You know what would be interesting? If someone—perhaps in response to accusations that a group of cops was framing innocent people—spent months setting up a fake drug house to attract police suspicion. Then, after the police raided the place and found no drugs of any kind, asked to see the sworn search affidavit, so they could check it for accuracy against their own heavily documented activities.
You’d have to be crazy to try something like that. You’d have to want to get in cops’ faces and not be afraid of what they’d do to you. You’d have to have a hatred for the drug war verging on madness.
You’d have to be Barry Cooper.
Yes, the madman behind the Never Get Busted Again videos has set up a sting operation to snare a bunch of cops that he believes are responsible for getting an informant to plant dugs on a young woman named Yolanda Madden, who is serving a seven year sentence for possession with intent to distribute.
KopBusters rented a house in Odessa, Texas and began growing two small Christmas trees under a grow light similar to those used for growing marijuana. When faced with a suspected marijuana grow, the police usually use illegal FLIR cameras and/or lie on the search warrant affidavit claiming they have probable cause to raid the house. Instead of conducting a proper investigation which usually leads to no probable cause, the Kops lie on the affidavit claiming a confidential informant saw the plants and/or the police could smell marijuana coming from the suspected house.
The trap was set and less than 24 hours later, the Odessa narcotics unit raided the house only to find KopBuster’s attorney waiting under a system of complex gadgetry and spy cameras that streamed online to the KopBuster’s secret mobile office nearby.
Although I like Barry Cooper, I’ve always thought he was a bit of a con artist with a giant ego, and that his Never Get Busted Again video series was mostly a way to turn his background as a narcotics cop into some quick cash.
But damn, if this plays out, I have to admit he’s the real deal, and that his giant ego is actually well-earned.
Here’s some media coverage:
I’ve met Barry and I couldn’t disagree more with your “con artist” label.
Barry is an enthusiastic self promoter but his advocacy for marijuana reform is sincere. If you’re looking for con artists try the drug czar, not Barry.
You may not like style, or personality, but don’t mistake bravado for dishonesty.
Oh, come on. I say “a bit of a con artist,” you say “an enthusiastic self promoter.” I think it amounts to about the same thing. I’m a fan of Barry’s (he even quotes me on his website), but he’s not exactly the Martin Luther King of drug reform.
By his own admission, Barry has spent years as a cop, tricking people into jail, and now he just (probably) tricked a bunch of cops into opening themselves up to perjury charges. Barry’s good at tricking people into doing things that are against their own self interests. He cons people.
Reading what I wrote, I can see how it sounds like I think he’s insincere about drug law reform. I didn’t mean it that way. But Barry is not selling his videos out of charity. He’s in it for the money…not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it does call for skepticism. After all, when his first video came out, he was billing himself as “The Most Trusted Name in Anti-Prohibition” which was simply not true.
On the other hand, his latest trick, as I’ve said, is very, very cool.
Cops use forged affidavits all the time (and they lie in Court ALL the time). Corrupt police, yet another infringement on our rights by the gov’t. Add it to the ever-growing list of violations:
They violate the 1st Amendment by opening mail, caging demonstrators and banning books like America Deceived (book) from Amazon, Wikipedia and Facebook.
They violate the 2nd Amendment by confiscating guns during Katrina.
They violate the 4th Amendment by conducting warrant-less wiretaps.
They violate the 5th and 6th Amendment by suspending habeas corpus.
They violate the 8th Amendment by torturing at Gitmo.
They violate the entire Constitution by starting illegal wars without declaration.
Impeach them all (both parties) and save this great country.
The account for the link has been suspended.
Anyone with the authority to put another person behind bars should be required to spend time in prison themselves, on a yearly basis, as part of the job qualification. That goes for everyone from legislators to local cops.
If you wish to reform the legal system, that right there will do it, and fast.
Remember: Do NOT kill the messenger. Whatever you think of Barry Cooper, this is the state of law enforcement tactics in the drug war.
