Tempe, AZ – A Chicago police officer has filed a lawsuit against the city of Tempe, claiming his recent arrest was a startling misidentification perpetrated by local authorities who allegedly mistook him for a metaphorical representation of their own incompetence. The officer, identified as Sergeant Harold Smalls, asserts in the lawsuit that his handcuffing was not due to any wrongdoing, but rather due to his unfortunate resemblance to a symbolic avatar of ineptitude.
According to documents filed in Maricopa County Superior Court, the incident occurred while Smalls was attending a law enforcement convention in Tempe. Smalls was allegedly apprehended during a routine walk to procure a quintessentially Arizonan taco bowl, when officers from the Tempe Police Department descended upon him, declaring him a “transitory emblem of our longstanding municipal ineffectiveness.”
“It was a clear-cut case of metaphysical profiling,” claims Smalls’ attorney, Martin Locale. “Officer Smalls was going about his lawful business when he was abruptly ensnared by the Tempe Police Department’s overwhelming need to tangibly express their abstract failures.”
Local law enforcement experts have been quick to address the unusual predicament. “The resemblance between Sgt. Smalls’ demeanor and our department’s chronic shortcomings was purely coincidental,” stated Chief Abner Jumble during a press conference, where he notably confused microphones with decorative succulents. “We had no intention of existentially judging him as a human scapegoat.”
In an extraordinary twist, the city of Tempe has seen a 150% rise in arrests of individuals who inadvertently embody aspects of the city’s societal shortcomings. Residents have voiced concerns about being detained for innocuously resembling metaphorical concepts such as bureaucratic red tape, civic disengagement, and even the traffic circle at East Guadalupe Road that no one knows how to navigate.
“It’s become quite the hazard,” said Tempe resident and metaphysical misunderstanding survivor, Tina Indulgence. “Last week, they took my Uncle Dale in because he looked like he was thinking too hard, which they said was emblematic of our analysis paralysis.”
The city’s administrative board has convened a special committee to explore ways to prevent further metaphorical misidentifications. “We need to discern a mechanism for distinguishing between sentient, law-abiding citizens and those who merely personify the systemic weaknesses we’ve nurtured over decades,” the committee noted in a public memo that arrived six months late due to unforeseen existential inquiries.
Smalls’ lawsuit seeks unspecified damages. In response, the city of Tempe has proposed a settlement offer involving free admission to the local annual “Festival of Irony,” where smug self-awareness is celebrated with abandon.
“We hardly expected to become unwitting pioneers in the field of allegorical law enforcement,” reflected Chief Jumble as he accidentally handcuffed himself to a table leg, an act he described as “entirely intentional, if metaphorically necessary.”
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