US customs agents out of control?

Here\'s an interesting question to consider.  Click here for the complete story:

http://www.s2ki.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=133046

The poster S2Kwhite is a young guy in his 20s who is of iranian descent, and lives in Quebec, Canada.  He owns a Honda S2000, and has been working on replacing most of the body pieces with custom fabricated carbon fiber replacements.  (Inexplicably to me, he decided to keep the doors their original white color.  There\'s no accounting for taste, but never mind because that\'s not important.)

He decided to drive down to Boston to show off his car at a Hot Import Nights event.  He was stopped at the border, detained for many hours, and his car was disassembled by customs agents searching for narcotics.  S2Kwhite had to have the car flatbedded back to Quebec in pieces, and he probably has no legal recourse for recovering the damages to the car, or cost of reassembly.  US Customs agents said "You\'re lucky we didn\'t sieze your car."

While on the one hand I am a little outraged that representatives of our government did this to a Canadian member of the S2000 International forum who is so well appreciated by others members, I can also see the other side of this.  I\'ve always known that customs agents have a wide range of powers to search, tear apart, and disassemble anything they catch you with.  I would have thought long and hard before taking a car that was THAT weird looking through the border.  Overall, I do think these border agents abused their powers by hassling this guy who was clearly no threat to anyone.

Any opinions?

car is ugly as hell, it deserved to be torn apart!

[SirMystiq]

The car is ugly. But I don\'t think it was necessary for the agents to tear it apart. He did have his passport and from what I read there was no reason to be suspecious. Unless he LOOKED suspecious a.k.a looking like a terrorist. The agents saw his skin color or they saw where he was from they automatically labeled him and over did their duty. I bet that wouln\'t have happened to a US Citizen or a caucasian.

What are you two on... the car is awesome. Just not with the white door-thingy. Should just have been all black.

Still, not very nice to just tear it apart because it looks a bit different ... ?!

[videoholic]

I think that is what they are refering to.  The white panels slook stupid as hell.

I think what the guy had happen to him is majorly whacked.

BUT, you have no clue if he is telling you the whole story either.  He could have been a dickhead.  He could have just acted funny.  You never know.

You are taking his word as true when there are always two sides to every story.

I find it hard to believe they would take a guys car apart if there wasn\'t some sort of a reason.

This kind of $hit is only the beginning. The present Gov in America will step on anyone, re-write any costitutional right they wish, and they\'ll base these changes on manufactured fear.

I\'d be pissed.... I am pissed

The border patrol agents who did this are probably Mustang owners.

Anyway, it\'s called racial profiling and to be honest, I don\'t see a problem with it in general. If I were this guy I would be pissed as well.