a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by uhsguy
uhsguy  ·  778 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: February 9, 2022

Lol you ever pull your fbi file? You seem like someone that would have one and it might be interesting





kleinbl00  ·  777 days ago  ·  link  ·  

been thinking about it lately.

It was confirmed for me that I had one after a buddy and I were approached by cops for photographing an oil refinery in Long Beach in December 2001. Stupidest fucking thing ever - we were both wandering around LA (his idea) dragging around medium format cameras and tripods (his idea) and I had like five rolls of really dope-ass stuff and then this chucklefuck decides we need to head down to Long Beach to attempt to take photos of oil refineries from across the parking lot. It was an utter and total bust - you need wider angle than we had, you need further distance than we got. I didn't snap the shutter once.

But the goddamn pinkertons roll up on us after about five minutes and tell us we can't shoot from public property. So we say okay, who do we talk to about getting a release and they say they don't know. So we say okay well we'll be going and they say okay we need you to surrender your film.

I say nah.

They're fucking private security on public property - they can't do shit. They know they can't do shit. So they say "okay?" and I say "no." So they say "okay?" and I say "no." and my buddy, who is an asshole who constantly caused me grief until I cut his ass out of my life two and a half years ago, starts getting real nervous. But the Pinkertons let us go because what the fuck else can they do and they know it.

So we drive half a mile and find out - FOURTEEN of Long Beach's Finest pull us over because the Pinkertons described us as a "credible terrorist threat."

To the LBPD's credit, they were friendly, and I think they were ragged edge of arresting the Pinkertons. At once point one of 'em said "you know this would all be a whole lot easier if you gave us your film FOR NOW we'll give you a receipt and you can reclaim-" at which point my buddy popped open the back of the camera and spooled out live film while also damn near shitting himself. But he was also so freaked out (and so mad at me for not surrendering my film - once he made such a display the cops never even asked me again) that he called his buddy with the FBI brother at 2 in the morning and by 6am we knew a report had been filed.