Operation Flagship was undertaken at a time when the U.S. Marshals performed their jobs with a lot of flair. What other agency would throw a football party in order to arrest a handful of (mostly) non-violent criminals?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Chapter 1: What is Operation Flagship?
Yeah, you know what the edition this is? This is the law enforcement sometimes thinks they're so cute and clever edition. Right. Man, I can't wait to point out how many cutesy little names and acronyms pop up in this story. And this, and a lesson.
If you're a criminal and you ever think something might be shady and it might be a sting operation, just look at any name that they've given you and, like, read it backwards or see if it spells an acronym that says, like, we nabbed you, buddy, or something like that. Like, that's how cutesy they got. And you'll see. I'll just throw that out there, and we'll talk about them as they pop up.
And there's our daily assistance in helping criminals evade capture by law enforcement.
Yeah. Was that what I was doing? I certainly was. All right. Moving on.
So we're talking about one specific operation, Operation Flagship, which was conducted by the U.S. Marshal Service back in, I think, 1985. And It's just kind of mind boggling. What did you hear about this? Did it did somebody write in or did you already know about it being an NFL fan?
Yeah. You know what? I'm not sure. Now that I think of it, this may have been a listener request. And I'm going to look that up real quick because I hate not shouting people out. Yeah, I'm with you when that happens.
So how I keep talking while you look. OK. So the U.S. Marshal Service, they're one of the first American law enforcement agencies. They were founded back in 1789. Dave helped us with this. It's Dave Week, by the way. Oh, yeah. As Dave put it, in the time of George Washington— So they've been around quite a bit.
And over the course of this history, like they've done a lot of different really kind of great stuff. They escorted students into the first segregated schools, black students to segregated schools. They protected them. They enforced prohibition, which I guess, depending on your views on prohibition, it was great or not. They operated the U.S.
Census, which seems like they were at the time just really looking for busy work for the marshal service.
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Chapter 2: How did U.S. Marshals use sting operations creatively?
I saw that part of the package that they won was also a photo shoot. I saw that in a couple of places.
With the Culture Club?
Yeah. Oh, okay. And then one of the marshals who headed up the Hartford, Connecticut Boy George scam said,
um said it was just like one of the other ones where like when you went to get picked up by this limo right when you got in the limo they arrested you he said all these people that they got with this were all dressed up to go to the culture club concert oh god can you imagine what they looked like when they arrived in jail like those feathers that you clipped to your ear yeah yeah like glitter war paint like on your cheeks like the whole the whole shebang
I wonder if they said bad karma chameleon for you, my friend. I love all the extras, too. It wasn't just like tickets to a concert. It was always like and dinner and a photo shoot. Like, I guess they really thought they needed to make it something someone couldn't refuse, I guess.
Right. How can you refuse a photo shoot with boy George?
Yeah. But we laugh. Fist seven knitted thirty three hundred arrests and is the largest fugitive roundup in American history still to this day.
Yeah. 3,200 of them came from the Boy George scam.
That feels like we have to take a break right there, right?
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Chapter 3: What was the role of sports in Operation Flagship?
Yeah, that was horrific. I mean, it was a compound fracture that came out of his thigh, right? Yeah.
I don't think it was his thigh. I think it was a lower leg. But I just I remember it was that was the first horrific injury that I saw on TV that even though I didn't know it at the time, activated my mirror neurons in a way that was quite striking.
One of the ones that got me, there was a Miami Hurricanes player in early 2000s. And he was like running down the sideline and somebody dove to knock him out of, well, out of bounds. And and they got him right in his knee and his knee turned into like his whole his whole leg. But the apex was his knee just turned into a rubber band that went really far to the left.
It's always so disturbing.
This was the zeitgeist at the time. They showed that injury in slow motion 15 times while the dude was laying on the field. They didn't cut to anything. They just kept showing it over and over like it was a new volume of Faces of Death or something like that.
Yeah, they did that for up until not too, too long ago. And then they stopped anytime there's a serious injury like that. They're like, we're not, you know, we don't show the replays of these things anymore.
But we probably shouldn't feed the bloodlust.
Yeah, exactly.
But yeah. So anyway, that was that was it's forever burned into my brain that that image. And I don't think he broke anything. He just apparently is like the most flexible, resilient leg of anybody's.
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Chapter 4: How effective were these operations in arresting fugitives?
Yeah. Thank you, Dave. That was great. We appreciate the assist on this one and on Harry Belafonte. It's Dave Week, everybody. That's right. And since I said it's Dave Week again, that unlocked listener mail.
Hey, guys. Love the show. I just started listening around 2018. I'm now realizing that was seven years ago. My commute to work is about 15 minutes in each direction, so your release schedule is perfect to listen to a fresh SYSK episode all the time. So fresh.
I was listening to Automats and hearing Chuck weirded out about pie for breakfast is so funny to me because I'm a chef and I will never understand why pie, sweetened, thickened fruit in a pastry, is dessert. But a Danish or jelly donut, sweetened, thickened fruit in a pastry, are breakfast.
And by the way, this totally vindicates you because when you were like pie for breakfast and I was like, that sounds so crazy. And you said most breakfast foods are dessert. And I was like, what are you talking about? You're completely right. I wasn't thinking about all this stuff.
Oh, I love it when you say stuff like that.
I was thinking about eggs and bacon, but I forgot about the sweet side of breakfast, and all that stuff is dessert. Same goes for cake and pancakes. Flour, sugar, eggs, baking powder with a sweet condiment. French toast is plain white bread dipped in a sweet cinnamon custard, griddled, and then you drizzle sugar syrup on top of it.
I love that stuff.
So, guys, Josh is right. Lots of breakfast foods are pretty much dessert, and I say if it makes you happy, there's no reason to keep it. away from dessert foods at breakfast. Your stomach doesn't know what time of day it is. Thanks for all the amazing information. I've learned so much from you guys and always have a great time listening. That is from Aaron Brittingham.
And Aaron, thanks for proving me wrong. I forgot about all this sweet breakfast stuff. Thanks for proving me right. Yeah, and not to even mention cereal. I mean, what is Captain Crunch besides a bowl of dessert?
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