Is anyone else experiencing increased police activity?

I just want to say that the police in my city are absolutely nuts!
I live in Mobile County in Alabama and it's been like this for the past year. It started off like a year ago when they had the idea to do random roadblocks and checkpoints to just stop people and check their information, and this was only done on major holidays, like Fourth of July weekend, New Years Eve, and stuff like that to make sure people weren't drinking and driving. Now, they've gone off the deep end and do these roadblocks randomly, almost every weekend, and sometimes on random weeknights. And lately, for the past week or so, I cannot drive around without seeing police patrols EVERYWHERE. And they have been acting crazy.

For example, (just one of many) I went to my friends house one night because we were having a get together and cookout. We turned into his neighborhood and were followed by a Sheriff car that was tailgating us all the way to his house when we pulled into his driveway. The Sheriff kept going past us. But his house is the last house on the street, but the street keeps going into new neighborhood territory and there is nothing back there except a dead end. So we got out of the car to walk inside, and as expected, he came back down the street to exit the neighborhood. Keep in mind that me and my friends have no reason for the police to be looking for us or bothering us. So, the party is over later that night and one of my other friends is driving home.

This is where it gets weird.

He lives right down the road from where we were and as he was turning out of the neighborhood a car passed him and flashed its brights at him. He flashed his brights back thinking, "what an asshole" and it turned out to be a city cop. The cop whipped around behind him and didn't put its lights on or anything, but just followed him to his house down the street and turned in his driveway after him. So my friend gets out of his car, and looks at the cop and just walks inside his house like normal thinking, "I dunno what's wrong with this cat, but I'm going to bed." So after he goes inside the cop gets out and starts shining a flashlight through his windows and walking around the house. At this point, my friend is thinking, what the *snip* is wrong with this dude? So he goes to his door and opens it and the conversation went something like this:

Friend: "can I help you with something?"
Cop: "yeah, were you driving that car right there?"
Friend: "yeah, why?"
Cop: "well it's been reported stolen."
Friend: "What?! I've had that car since I was 17."
Cop: "Well the computer says its stolen."
Friend: "Well, its not. It's my car."
Cop: "hold on a sec."

Goes to his car for like 10 minutes while my friend waits at the door.
He comes back.

Cop: "Alright well you have a good night."

And he leaves.

Has anyone else been noticing increased policia activity in their city lately?
And does anyone elses city have an assload of roadblocks and any random given time? Or is it just our city?

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[edit on 3-6-2008 by GAOTU789]

No, not where I live, in Canada.
But my gut tells me you guys in for a crazy summer tho, what with the elections coming up, Bush admin on their last legs - something's going down big.
Good luck to you.
Any new prison/detention camps built in your area?

woah, woah, woah! Okay, seeing as how I'm in Huntsville, AL, this makes it even weirder.

I have, as a matter of fact, noticed there's way more police around than there was a year or two ago...

I happen to live near the Huntsville PD, or at least I think it's the PD-- They are located in a sort of strip mall-styled building, of all places... IDK...

But the increase in cars on the road is seen all over the city...

This is definitely something I'm concerned about... I'm curious to hear form others!

Oh, another detail i forgot to mention is that this cop was out of his jurisdiction. We all live outside the city limits in the county. So the city police have no jurisdiction out here, only the sheriffs. But this was not a sheriff, it was a city cop. So what the hell was he doing out here? And as for new detention camps, I'm not sure. Perhaps someone else knows of this??

[edit on 6/2/2008 by Mad_Hatter]

Originally posted by Mad_Hatter

The cop whipped around behind him and didn't put its lights on or anything, but just followed him to his house down the street and turned in his driveway after him.

I live in a very rural part of Louisiana. On this street there a very few houses that are not separated by lots of acreage, but we live on property that has 3 houses close together because all 3 houses used to be part of a family compound. One of the houses was sold. Just about 2 weeks ago, the people who live in the house no longer owned by the family had the police follow them home, straight up their driveway, and as you mentioned no lights flashing. The car was also unmarked. The police demanded identification from everyone in the car as well as the papers on the vehicle. From what I understand, the police never indicated why the people were followed. Once everything was checked, they just left! Nobody was ticketed for anything!

Has anyone else been noticing increased policia activity in their city lately?
And does anyone elses city have an assload of roadblocks and any random given time? Or is it just our city?

A relative used to work for the sheriffs office here, and recently retired. He told my boyfriend yesterday at church that the state was just given a huge budget to increase state troopers. I didn't get the gist of this comment but my boyfriend said that the new ones hired "are a different class of state trooper." The relative told my boyfriend to expect a lot more road blocks to be set up, and for people to be stopped randomly.

