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Man Barred From Being Alone With Daughter After Informing Police of Porn On PC
First time accepted submitter robably writes "A man who informed police when he found child abuse images on his computer has not been allowed to be alone with his daughter for four months. Nigel Robinson from Hull said he called police after trying to download music but instead finding pornographic images on his laptop last November. As a result social services said he 'should not have unsupervised access with his own or other children.'"
That is all.
If you find something like that, you do NOT report it.
It doesn't matter if you obtained it, you will likely take the fall.
And I'll say it again. Never, ever, under any circumstances, contact the police unless your life is in danger and they are your only hope. NEVER
You will only end up much worse off than you were before you called them.
"Hi, police, I am currently committing the crime of possession of child pornography, here's my name and address..."
You can't take the sky from me...
Never talk to the Pigs. There is never, and has never been any interaction with the police that will ever benefit you in any way.
People expect reason and common sense from the authorities are dumb. I remember a friend of mine reported his roomate for child porn and the police came and took ALL the computers in the place. His roomates and his. They tried their best to implicate him as well as his roomate in the illegal pictures but couldn't quite stretch it far enough so settled for keeping his computers. He never got them back and I guess they scared him so bad he was happy not to be in jail. He said he'd never call the police again if his life depended on it.
The RIAA now has resorted to other means of enforcing their copyrights than normal lawsuits, they have opted instead to inject illegal photos into popular music torrents. More news at 11.
Here at work it is my job to fix IT problems. When I see a server I see a box of problems. There is always something that can be "fixed."
A police officers job is to "catch bad guys." Whenever they see a person they see a "bad guy" they need to "catch."
Police are not your friends unless you help them "catch bad guys."
Ever.
"What Are They Gonna Do When Were All Using Freenet"
So much for Innocent til proven guilty.
Next time, DON'T bother, when the police create a climate of fear from reporting something, simply don't bother (no exceptions)
Remember, the unwashed masses voted Liebour in THREE times, they had it coming.
He's a snitch. Of course he should be persecuted. Worst of all, he snitched one the one person who should have been able to count on his loyalty and discretion: himself.
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
On the BBC website (the link posted in the summary), and it was quite a prominent story - however, I went back to find it this morning and it's nowhere to be found, you have to use a direct link to get to it. Interesting...
The story itself is a typical example of UK officialdom vastly over-reacting, and has been picked up by many mainstream newspapers today - I hope this bloke is absolved and compensated by social services for their idiotic behaviour.
Clearly, there is a moral lesson here: if you don't know enough about your computers to keep child porn off them, you will probably not be an effective parent. East Riding social services should be complimented for bringing to light this previously unknown connection. Perhaps other similar relationships exist, such as improperly weeded gardens leading to revocation of driver's licences, or lawyers disbarred for insufficient knowledge of breakfast cereal jingles.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
There's a new iPad. With 120% more horizantal who-gives-a-shits and a whole bunch of new big-fucking-deals available on the app store.
And you guys are talking about this nonsense? Defending a guy with a hard drive full of child porn, that just somehow "magically" got there, he doesn't know how - a wizard did it?
iPad people, iPad. Apple isn't paying you to defend child molesters, it's paying you to sell them more iPads.
Unfortunately, there are still people out there wearing rose-colored glasses. We can only hope that all the people who think it's a good idea to have bigger government with more authority over our lives will have an event just like this happen to them, so we can get off this road to hell paved by their "best intentions".
Never ever ever ever talk to the police.
There's at least two other people mentioned in this story who probably had access to the computer.
Its only fair that the child should be put in foster care, isolated from her parents, and kept away from school, playgrounds, or anywhere else where children her age congregate.
US, Canadian, and UK law enforcement have a major jones for nailing creators and consumers of child pr0n, who are disproportionately male. As such, when a male comes forward with pr0n on his equipment, the default position will usually be to consider him a suspect until they have a better grasp of the situation.
Given the policy, and that the police aren't mind readers, they may never obtain that grasp, and thus a male in Mr. Robinson's position will likely always be under suspicion. God help him if he ever has family problems that reach the authorities in the future (divorce, child acting out, etc).
