, they had mentioned it.  I clarified that I went to see friends I knew through USAS.  Then he started grilling me about drugs.  This is more or less how the conversation went:  “Do you have any narcotics in your vehicle?” “No, sir.”  “Would you mind if I searched your trunk?” What?  “I’d rather you didn’t.”  “Are you sure you don’t have any drugs in your car?  Even just a little marijuana?”  “No, and I won’t consent to a search.” (Always say, I DO NOT CONSENT TO A SEARCH, if you just say yes or no, either way they may use it as consent to search)  “Why not?  You shouldn’t mind if I search if you have nothing to hide.”  “I don’t have anything illegal in my car, but I do not consent.”  “So if I bring the dogs out, they won’t find anything?”  “No sir.”  “Honestly, if you just had a pipe, I could care less.”  I don’t own one.  “You don’t have any hard drugs or hallucinogens?”  “No sir, I do not.  I’ve had friends mess up their lives with drugs.”  “So, you’re not going to let me search?”  “Look, sir, I know my rights, I know you don’t have probable cause or reasonable suspicion, and I’ve told you I won’t consent to a search.”  Without reasonable suspicion or probable cause, it’s very unlikely he could get a search warrant or bring out a K-9 unit, and without consent he has not other way to search.  Then he said, “I guess if you know you’re rights, then you’ll want to go?”  Out of options.  “Yes I do!  Are you going to give me a written warning now?”  “No, have a good night.”  And I walked back to my car and drove off.  So I was more or less pulled over because he thought I might be running drugs across the corn belt in my little Toyota.

The moral of the story is, never ever ever give consent for a search, and be very clear that you in fact do NOT give consent.  There is never any legal repercussion for refusing to give consent; they may search you anyway, but typically anything they find will be inadmissible in court.  Had I given consent, I realized later, there wasn’t anything illegal in the car, but there was political material throughout the car (maps of St. Paul for the RNC, lit from groups targeted by the green scare, and contact info for USASers and other activists), and sensitive material on laptops and in notebooks.  All of this could have been potentially harmful for other people, or could have linked myself to “illegal” activities.  Maybe not, but why risk it?  I also should have asked earlier on if I was being detained.  So, I’ll repeat it again: never give consent for a search!  And if you are being interrogated, never lie — instead, ask “Am I being detained, or may I go?” or choose to remain silent and ask to see a lawyer.

Familiarize yourself with the law, and practice various scenarios.  I had been to workshops before, and in the past week have been putting together “Dealing with police” info for folks going to the RNC, and even still, I didn’t feel in control, and didn’t handle the situation as well as I could have.  So I hope this was a welcome and friendly reminder to all of you to become more familiar with how to deal with police situations, like the one above or in activist contexts.

Much love and solidarity