why was this FBI guy so forthcoming with this lady about his agency's arguably civil rights abuses? I mean I guess it's good he was but on the other hand it seems a bit weird, given my experience with feds.
They're not confessing. They're bragging.
"We have you dead to rights. Check here in my fancy computer."
Just intimidation, pretty common.
I cannot articulate how much they fucking love this stuff. If you want to actually help your community you become a paramedic or a teacher...
...but if you want to have absolute power over your community, you become a cop or a mayor.
The cops are obsessed with all the shiney toys that let them surveil and kill people. They will buy literally any wildly unnecessary thing they can get their hands on if it tickles their sense of cool. That's why they're driving around in GWOT surplus MRAPs with GPS synchronized emergency lights (Google it) and complaining about not being able to buy the latest drones from China so loudly.