For "minor" violations, they are not a priority at all. At least that's my experience and what I was told by that lawyer as well. If nobody in the system will enforce or defend your rights, then do you really even have those rights?
Nobody is a stretch. They can be enforced, just at great expense. So some people can defend those rights; others can’t.
We can’t extend this to the latter not having the rights because people intervene on behalf of others’ legal cases all the time, there are non-profits set up to do this (e.g. the ACLU and EFF) and some wealthy retired lawyers’ pass times.
Most civil rights violations aren’t criminal offences. It literally isn’t the police or DA’s job.
Color of law violations...
Did you see the quote about "legally, not at all"? This is easily identified as false. There are criminal charges in at least 4% of civil rights cases.
On top of that, we aren't just talking about charging some. We're talking about the idea that protection of civil rights is part of the job for police and prosecutors. This is also easy to prove. Police are required to Miranda-ize before interrogation, the agency they work for is required to investigate IAD complaints without being hostile to the complainant, etc. Prosecutors are required to maintain Guiglio lists, follow Brady for exculpatory evidence, etc. These are clearly defined examples of where the actors are in fact legally required to take steps to protect one's civil rights.
Do they sometimes violate these? Sure. The point is that it is in fact their job to ensure they are not violating people's civil rights. The reason they get away with it is that there's no real oversight, and even the civil cases are overseen by judges who are also part of the system and inevitably have biases to support the other members of that system.