BART Keeps Cell Service Despite Protests

Okian Warrior writes "After taking heat from the ACLU and being hacked by Anonymous for shutting down cellphone service to four stations last week, BART kept cell service on during Monday's protests. Officials at Bay Area Rapid Transit decided Monday that cutting cellphone service to thwart another planned protest would cause more trouble than the protests themselves. Instead, four stations were temporarily closed, creating a chaotic rush-hour commute."

Comments

Re:Baby with the bathwater

[MozeeToby]

dealing with protests by first cutting off people's ability to communicate, then when people get annoyed by THAT, they just shut stations completely?

Eh, I can't blame them for closing stations, considering that the stations they closed had protestors on the tracks, blocking trains from leaving. Which was a pretty stupid way to protest anyway since you're just going to piss off the other commuters, people who could have been on your side. Now all they'll remember is how those stupid protestors screwed made them late for work or late getting home (bearing in mind that they were already disrupting service).

Shut it all off!

[Nom du Keyboard]

If I has been in charge of BART this weekend (and I was up in the Bay Area during this) I would have shut the whole courtesy BART cell phone repeater system down and told the EFF and the ACLU to take a flying f'ing leap into the bay. There is NOTHING in the Constitution about freedom of speech that says that you have to assist demonstrators in shutting down your system. BART exists to move people efficiently in a city with too many cars, too much pollution, and never enough parking. The demonstrators are a bunch of loonies who want to be part of an Anonymous based action and have no right to even be on BART's private property for that purpose. If BART directors actually had a spine that wasn't broken down by too much bending down to Political Correctness they wouldn't have these issues. This is something to be sorted out in the courts, not on the streets - unless you really want to become Egypt. Personally, I don't.

Re:Shut it all off!

[SydShamino]

And if anyone had a heart attack on a train this weekend, and no one was able to call for assistance, you would have been charged with criminal negligence and sent to prison.

Re:Shut it all off!

[Nom du Keyboard]

And if anyone had a heart attack on a train this weekend, and no one was able to call for assistance, you would have been charged with criminal negligence and sent to prison.

A Red Herring fallacy if there ever was one.

Re:Shut it all off!

[jdunn14]

Bull.

The BART cell phone repeater system has only been in place for a few years as a courtesy to riders. There are still emergency phones in stations (along with employees who have access to land lines) and the train conductors have the ability to call for assistance as well. People have built systems for calling for help in emergencies for decades before cell phones existed.

Re:Shut it all off!

[Duradin]

I wonder how the trains communicated with each other and the stations before the cell phone repeaters. There must have been a lot of accidental collisions due to getting off their scheduled times.

Re:Shut it all off!

[The MAZZTer]

But how far can this logic take us? Let's just shut off water and electricity to the properties of people we don't like. Nothing in the constitution that says they have a right to be able to purchase those services. IMO at some point, conveniences become widespread enough that we start to rely on them, and the providers of that service can then exact control over us by restricting or controlling this service, which previous to our reliance might not have mattered so much.

Re:Shut it all off!

[poity]

I get what you're saying and I agree to an extent, but consider that water and electricity provide for basic human biological needs - thirst, hygiene, and need for warmth. Perhaps cell phone access does not fit in that group as perfectly as we may wish.

Re:Shut it all off!

[DRJlaw]

There is NOTHING in the Constitution about freedom of speech that says that you have to assist demonstrators in shutting down your system.

Merely that pesky First Amendment ("Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech") as applied to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment (See Gitlow v. New York, 268 U.S. 652 (1925)) and a host of Supreme Court precedent stating that prior restraints to speech must serve a compelling governmental interest, be narrowly tailored to achieve that goal or interest, and be the least restrictive means for achieving that interest.

The closest analog to this situation is likely found in the imminent lawless action test. Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444, 447 (1969). Before you interpret that phrase too broadly, consider that the Supreme Court stated that "the constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action."

"Because July protests against BART police shootings had turned violent, BART officials took the unusual step to protect public safety, they said." Source: Christian Science Monitor.
That doesn't sound like evidence that anyone was advocating imminent violence. That doesn't even sound like evidence that violence was likely to occur last week. Instead, that sounds like an official decided that potential violence was a good hook and shut down the BART cell phone repeater system based on the likely content of the calls (calls organizing a protest) rather than any substantial likelihood of violence.

The demonstrators are a bunch of loonies who want to be part of an Anonymous based action and have no right to even be on BART's private property for that purpose.

