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Police Busted When Tracking Device Found On Car
uh oh notes a story from Down Under where a police investigation came to a screeching halt as a man being investigated by the police found tracking devices in two of his cars, ripped them out, and listed them on an auction site. "Ralph Williams, of Cromwell, said he found the devices last week in his daughter's car, which he uses, and in his flatmate's car after the cars were seized by police and taken away for investigation."
Obviously not you.
Well, it is a very well-documented legal fact that possession is 9/10 of the law.
Therefore, all the man has to do to be in the right is provide the police with 10% of the proceeds from the sale.
I would have simply removed them, disabled them, taken them out on some back road, and run over them a few times, followed by a thorough beating with a sledgehammer. The police won't admit they were there, so why should you? Then they'd have to admit to them to get them back, and you could plausibly say you never knew they were there, and thus couldn't be held responsible for their disappearance.
Now if you want to get really funny, leave them powered up and transmitting on aforementioned backroad for a few minutes, make sure they get at least one location transmission off, and then beat the crap out of them.
And what kind of law requires a warrent to do something, except when the police are claiming they are in a hurry and don't need a warrent if they think the judge will be on their side?
You do realize that the US has very similar rules of evidence, right? That whole 'exigent circumstances' thing? There are similar rules for FISA wiretaps, even before this whole NSA scandal thing, in that DHS could have tapped someone's phone then gone and gotten a warrent retrospectively.
It's more limited than the scope of this law seems to be, but the idea is by no means absent from the US legal system.
Assuming the police are responsible though, and they aren't admitting it is theirs, I'd imagine it is fair game. They can hardly complain about him selling their property if they deny it belongs to them.
Joe Llywelyn Griffith Blakesley
[This post is in the public domain (copyright-free) unless otherwise stated]
He should have attached the devices to helium balloons and set them aloft.
The police won't admit or deny they placed them. The owner of the cars most certainly own them.
I would've attached them to a police car, though. Or a public bus. Or some kid's tricycle.
Or a police car.
Or hide them somewhere near the police station and then re-activate them.
Police:Dear god, he is in the building 24/7 and yet we haven't seen him. He must be an invisible, cop hating machine that requires no food or water! Lets not fuck with him!
Monstar L
Or even better, put each of them into separate packages, mail one to China and one to America.
Would love to see the police phone bill after that ^_^
...
I would have mailed them to Nigeria or someplace where the roaming charges are quite high.
FYI, the article is referring to New Zealand, which is not yet a state of Australia.
That's exactly what I was going to write. But then, suddenly, monkeys flew out of my ass and while I was dealing with that, you beat me to the post. Oh well, one lives and learns; sleep with butt cheeks clenched tight from now on.
"Consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead." A. Huxley
>How's that for a toothless system?
Yes, it's pretty stupid. Why don't you stop wasting your time and money impounding their equipment and just let them grow? It's completely harmless.
Its probably safer to not be found planting a device on a police car if you're currently under investigation for torching a cruiser.
OK, I'm never going to Germany.
I could easily be accused of being a rapist, since I "own" certain "raping tools", i.e. a penis.
And I carry it with me all the fscking time.
Ignore this signature. By order.
a man being investigated by the police found tracking devices in two of his cars, ripped them out,
The article was very sparse regarding what problem he had with the cars that led to the discovery. I will take a speculation stab at this. Cell phones are well known for causing RFI problems with poorly shielded electronics doing everything from causing keyboards on PC's to lock-up to putting a buzz into radio and stereo gear.
The location of the device was on the passenger side footwell. This would place it close to the engine computer in many cars. It may be an easy to install location for the police and the GPS antenna can be located under the dashboard giving a good location for GPS reception through the plastic dash and windscreen, but the cell transmitter in that location could and probably did cause problems with both the stereo and engine computer. As he stated, it was a botched installation that led to the discovery. A proper install would have located the cell transmitter in the trunk away from sensitive electronics to transmit out the rear window. The car ran poorly, but it was probably the teltale radio noise that geve it away. Removing it fixed both the radio and engine computer.
This interference issue is why most magnet mount tracking devices are mounted on the rear of the car away from the engine compartment. Inside the plastic rear bumper on a metal bracket is a favorite location. there is little chance of interference revealing it's presence, and good GPS and cell signals.
