Well that is why the drug dealer example is a good example.
What you said about it is still wrong though. A suspect is a person who police have reason to believe committed a crime. This person may be detained. Even if the drug dealer does find new customers at pickup basketball games, not everyone is a suspect. Everyone may be investigated, but a court will rule against police if they detain every single person that played basketball with the guy, obviously, because playing basketball is not reasonable evidence of criminality. You need something else, even something circumstantial to form a pattern that shows reasonable suspicion. If you played basketball and then followed him into an alleyway then exited the alleyway 3 minutes later, for example. Literally almost anything else on top of that, but there does have to be something else.
It seems like you're making my point, in order to raise the same level of suspicion on your example to be in line with Epstein you need to go to great lengths. but youre missing out on a key aspect, the FBI dont need to detain anyone really. they just need to use the evidence they already have any then take it to Maxwell to get more information. they wont tho. im sure anyone in this thread would be happy to see her get a sweetheart deal if it meant prosecuting a pile of other people, but she'll get the deal anyways without turning over anyone.
that's not even taking into account the fact that in this case we have actual accusers, witnesses and victims of the crimes. witnesses we learned just this week the FBI refuses to take testimony from.
this is why all of your comparisons really aren't good ones imo. there is more than enough to start rolling out a case with a list of people to look into, and yet we both know they wont. while they hide behind the type of excuses you gave of guilt by association to hide the truth of plenty to go on. not to mention when has the FBI ever in it's history stuck behind typical law enforcement protocol like reasonable suspicion or probable cause? if they suspect they investigate, they follow you, they tap your phones, they literally infiltrate your life to collect info.