“Do you know who I am?” is never a promising line to open with while facing a possible arrest.
Devon Flanagan -- who couldn’t get past her own ego -- tried the oldest line in the bad-behavior playbook. Facing a curbside arrest, Ms. Flanagan cleared up the question telling the arresting officer: “I am an AG.”
She is actually an Assistant Attorney General in Rhode Island, despite telling the officers 12 times (yes 12) that she was an “AG.” Yet her courtroom experience somehow failed to equip her with even a shred of sound judgement. She, in an inebriated state, was being arrested for trespassing outside a restaurant in Newport.
During her curbside arrest, she told a police officer to turn off his camera, insisting that recording her antics (without her permission) was “illegal.” Spoiler alert: She’s wrong.
One takeaway from the humiliating exchange, Flanagan seemed determined to make life as miserable as possible for the police -- even as she was an officer of the court collecting a paycheck from the very judicial system she was thwarting. The irony, no doubt, had not escaped her supervising attorneys. She needn’t worry about getting her title down -- correctly -- because she’s now on a forced “unpaid” leave of absence.
In what could easily serve as a master class in “How to Get Yourself in Deeper Trouble,” Flanagan is actually an excellent teaching model for incoming district attorneys hoping to avoid humiliating both themselves and the department they serve.
Her missteps are now a matter of public record, airing on “YouTube”, Fox News, and appearing on the front page of the New York Post. There is a lot to unpack in this exchange: Flanagan, who appears unable to control her stream of vitriol, attempts to wiggle and wrangle out of handcuffs, and repeatedly pushes her feet against the squad car door to prevent the officers from closing it.
Flanagan’s curbside dramatics -- warning officers they’d ‘regret this’ -- may go down as the ultimate case of self-disillusionment yet recorded on a public street.
If this is the standard fare from salaried judicial employees, it’s safe to say our police officers deserve extra aggravation pay, along with the routine hazard pay.
Regrettably, Ms. Flanagan is merely a symptom of the corrupt behavior overtaking our judicial system, and the corrosive conduct of government personnel that has led to demonizing our law enforcement agencies.
Nonetheless, Flanagan did valiantly defend her right to be spectacularly wrong, while showcasing an uncanny talent for appearing clueless about local laws -- and for being consistently wrong about what’s right.