The truth shall set you free!
If a meter wench put clamps on your wheels, they do not then automatically belong to you.
No shit, Sherlock. Did the big 'Property of The City' on it clue you in there? There's a reason they put that on there, you know.
He found unlabeled boxes attached to his car. He called the police, he asked if the boxes were theirs. They were not. (At least, according to the police, and, obviously, they'd know.)
And if someone welds a can of caltraps under the rear bumper of your car (to be shook loose at random), you can not be held responsible for accidents that's caused by them.
You can't be held responsible for something you had no cause to know about, but that's entirely unrelated to whether or not it's your property. If they stole a box of nails out of your front seat and stuck them under your bumper, or just unattached your bumper and made it fall off, you aren't liable either. (Assuming the facts are not in question.)
And no, if a burglar drops his wallet with $1,000 on your floor, that doesn't make the money yours. He may be guilty of a crime, but that doesn't give you any rights to what's not yours.
Which is why I made the distinction between 'attached' and not attached. Sometimes things fall on or in your property. That does not make them yours. (Unless they are vegetation, which oddly enough is yours in most places.)
And sometimes things are left on your property, for you, and they are in fact yours.
It's all what a reasonable person would think. A reasonable person assumes a wallet laying on the ground is not for him (Even in his own house), whereas a reasonable person would assume an unlabeled envelope taped to his door full of cash is for him, even if he can think of no reason why this would be.(1) However, sitting in his front lawn, nope, not for him.
Likewise, if you're parked in a parking lot and walk up and see a cooler full of soda sitting on your car, it's reasonable to assume some ass is just using your car as a table and that is not, in fact, a gift.
And if you walk out and see something stuck under your wipers?(2) That is pretty clearly someone leaving you something on purpose.
In other words, while something simply being on your property doesn't make it yours (And I didn't say it did.), it doesn't mean it's not yours. Transfer of ownership can be implied by leaving something for someone.
It happens all the time with delivery people, or people leaving things in mailboxes. (According to postal regulations, things that enter the postal system are property of the recipient.) Or, like I said, things stuck under wipers.
He checked to see if the police had left it, which would be the only people that reasonable would attach things to his car not as a gift, and it wasn't them.
Now, if someone else shows up and claims it's theirs and the left it attached to his car by accident, he might be in trouble, but as it pretty obviously is the police's, only they would have grounds for complaint. And they can't because they said it wasn't theirs, leaving the obvious implication it was his.
1) Well, it might be on the wrong house, but that doesn't really apply to this case.
2) And that raises an interesting question. Are you honestly asserting that people can't legally claim ownership of pieces of paper stuck under their wipers? And before you say 'Paper is valueless', let's postulate it is an 85 dollar concert ticket.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
O.J.: Radio interview quote from Marine Corps General Reinwald and a female radio host. He wants to host some boy scouts at the training center for some practise excercises. As follows
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: So, General Reinwald, what things are you going to teach these young boys when they visit your base?
GENERAL REINWALD: We're going to teach them climbing, canoeing, archery, and shooting.
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: Shooting! That's a bit irresponsible, isn't it?
GENERAL REINWALD: I don't see why, they'll be properly supervised on the rifle range.
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: Don't you admit that this is a terribly dangerous activity to be teaching children?
GENERAL REINWALD: I don't see how. We will be teaching them proper rifle discipline before they even touch a firearm.
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: But you're equipping them to become violent killers.
GENERAL REINWALD: Well, you're equipped to be a prostitute, but you're not one, are you?
The radio went silent and the interview ended. You gotta love the Marines!
-- bash.org
I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
If I find something electronic that I don't own attached to my car, I call the bomb squad.
And the papers, because they'll want to cover the argument between the military guy with the flack-jacket and the police guy with the red face.
Please consider this account deleted, I just can't be bothered with the spam anymore.
In the minds of most police, they are not subject to the law. They ARE the law. Just ask the next one you see on the street (and hope he has a sense of humor). Personally, I would have driven to the officer's house on numerous occasions while sending him messages about "the operation" and finally telling him "the cheeseberger is ready to be fried."