The drug laws are unlawful.
Your police are terrorists.
Your politicians are gangsters.
It’s sad that shock tactics like this have begun to be used, but it is no surprise. The “Martin Luther King” approach has failed us; tyranny of the majority. Constitution be damned.
Dr X, Yeah, the account is down. This has happened a couple of time already, presumably because Barry has exceeded his hosting service’s limits.
m_astera, I’ve often thought something like that might be a good idea.
Allusive, I have no objection to Barry’s tactics here. This was beautiful.
Having been raised in a family of corrupt cops, I have stated for years that every law enforcement official (fed/local) should be required to wear a digital recording device that is engineered into their badge. At the end of evey official shift they should be required to download the digital file of their workday and it should be held in file indefinitely. We should demand moment-by-moment records of these corrupt activities…..bet it would slow em up, just a bit…
Bob
What’s so funny is Barry Cooper’s myspace site…yup, it all seems like a publicity stunt to me…and it’s illegal to call in false reports to the police, so he really isn’t any better than the police when he used lies and deceit.
Here is his myspace page.
What a riot.
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=142610417
“There’s a sucker born every minute.”
And Barry seems to want to target those people.
Well, one thing you’ve got to give Barry over the police is that he’s not the one going around locking people in cages. Not anymore.
Cops, even ex-cops like Barry, are masters at undocumented conversation. Why would Barry make a documented phone call when he could simply have someone say, in person to a cop, that there is a house on X street with foil on the windows? This piques the cop’s interest and is neither a lie nor a false report.
If Barry was more of an entrepreneur, he’d parlay his new fame into more than DVD sales. Maybe something like sales of live streaming or remote recorded automobile video. Catch the cops in what they do best, lying… Cop says “red light”, video shows green; cops says someone gave permission to search: video shows permission denied…
This is an example of documentation. Documentation is evidence. Cops don’t like evidence, cops prefer to the freedom to lie.
You know, a line of Barry Cooper Approved surveilance gear would probably be a seller. He could probably just do one of those reseller web sites where someone else does the order taking and fulfillment and he just provides the marketing to bring people in.
You should suggest this to him. I was the one who suggested that he should set up a community site to map out law enforcement activity, and he took me up on it. It’s not like he’s cutting me in for any cash flow, though…
Mark, would you mind asking Barry Cooper how his hot IR signature succeded in attracting the police by itself in LESS than 24 hours?
I’ve worked with this stuff here in Australia (where its use by law enforcement is actually legal). I’m also an IR equipment instructor in the Aussie army reserve. I can assure you it just doesn’t work the way he claims.
Any suburb is filled with so many hot IR signatures it’s just too confusing. A new IR signature wouldn’t get police knocking in 24 hours, and in any case how can they be scanning the whole town (Odessa has over 90,000 people) that thoroughly in one night (the equipment only works at night)? Googling this story suggests that the Odessa P.D. seem to have access to anything from 1-3 helicopters, some of which are shared with other agencies. It’s anyone’s guess how many of those have IR on board.
So Cooper wants us to believe that the IR signature by itself got the place searched in less than 24 hours, so he could then catch them lying on their warrant?
Can he tell us how the hot IR signature can be differentiated from the hundreds, possibly thousands, of other hot spots in the area, from purely benign sources?
When I’ve ordered up these sort of surveillance flights in australia, it was done after other information was received, which pointed to the specific houses in question. The overflight was then used to help confirm or deny the existance of a hot spot that ‘might’ be growing lamps. But the same suburb would be a sea of similar IR signatures from innocent sources. YOU HAVE TO KNOW WHICH HOUSE TO LOOK AT!
If you ask the guys operating the equipment here if they could randonmly fly the neighbourhoods of a town, spotting a magical new signature that just popped up and wasn’t there last night, they will laugh at you. Not to mention complain about the waste of avgas involved. And by the way if just popped up overnight, and you could magically spot that, wouldn’t you wait until it had actually GROWN something?
