Police accidentally record themselves trumping up charges, lawsuit says

What is then heard seems to be a discussion of what charges might be brought against Picard.

"So, we can hit him with reckless use of the highway by a pedestrian and creating a public disturbance, and whatever he said," says Jacobi.

Torneo adds: "And then we claim that, um, in backup, we had multiple people, um, they didn't want to stay and give us a statement, so we took our own course of action."

To the lay ear, this all sounds suspicious and precisely the sort of thing some citizens fear happens too often.