First, Anonymous wasn't involved last week's demonstration. Second, BART is a governmental organization that is incapable of owning "private property." Third, even in the sense that the government can exclude the general public from public property, there's this pesky problem:

The privilege of a citizen of the United States to use the streets and parks for communication of views on national questions may be regulated in the interest of all; it is not absolute, but relative, and must be exercised in subordination to the general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order; but it must not, in the guise of regulation, be abridged or denied. -- Hague v. Committee for Industrial Organization, 307 U.S. 496 (1939)

Subways and their stations are merely another iteration of a public street, and while they merit tighter regulations due to the environment (confined spaces, dangerous areas, etc), that last "but" does not completely go away. Public transit, like it or not, is required to deal reasonably with public speech and protest.

If BART directors actually had a spine that wasn't broken down by too much bending down to Political Correctness they wouldn't have these issues. This is something to be sorted out in the courts...

It will. Merely not in the sense that you intended. Peaceful protestors* will defend against charges filed against them in court (that pesky Brandenburg didn't like his criminal conviction), the ACLU or some other entity will drag BART into court if they use that tactic again.

not on the streets - unless you really want to become Egypt.

Too late. BART in general faces an even more riled up and motivated opposition as a result of this action. Besides, the courts are not there to resolve political problems. Politics exists to resolve political problems. Politics is sometimes diplomatic, sometimes backroom, and sometimes made on the streets. Get used to it.

Re:I don't get the connection

[Nexzus]

It's the London scapegoat effect.

Re:BART really doesn't like dissenting voices

[LWATCDR]

Interesting but annoying.
From the news stories I read the person shot was said to be armed with a knife and one of the officers involved was treated for cuts. Is that not true? What is your source? In fact there is a video of him throwing a knife at the officer. A drunk throwing bottles and knives at officers in a train station where their are other passengers seems like a real threat to me. The bottle stuck to officer and the Officer fired on the man after he threw the bottle and was coming at him with a knife.
http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/bay-area/2011/07/bart-shooting-video-shows-thrown-knife-not-threat-man-posed
Frankly that data points to the officers reaction being reasonable IMHO. It isn't proof but there does seem to be some data that points in that direction and very little that points to this being an unjustified shooting.
Second where does someones rights end? Why do the protesters rights to free speech matter more than peoples rights to use public transit? The protesters set out to shut down the stations. They have every right to protest outside the stations but once they interfere with people using the station they are violating others rights.

I do not see what there is to protest about. It almost seems like vigilantly justice towards the police.

Re:Baby with the bathwater

[Ossifer]

The cell phone antennas in the BART tunnels and platforms are own and operated by the carriers, who pay a hefty sum of cash to BART as rent.

Re:Baby with the bathwater

[sjames]

Pix or it didn't happen. I have seen video of police closing doors and generally impeding the flow of the crowd, and of the media with bulky cameras and lights crowding out a train car, but no protesters on the tracks (wouldn't they tend to bump into the 3rd rail?) blocking trains.

It seems from what I can see anyway, more likely the stations were closed so the inconvenience could be blamed on protesters.

Re:BART really doesn't like dissenting voices

[Ossifer]

Justified killing is still "violent police action". And justification is up for each and everyone to decide for himself.

Personally w.r.t. BART police killings, I think protests were in order for the Oscar Grant manslaughter (officer tried, convicted, served time), but probably not for the knife guy, even though the video clearly shows the cops shooting *after* the knife was already gone (no longer an actual threat)...

Re:BART really doesn't like dissenting voices

[PCM2]

Did you not read the headline of the story you linked? "Bart shooting video shows thrown knife, but not threat man posed."

BART police arrive on the platform in response to a call of a man being too drunk to stand. Within 30 seconds of arriving on the platform, they had shot the man to death -- apparently, for being drunk and mouthing off to police.

Apparently the man was belligerent, apparently he had a weapon, and he threw the weapon at them. What did the officers think he was -- a circus knife-thrower? Was he planning to pin the officers to the wall with knives, maybe? He was apparently too drunk to walk straight, so maybe he was planning to do that with his hand over one eye?

But hold on -- according to the story you linked, the man wasn't considered a threat because he threw a knife at police. He threw a bottle. I'd hardly call that a threat to the officers' lives. They say the bottle cut them. Well, show me the hospital report or boo fucking hoo.

But let's say he did throw a knife. Is that when you decide you have no recourse but to shoot a guy -- after he's thrown away his weapon? If he'd just tossed it down on the ground, presumably they would have still screamed "he's got a knife!!" and shot him?

But no -- the truth is, according to the very story you linked, the suspect didn't even throw the knife until after the officer shot him. If a belligerent police officer came out of nowhere and started shooting at you -- remember, police had arrived on the platform less than 30 seconds ago -- might not you also try to to defend yourself?