Unfortunately, Mr. Robinson seems to be victim to his own naiveté. A typical /. commenter might wonder: what did he expect to accomplish by reporting the results of a file download to the police? They are likely not equipped to deal with cyber crimes, so even if all concerned agreed that Mr. Robinson had inadvertently discovered a criminal child pr0n provider, they'd be hard pressed to do anything about it unless Scotland Yard got involved.
Luke, help me take this mask off
They don't help kids, they just hurt parents!
It reminds me of that episode of COPS which opens with an elderly woman in a gas station. The woman holds up a rock of crack, telling the cop it was she that called them because somebody sold her that rock of crack.
The episode comes to a close immedately as the cops cuff her on the spot without question and take her in.
``Honey, what's this on your computer?''
`What's what? Oh! That!'
``How did it get there honey?''
`Uh, I don't know. It must have gotten downloaded when I was downloading music or something.'
``We should call the police.''
`Uh, yeah, we should do that.'
This is almost a new iteration of survival. It doesn't matter if it seems like the right thing to do, contacting the "authorities" will result in a punishment for someone, it is what they do, it is what they are trained and told to do. This guy most likely would have been fine if he would have called a tech and asked for help that way.
NEVER go to government. Let them come to you. If they have determined that there is a problem (and that's for them to decide, not you), then you will be engaged. If they don't know (very possible) or don't care (also very possible), then you will not be engaged, and hence there was never a problem in the first place.
If you go to government when there is no need, what "good" can come of it? You really need to learn some risk management. The downside risk here absolutely dwarfs any "good" that could come from engaging government. At the very least, you will lose in the form of hassle, time, and money. At the most? I think we all know the answer to that.
Government doesn't engage a citizen unless they want something from him. When a citizen engages government, the people making the decisions don't ask "how can we help this citizen?", but rather "what do we want from this citizen?" If they can't determine what they want, then you will cut your losses at the hassle stage. If they can determine what they want, your losses are potentially unlimited.
Example: If I witness a violent crime, then yes, I will do the right thing and report what I know. This is the exception rather than the rule.
Example: If I am rear-ended by a careless driver resulting in a dent on my bumper, I tell him not to worry about it and move on. This is the rule rather than the exception.
Don't seek out help from institutions that justify their existence by creating problems they can then claim to have solved. Especially don't seek out help from such institutions that have permission to use violence to achieve such ends. Asking cops to address an action that has been deemed illegal is only going to get you intimately familiar with how the justice system actually works. It isn't designed to solve problems, to provide restitution, correct behavior or to prevent certain behavior. It is designed to perpetuate itself. This is true of peaceful institutions as well, but the single important difference is what sorts of actions are used to achieve that end. Voluntary organizations promote themselves by being useful, by offering something people want. Violent organizations promote themselves by being preferable to resisting them. That means the value they offer(and they do offer legitimate value, I don't deny that these mechanisms of 3rd party self defense and dispute resolution that they approximate are useful things) need not be compared to their cost, instead it means that one must also consider the cost of resisting them, as opposed to a peaceful solution which does not compel association.
A great way to see the difference is to imagine what neighbors and teachers and friends and family would do instead, were this warning flag brought to their attention by the parents. There is no way they'd simply impose such a blunt impersonal ruling. They'd talk with the parents, the child and see if something is actually going on. They'd probably not be experts in either psychology or investigating computer usage but if they had reason to suspect the worst, such outside help would be possible.
So the lesson in short is to go to your community, whatever that may be, when you want help. Avoid arbitrary rule driven institutions that will simply turn you into their next project to justify their wages for the day.
I recently had a great experience with police. We had a break-in, and all the laptops were stolen. Fortunately we had Prey on one of them, and it tracked the thieves to a hotel in a nearby town. The local police investigated and recovered almost everything. We drove over the next day and brought them brownies.
... just sue them for getting it wrong. Besides, suing is the national sport.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
People who steal music shouldn't be allowed around impressionable children.
People who steal music and instead get child porn (porn, not pr0n, because it's not the acceptable kind...) shouldn't tattle to the police.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
This guy seems to doing the right thing and is being punished. What's the take way lesson?
It's just this sort of thing that makes me want to bring back tar and feathers. Find every official who thought this was a good idea, and publicly shame them. It will keep other bureaucrats from being similarly obtuse and anti-common sense.
