Law enforcement laughs off man’s ‘Cops Suck’ tattoo in viral Facebook post

Police in Bangor, Maine, attempted to start the week off on a positive note by showcasing a man’s “Cops Suck” tattoo in a Facebook post that has since gone viral.

The Bangor Police Department’s posted a snapshot and a story through its public Facebook page Monday morning regarding Russell Johnson, whose right and left knuckles have respectively been tattooed to spell out the words “Cops Suck.”

“Officer Jimmy Burns and Officer Keith Larby had occasion to meet Russell this past weekend. The meeting went well and Russell was pleasant and agreed with the fact that he had to move along from his chosen location,” the department explained in a Facebook post.

“Burns noticed the tattoo(s) and Russell told the cops that he now regretted getting that written on his knuckles a few years back. They all shared a laugh and Russell agreed to let Burns get a photo of the ink.”

First, however, Officer Larby posed alongside his new fist-inked friend — “for comedic effect,” according to the Facebook post.

“A cop in the frame of this shot just makes it better,” the department said.

Indeed, the post was shared several hundred times within a matter of hours and had garnered a few thousand reactions from Facebook users by Tuesday morning.

“This sort of wisdom cannot be taught at the police academies, unfortunately. Keep up the good work and the good posts. We’re all in this together,” one commenter wrote.

Police said Mr. Johnson was neither charged nor arrested with any violations, but acknowledged his weekend run-in with the authorities could have ended negatively.

“If this situation had been handled differently, it might have led to the handcuffing of our friend, Russell. Handcuffing would have necessitated placing the man’s hands very close together. Two words could have become a sentence. A sentence that would have confirmed exactly what Russell might have believed at one point in his past,” the posted continued.

“That would have been too bad.”