Drove a new Hyundai with dealer plates from AZ to Minnesota and got pulled over by Bethany, MO city police on I-35 in northern MO with no probable cause other than window tint being too dark. They tore the car apart certain that I was muling drugs (removed seats, body panels, etc). Took 6 hours. Never found anything and left me with "we know you have committed a crime, we just cannot find it, but you will get caught". I had to put the car back together myself in the dark.
Retired age men driving dealer plate cars eastbound onto I-80 in Nebraska out of Colorado from I-76 get stopped ALL THE TIME as potential drug mules.
I'm confused. Are you saying they disassembled your car right there where you were pulled over? They had the tools on hand to do this? They didn't tow your car to a shop to have it searched? I've seen many many a car stop get searched by hand and/or with canine. Not once have I ever seen removal of seats/paneling/etc on the side of the road. So this is a bit much to take on first read without further questions
Yes that is what I am saying. Most cops carry a multi tool at the minimum (with Phillips screwdriver). They also had a standard 10mm socket (carried by MANY cops and all that is required to dismantle much of any Hyundai).
Using their multi tool, they removed the fender liners (wheel well liners) from all 4 wheels, the trunk side trim (luggage compartment side trim) from both sides - all of which just has plastic push-pin scrivets (retainer clips). They broke 5 of them.
They folded down my back seats (after removing all my personal items out to the shoulder in the rain), then unbolted and removed the back seat.
I do a LOT of interstate driving, and it is not at all uncommon to see this happen.
This is not the only time I have been in situations where authority has been exceeded. My attitude is to generally be cooperative (without giving consent) as my experience has taught me that is the most painless way to go.
Just adding some perspective from someone who has been inside the trunk of a lot of cop cars over the years[1]:
A good many cops (maybe not >50%, but a very significant percentage) carry a pretty decent ad-hoc toolkit in their vehicles. There's often a toolbox with screwdrivers, socketry, pliers, some wrenches, maybe a hammer and/or other basic handtools.
It's pretty common for folks who know how to use tools to keep some on-hand, and cops are not an exception.
[1]: Yeah, so... I should probably explain that part. Some of my work involves 2-way radios, and some of that 2-way radio business has lead to me putting radios and stuff into things like cop cars. I've emptied out hundreds of cop cars to get access to what I need, and have certainly climbed into the trunk of dozens of them to be where I need to be. (Someone has to do it, and sometimes that person is me.)
The Honda I drove as a teen could be significantly disassembled with a 10mm and a couple screwdrivers.
I rear ended someone with a tow hitch, busted the rad an AC condenser and the shop wanted $300 to fix it (tells you how old I am).
I replaced them myself and I still remember the list of tools I needed - slot screwdriver, cross screwdriver, pliers, 10mm socket on an extension on a ratchet.That's it.
Did you ever ask for a supervisor/sergeant to be called? If they are in on it to then you're no worse off, but if they can come out and rein in an out of control patrol then so much the better.
One of them WAS a sergeant. My hope was that a State Trooper would stop and reign things in a bit. Just lots of semis thundering by. Otherwise, it can get pretty quiet on rural interstates at night.
I was hassled once for driving without my head lights on at night - when they were in fact on - in NYC and one of the cops was a white shirt lieutenant. They were rude, insulting and were obviously trying to get a rise out of me. I kept cool along with my passenger and after some simple questioning and running my ID they let me go. It was obviously a fishing expedition but for what I can only guess.
They don't need a lot of tools to do such a deep 'search' of your car, they're not under any requirement or mandate to make it easy or even possible to repair.
In my 40+ years of driving, I've seen such disassembled cars along the road a hand full of times.
I've always wanted to ask people who lived in East Germany: what similarities and differences do you see with the modern American surveillance infrastructure?
Yes, I’m Polish American and was traveling from West Germany to Poland. It wasn’t so bad once we bribed them. It turned-out the guards just wanted Marlboros, Johnny Walker, and US dollars. We still had to reassemble the Mercedes.
Police in Germany regularly pulls regular coach service aside to some warehouse and searches in detail everyone's posessions on them. It tends to happen close to borders but not necessarily. It happened to me close to xmas in 2008, people had to unwrap their christmas gifts... I try to fly instead since. Border police are no joke
The more this flyover-state mentality policing continues (obvious civil asset forfeiture fishing - dealers might be carrying cash from a previous sale, etc), the less people are going to drive through them, further depriving these states of a revenue source. Of course, this mentality could be voted out by the residents of these states, but I'm not optimistic.
I hope mightily that you are correct and it is restricted to the flyover states. I fear that the reality is probably that in populated states the police are so preoccupied dealing with real crime they have little opportunity to take "preventative action". Being as empathic as I can, I would say that the cops in flyover states deal with a LOT of transport-related drug crimes (that's why they are called "flyover"), so I get their focus. I have just learned to exist below the radar as much as possible. I no longer drive dealer plated cars and have no vehicles registered in my name (so I never come up in ALPR systems). I try to be compliant in every way possible. But then again that's what real criminals do too.
Retired age men driving dealer plate cars eastbound onto I-80 in Nebraska out of Colorado from I-76 get stopped ALL THE TIME as potential drug mules.