The investigator might have found something to merit being cautious at least.
How many of you have downloaded music to find it was really porn?
I would imagine the answer to be nearly zero.
It seems like everyone is blaming the police for this but if you RTFA, no charges or arrests have been made at all. It's social services who made the recommendation and I have NEVER heard of their decision being contested successfully. These people have the ability to apply restrictions like this to anyone with little to no evidence of an actual crime or charges being laid. For parents these organizations are far more intimidating than the police because they can make their own rules and the courts will uphold them.
Clearly, his other self downloaded it.
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
Personally, I'd be tempted to find out everything I could about who hacked into my system and how they did it.
Would that be wise? I'm not sure. My guess is that you couldn't do such investigative work after calling the police, that it might help if you did it before calling the police, and that if you were in the middle of doing it and the police came knocking, you'd be in even more trouble.
I couldn't just delete it and not try to help - I'd feel guilty the rest of my life and wonder if I could have made a difference for some child. I'd have to call the police.
What would you do?
They really should consider if he has any record of criminal behavior in this area before making a decesion like that. I can see the need for caution but this seems very exsussive. I hear stories like this all the time and wonder if child molesters are the communist of the new millennium.
Chris Sheppard
(re-posting because I accidentally posted as AC)
Personally, I'd be tempted to find out everything I could about who hacked into my system and how they did it.
Would that be wise? I'm not sure. My guess is that you couldn't do such investigative work after calling the police, that it might help if you did it before calling the police, and that if you were in the middle of doing it and the police came knocking, you'd be in even more trouble.
I couldn't just delete it and not try to help - I'd feel guilty the rest of my life and wonder if I could have made a difference for some child. I'd have to call the police.
What would you do?
why is the possibility of getting blamed for something you had no part in not better than the certainty of it?
my sister-in-law's brother is a victim of law enforcement stupidity in this area - he bought a USED computer off e-bay in '02 running XP (pause & think about that for a minute - how many exploits have been found/patched in last decade?) that turned out to be a pron zombie but he was (then) 19, single & still living at home so OBVIOUSLY he was a perv! there's a whole lot more detail (some interesting technical stuff if we weren't talking about ruining an innocent kid's life) to his story - short version is that while it's not possible to 100.0% exonerate him to say there's reasonable doubt would be an understatement of biblical proportion but if you think for a SECOND that opportunistic cops and/or prosecutors are going to let that get in the way of their photo op you're probably still waiting for your hope & change...
one thing I learned from his case is you're a damned fool to assume/expect good faith from law enforcement in this (or probably any) area...
TFA actually states that social services made a decision based on evidence available to them. We do not know if that information is also available to us. While I, of course, believe in being innocent until proven guilty, there is an additional factor in that if this bloke has been convicted of a sex crime in the past, social services may have access to that information, but they are not allowed to pass it on.
Also, if he IS a paedophile, and suspected the police were closing in on him, then he can now turn around and say "yes, of course that kiddie porn is there; I told you it was". In short, I'm reserving judgement on either party for this one. If he's not guilty, then he deserves to be able to have that decided in a court, rather than have people making up their minds based on a news article. On the other hand, there may well be a very good reason that access has been removed. If there is, then let the courts rule that the decision made by social services is fair.
It's right that he is allowed to challenge, but it's also right that social services are allowed to make a decision based on what they believe at the time to be in the best interests of the child.
This is a serious Catch 22 situation. You can only report child porn if you are in possession of it or have knowledge of it. You are committing a crime if you are in possession of child porn, period. Even if you came into possession of it entirely innocently, the burden is going to be on you (probably for the rest of your life) to prove your innocence. This is one of the worst areas of the law to be on the wrong side of. The police will always err on the side of caution, which means, if you are in possession, you are a suspect. They will sort out the details later. If ever. And it appears this Catch 22 situation will only get worse for the foreseeable future. The best thing might be to zip your lip and burn the laptop, and move on. I hope this man is cleared soon, and can be a normal family man again. Very sad.
