By Doug Moe

I heard about Clint Eastwood's new film, "J. Edgar," starring Leonardo DiCaprio as the late FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, and right away I thought of Debra Sweet.

Debra grew up a block south of me on Woodside Terrace. She graduated from West High in 1969. A year later, near the end of Hoover's life, she had an encounter with Hoover and his boss, President Richard Nixon, that made headlines around the world.

The episode prompted a memo from Hoover, in which the FBI director noted that Sweet was from "Madison, Wisconsin, which ought to have made us stop, look and listen."

Sweet was 19 then. She's 60 now, living in New York City. When I reached her by phone one morning last week, and asked if she intended on seeing Eastwood's Hoover movie, Sweet said, "I probably should."

It may be hard for her to find time. All these years later, she's still making waves. On Oct. 21 Sweet was arrested in Harlem with a group that included the civil rights activist Cornel West. They were protesting the New York City Police Department's "stop and frisk" policy.

When we spoke last week, Sweet was operating on little sleep, having spent the night helping people get out of jail after yet another "stop and frisk" protest, this one in Brooklyn, where Debra lives.