If the Odessa P.D. used an IR system at all, something else MUST have lead them to the individual house in the first place, then the IR equipment could be used to confirm their suspicion (please note, whilst this is legal in australia, I have no idea what Texas law says on the matter). Cooper’s suggestion that police are randomly scanning every neighbourhood illegally and then fudging the warrant just doesn’t add up (although it probably helps sell his DVD, and suits people who wear tinfoil hats).
And if Cooper got witnesses to lie for him to police, what exactly does that prove? That police developed a suspicion of illegal activity based on several members of the public actually telling them something? Provided the warrant was then written correctly, he’s proved nothing at all.
Cooper would appear to be a guy who knows IR signatures can be part of the intel gathering process. He just hasn’t worked closely enough with the equipment to know how it works. Perhaps U.S. industry has something I haven’t seen in Australia yet…. can Cooper enlighten us, please?
Wilbur, you raise some very good points. I wish I was in a position to ask Barry about these things.
From what I’ve seen around the web, nearly everyone assumes he or one of his people phoned in an anonymous tip for exactly the same reason you do: The police responded in 24 hours.
If the tip was fraudulent, they may have committed some minor crime just by phoning it in, which seriously undercuts their point, even if the police invented additional details for the warrant.
I think you could very well be right, the anon tip scenario seems most likely.
I’d suggest he’s carried out some other activity too- getting people to come and go from the house whilst only staying for 2-3 minutes at a time is often a big giveaway, for instance, and would get the neighbours phoning it in.
I would suggest that whatever Odessa P.D. reveals, Cooper will claim it’s untrue… and he’ll stick with his “the IR did it” line.
On another note, it’s intriguing to see how many of your U.S. based warrants involve a SWAT team though. That’s actually quite rare over here. Which might be why our warrants haven’t got much media attention….?
hey, if it’s not illegal for the cops to lie to ya, how come it’s illegal to lie to them?
love what you are doing for the country and i am going to vote for you this next year for head cheaf of texas so right on bro
Mark,
You wrote: “It’s not like he’s cutting me in for any cash flow, though.” When I released my first video you also made a comment that suggested my work would be good for you if it drove a lot of traffic to your site…which it did.
Then you accuse me of doing all this for money and call me a con? If you knew me, you wouldn’t write those things.
Tell ya what Mark, I’m inviting you to come to Austin and meet my family, my staff and me. I often have reporters staying at my house and would like the opportunity to prove you wrong by letting you peak into our inner-workings. Maxim Magazine just left. They are doing a big feature in December issue.
Email me: [email protected] if you would like to know the real Barry Cooper and not the one you pre-judged.
Peace,
Barry N. Cooper
NeverGetBusted
KopBusters
ElectBarryCooper
Robert FitzGibbon:
“it’s illegal to call in false reports to the police, so he really isn’t any better than the police when he used lies and deceit.”
—————————————————————————–
Yeah, lying to murdering kidnappers is as bad as murdering and kidnapping.
Kill yourself. For the good of the species.
Is he a con artist? that is a very good question. I don’t know. but here is some information that might surprise you:
On barry’s internet site, nevergetbusted dot com he is selling his “special blend” legal herb, its 200$ an ounce. If this is another synthetic cannabinoid then it is potentially unsafe and it makes no sense why a man who supposedly is so pro-marijuana would endorse and sell people this untested garbage, that could very well be quite dangerous, unlike real MJ. But what is worse, If it doesn’t contain any chemicals and is just potpouri then its just a waste of money. why would anyone buy this crap knowing that it won’t do anything. and how can he live with himself knowing that he is ripping people off 200 bucks!
In a nutshell, legal buds are an overpriced scam! they are either straight placebos or sprayed with untested synthetic chemicals that are not proven to be safe for human consumption! But even If you wanted them, you could still buy them for much cheaper than the price on those internet sites.