I can't say precisely where things went wrong, but it does look like the system goes after the "easy" cases rather than dig into the ones where children are genuinely in danger. Now we have parents who are trying to do the right thing being routinely badgered by the powers that be (not necessarily the police, who are only the arms of the bureaucrats) while we continually read of kids who were killed or severely traumatized in situations where authorities were aware of the situation but did not pursue it. It really seems like they tend to pursue the easy things. Is this to push up statistics?
When my daughter was young (single digits, don't remember exactly) she got a rug burn at daycare that became infected. I took her to the doctor, who sent me across the street for x-rays. When I came back, there were police waiting. After much hilarity and trauma, they decided they didn't have enough evidence to arrest me and let us go.
So, what do I do the next time she gets injured while playing? Not take her to the doctor?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Straight from the horse's mouth: Don't Talk to Police.
The first half is a defense attorney, the second half is a cop. Both speakers make it very clear -- do not talk to police without a lawyer present. Some will try to screw you to boost their numbers, others will screw you by accident, but either way you get screwed. Cops have a very specific job to do, and that job does not involve looking out for your personal best interests. Talk to a lawyer instead - they are legally required to do what's best for you.
Did you know that all of those correlations you listed ALSO correlate to the well-documented Pirate to Global Warming ratio?
It's truly astounding how far-reaching bulletproof statistics really are.
This whole world is going to hell in a hand basket. The police are overly psychotic, and ready with the "GUILTY" trigger. Citizens are effing stupid for even trusting the police. And than, let's not forget the ever invasive social services. They want to control your family, and your life. Do I have an compassion towards STUPID people? HELL NO!!! he got what he deserved!
Actually, in the more general sense, *never* _volunteer_ information.
I am posting anonymously because of the idiotic attitude of a small minority of people to do with any comments about children and sexuality. At the moment there is a neo-Victorian attitude to children and sexuality as though children are completely innocent of all knowledge and aspects of sexuality until in their mid teens. This is mindless nonsense and most people know it but choose instead to support the pitchfork wielding mob-rule mentality because - well it's good to have a section of society to blame all our ills on isn't it (and if not p3doph1lia then presumably 1slamic M1litants or other people we can burn at the stake). Children ARE sexual. Fact. Most children masturbate and know that touching your privates feels great. I did (as a child) and so did many of my friends. I was also touched (between my legs) by an adult (who I knew as a distant relation) as a child and l loved it. What isn't great is when ANYBODY (child or adult) is forced to do something against their will or treated as an object rather than a person. That hurts (as does being made to feel guilty for being sexual as a child). What about (God forbid) sex education at home and telling children about the facts of life when they ask (as a good parent). I used to play with a little girl the same age and played a 'doctors and nurses' game with her at 8 years old. We were discovered and rather than being punished - my grandparents used it as an approriate time to educate me and her (with her parents permission - they rang them) about bodies, sex and all that - then let us carry on! These days my grandparents (wonderful people they were) would have been arrested! It is entirely possible that this person did download child pornography. What would hurt his children more? The authorities taking his word for it (but perhaps checking up a couple of time in the future) or stopping him seeing his children (or probably cuddling his children like he did before). Right - really helps his children this doesn't it. I'm glad that this story was published - it will act as a warning to everybody else to NEVER trust the Police or Social Services (in the UK) again (or probably in most other western countries as well) It is clear that they cannot be trusted to act in the best interests of parents or anyone else for that matter (except themselves). I guess that we only have ourselves to blame for their attitude - since when in recent times did anybody have a balanced discussion about whether sexuality hurts children without being (metaphorically at least) torn to pieces by the raging mob. OMG I'm so glad I'm not growing up now.
On three separate occasions, we had computers stolen from my workplace and the computers checked in with our WSUS server, after they were stolen, leaving their public IP address. On all three of those occasions we shared the information with the local police immediately NOTHING was done.
I don't always use unix-like operating systems; but when I do, I prefer FreeBSD.
Posession of child porn is illegal. It doesn't matter how you got it, having it is illegal.
So, if you want to get someone in legal hot water, just plant some on their property. Or anonymously text it to their phone when they are somewhere nice and public that it might be seen when they look at it. Just make sure YOU don't get caught with the stuff you are planting on your victim (since distribution is also illegal).
- Visit youtube
- Search "Don't talk to police"
Both a lawyer and a policeman explain why you should never volunteer information.