How did any of this happen? Did the officer not have time to say "halt"? Or "drop your weapon"? The drunk man, who was reported as being too drunk to stand and too drunk to walk straight, was such a threat to the officers' lives that even though they were armed and wearing body armor, as soon as they him, they realized they had just 24 seconds to shoot him dead?

And perhaps the most pertinent question: Why did they choose their firearms instead of their tasers? When Johannes Mehserle murdered Oscar Grant by shooting him in the back while Grant was face down on the ground and handcuffed, Mehserle's excuse was that he mistook his firearm for his taser. Many, many law enforcement experts came forward to say that this was highly unlikely, as officers are required to keep their taser and their handgun on opposite sides of their bodies. Mistaking the two would be tantamount to mistaking your own left hand for your right. Now this other officer chooses to draw his handgun and use lethal force on an inebriated suspect, while his taser sits in his holster, unused. That's an interesting coincidence, don't you think?

I've always thought it was interesting, too, that BART police officers seem to carry 2-3 extra magazines on their belts when patrolling trains. Just how many shots do they expect to have to get off on an occupied train or inside a subway platform, anyway? 45?

Might it not be that BART police training encourages officers to use their firearms as the first line of defense? And that BART needs to answer to this pattern of behavior by its police force? But that it chooses not to answer, because its police force is not answerable to any city's mayor or city council, and in fact is answerable to no organization but BART itself? And therefore the public's only real recourse is civic unrest?

I'm just floating the possibility out there.

Re:Baby with the bathwater

[JordanL]

And this is why protesting the US never made it past the "I want to be heard!" stage in the 70s. Active protesters in the US don't even see their goal as changing anything, they see their goal as protesting.

Protesting doesn't actually accomplish anything productive. It is a means to an end. That end never comes if you don't effectively convey your actual message to people in a way that asks them to consider if they agree.

In other words, I am not saying you are wrong, I am saying you are missing the point. If your goal is to protest, then by all means, your logic is sound. If your goal is to change something, your logic may be sound or unsound. It is entirely up to the people receiving the message if your logic is sound. If you are comfortable leaving it up to them, then fine. But keep in mind that it you, the protester, who has the message that is trying to be disseminated. You are the one with the passion and the information. You must accept that it is then your responsibility to communicate that in a way that others can effectively receive.

Protesting for the sake of protesting hasn't been effective at any kind of institutional or long-term change for decades. Why people continue to think it is productive is beyond me. If you are truly passionate about your message, actually go out on a limb and put in real effort. Any idiot with a sign can protest, but not any protester can be a Gandhi. You have to choose to commit yourself to your goal to do that, and speaking frankly, most protesters (like most people in general) are not willing to invest that much of themselves in committing to something that doesn't directly benefit them.

Re:WTF is this story about?

[Alex Zepeda]

Grr. I accidentally posted this as an AC. Here's your context:

Two years ago BART PD shot and killed an unarmed, handcuffed man on the platform[1] of the West Oakland BART Station. White cop, black detainee. It California, if not the rest of the US, it's extremely rare for on-duty police officers to be charged with felonies surrounding shooting deaths. The police officer was tried, and convicted of involuntary manslaughter with a "gun enhancement". The judge threw out the "gun enhancement" and sentenced the police officer to the minimum amount of jail time required by law.

Two months ago BART PD shot and killed a man on the platform of Civic Center BART Station[2]. This time the deceased was a white man. BART PD alleged that he was drunk, aggressive, had a knife, and had already thrown a bottle at one of the police officers. BART has released security video of the situation which, unfortunately, doesn't seem to clarify much[3]. Witnesses at the scene claim that the man was not acting aggressively[3,4], and that the man's actions did not warrant the use of lethal force. There is, apparently, some dispute as to whether the man had a knife in the first place.

Last week, there were rumours swirling around about protests scheduled for Thursday regarding this latest shooting. In response, BART preemptively shut down their cell phone repeaters in the San Francisco portion of the subway[5]. This raised the ire of Anonymous[6], who obtained and subsequently released user information (names, addresses, passwords, telephone numbers) from BART's myBART.org site[7,8].

That's about as succinct as I can make the current tensions surrounding BART PD.

Meanwhile on the streets of San Francisco:

In January, SFPD shot an aggressive, knife wielding, wheelchair equipped man in the leg[9]. He was shot with a beanbag gun and subsequently dropped his knife. Allegedly the act of dropping his knife was considered further aggression, so SFPD shot him with a gun. He survived and is now suing the city[10].

