Bizarre LEO experience/observation..

[junglesmacks]

Ok... check this out.

It was Wednesday night/Thursday morning around 2am out at Robot Heart. The girl and I were standing and relaxing/listening on the fringe area. Out of the corner of my eye from behind me, I see a camera flash go off. I turn around, and there are about 5 LEOs in full green (I think BLM.. can't be totally sure) standing around this older guy in costume chatting him up and taking pictures with him like they were best buds. At first I'm thinking.. hmm.. maybe they know him. He was wearing kind of a military style captains hat and they were making motions to him. Something about it though was just.. off. I sat and observed and I could see that the guy was trying to be civil and smile but looked scared shitless and I'm pretty sure tripping. I saw them take one more picture.. this time with an LEO on either side with their arms around his shoulders, leaning in like best buds with these huge fake smiles on their faces. Something was just not right.

While the girl stayed turned around and oblivious to what was going on, I stayed looking the other way and just observing. I saw the guy walk off, and the officers kept moving through the fringe area of the crowd. Within about 20 seconds, they walked up to a 20-30 something year old girl that was digging in her backpack. They surrounded her and shined lights on her and her bag while their backs were to me. While I couldn't see the girls face or exactly what was going on, I could see instantly that she was in distress. An officer took her bag and was shining a light into, while she was gesturing slightly frantically and looked to me as if she was pleading with the officer to just be cool.. be cool.. please. She called out to her boyfriend who was deeper in the dancing crowd and the cops started to stop her. He came over, and they both were talking to the cops. After about 20 seconds of this, I saw through the cops her make this motion with her hands and body like "FINE! Ok.." ..and she gave everything in her hands to her boyfriend.

She then walked a few feet with the group of cops.. stood and posed.. while the cops around her put their arms around her.. all leaned in.. and took yet another picture.. all parties with the same, cheesy, fake grins.

They said a few more things to her and walked off. She and her boyfriend walked quick as they could without running towards the esplanade.

Me and the girl at this point were like ok.. this is weird and killing our vibe. Let's get out of here. As we walk out of the area, we see the guy from the first picture taking session walking around in circles looking very distressed and confused..


WTF?


This incident was by far and wide the weirdest thing that happened to me this year, and I'm dying to figure out what was really going on. Were they caught with something and given a warning and a good scare by taking pics? What was going on here? Anyone else see anything like this?

[weirdscience]

Sounds like they were just using scare tactics and harassing decent burners just to be dicks... there's nice cops here and there but there's always the couple few who like to fuck with people.

[Captain]

A guy our group was hanging out with got busted for weed at one of the large sound camps. We were delighted to find him back at our camp a few hours later with nothing but a ticket. Thought that was pretty cool that he didn't get arrested, felt pretty good about LE after that.

[illy dilly]

I saw surprisingly less LEO this year.
But, I also spent a lot less time at the huge sound camps.

Only, once did I see our street, G, get slow rolled by an LEO vehicle.

[junglesmacks]

Ditto!

LE presence this year was melllloooooowwwwwwww....

I saw surprisingly less LEO this year.

[wedeliver]

I have some friends who were greeters again this year and they told me that on at least 2 of their shifts LEO's walked the line at the greeters station looking for people who were drinking or did not have seat belts. The greeter told me that he tried to get infront of the LEO to warn people. Also on aother note they told me that spanking is no longer allowed by greeters to Black Rock City. my how things change.

[trilobyte]

We were camped a few doors down from Distrikt, and the BLM/LEO presence there on Friday and Saturday was just plain oppressive. Entire squads of a dozen uniformed guys marching into the space in uniform, really made me feel uncomfortable. And on Burn night it seemed like there was always a vehicle or two with flashing lights at the back of Opulent Temple. It didn't appear (to me, anyway) that an arrest was in progress, just that they wanted to make their presence as visible as they could. Neither seemed justified, IMO.