I've noticed a lot more police activity recently. More and more cars driving round, and despite what people say, I do think there are more police on the street here in the UK than ever before.

Use of unmarked patrol cars is going up as well, I'm spotting them everywhere... a plain silver or black Volvo or Ford, then I see little lights hidden in the radiator and back window.. then theres the police uniforms.

I was stopped by the police whilst driving once. It was 2am, there were 3 of us in the car. I wasn't insured to drive it, but had to because my friend (whose car it was) was quite drunk.. anyways, as soon as they walked over there was a 'questionable' odour around (I'll leave that to your imagination), and as soon as they picked up on that, more and more cars came, to the point where there were about 15 policemen and women literally surrounding us, about 3 cars, 2 vans and an SUV.
All for 3 people just trying to get home. I lost my license because of it.

And recently police seem more suspecting of young people. I'm 19 and, well, I stand out in a crowd by quite a long way. The last year or so, I've lost count of how many times myself and my friends have been stopped and asked "Where are you going?", "Whats in the bag?", "What drugs have you taken today?". All these with absolutely no proof, not even a suggestion of anything against the 'law'. And every time they ask a question, the tone of the voice gets angrier and angrier, as though they're getting frustrated that we don't have anything for them.

IMO, they should spend more time tracking down murderers and rapists then mithering a bunch of kids walking through the park.


No roadblocks round here just yet, but there does seem to be more police cars parked up at the sides of roads, presumably checking every single numberplate that goes past. Anything slightly dodgy about the car, maybe 4 teenagers in the car, or one person smoking something, even someone in the back drinking beer... all these, and more, pretty much guarantee harassment from the police 'service' these days.

And it is getting noticeably worse.

This is just anecdotal but I have noticed an increase in non standard police cruiser type cars. Black unmarked and what I assume to be drug repro black mucsle type cars. Intimidating.

The other day I had a grey Grand Prix in front of me, nothing about it looking out of the ordinary, and I didn't think anything of it. then all of a sudden it flashed on its cop lights (not in the window, but the actual head and tail lights started flashing) and it blew through the red light to go after someone. They're everywhere.

Try being a football fan in the UK

We cant walk from one pub to another on a saturday afternoon without at least an 18 man police escort and camera crew filming our every move

Some weeks you can get section 60'd 3 or 4 times in an hour

The amount of black SUVs and white Pontiacs pulling people over with officers in black BDUs and combat boots has noticeably increased in central MS. It has gotten to the point that they are getting as easy to spot as the standard patrol cars.

Beyond those, I havent noticed any unusual police activity. However, in my neighborhood there are local police and sheriff residents, so we are used to seeing police cars, motorcycles and sheriff vehicles passing in and out all the time.

Apparently you didn't see this...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

The density of police is totally out of control.

WHEN DID IT BECOME OK FOR POLICE TO DRIVE BASICALLY WHATEVER THE F THEY WANT? (so long as they have red n blue lights in the grill or by the rear view mirror) Anyone have some real info on this?

-v

Yes, I noticed that the last few weeks, there seems to be so much increased police activity! Of course, where I live, there have been 2 very bad murders in the "safe" part of town! Last night, I went for a drive out in the country. I wanted to chill, roll down the windows, and turn up the radio and sing, etc! My usual way to chill, etc! So, I got out of the city, headed out for my country drive, and a state trooper starts following me. I turned and went down a country road, and he followed me, so I turned and went down another country road and he followed me. I know I was going under the speed limit, etc. I was going 40-45 mph, and he stayed a good distance behind me. When I would slow, he would slow. Don't know what's up, but I was frustrated because I didn't get my "chill" "space" time!

Let them waste their resources. Reaction to their game will only serve their purpose. I say play games back. If you know there is a road block maybe get a bunch of your friends to go through he roadblock, wasting their time further. Also Know that there are good cops.

Their game brings up the fear factor, keeping the community in a state of survival mode. Also think about your tax dollars being wasted.

[edit on 6/2/2008 by eye open doors]

It's interesting to see the comments regarding increased police presence in the UK. I'd love to see more coppers where I live!

In this part of the Midlands we're inundated with feral youth polluting every corner, green space and shop doorway. They drink, take drugs, fight and stab each other with abandon, safe in the knowledge that the old bill are too scared to ask them politely to move on or go home. Individual citizens could ask the hooligans to move on but this usually results in being kicked to death or having their home torched. Me? I asked 30 drunks to get off my drive and stop leaning against my car and the subsequent threats to my health and safety took 48 hours for the police to respond to.

