You know, I love it when they give a long list of offenses and finish it up with a minor one. I know it’s a routine gag. I know it’s easy. And if it’s only a third or fourth charge, that’s not as funny. However, Jim’s listed as being wanted for six or eight, easy, followed by “vandalism.” I mean, if you’ve got a guy for things like narcotics trafficking and attempted kidnapping, vandalism is barely noticeable and wouldn’t even be worth the time on the radio.
Jim’s going through the town of New Pastoria. He’s had to get towed in, because the brakes on the Firebird went out. He is nice to the girl who works at the motel, which quickly escalates into an enormous scam. He’s framed for drug smuggling. He makes a break for it, but the guy he trusts has him hauled back. It quickly becomes clear to Jim that the whole town’s setting up anyone who passes through to shake them down for “fines.”
The mayor (Kathie Browne) mentions to Jim that the rest of the country is in an economic downturn. She’s running a scam for what she sees at the betterment of her community. It’s probably true that Pastoria was troubled. It’s an agricultural community in rural California. However, obviously this is not the way to do it. There are a whole bunch of ways to improve the lot of her town, and she’s just chosen the one that only hurts outsiders without realizing the long-term results of thinking that way. She’s hyping the “lemon festival,” but surely the hope there is to attract outsiders.
This is a fun one for Beth. She gets to watch Jim work, something she usually strictly avoids. Sure, he’s at best bending laws while getting the thing figured out here, but she’s also aware that the law is untrustworthy in Pastoria. She has a hard time wrapping her head around just how untrustworthy, and that’s in part because we know that Beth has an incredibly privileged upbringing. She’s a wealthy white woman from Pasadena—and as a woman from Pasadena (well, Altadena, but close enough), I know just how wealthy that can be. The law was always on Beth’s side. She works to help those without her privilege, but she has a hard time understanding just how major that privilege is.
The judge (Bill Quinn) believes that half the crime in the US is caused by lenient judges. He believes that anyone who admits they’ve committed a felony in his county owes him personally. I have no doubt he doesn’t have the slightest awareness of how he’s actually making things worse by those two beliefs. We know that the US penal system is not designed to prevent further crime in any substantive way. He believes fines are “a bill that’s come due,” but of course someone from Beth’s family background could shrug off $5000, even in those days, in a way that Jim simply can’t—and even he’s privileged relative to a lot of other people.
Take Care of Rockford Files: Beat up by thugs. Car chase. Held at gunpoint. Pursued by half the county. Takes the top off a police car in something that makes me fondly reminiscent of my local railroad trestle.