This whole thing fits nicely into anti-government rhetoric, but personally I think the Buffalo police were entirely justified in holding him and investigating exactly what the petri dishes were. If it had been anthrax or small pox and the police had not arrested him, and five thousand people died, imagine the outcry there would be.
That said, the wire fraud charges are just absurd. It's good the whole thing is finally over.
The initial investigation was arguably reasonable. But as you say, the wire fraud charges were totally bogus. If only the former had occurred, there would have been no movie and no great controversy.
There was a guy I knew here in northeast Missouri who was also swept up in the post-9/11 hysteria. Picked up by the FBI, indicted in St. Louis, all because he was a young college-aged dude who preached anarchy and attended anti-Bush protests. He was never convicted of anything, but what a nightmare for him and his family and what a chilling environment that was, not so long ago (though it seems like it now).
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See a list of my favourite films here: http://www.flickchart.com/slackerinc