Leave a Message, Go To Jail

Okian Warrior writes "A man in Weare, New Hampshire was charged with felony wiretapping for recording the police during a traffic stop — based on a cell phone call he made as an officer approached his vehicle. From the article: Police considered it wiretapping because the call was being recorded by a voice mail service without the officer's consent."

Comments

I live in NH, this happens a lot.

[Anonymous Coward]

Here in NH we have this thing called the "NH Liberty Alliance" which is this psuedo-anarchist libertarian/teaparty group that tries to indirectly egg-on the police.
They pull stunts like carrying a pistol standing downtown at a crowded intersection (which is legal), and pull out the camcorder if a cop walks over to ask them if everything is ok .. I mean, let's face it, a dude with a gun and a camcorder standing on the street corner downtown -does- look a little out of place .. and when questioned they always retort with overly dramatic recitals from the bill of rights or the NH state constitution.

This has the fingerprints of that same group written all over it, they go out of their way to get into confrontations with the police (they brag about traffic stops), push the absolute limit of legal antagonism, then cry victim if the cop gets frustrated and brings them in on some usually-BS charge of disturbing the peace or whatever.

In short, while the details may indicate that the charge is bogus, it's important to understand we have a group of people here in NH who -actively try- to get charged with bogus crap by the police just to make a stink out of it.

Re:I live in NH, this happens a lot.

[Attila Dimedici]

To be perfectly honest, I think this is perfectly legitimate. The police should approach someone who is standing on the street corner downtown carrying a firearm and a camcorder and question him. If he turns out to be a crackpot retorting with overly dramatic recitals of anything, the officer should politely inform him of any legal limits to his behavior and move on. When the police know they are interacting with such individuals they should go out of their way to be polite. These individuals should be viewed as obnoxious twits who, on those occasions when the police catch them doing something that they can be legitimately charged, as people who got what was coming to them. On those occasions when the police have no legitimate basis to charge these twits, they should be viewed (by both the general public and the police) as good training for police officers to treat innocent civilians with respect, even when those innocent civilians are annoying twits. Too often, the police view the general public as criminals they have yet to catch.

Re:America, land of the "free".

[Jane Q. Public]

That depends. Many states have decided that places like shopping malls, etc., while technically private property, constitute "public places" when it comes to the matter of free speech. So for example in my state, people can stand outside of a grocery store -- on private property -- and protest or picket, as long as they do not harass the customers.

But it seems to me that the Westboro people were there to intentionally disturb and harass the attendees. I think there is grounds for a suit on that alone.