- Practice your Miranda rights (remain silent).
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
If I "intentionally" try to download CP but find instead a ZIP full of shitty pop music, will all the music producers be removed from my earshot for "protection"?
Because I just tried to pirate (yarh!) a certain OMG WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN work by Vladimir Nabokov and all I got was an archive of Lady Gaga MP3s encoded at 128kbit.
The problem is that retaining a lawyer can be expensive whereas reporting a crime to a police officer is relatively free.
The article doesn't make it clear whether he went to his computer to perform some task and then found pr0n or if he was performing some task and was then inundated with pr0n. If he was trying download music from an sketchy source (e.g. bobsultrasuperlegalandfreemp3s.com) verses amazon.com or itunes, he was probably out to pirate music and those sites are usually filled with viruses. Did he deserve to get pwned? No, but that's besides the point.
It's disparaging that a man who hasn't even been charged is basically being treated like a criminal. I guess when it comes to kids, it's guilty until proven innocent to everyone's satisfaction.
We don't live in Shouldland.
This is the same mistake made by Google in the Wifi scandal and the US military in the accidental Quaran burnings.
You see something illegal on your own property that has hurt no one so far and no one knows about, and will cease to exist and continue to hurt no one if you destroy the evidence of it and cover it up? DESTROY THE EVIDENCE AND COVER IT UP.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
The RIAA now has resorted to other means of enforcing their copyrights than normal lawsuits, they have opted instead to inject illegal photos into popular music torrents. More news at 11.
On a more serious note, that is exactly what the Church of Scientology did to one of the earliest anonymizers (based in finland). Worked, to.
Mod up. That video is terrific.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
It does not matter if you are later cleared, acquitted, exonerated or whatever your local legal system calls it.
If you are cleared, there will always be those who think that you are some sort of pervert who "got off".
Also, if you are convicted just because there was porn on your computer, there will be (hopefully) be some people who will recognize the miscarraige of justice..
Once accused -- guilty or not -- your live is forever changed. I will likely cost you your retirement savings to pay to a lawyer to mitigate the damage.
Therefore, do not be your own accuser.
If you find anything incriminating on your computer, delete it irretrievably -- if you don't know how, find out.
Then ever afterwards, stfu.
You realize that, if they do investigate you, cooperating can make your life far more pleasant, right?
This is more of a special circumstance. No one wants to get their name attached to a potential pedo and have it on record that they didn't arrest him because they believed him when he said he wasn't trying to download the stuff. It really sucks to be that guy but the internet is a dangerous place.
Having said that, I probably would have just wiped my comp and made a note to never go to that music download site again. Maybe throw the Feds or a journalist an anonymous tip or something.
artor recommended:
Straight from the horse's mouth: Don't Talk to Police.
The first half is a defense attorney, the second half is a cop. Both speakers make it very clear -- do not talk to police without a lawyer present. Some will try to screw you to boost their numbers, others will screw you by accident, but either way you get screwed. Cops have a very specific job to do, and that job does not involve looking out for your personal best interests. Talk to a lawyer instead - they are legally required to do what's best for you.
Mod this WAY up. The video in question is 48 minutes long, and wildly entertaining throughout. Also, eye-opening.
Thanks.
Check out my novel.
Greetings from scenic Clueville! Woosh you were here.
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when the pigs try to get at you park it like it's hot, park it like it's hot...
in all seriousness though, that's my philosophy: no good can ever come from interacting w/a cop, the best case is you break even but even then you've had your time wasted and the scenarios only go downhill from there in a hurry... cops, unfortunately, are a necessary evil that are in fact both necessary AND evil at the same time (the two aren't mutually exclusive) - as long as they're the lesser evil (compared to overt criminals) they're still a net good (individual mileage obviously varying wildly) but I think a lot of people would agree the trend line is clearly in the wrong direction... the funny/sad/ironic part is that the NYPD ones that broke up OWS don't get that the firms they were brutalizing protestors to protect have raided their pension funds (if not directly at least by conning/bribing fund managers to trade actual $ for worthless "securities") - it'll be interesting to see their reaction in coming years when that nasty reality can't be ignored any longer...
the social services worker made a judgement call that there was a non-trivial chance that the porn came from the man himself.
