Did you see who has been arrested? As you see their picture you think, “OMG I don’t believe it!” Guess what, just because you have been arrested does not mean you have actually done what you are being arrested for. The police officer that made the arrest is your judge, jury, and executioner in the mugshot racket and extortion. More often then you might believe the “Officers of the peace” who are here to “Protect and serve” are doing neither. On New Year’s Eve of this year I was pulled over for supposedly driving 18 mph over the speed limit (my cruise control, set to the speed limit, will beg to differ). When I told the officer I was driving home from a gay club, I was told I needed to step out of my vehicle. After being belittled by the officer (who’s name, for the time being, will remain anonymous), I was asked to submit to a number of “field sobriety tests” to determine whether or not I’d been drinking. I agreed to the tests as I was in no way under the influence. I easily performed the tests and expected to be released. The officer told me I was going to jail. I was astounded and confused. Is this really happening? Does an officer have the legal right to 1) stop someone for no reason at all, and 2) arrest someone for no reason at all and with no proof of a crime? Well the answer of course is yes. Once you are arrested, your mugshot is taken. If and when all charges are dismissed and your record is cleared, your mugshot will still appear online, often as the first result of any search for your name. Once there, you are hit with an extortion racket like no other…you can pay the website who put it up in the first place hundreds of dollars in extortion money in the hope that they’ll remove it and not pass it on to another website to extort you many more times! Your government is perfectly okay with this. Welcome to the new age of privacy and power in our country.