Rank-and-file Chicago cops ticked off that Jussie Smollett’s arrest was “negotiated” — why wasn’t Roger Stone given the same courtesy?

02/25/2019 / By JD Heyes

When Roger Stone, noted Republican political operative and long-time associate of POTUS Donald Trump, was arrested last month for non-violent ‘process crimes’ including lying to Congress and obstruction, his Florida home was raided by more than two dozen heavily armed FBI agents at the crack of dawn.

“The deep state officers were dressed in tactical vests with large weapons. They were wearing night vision glasses. This is the [special counsel Robert] Mueller Deep State at work,” reports The Gateway Pundit. “They send out fully armed tactical teams to harass and abuse political opponents in the dead of night. And only CNN hacks get tipped off before hand.”

Stone, 66, didn’t resist and no one thought ahead of time that he would. He had no guns in his house. He was sleeping at the time of the raid. And he ‘went quietly.’ But the SWAT-like effort to arrest him smacked of intimidation and for no good reason other than Mueller’s authoritarian prosecutor, Andrew Weissman, wanted to ‘send a message’ to anyone else associated with the president they could expect the same treatment.

Meanwhile, just days after Stone’s Jan. 25 arrest, a previously obscure actor unknown to Americans outside of a few million faithful who are fans of “Empire,” the Fox Television program he stars in, was plotting a hate crime hoax that would eventually result in his arrest as well.

By now most Americans know the name Jussie Smollett, and they know him alternately as the actor who faked a hate crime or the actor who was driven to fake a hate crime by the “racial hatred and bigotry” of the president and his growing legions of supporters. (Related: PREDICTION: Jussie Smollett will confess, then blame “racist America” for driving him to fake his own hate crime, TRIPLING down on being the “victim.”)

While people debate that point (for some reason), what is crystal clear is that the manner in which Stone and Smollett were taken into custody was very different.

Very different.

There is good reason why rank-and-file cops in Chicago are angry about Smollett arrest

Stone was treated as though he was a ranking member of a criminal cartel. While the FBI did not use an actual SWAT team to make the arrest, most of the two dozen agents who stormed his home around 6 a.m. were armed with “assault” rifles and wearing body armor, though Stone didn’t have a single firearm, according to reports.

Did the charges against Stone warrant this kind of massive show of force? Were government agents concerned he would put up a fight? Was there some intelligence the FBI had suggesting that Stone was holed up in his home with several other gunmen? No to all of that.

Smollett was not subjected to the same kind of ridiculously over-hyped arrest. In fact, he was notified by Chicago PD that he was going to be charged with disorderly conduct for filing a false police report. Granted, his alleged crime also did not warrant the response of a police SWAT team and nearly 30 officers.

But neither did Stone’s arrest for a similarly non-violent criminal action. The difference appears to be that Stone is a Trump associate and Smollett is a Left-wing, Trump-hating, gay, black actor.

Nevertheless, rank-and-file Chicago PD officers were none too happy with the manner in which Smollett was taken into custody and treated with kid gloves, according to Quillette journalist Andy Ngo, who observed in a tweet that “rank and file officers at CPD are angry at how their PR is coddling” the actor with soothing public statements.

“I know this can be difficult emotionally, and we hope he doesn’t do anything terrible. We want to make this as diplomatic as possible. In the end, this is only a class 4 felony. He will get through this and we want to make it as easy as possible for him to do it. But again it is about accountability,” Chicago PD police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said, after also stating that the department would “negotiate a reasonable surrender for his arrest.”

Source tells me that the rank and file officers at CPD are angry at how their PR is coddling Smollett with comments like this. He is wanted for a felony offense & his location remains unknown. https://t.co/0HXLNfVUuz pic.twitter.com/XgAnmKsBZn

— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) February 21, 2019