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Cops Spy On Anti-Speed Camera Website, Make Arrest

Too Much Free Time

from the such-is-life dept

Mon, Jul 11th 2005 9:13am — Mike Masnick
Bob Dole writes "Watch out what you say online, because the police are apparently out to get you -- in the UK, at least. A London couple has been tagged with Martha Stewart-style electronic monitoring bracelets after the guy bragged online about convincing his girlfriend to take the fall for a speed camera ticket which would have added points to his driver's license. Cops saw his post and hauled both into court where they were slapped with hefty community service punishments. The for-profit police practice of mailing out photo tickets instead of actually pulling over bad drivers has created the situation where 726,000 Britons have already made this very swap, and they all are now criminals. Another 10 million said in a survey that they would do so if it meant saving their license or job. Expanding the prison population by a factor of ten or slapping a third of the country with electronic monitoring devices is just another instance of the slippery slope created by accepting speed and red light cameras." The fact that police are monitoring online conversations to catch wrongdoing isn't that surprising. But, it does seem a bit excessive in this case, given the "crime" in question.
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9 Comments

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  • identicon
    dorpus, 11 Jul 2005 @ 9:59am

    Yeah but works the other way too

    What better way to prove police themselves are bad drivers? How often do police cars just ram their way down the highway without turning signals or anything? In Asia, there have been many recent incidents of drunken cop drivers killing pedestrians.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 11 Jul 2005 @ 10:20am

      Re: Yeah but works the other way too

      dorpus....where do you live (what country-or state if in the US)? Just curious

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        dorpus, 11 Jul 2005 @ 10:28am

        Re: Yeah but works the other way too

        Well Mike, I've lived many places and seen the same pattern. Which state or country I will live in next year is anyone's guess -- wherever opportunity takes me.

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          R Pollack, 11 Jul 2005 @ 11:46am

          Re: Yeah but works the other way too

          But not in the real world. I doubt if the police are monitoring online conversations to catch traffic offenders. They dont have the brains, technical knowledge or interest. It is more likely that someone read the comment and tipped them off.

          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          supord, 11 Jul 2005 @ 12:30pm

          Re: Yeah but works the other way too

          Yeah, that hobo life really takes you places, don't it.

          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Todd, 11 Jul 2005 @ 12:37pm

    ethics and the nature of the crime

    to mike's comment regarding "the severity of the crime:" penalties for traffic infractions work on the accrual basis. if you speed once in a while and get a ticket, tough luck - but that's as bad as it gets. if you are a habitual speeder, the system is designed to load on enough pain to encourage you not to, or if necessary get you off the road. whether the system works is another debate, but the fact that the speeder in question was looking at (additional) points merely shows that the system is working as intended.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    blankmeyer, 11 Jul 2005 @ 1:56pm

    Posting about illegal activities...

    Anyone dumb enough to post about participating in illegal activities in a public forum is just asking to be arrested.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Ivan Sick, 11 Jul 2005 @ 5:58pm

      Re: Posting about illegal activities...

      err, right. Do you think that if I were to post to a website about MARIJUANA or UNREGISTERED, CONCEALED HANDGUNS, or RAPE, or BOMBS, or CRACK COCAINE IN CRAYOLA BOXES that I'd actually be arrested? American citizens have fewer rights every month, but free speech isn't completely killed yet.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    marek, 11 Jul 2005 @ 4:31pm

    Perjury

    The crime is not shooting a red light - that's not a crime at all in the important sense of creating a criminal record. The crime is telling a lie in judicial proceedings - in other words, perjury. That's a serious crime for which a serious punishment is entirely appropriate.
    The curious idea that it is somehow unsporting to catch drivers guilty of driving offences by more efficient means than paying expensive policeman to stand around on street corners can be left for another occasion.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]


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