[shykat]

We saw a pair following the sardine art car who were playing some silly song and the two leo's where laughing their asses off ,it was pretty funny......

[Savannah]

At least one of the sets of flashing lights at Opulent Temple was an ambulance. A guy fell off a 20 foot something-or-other, and was backboarded (still conscious). Never a dull moment.

[JStep]

According to an article forwarded to a buddy of mine on the ride back there were only 3 felony arrests all week. I only ever saw one uniformed LEO who was not in a vehicle, every other one I saw was in a truck, SUV or on a 4-wheeler. I smiled and waved when they cruised our street, sometimes they smiled and waved back. I happened to start doing "road signs" with my mister during the day for some neighbors, which a lot of people really enjoyed... got a ton of compliments and thank yous. Several times while maintaining my moist playa lettering an LEO vehicle (usually a BLM truck) would be rolling down the street and actually made the effort to go around my design so as not to mess it up. I thought that was awesome. (Of course a few also just rolled over it like they could care less too.) At one point a group of LEOs on 2 4-wheelers rolled by the "<=== STOP HERE!" lettering I'd made for our friend's bar and I though "oops, wrong audience!" but they looked and smiled and kept rolling. Nothing to see here folks. I thought after all the hype about LEO presence and undercover ops that it would be a lot worse than it was. It really seemed to me that overall, anecdotal one offs not withstanding, the LEO presence was professional and polite and doing what they *should* be doing; keeping things safe, looking out for people needing help and not interfering where they weren't needed.

[Turnip]

The only personal encounter I had with any LEOs was when I was drinking out of a bottle of 7-Up with dark drink in it (Mmmm, reusing bottles)

I took a drink, cringed because it was warm (imagine that) and spyed an LEO starring at me. My entire body jumped in surprise, and I starred back. Let me just say I was drinking plain water with Mio mixed in, and completely sober with no illegal substances of any kind on me. Obviously he thought I was drinking some sort of mixed drink, and thought I was under age (I'm 23 but have been told I have a baby face. I agree with those people, lol) But he just kept starring at me. I didn't know what to do, assuming any action I took from there would reflect negatively on me. So I starred back, making dead eye contact. He didn't blink. Time stopped.

I waited for him to come over and close line me, and do that thing I've seen on Cops where they twist your arm behind your back and moosh their knee into the side of your head while crushing you into the ground. Neither of us moved. This "exchange" lasted an uncomfortable 3 minutes. Finally a group* of ELwire'd sparkle ponies moved between us and in that classic way, when the space between us was cleared he had disappeared, Batman style.


I didn't know how to act the rest of that night.

[Miles]

WTF?

Wow, that is really bizarre- I think I was at Robot Heart around the same time (who knows really), but didn't see anything like that. Wish you asked the green guy what happened...we may never know

[Savannah]

Last year was the first year I volunteered in uniform, and found that LEOs were waving at me. So I started waving back, and accidentally kept the habit even when normally dressed. It's fun, and relieves tension. It feels a lot better than that weird feeling of automatic and completely unfounded guilt I am otherwise inclined to feel every time I see law enforcement.

[illy dilly]

I waited for him to come over and close line me, and do that thing I've seen on Cops where they twist your arm behind your back and moosh their knee into the side of your head while crushing you into the ground. Neither of us moved. This "exchange" lasted an uncomfortable 3 minutes. Finally a group* of ELwire'd sparkle ponies moved between us and in that classic way, when the space between us was cleared he had disappeared, Batman style.


I didn't know how to act the rest of that night.

O man I know the feeling! Not from this years burn but just past experiences. Your sitting there thinking "Great, I'm about to be framed for something" Though, if you were clean I would have waved hello smiled, and moved on.

On another note,
This might just be a rumor, but wasn't there a new police chief or BLM head ranger this year? I'm sure this has something to do with it.

