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Police Database Lists 'Future Criminals'
Rio writes: "A Local6.com article tells us about a database that contains a list of people who police believe are likely to break the law. It features names, addresses and photographs of potential suspects --many of whom have clean slates. Since the system was introduced in Wilmington in June, most of the 200 people included in the file have been minorities from poor, high-crime neighborhoods."
how long till the suspected criminals-to-be are arrested "just in case"?
Cthulhu fhtagn!
Most crime happens in poor, minority-dominated neighborhoods. It only makes sense to increase the police presence in those areas, through random patrols and targetted surveillance of possible hotspots and hotheads.
The people who live in those neighborhoods have a right to live in safety. If this can effectively retard the development of criminals, isn't it worth it?
This why we have affirmative action programs like "Midnight Basketball". When there is a possibility of someone going down the path of crime, it is much cheaper to stop them when they haven't done anything than it is to incarcerate them later.
I have been pwned because my
"I don't care what anyone but a court of law thinks," he said. "Until a court says otherwise, if I say it's constitutional, it's constitutional."
That's from this article.
Free Mac Mini
They're just crusing high crime areas (where the probabability is greater that a resident will be involved in criminal activity), then they find someone who's doing anything that's even remotely in violation of the law (loitering for instance), then adding them to the probability list.
And of course, they cite numbers of "successful guesses" but fail to mention how many misses. Its not necessarily meaningful. Very VERY few people are completely 100% in compliance with the law. I wouldn't go so far to say that someone who occasionally speeds is to be considered a criminal, but if you look at the teeth many laws have, especially copyright law, many of us are in violation to the degree that we could spend many thousands of years in prison and be fined billions of dollars, should they bring those cases to court and press the maximums.
6.6 Million americans (about 3%) are currently under supervision of a correctional institution, either in prison, or on parole or probation. And that's RIGHT NOW. That's a significant percentage of the population. To drive around someplace where that percentage is signficantly higher, it wouldn't be terribly unlikely to get a 10% matchup with pure guessing by pointing out random people who will one day end up in trouble with the law. To tout statistical probabilities as indications that this system is any more useful than pursusing criminals after the crime has been commmited is nothing more than a lazy effort to create the impression that something is being done about the "problem".
What is the point of this anyway? So someone's name is on a "future criminals" list. Does that make any difference when a trial comes up? I suppose if there's a murder, and one of the suspects happens to be on the list, that might be something, but if the only critiera for being added to the list was the fact that you once jaywalked 5 years ago, there would be little grounds to take it seriously, and defense lawyers would have a field day if someone was held longer than necessary based only on such inconsequencial evidence.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
How else are they supposed to get you off death row 18 years after they coerce you to confess to a crime you did not commit? Can't you see this is for your own good? We have to choose between the lesser of two evils:
- Keeping a DNA database of the innocent.
- Scaling back efforts to force false confessions, letting both innocent and guilty individuals go free.
</SARCASM>I wonder how many of these types will be listed. How are they going to determine who is going to most likely be involved in embezzling or fraud? Is it going to be MBAs who don't take ethics classes? This is just plain WRONG!
Consider This bill...
If passed, this will mandate a year of military training for nearly all "selective service" age males (and any females for volunteer - is it just me or is this an amusing chauvenistic anachronism for a modern law?...).
It's far from being an outright "draft", but it holds a disturbing (and on-topic) implication.
I seem to recall that when someone begins US military service, that they are subjected to a variety of examinations, including, I assume, psychiatric ones. Of course, the military keeps records of the results.
Therefore...this bill is basically a convenient way to ensure that the US Federal Government would from that day forth be able to "profile" effectively every male US citizen as they hit voting age. It'd be a trivial matter, in a technical sense, to automate the "picking out" of any results that are deemed "worrisome" and the reports shared with law enforcement agencies everywhere...
I'm not certain that's the main PURPOSE of the bill, but I don't doubt that aspect of it would appeal to current AND FUTURE executive administrations in the US....
