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Google Used to ID Hit-And-Run Victim
jafiwam writes "Google has been used (according to CNN) to help identify a hit-and-run victim from 1993. Detective Pat Ditter used Google to identify victim David Glen Lewis, 39 who died after being hit by a car while out of town. An image involving a fairly unique pair of glasses was found on the Texas Department of Public Safety web site, and a similar image on the Doe Network (involved in unsolved cases). This was after Det. Ditter began working on unsolved cases utilizing Google as a tool in that process. Makes you wonder how it took law enforcement that long to think of this. Process servers, employers and significant others already use Google for theses purposes... why not cops?"
I agree. I am also glad. It may seem big brother-ish at first, but in fact its the opposite. The key difference is that the information is free and available to everybody. That's the way all information wants to, and should, be.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
The second is that Google is a private corporation and there is no guarantee that google does not the display search results that it wants displayed instead of the real ones. Just too much power in Google's hands in my mind.
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Thank you.
I often sneer at the fantastic search capabilities (and impeccable graphics) dramatized in the CSI shows. If only the state was so organized to have so many databases immediately on hand... and if only the software was so good. Perhaps Google is in fact one step in that direction.
Also interesting, there is a phenomenon called the "CSI effect" referring to jurors expecting capabilities similar to the tv series in real-life forensic investigations...
Many cases get shelved not because they are unsolvable but because there is too much other low hanging fruit that can more easily be addressed first. To get the most bang for the taxpayer dollar, easy cases get solved first and if there is time, the tough ones that take more time are addressed. Too often because of resource limitations, the more difficult cases are never addressed.
anything else being ID'd by any other 'technology' and it would've been 'Your rights online' ...
"Makes you wonder how it took law enforcement that long to think of this"
This is of little surprise to me.
If we look at the demographic that is the police, then the only saving grace is that they would probably contain a small percentage of "forward thinkers" - maybe 2-5% of their number, just as in most organisations.
Police officers often do not hold any formal qualification outside of high school, or their own training instutions.
Fundamentaly, police in the field need the ability to arrest, tackle, and subdue violent offenders. The fact is, they need special...uh...abilities, to do this. Not the ability to "think outside the square".
Later in their career they will graduate to perhaps detective. They then utilize past experiance and gain new initiative.
They would now have the opportunity and freedom(in work) to move beyond the text book.
There must be so many "old schoolers" in the police, where challenging tried and true process's requires seniority, an innovative bent, and the ability to say no to the old school.
In post Patriot Act America, the library books scan you.
Adjust the query thusly, and it will give directions and a street map to them... Clicky
Adjust for actual location/district/beat, of course.
Caveat Emptor is not a business model.
Well, I ended up googling his email address. Turns out - I got something to this affect on a "Discreet Personals Website" in Colorado:
"Male looking for other males for discreet, private meetings - into play, but nothing too rough"
Just curious - would you have held it against him if his email had come up on a straight dating site? That is, would you still have blackmailed him if he had been searching for female company?
This silly story is like saying, I drove my car around and found the suspect. Wow! My car solved the crime! Google zealots.
Erhm, y'kno, unless you want other people to have more "Google stalking" material on you, you might want to have written that narrative a little better.
:/
Right now, it makes it sound as though you were in cahoots with that auction scammer, and that you blackmail your customers
Now, I know that *probably* wasn't your intent, and I know better than to judge a story from only one side of it, but... well, I usually post as though someone were looking over my shoulder... (Hi ECHELON! How's the fnord?)
Sadly, they don't have enough manpower because they're too busy trying to make money off of people driving 5mph over the speed limit. How about they get traffic cops to start working on real crimes?
They already do. Take a look at the Google-cached copy of a page, and you'll see something like "This is Google's cache of ((BLAH)) as retrieved on Sep 21, 2004 05:14:22 GMT" at the top of the page.
I didn't blackmail him - he was stalking me - literally, he was emailing constantly, he even called, he also made a false report to my better business bureau. I had every right to find out information about him. His information was OUTSIDE the norm, but I would agree, as a straight man, I held bias and stereotype against him - well - it worked.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
Speeding is a real crime. If you're travelling at 35mph then an increase of 5mph (14.3%) will increase your braking distance by 30%. The distance travelled during your reaction time is also increased by 14% however the reaction and braking distances are in different scales so cannot be simply added together. At any rate, the combined stopping distance at 40mph is something in excess of 30% more than at 35mph. That could easily mean the difference between life and death.
The Great Lie of motoring is that 5mph isn't a big deal. It's not a real crime. Surely driver attention, skill level, quality of car, surface conditions, they all outweigh the dangers of speeding. I'm a better driver than everybody else; I should be allowed to speed. Cops should be arresting those Real Criminals instead of poor little old me when I was only exceeding the speed limit by 5mph in my 2500kg V8 4WD truck.
Anybody who seriously believes those arguments should have their license immediately revoked. You only have to look at real world case studies to see that speed reduction on USA highways was the major factor in 9000 fewer road deaths in 1974.
In 2002 the USA road toll exceeded 43,000 deaths. One-sixth of those deaths were solely due to unsafe driving speeds and speed was a contributing factor in more than one-half of the fatalities
Speeding is a crime because it results in deaths. It harms society. Not only because of the human cost (which is the most tragic loss) but also because of the wasted time and money spent cleaning the spilled blood off the roads.
So the message is clear: STOP SPEEDING.
Problems with that:
1. Income from traffic tickets helps to pay for police. Not directly, but still... Without it, most cities would probably only be able to have half as many police.
2. Why do you think traffic laws shouldn't be enforced? Traffic fatalities are a MAJOR cause of death... Far above anything else police are involved in, let alone, anything they can help prevent.
3. Do you really want traffic cops to become detectives? There is no magic formula that is going to make that happen.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Makes you wonder how it took law enforcement that long to think of this.
No, not really. I'm pretty sure the cops figured out google a while ago, all around the world. It's just that its successful use is not fucking news!
What it really makes me wonder is what on earth these guys at CNN were on when they decided to run this.
Given a choice between free speech and free beer, most people will take the beer.