Also, a camp mate of ours works Fire Safety. According to him on his check in night the head LEO was about 20 yards away giving some of his fresh arrivals the entry lecture and, from what my friend says, the big cheese literally said "This is not a place where you can win the war on drugs, we're here to stop violence"

[Isotopia]

My personal experience this year:

1) BLM law enforcement officers are a posse of small prick assholes hell-bent on continuing to the practice of wiping their collective asses on the Constitution. At some point the ACLU ends up with a case that ends up taking them to the tool shed

2) Pershing Co. law enforcement officers were absolutely stellar in their interactions and responses with participants. Of course, there were some arrests but most of them were Darwinian in nature. You had to either a real fuck up or a Level 10 cluetard to incur their wrath.

[AntiM]

Our campmate came back from a night of dancing (I don't recall where, by a sound MV??); she said it was odd how the LEOs moved through the crowd with the dancers rather than hang back at the edges. She didn't see any arrests or outright harassment, just thought it was odd enough to mention to us.

[lucky420]

Pershing county does have a new sheriff

[illy dilly]

Our campmate came back from a night of dancing (I don't recall where, by a sound MV??); she said it was odd how the LEOs moved through the crowd with the dancers rather than hang back at the edges. She didn't see any arrests or outright harassment, just thought it was odd enough to mention to us.

Yeah they've always done that "snake through the crowd" thing. But only at the big sound camps really. Its when the "circle the wagons" around someone that always scares me. But I didn't see any of that this year.

Lucky, thanks for the info!
So it wasn't total rumor that I heard the Pershing Sheriff was new.

[FuckingEh]

... the big cheese literally said "This is not a place where you can win the war on drugs, we're here to stop violence"

That's pretty much the feeling I got.

The cops should make their presence known to remind people that they need to respect the law of the land, but if I waved or nodded at a LEO, they waved or nodded back. I saw LEOs posing with people, smiling. And that's great. Though I did see a couple LEOs creeping with binoculars on a showering woman mid-week.

[Shambala]

The night of the burn of the Man, I stopped to chat with a county officer walking around by himself. I found that extremely significant since if there were even a tiny shred of fear of any violence, they would be in pairs. If there was the slightest question of their own safety in a crowd this size, they would NEVER, EVER roam alone. I was impressed with both the police and the participants, that this was the aura of the event. No issues, no fights, no problems!

[dr.placebo]

Although this is just an impression, I saw fewer LEOs on the playa speeding from point A to point B to do whatever they were doing compared to last year or the year before. Could be measurement error, of course.

On our street some joker was operating a Stop/Slow sign more or less at random. A Pershing sheriff car came up to the sign and actually stopped before being waved on through. Nice to know that at least one LEO had a sense of humor.

We waved at the cops and the cops waved back. Not saying that the LEOs are all cool, but I've seen more activity on one weekend on street in Santa Cruz that I saw on the playa this year.

[joya]

The night of the burn of the Man, I stopped to chat with a county officer walking around by himself. I found that extremely significant since if there were even a tiny shred of fear of any violence, they would be in pairs. If there was the slightest question of their own safety in a crowd this size, they would NEVER, EVER roam alone. I was impressed with both the police and the participants, that this was the aura of the event. No issues, no fights, no problems!

... is no one here aware of what happened!?!??!

l think it was early Sat morning. A law enforcement officer got jumped and beaten by a group of burners, not too far from the Temple. I heard this news on the BRC radio Saturday afternoon. But have yet to find anything else about it. I hope to goodness this is a sick joke. It makes me ill to think of this actually happening.

Does anyone else know about this?

[JStep]

The night of the burn of the Man, I stopped to chat with a county officer walking around by himself. I found that extremely significant since if there were even a tiny shred of fear of any violence, they would be in pairs. If there was the slightest question of their own safety in a crowd this size, they would NEVER, EVER roam alone. I was impressed with both the police and the participants, that this was the aura of the event. No issues, no fights, no problems!

