This happened to me last January in Seal Beach, CA. Only I was not courageous enough to step forward and be heard - there is a certain shame in being put in jail, even if you didn't do anything wrong. The shame is really on the officers, and the system the enables them to abuse the citizens who might even be operating under the delusion that the police are there to protect and serve, rather than bully, escalate, and abuse.

And I hear the defensive tone in her voice. She feels, as I do, that many people in the public won't believe, or if they do believe, that they will rationalize the police behavior. Or even if they don't rationalize, they will keep quiet, feeling powerless and not strong enough to make a difference. But, what Peretz has shown me personally, is that there is a certain strength in numbers, and sharing your experience so that other people don't feel like they're the only one who got treated that way, that they are not the only one who got brutalized by American city police - and then were left with absolutely no options to keep them accountable.

The system is fucked and it needs to change. Police should be required to record all audio and video of their actions, and provide this footage to anyone they interact with, on request. And if that device doesn't work, they should be severely reprimanded. (Officer Sasenbach of the SBPD, the one who threw me in jail without arrest and without reason, had a recording device which "failed" the night of our interaction.)

Much of my experience was eerily familiar - the suddenness of the violence on the street, when Sasenbach decided I was trouble. The taunts from the jail keepers. The taking of clothing (jacket and shoes), and kept in a cell too cold to sleep in for 12 hours. Asking for a phone call, and being ignored. Asking if I was arrested, and being ignored. Asking what right they have to keep me, and having them smirk and say, "because I'm on this side, and you're on that side".

When I filed a complaint, the sargeant assigned to the case was sullen, bored. Sasenbach's personal recorder was broken; the video feed in the cell i was kept in was broken. I could file another complaint if I wanted.

I remember feeling so out-of-body, like the system I'd grown up to believe in, the system that was supposed to represent "the good guys" was completely upended. These were brutal, horrible people drunk on their power over me, and delighted to cause as much harm as they could get away with, for no other reason that they could. It was an important moment in my life, when my illusion about the state, the police, and the bare issue of who we trust with a monopoly of violence became starkly defined: none of us are safe. The police can invade our lives at will, and do what they want to us, and we are helpless to defend ourselves. The only thing preventing general rebellion is statistical: the number of people who "win" the shit lottery that is interacting with the cops is very low, and it's hard to convince others that they are indeed at risk of suffering the same treatment. Who knows, perhaps things will change.