Diksha Sundriyal
In Netflix’s ‘Rebel Ridge,’ a former Marine is pitted against a corrupt police force and finds himself getting dragged into the quicksand of the small town that he wasn’t supposed to spend a lot of time in. Terry Richmond arrives in the town of Shelby Springs to help his cousin Mike, who has been thrown into prison for a minor misdemeanor charge. What makes the situation tricky is that the bail required to get him out of prison is quite high compared to his crime. Anyway, Terry comes up with the money and is on his way to post the bail when he is stopped by cops midway. Seeing the money in his possession, they seize it under the suspicion of it being drug money. This poses a huge problem for Terry because he needs to come up with bail money in a short amount of time. But that’s just the beginning of his troubles. SPOILERS AHEAD
Terry Tries to De-escalate the Situation Before Taking the Law in His Own Hands
One of the things that defines Terry’s character in ‘Rebel Ridge’ is that he prefers not to have a confrontation. He tries to maneuver his way out of a situation with conversations, trying to keep things as non-violent as possible. He tries to do the same with the Shelby Springs police department and even offers to get the $10k he needs to free his cousin, Mike, leaving the rest $26k for the cops as a peace offering. Even when he has to use force, he only takes the bail money, hoping that it should be enough to get the job done, allowing him to leave the town as soon as possible. But Chief Burnne and his officers aren’t very keen about letting him win.
It is only after Mike’s death that they come to their senses and make a peace offering of their own, which Terry accepts.
If it hadn’t been for Summer McBride, who helped Terry when no one else would, being attacked by Burnne and his department, Terry would probably have never returned to Shelby Springs. However, he owes it to help her, knowing that it was in helping him that she ended up finding something that completely turned the tables on the corrupt cops, forcing them to push her out of the way by any means possible.
Summer, too, considers leaving town for the sake of her daughter, but when Terry is attacked by Officer Lann, it becomes clear to her that she needs to finish what she started. By now, a lot of things are clear about what is going on in the town. Two years ago, a lawsuit almost bankrupted the Shelby Springs police department. The authorities wanted Burnne gone, so they posed a lot of conditions on his department, one of which was to turn a profit. They knew he was corrupt, but they also needed something to work against him. One minor discretion on his part would have sealed the deal, but the Chief turned out to be more cunning than they had anticipated.
Terry Ensures Justice With His Final Act
Instead of looking towards illegal practices, Burnne used the loopholes in the law, or rather; he used the laws that he knew would deem his actions entirely legal. He knew about the civil asset forfeiture thing and abused the law as much as he could to get what he wanted. This meant that he and his officers could stop and seize anyone’s property, be it money or something else. The person could contest it, but they’d have to go through a lengthy legal procedure, which would cost them a lot more than what was being seized.
On top of this, the police department would also file criminal charges against them. For a normal civilian, this would be more trouble than it’s worth, and as expected, people would just let Burnne and his men have the seized property. With this, the police department started to turn a profit, enough for them to get others, like the local judge, into the fore. The fact that they had municipal courts where no attorney was provided to the defendants made things much easier for Burnne, and he continued with his lawless ways.
In the end, Summer and Terry find a way to expose Burnne’s corruption. They have the hard drives from the dash cams of the police vehicles. The footage is stored for 90 days, after which it is erased if it is not subpoenaed in the meantime. This footage is the only way to make Burnne and his men pay for their deeds, but that option is taken away when Terry makes a mistake, trusting the wrong person. However, he gets another chance to make things right when Officer Evan Marston suggests he get the dash cam of his car working, on which Burnne is caught shooting at the vehicle.
Following a car chase, with some help from Officer Sims, Terry is able to get the car out of Shelby Springs. Having been burned before, this time, Terry makes it a point to keep the incriminating footage in his possession until he knows that it is in the right hands. During the chase, Marston tells him that the DVR is in the back of the car. So, as soon as the danger is over, Terry takes the DVR out, which contains the footage, and holds on to it until he can safely hand it over to a trusted official and make Burnne pay for his actions.
Is Chief Burnne Caught? Does He Go to Prison?