... is no one here aware of what happened!?!??!

l think it was early Sat morning. A law enforcement officer got jumped and beaten by a group of burners, not too far from the Temple. I heard this news on the BRC radio Saturday afternoon. But have yet to find anything else about it. I hope to goodness this is a sick joke. It makes me ill to think of this actually happening.

Does anyone else know about this?

First I've heard of anything like this. Sounds like BS. Since the blatant Bassnectar lies this year, I'll listen to BMIR but I won't believe a thing I hear on it.

[BBadger]

l think it was early Sat morning. A law enforcement officer got jumped and beaten by a group of burners, not too far from the Temple. I heard this news on the BRC radio Saturday afternoon. But have yet to find anything else about it. I hope to goodness this is a sick joke. It makes me ill to think of this actually happening.

Odd... someone told me about the opposite... no news yet on that either.

For my own experiences: there was one law enforcement incident near me, where a guy (moron) motioned to a girl (moron-ette) to get in on his line of coke-on-a-mirror near the still burning remains of the wheels of the horse. Well, being in plain sight, a LEO in a truck noticed and signaled the truck's lights, and quickly turned them off. Then an obvious "undercover" old-man cop in an panda suit (reminded me of Mushu in Mulan calling a panda black-and-white) went over to investigate, confirmed, made some not-so-discreet gesture, and a cluster of cops closed in. The two coke sniffers were oblivious to the whole thing going down.

Extreme probable cause. Darwinism at its best.

[C.f.M.]

The only encounters I had were a group of BLM rangers stopping at Raiders camp, very friendly and fun to talk to.

Anyone is more than welcome to file out the questionnaire about LEO encounters. Local law doesn't want the assholes out there any more than we do.

[Mr. Googles]

We had an incident with an undercover cop this year. 99% positive he was a NARC.

On Wednesday night, we were wandering our way to Beats Antique having a jolly good time, and we almost tripped on a guy that was bent over on the ground. He said to us "I'm looking for the party", and asked us if he could tag along. We told him we were headed to Beats Antique, and he said he wanted to come with us. He said it was his first burn, and that he was there with girlfriend who was a veteran burner, but split away from him for the night. There was stuff going on all around us, but he was quiet, and didn't really show any interest except to stay along with us. His outfit was a little too "perfect".. dread locks, a bag that lit up, and looked very forced. Eventually, we started to get freaked out, and got pretty quiet. He still tagged along like we were the most interesting thing on the playa. Eventually, we split from him and told him we needed to refill on H2O.

I'm glad that we were able to see right through his costume. I guess it could have been a lonely burner, but something just didn't feel right ya know?

[CapSmashy]

5 years running and nothing but good things to say about the leo's I have met and watched do their thing. Of course, I do not frequent the big sound camps though. I was worried last year about gifting all the cops I met googily eyed bacon strips, but all of them had a good laugh about it whether or not they caught the double meaning.

I got a great picture of a group of Pershing County deputies with 3 K-9 doggies out by the man this year. They were doing a group photo and I stepped up and started shooting and handed out my card with my flickr album address for them. As soon as we get back to ft worth, i'll actually get them posted.

[ibdave]

I went out to the Temple Sat a.m. and saw 5-7 LEO's close to where a art car set up a sunrise dance near the temple (3:00 side). They had a few sitting on the ground, I thought drug bust. On the way back, art car gone, guys on ground gone and what burners were left were walking away. About 40 ft away from the main LEO group was 2 LEOs search the ground with a fine tooth comb. still that/think drug bust, but now......

[Packoderm]

Things have gotten so dire that they need to bring in K-9 Units? I guess there must have been such insurmountable problems within Burning Man society in the past few years that would necessitate that. What's next, robotic drones?

[BBadger]

Things have gotten so dire that they need to bring in K-9 Units? I guess there must have been such insurmountable problems within Burning Man society in the past few years that would necessitate that. What's next, robotic drones?

I'd welcome that if they used Hellfire missiles to take out darktards.