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
So there's a published list, even if it's only published to cops, saying "This person is likely to commit a crime". Leave aside the obvious civil liberties issues for the moment - this seems like simple libel to me. At least for the Usual Suspects who haven't yet been arrested for things, this doesn't sound like investigation of a crime or other legitimate police function that's protected by laws protecting government officials doing their official jobs. Of course, most of the people on the list probably don't have the resources to fight that kind of libel suit, but it'd be fun to get the ACLU or some other pro bono support for it.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Crime is a relative term. For example, here are some common business practices that can be perceived in different ways depending on how you look at them:
Stock Investments = Prospective Trading = Gambling
Insurance = Protection = Extortion = Mugging
Inaccurate Quarterly Reports = Creative Accounting = Embezzling = Mugging
Depending on where you stand, only one of the terms in each group is legitimate to you. I will use insurance as an example:
In the protection rackets, you "insure" someone that they won't get their place trashed and their legs broken. As the "protector" you feel fully justified that you are providing them with a service: keeping you or your henchmen's violent tendencies at bay. After all, these things just happen from time to time. Right? Either way, in the end it comes down to: "Your money, or your life. It's your choice."
In the insurance industry, there is a bit of legal wrangling, and the roles of the players are somewhat shifted to make it seem more legitimate, but it's a very similar situation: Health care providers (not necessarily doctors mind you... although some of them can be blamed for the unrealistically high insurance rates of today.) have the ability to do something to protect your life in one fashion or another. They are the "protectors". In this case, they don't want to go out and threaten to withhold health care from you. Instead the insurance companies go out and tell you that "without insurance, you could wind up with huge bills that will bury you in debt for life or no health care which can be fatal. It's in your best interest to pay." You wind up in essentially the same position: "Your money, or your life. It's your choice."
So... as you're walking down the street, a "common criminal" comes up to you and puts you in the same exact position by pointing a gun at you: He just comes out and says, "Your money, or your life. It's your choice."
In the end who is more honest about what they do? The "common criminal" because he states in plain view what his intentions are? The protection racketeer, who is somewhat illusory as to his reasoning but still fairly obvious about his intentions? Or... the insurance companies, who use so much obfuscation to cover up the end result? You decide and then look at the end of my reply to see where you fit in.
I would have to say that crime occurs at all levels of society at equal levels. They just call the crimes different things, and in some cases some of the crimes are legalized.
And now for the answers:
If you answered "The Insurance companies are the most honest. Besides , this is America and they have a right to make a profit". Then you are a stinky repugnican.
If you answered "The Protection Racketeer. Hey... accidents happen. Capiche?" Then you are likely a budding mobster who's been playing too much Q3A. BTW... I like your woman.
If you answered "The common criminal because he doesn't hide behind legalese and F.U.D." Then you may actually be a reasonable human being and give hope to others that have given up on the idea that humans are basically intelligent.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Writers imply. Readers infer.
This is nothing more than an extension of what is already being done in the law enforcement communities. In smaller communities, like the one where I used to live, police could simply memorize the names of the folks that they suspected of being "on a bad path."
As an example, I had a buddy that had a string of DUIs and got his license suspended. He was later pulled over by a policeman because his license plate light wasn't bright enough (or some other excuse) and given yet another hefty fine for driving without a license. He couldn't believe that the police would pull him over for such a piddly deal, especially considering the amount of traffic that has faulty lights on their vehicles (stand on a streetcorner and count sometime, you will be amazed). It goes without saying that years of alcohol abuse had severely effected my friend's thought processes. The policeman hadn't pulled him over because of a minor infraction. The policeman had pulled him over because he recognized the automobile!
In small towns police do this all of the time. They know who the criminals are, and they know that a quick sweep of everyone they are keeping tabs on (who isn't currently locked up) will generally net them their criminal. Of course, small town dwellers tend to understand that when the go out "in public" they are quite likely to be recognized by the people they encounter. We realize that none of us have a right to anonymity. What these big city policeman are doing is simply this same principle on a larger scale. They want to be able to "remember" the people (as a group) that they thought were suspicious. Now, whether this is right or not is hard to say. All I can say is that profiling potential criminals in this matter has been working quite well in small communities since the beginning of time. All things considered, I would strongly encourage folks that live in this part of the U.S. to take care to not dress like a stereotypical drug dealer.
The vast majority of the prizon population are non-violent drug offenders. It is a war on the poor. Another disturbing trend is the rise of prizon labor. Prizoners manufacturing goods for nearly no pay will be the new form of slavery. That is why America incarcerates 4.4 million of its citizens, more than any other country. More even then China. Land of the free? Tell that to the non-violent drug offenders who are locked up.
How ya like dat?
Holy shit. That only happened a week ago...why wasn't it covered on mainstream TV? That's a big story, and a legitimate news item as well. I'd have expected media outlets nationwide to cover that, if only in expectation of the police chief going to prison over it. I'm not sure what pisses me off more...that it happened in the first place, or that it wasn't covered at all.