I'm glad an underpaid bureaucrat can destroy my life and my hurt my family based on a "non-trivial chance", that's... that's just awesome.
That goes both ways. I've seen children forced to see abusive parents because the courts were trying to decide who gets custody. Often when the child is 'too young' to have an opinion that carries any legal weight in court.
In my opinion the solution is to ask the child (in some circumstance where the child feels safe telling the truth) if they feel safe at home.
That didn't work for my divorce attorney!
It's really frustrating when people respond without reading the whole post. Unless this individual cannot process sarcasm, READ THE WHOLE POST.
- Practice your Miranda rights (remain silent).
Fruity oaty bar...
The police may be "friendlier" if you cooperate, but that is just because you are handing them everything they want on a silver platter. When the case is made against you for something you didn't do using "evidence" they got from your cooperation, the only thing you can hope for is that the prosecutor will cut you some type of deal, which won't happen if you didn't do anything and don't have any other information to give.
Unfortunately, this is the society we've crafted for ourselves. Talk to a lawyer first and let them speak for you.
Am I the only one that suspects that maybe "I meant to download music" was just a lie he told his wife, and perhaps there was a ton of child porn on there?
Well, what the hell has social services got to do with this? If the newsitem is real (and the images where not of his own children) why the hell do they bar him from being with his children.. One of the biggest problems with social services is that it has too many employee's who don't know their left from right, and those morons have to decide about YOU? No f-ing way... those people have already shown so many times they are incapable of doing their jobs right, it's just not funny anymore.. In a case like this (as I said, if we know all there is to know about this case) and it where my children, then NO-one can stop me from being with my kids..
I don't know how anyone in this day and age could think it was a good idea to have more dealing with the police those that are forced on you.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Prior to that event, I bet he was one of those naive people that thought the police were there to help you.
People with 'moral lessons' usually have shitty, shitty, horrible logic.
You get what you pay for.
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
Obviously not, in this case. In this case, he wasn't being investigated, and now, he won't have the defense of a real investigation. Just a smear on his name for the rest of his life.
Since we never know when this kind of bullshit will hit us, it's safer to not cooperate, and to avoid the authorities at all costs. Certainly I won't be reporting any crimes I happen to see . . . I'll just keep my mouth shut so I don't get dinged with guilt by association.
That is what the result of this ham-fistedness will be. Promise.
One day I feel I'm ahead of the wheel / the next it's rolling over me / I can get back on / I can get back on
NEVER, ever contact the police unless they are your absolutely last hope of help in a life threatening circumstance. They cause far more trouble than they are worth. Keep this in mind, they are here to protect and serve the government (local and otherwise), NOT US.
---- Don't be irreplaceable. If you can't be replaced, you can't be promoted.
Is this is another case of bureaucracy at it's finest?
"Give a woman two glasses of wine and some pad thai, and they'll agree to just about anything." the Sports Guy
P2P download are distributed accross the world any way.
Just make sure that the people planting the booby-trapped files are in jurisdiction where they won't get automatically on the death row for it.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Clearly, there is a moral lesson here: if you don't know enough about your computers to keep child porn off them, you will probably not be an effective parent.
Who said anything about child porn? Where did you get that from?
Extraneous apostrophe at it is finest...
You noticed?
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
That polar bear could be perfectly friendly, but he can also tear your head off without any consequences if the notion came to him.
Treat police the same way.
Never approach them. If one happens to wander into an area where you are slowly move out of sight without making eye contact or any motions that could possibly be perceived as threatening.
If they confront you the only words you should ever say are "am i free to go?". If they refuse to answer or answer in the negative state "I am invoking my right to remain silent I am going to slowly extract my mobile phone from my pocket and contact my attorney." At which point hopefully there are some witnesses so at least if he shoots you for slowly reaching for your phone at least your family gets a payday.
I am indigent, I will only speak to a court appointed public defender, do NOT do what the first one tells you is in you own best interest! Remember the cops and the public defender work for the same entity, you have the right to fire one after the other with the mantra He does not represent my interests, keep doing this until they are forced either to drop the charges or retain a private attorney for you.