Obviously my taxes are paying coppers to harrass goths and football fans rather than do the job they're supposed to do ie protect people from being murdered, raped and robbed. If you've too many coppers up your way, please, send them down here where they're needed.

In the UK do not forget that it was the government and police that ALLOWED the kids to run riot for years. They introduced all sorts of protective laws that meant you could'nt so much as say boo them without being arrested on crazy charges.Parents could'nt smack them, teachers could'nt punish them and police were told to ignore them. Now they are running amock as they KNEW they would, and are introducing ALL KNEW legislation to deal with the situation that not only breaches the rights and freedoms of the youths, but will affect all of us at some point or another. The UK and so many other countries, now tell me if this rings a bell in YOUR country. introduce time and again 'SWEEPING NEW POWERS FOR THE POLICE'!. Then through the media they select a few choice one's to mention. maybe two or three, they actually have a benefit, so everyone thinks "ok yeah, fair enough", but they don't tell you the mass of other sweeping powers that will strip you of even more liberties!! There has been a huge increase in ariel serveillence also in the UK. More and more people are reporting exceedingly low flying unmarkrd helicopter activity. These things fly WAY below the 500ft legal limit with absolut impunity.They are intimidating and menacing. I have myself been menaced by them twice when they have spotted me filming them. I have also witnessed the police and the MILITARY working together. On one such occasion a black and yellow police helicopter and a CHINOOK military copter were flying as low as two houses high over civilian areas. Chinooks have also flown near to where i work,also at illegaly low levels. A chinook helicopter under UK law cannot fly below 2000ft, even on training manouvours. This is because of the THUNDEROUS sound that they make, and believe me, after having heard them fly that low i can tell you that it sounds like the world is about to end. It really shook me up. Basically, those in the US are not the only ones with trouble ahead, there are BIG plans being laid out for the UK also. We should ALL be prepaired for an assault on civilians EVERYWHERE, as they want to get rid of as many of us as they can!!

There are good police and bad police yes, but in my experience, there are more bad ones.....it just seems like there are so many of them that roll around here and they all act like they have nothing to do. I don't know about you, but a gross overcompensation of cops and boredom are not a good mixture. I got pulled over the other day for no reason at all. They questioned everyone in the car (me and two other friends) and asked us for cigarettes and let us go. I...HATE...the police. This is a regular occurance for me and people I know. Yeah, I could argue my rights with them, OR I could just cooperate with them and go on my way. I feel like I'm copping out though (no pun intended) if I cooperate with them.

And I would also like to add that when my car got broken into last year, the police did absolutely nothing. They have never helped me accomplish anything, but they jump at the chance to mess my world up. I got 4 tickets at once last year when I got pulled over. Well 5, but he tore the no insurance ticket up after I argued to death with him that I gave him my insurance card, and he realized I did.

[edit on 6/2/2008 by Mad_Hatter]

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[edit on 4-6-2008 by GAOTU789]

Yes, its the same sad story up here in Minnesota, with the exception of roadblocks and checkpoints, which will be coming very soon. The RNC is going to be crazy, I lvie close to the Xcel Center, where it is being held, and securtiy preperation is already happening.

I have had local reports that are trying to firgure out the best traffic routes and now local and state police practice riot control in my own backyard! (not literally), but I can sense that they are preparing. I live down the road from the national guard station, and I have seen convoys going IN not OUT constantly, its like they are stockpilying.

Police is definitly up around here

ugh... Asking for cigs? haha... That seems mighty arrogant and is (obviously) an abuse of power... Harmless, maybe, but still total BS...
Here, they'll turn on their lights behind you, to make you pull over (and scare the s**t out of you!) just because they want to PASS YOU when you are trying to avoid going over the speed limit... Even if they aren't in pursuit of anyone... bah!!!!
---
Anyways, here, there's just a whole lot more "emblazoned" cop cars and blocks, though not as many unmarked ones... It has become more common to see a larger number of unmarked cars in general, though.

[edit on 2-6-2008 by the raytownian]

With the federal gov sending less and les back to the states and in so doing the towns and cities, look for more of this local revenuing to take place. Its the easiest way to put more money in the towns coffers by fining the citizens than to raise taxes!!,

Zindo

reply to post by Mad_Hatter


Cops look to pull over cars with college age males in it. Also the time of day/night you are driving around may also attract attention. Beware of the end of the month as well. Sometimes they need to reach their quotas and have a hard on for pulling people over.

I've been pulled over walking down the street before. I think it was because I was wearing a leather biker jacket. In my experience, it is best to be as professional as possible with them. Do not show fear though.

Do not let them bully you dude. Coppers are out in full force every where.