Ah, yes, that is a bit of a problem.

Here in the Midwest there is a real and significant problem with meth - to the point of paranoia on the part of both the population and government. This has led to laws restricting access to certain precursor drugs and chemicals, reports of environmental damage (meth labs tend to produce some really nasty chemical contamination), and the development of special task forces of local, state and federal police agencies to target meth production and distribution. It is the War on (Some) Drugs on steroids.

So it is fairly easy to see how something like this can happen:

Town Finds Drug Agent Is Really an Impostor

GERALD, Mo. — Like so many rural communities in the country’s middle, this tiny town had wrestled for years with the woes of methamphetamine. Then, several months ago, a federal agent showed up.

Busts began. Houses were ransacked. People, in handcuffs on their front lawns, named names. To some, like Mayor Otis Schulte, who considers the county around Gerald, population 1,171, “a meth capital of the United States,” the drug scourge seemed to be fading at last.

* * *

But after a reporter for the local weekly newspaper made a few calls about that claim, Gerald’s anti-drug campaign abruptly unraveled after less than five months. Sergeant Bill, it turned out, was no federal agent, but Bill A. Jakob, an unemployed former trucking company owner, a former security guard, a former wedding-performing minister, a former small-town cop from 23 miles down the road.

Ah, yes, that is a bit of a problem.

Read the whole piece, and you'll likely be astonished that this guy was able to pull off this con job for so long. He had no documentation. He claimed that he didn't need a warrant to enter people's homes and businesses. He got by on cop-like swagger, a black T-shirt that said "POLICE", a cop-wannabe car, and a short haircut.

Oh, and on the fact that the local police and government wanted him to succeed for their own purposes.

See, this is the thing. Pesky things like due process and respecting the civil rights of people slows down drug investigations. Or terror investigations. This can frustrate cops at about every level, who see a problem and honestly want to fix it. Along comes someone who says that he has the solution, and it is easy to believe him.

This is what the Wars on Drugs and Terror have brought: a willingness to trust authority at the cost of civil liberties. A willingness to cut corners to 'meet the threat'. A perception that we're in a crisis, and only by extraordinary means can we survive.

It starts by recognizing a problem. Then, because identifying and targeting a problem brings with it increased budget and power for the agency/department tasked with dealing with the problem, there is a tendency to inflate the problem, convince the public that the problem is growing, or deeper than initially thought. Things spiral, slowly at first, then with increasing speed. Unchecked, this positive-feedback loop takes on a life of its own, until it culminates in stupidity and horror.

This is the basic mechanism of what happened with the Inquisition. With the Salem Witch Trials. With the Red Scare(s). And now with the Wars on Drugs and Terror.

Think that I am over simplying? Here's what Bill Jakob's attorney, one Joel Schwartz, said about how his client got into this mess:

“It was an innocent evolution, where he helped with one minor thing, then one more on top of that, and all of the sudden, everyone thought he was a federal agent,” Mr. Schwartz said. “I’m not saying this was legal or lawful. But look, they were very, very effective while he was present. I don’t think Gerald is having the drug problem they were having. I’ve heard from some residents who were thrilled that he was there.”

That right there explains why and how these things happen. The way to stop them is well known: legal protection and due process. Those mechanisms were developed slowly over the centuries, with notable culminations in Magna Carta, our own Constitution, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We ignore those protections at our peril.

Jim Downey

Cross posted to Communion of Dreams.