Had Chief Burnne known what Terry Richmond was capable of, he probably wouldn’t have let things get so far. In fact, he tries to make peace with Terry, but he underestimates the former Marine’s dedication to saving good people like Summer McBride. It is the attack on Summer that triggers the chain of events that could otherwise have been avoided, and Burnne could have gone about with his corruption, making money off of innocent people and having the whole town in his back pocket. By the end, however, he has to accept defeat.
With Terry in possession of the hard drives, which contain footage from dashcams, Burnne and his men try to trap him using Summer as bait. But Terry has other plans, and he almost gets away with them. It is a mistake on his part to believe that Officer Simms is Serpico, Summer’s secret source in the police department, which turns things against Terry’s well-laid-out plans. Still, it is not wrong to believe that Simms is not a bad person. She is an unwilling part of Burnne’s operation and, most likely, isn’t even aware of all the things that are going on around her. Like Elliot and the Judge, she is trying her best to stay out of Burnne’s way and let him do what he wants without stirring trouble for herself.
It is during the final showdown that she realizes how far things have fallen, especially when Marston is shot by Burnne. If he can shoot one of his own, it’s clear that she is nowhere on the list of people prioritized by her boss. Despite the mistake of giving over the hard drives to Lann, Simms learns quickly and allows Terry to take cover while also helping a wounded Marston. But that’s not the extent of her help. When Terry flees the scene in Marston’s car with Summer on board, he is followed by Burnne’s men, who are ready to do whatever it takes to stop the trio from crossing state lines and turning it into a federal investigation. With the tyre of Terry’s vehicle blown off, Burnne’s task becomes easier, which is when Simms crashes into his car, throwing him off the road and clearing the path for Terry, who is then surrounded by the state police.
In the final scene, Burnne is seen in his car. He is wounded, but it doesn’t seem to be anything major. What’s more interesting is that he has a dejected look on his face as Officer Simms points a gun at him and asks him to surrender peacefully. With Terry getting away with the dashcam footage on Marston’s car, Burnne has been caught on camera shooting at a police officer’s car. This isn’t something he can explain away, especially because Marston will be on the stand against him, giving up all the info about Burnne, his corrupt practices, and his hold on the town. All of this is enough to put Burnne away for a very long time, and he knows it.
What Happens to Summer and Officer Marston?
Terry is just a passersby in Shelby Springs. He could have walked away from the whole ordeal and never returned to the town, and it wouldn’t have made a difference in his life. However, things are different for people like Summer McBride and Officer Marston, who not only have to live in the town but also have to face the consequences of trying to protect it from Burnne. Working in the police force under Burnne, Marston had to go along with what he was told. Still, he had more empathy for people and tried to keep them from getting into trouble as much as possible. It is he who brokers peace between Burnne and Terry, advising the latter to hear out the deal and stick to it. Marston also tries to protect Summer by tipping her off about Burnne and his plans to ruin her life. This shows that even though he is working for the bad guys, he doesn’t want the suffering to extend more than it needs to.
This is why, when Lann seems intent on shooting Terry, Marston intervenes and gets shot in the process of saving him. This is when Terry realizes that Summer’s secret source, Serpico, is not Simms but Marston. In the standoff, Terry doesn’t get wounded, but Marston has a gunshot wound on his thigh, and he would bleed to death if not immediately taken to the hospital. The same holds true for Summer, who was drugged by Lann as a means to ruin her life and career once and for all, considering her history with drug abuse, which she had worked so hard to leave behind. With Marston’s help, Terry gives her first aid, but she, too, needs medical care.
For a moment, it looks like they won’t be able to make it to the hospital. Eventually, the tide turns in their favor, and when the state police take over, Terry knows that they have won. He, Summer, and Marston have done what they set out to do. Escorted by the cops, Terry drives to the nearest hospital, where Summer and Marston are taken in for treatment. It is expected that they will make a full recovery in time and will be there when the time comes to testify against Burnne. Summer will most likely receive a clean chit on the drug charges because she didn’t take them voluntarily. This means that she will not be separated from her daughter. Marston, on the other hand, might go to prison, even if he is sentenced to a reduced amount, considering that he also indulged in the criminal practices perpetrated by Burnne. In any case, he won’t have to live under Burnne’s fear anymore and can lead the honest life he wants.
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