UNREASONABLE SUSPICION

I am the same age as Rod Amis, I am white, and
I have known him for a good number of years ("Reasonable Suspicion?"
Sept. 2). Indeed, he worked for me during the dot-com boom. More than
once, I have handed him small sums of money, and he has handed me
similarly small sums. These transactions were all on the order of
"Hey, I'm going to the corner store. Want me to pick something up for
you?" Friends and co-workers do this sort of thing all the time --
unless, apparently, they are New Orleans police officers.

Rod is the most unlikely drug dealer imaginable. He is a quiet,
bookish person -- a writer, not a thug. A police officer who wastes
time arresting someone like Rod while criminals are out and about is
wasting taxpayers' money, as is any prosecutor who wants to put him on
trial. Perhaps New Orleans has a huge budget surplus. Bradenton, Fla.,
where I live, certainly doesn't have law enforcement money to squander
on such tomfoolery.

ROBIN MILLER

Bradenton, Fla.