I live in LA. My parents were going out of town when I was in college so they had a close friend, who lives in the valley, stay and watch the house. He drives a beat up '96 camry. Good guy, never been in trouble, just happens to live in the valley and drive a car that isn't a detailed BMW.

He was parked in the driveway for the first half of the week. One day, he went and ran a few errands, and came back. As he was about to pull into the driveway, they pulled him over. They had run his license plate a couple days prior and had been keeping an eye on him to see what he was doing in such a nice part of town and so far from home.

They took him out of the car and, unsatisfied with his responses, searched the car on suspicion of burglary and detained him for an hour until they finally decided to call my parents. My parents confirmed his story. They told him to be careful and left.

You wanna know what crimes happen in my parent's neighborhood? Car break-ins. GPS thefts. iPod thefts. Occasionally a house gets TPd. Sometimes a bike or surfboard is stolen from an open garage. You know who's doing these thefts? Kids from the town. Not middle-aged camry driving men from the valley.

I realize this isn't the case with every area of Los Angeles. But seriously, I don't see how this is going to help solve or reduce the number of crimes.