I don't think you realize just how much money law enforcement agencies rake in because of the war on drugs. Due to blatantly unconstitutional seizure laws, police, FBI, DEA, etc. can seize property deemed "contributory" to alleged drug crimes, or bought with the proceeds of alleged drug trafficking. In other words, if they accuse you of hiding drugs in your car or house, they can take that property away from you, without a trial and often without a warrant. They are also under no obligation to return said property even if the original charges are dropped or if you are acquited. Any cash found during a drug search will also be seized, as will large enough amounts of money found during other procedures (i.e. if they find a suitcase full of money in your car during a traffic stop, or if you're found boarding a plane with lots of cash, they might very well take it from you).
Legal battles to get property returned are difficult, costly, with no guarantees of winning. And if you do win, the cost of getting the property back may be more than it was worth in the first place.
The cash and proceeds from auctioning off all that seized property go directly towards funding law enforcement agencies at the federal, state, county, and municipal levels. In fact, the money from the seizures is often figured directly into the budgets of departments, meaning that they will budgeted less taxpayer money because they are expected to pull in as much cash from seizures as they did last year. If they don't, their department will face a budget crunch, so it is directly beneficial to police to seize as much property as they can, in order to pay for new uniforms, sidearms, squad cars, radios, etc. Not to mention all the perks enjoyed by the big bosses, including sports cars, houses, boats, and more.
All thanks to the wonderful "war on drugs". It will never end because the people in power personally gain so much from it.
"Prejudice is wrong; you should hate everyone the same."
Yes. Interview. But how frequently do they second guess? Does the second know in advance the verdict of first?
In the US it is (or used to be) quite difficult to get out of the mental hospital. I think that they cut the funding, though, so that even really crazy people can't get committed. So they end up in jail, instead. The prison industries can find a use for them. At $.12/hour. (I wonder how quickly the prisons will empty when robots get cheaper? [But could they get *that* cheap?])
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
I've held the view that police officers are useless for quite some time now. I've never seen a cop deter a crime, I've never heard of one actually managing to do anything useful that a group of citizens could not have done equally as well. All cops really do is harass speeders and stalk teenagers around the mall in their off hours. They clean up the mess that's made after some punk splatters your brains all over the sidewalk for 17$, but that doesn't help you. We should liquidate the police force and dump the money into education in the inner cities, revitalization of the inner cities, and REAL urban renewal, not the "bulldoze the affordable housing and put up 1500$/month apartments" urban renewal.
Maybe complete liquidation of the police force is too much.... Just remove the entire War on Drugs section, that should probably do it... Then you can legalize drugs and regulate and tax them... A ton more income right there...
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
"Now, if they could weed out the (very few) bad apples that manage to get into policing, maybe people would start trusting them again.
More trust of police -> more co-operation with police -> more bad guys caught -> less crime. Or something like that."
I do believe the majority of cops are good people. But that the bad ones are a SIGNIFICANT minority, and that the majority are JUST AS GUILTY by their silence...
Fact is, there IS no one to "police the police". And in the last quarter century, police powers in this country have increased DRASTICALLY. Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Cops have near absolute power in some respects. THEY get to finger "the suspect". Or not.
Another major problem with our justice system is that juries are largely made up of a NONREPRESENTITIVE sample... There aren't nearly as many younger people, or working people, as there are older retirees. Why? Because everyone ELSE seeks to avoid jury duty. Not that it matters, as both prosecution and defenst counsel quickly seek to eliminate anyone in the pool with any cognition between the ears.
Remember, we are a country of TOO MANY LAWS... Many such laws that are actually illegal, especially on the federal level, as the feds are supposed to not have ANY POWER not SPECIFICALLY ENUMERATED in the Constitution. More laws are passed each year. EVERY new law creates a new crime. There are literally thousands and thousands of laws that apply to anyone in any given place.
AND, there are very few of us not guilty of breaking SOME arcane law, though mostly tiny.
Including the police. Police officers are typically the worst at disobeying traffic laws. It's rare to see them under the speed limit, or not driving what they would consider recklessly in a way they would pull over someone else. Everyone sees it. It's one thing that creates disrespect for them. Especially when speed limits are usually too low, sometimes DELIBERATELY too low, for revenue generation.
Same thing with crime. Most police crime is never known about. Only when it is captured on camera. Recently, in my area, city police officers beat a suspect to death, while he was IN CUFFS, and in the JAIL of all places...
Not much in the way of press on that, except locally. 6 months later I've not heard of ONE cop being dismissed, much less tried for murder.
And my town is one where there is very little crime!
Corporatism != Free Market