In July, SFPD shot a man running away from SF MUNI fare inspectors. Allegedly he shot at SFPD, and police officers returned fire[11]. He died. People protested[12]. The latest twist is that the deceased in this case accidentally inflicted the lethal wound upon himself[13].

So, yes, there's a lot of tension in the BART system and in San Francisco right about now.

Add to the mix that there's a general sense of BART dragging their feet in releasing footage and being less than transparent and, yeah, people get more pissed. Throw in a side of pimping a child and allegedly murdering a pregnant woman, and yeah, some people feel very strongly that the latest SFPD shooting was justified. And, yeah, there's there's a lot of tension both between the public and the police as well as within the general community at large.

1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BART_Police_shooting_of_Oscar_Grant
2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BART_Police#Passengers_killed_by_the_department
3: http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/07/charles_hill_bart_shooting_vid.php
4: http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/07/charles_hill_identified_as_man.php
5: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/08/13/national/a110904D55.DTL
6: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/08/14/BAH71KN6CK.DTL
7: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011

Re:Baby with the bathwater

[newcastlejon]

" What is the primary purpose of BART? " To serve the peoples transportation need; which includes cell phones and data connection.

Trains
Subways
Buses
Cell-phones
Trams

One of these things is not like the others.

Re:BART really doesn't like dissenting voices

[PCM2]

That would be a lot of thinkin for a person to be doing in a split second while a knife is flying at them

I hear you, but you missed one point: The knife was not flying at them. The officer shot the guy first, then he threw the knife.

If you read other accounts, there was some other Keystone Cops type stuff, where the guy threw the bottle, liquid spilled out of the bottle, and one of the officers slipped on the liquid and fell on his ass. That was when the second officer drew his weapon and reportedly fired two seconds later. If you read between the lines, it sounds like a pair of poorly trained, less-than-competent officers felt like they were losing control of a situation (with a crazy drunk, no less) and freaked out.

I mean, come on... this is who they were up against. And that photo isn't a mugshot, it's his driver's license photo. That's what he used to look like when he went to the DMV. In all honesty, I don't even know you, but I'm pretty sure you could take him.

Re:WTF is this story about?

[RanCossack]

Well, a quick summary...

BART (short for Bay Area Rapid Transit) is the mass transit system for San Francisco and surrounding cities -- think of it as like the Subway in New York, or the Underground in London, or the Mass Transit improvement you build in Civ to restore the one one city health penalty you lost when you made that coal plant.

A group of people decided to protest the BART security shooting a drunk guy who was trying to attack them with a knife. BART, which runs repeater cell stations so that people who ride it can use their cell phones, initially responded by disabling that cell network to prevent protestors from coordinating their efforts to block the trains from running by climbing on the tracks, but later gave in and kept it enabled.

They did not run trains on the stations where protestors blocked the tracks, as that would have killed the protestors, but the protestors and some commentators here are angry they still ran the other trains, I think. I'm not clear on this part, to be honest.

Re:Baby with the bathwater

[sjames]

One ID10T half climbs on a train and gets pulled down A MONTH AGO is why they closed 4 stations yesterday?

Re:BART really doesn't like dissenting voices

[LWATCDR]

Yes I did see the head line. It said that it didn't show the threat that the man was.
No hospital report but this news story. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/04/bart-shooting-san-francisco-transit-officers_n_889934.html

First line of defense?
The officer was already hit by a bottle? You don't think that being hit by a bottle isn't life threatening? Ask someone to shit you with a bottle sometime. These are not movie props.
There where innocent people in that station including a child. Yes I know was thrown it was visible in the video or did you watch it? They also found a second knife at the scene. As I said vigilantly justice. No investigation needed and looks like you didn't bother to watch the video.
And I will make this statement. There was NO NEED TO PROTEST AT ALL! There hasn't even been an investigation yet! The Officer may have made an error but if so it was a very understandable human error and not a cold blooded killing! I suggest you watch the video and see how fast this all happened. I doubt that it will change your mind since you seem to have feel no need to question the mob.

Re:Baby with the bathwater

[jc42]

BART operates those cell towers that it turned off.

Hmmm ... the message just above yours on my screen says:

The cell phone antennas in the BART tunnels and platforms are own and operated by the carriers, who pay a hefty sum of cash to BART as rent.

It sure sounds like one of you two must be lying. I wonder how we'd learn who is telling us the truth.

(It can be sorta funny when two adjacent replies assert opposite things with a tone of authority. Usually the conflicting claims are at least separated by a few other messages. ;-)