St. Petersburg's Finest

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"The St. Petersburg Times (Florida) reports on a 75-year-old grandmother who was arrested for "disorderly conduct" because she refused an officer's orders to move her car while she waited for coffee and fries at the drive-through window of her local McDonald's. The officer was behind her in line and (presumably) wanted to get his food but Jean Merola was parked where a McDonalds employee had told her to wait for her order and she wasn't budging. Merola wascuffed for what she estimates was an hour, searched, booked, fingerprinted, photographed and her car cost $160 to reclaim from impound. In explaining why she didn't "respect" the police officer's demand, Merola said, "I guess I felt he wasn't a police officer. He wasn't there to help me, he was there to be mean to me." If only more people reached that moment of wisdom and, then, generalized it to the entire force."

From Wendy McElroy.

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