And remember, some states require that if you invoke the right to a speedy trial they have X number of days to comply or drop the charges (the docket is SO full of killers and rapists, that unless some prosecutor has a hard dick for you, they'll drop).
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
I don't know! Who are you quoting?! What website is this?!
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
Same story but from our local rag http://www.thisishullandeastriding.co.uk/Dad-banned-daughter-downloaded-child-porn/story-15410159-detail/story.html I'm never sure which is worse BBC Humberside or the Hull Daily Mail. Both are usually useless and inept but thats local news for you.
That pesky penguin is still in my computer, I refuse to let the poor little thing out.
Did any of you people throwing around US Constitional rights and laws notice that he lives in the UK? The situation is still crap, but you're looking at the wrong set of laws.
They do exist; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_silence_in_England_and_Wales
The only caveat is that if you rely on some innocent defence in court that you might reasonably have given during questioning but did not, the judge or jury /might/ assume that you made up the defence.
blog.sam.liddicott.com
Someone we knew in a professional capacity recently reported us to CPS in an attempt to be helpful after she had heard my wife was very stressed/overwhelmed. She was trying to be nice and see if we could get CPS to help us get access to resources however this was really a bad approach, given the really awful reputation CPS has here in the U.S. Of course the whole cycle started - cops came and looked at our house and two CPS workers came through, "interviewing" our children and even calling their school. Their main objective is to do invasive research to determine if your children are being neglected and/or abused. Naturally they found nothing but who knows had they seen something they didn't like they could have tried to have our kids taken away. The lady sort of matter-of-factly apologized for calling CPS and thankfully it was basically more a nuisance than anything else but it could have turned out far worse and evolved into a real nightmare. I do believe probably 98-99% of CPS workers have a very hard, thankless job and have no vested interest in separating children from their parents however there are exceptions to the rule and sometimes it ends up in a situation similar to this guy's.
I thought COPS always opened with BP Vess opening his shirt to show off his metal chest... Fighting crime in a future time!!! Or was that not what you meant?
1) dude #1 knows dude #2 is going to inform on him
2) dude #1 informs on himself and claims he doesn't know where porn came from. I suppose he might have been better off destoying the evidence, but that's hard to do with out making it obvoius that you were destroying evidence.
3) dude #2 informs on dude #1. Police believe dude #2 more than dude #1.
The council statement alludes to the fact that they have information they're not releasing:
...The council's social care team considers that, on the information it presently has about this case, it is a proportionate response... ...
The council will keep the case under review but cannot comment further as this is an on-going investigation
It doesn't matter where you are and how much about how they might whine "it will hurt your defense later", you still probably should not go out of your way to incriminate yourself.
This issue goes far beyond American notions of Miranda.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Here's the problem.
He tried to download an MP3. If it was from a legit legal service, he would have to pay for it.
That company would be sued, and under investigation, not him.
What he did was used something free like limewire etc to download potentially illegal content. This was a poor decision.
It's like as if you decided to purchase 'medicine' from a dealer in a back ally, never know what you'll get, likely not advil.'
What is this "until proven innocent" that you speak of? We can't have someone accused of something be considered innocent, even when there is no real evidence against them! We have to be Vigilant! We have to make sure those sicko do-the-right-thing parents don't contaminate their children! My gods, THINK OF THE CHILDREN! We need Consumers, not Consciences! *mutters* until proven innocent! huh! *mutters*
If I had kids I certainly would want them hanging out with this guy. I mean... you have to wonder what is going on in a guy's head who calls the police to report something like that on his computer. I smell guilt.
Yes but that dosn't apply in the UK where if you don't meantion things when questioned it can harm your defence.
Personally, I think we have enough laws on the books at this point that we could use a dedicated house of legislature to remove laws - call them the 'House of Repeals'. They're only allowed to repeal law, reduce spending, etc...
I'd have it be 100 members, like the Senate, but be via proportional voting for electing candidates. Simple majority for passing a repeal bill, then both the house and the senate need vote on it - but only ONE needs to pass it for it to be effective, then to the president, like a normal bill.
If that doesn't work well enough, we can tweak it later.
I don't read AC A human right
This is just a war crime. Violating state, Federal, and International law. Typical of the progressive world view that the State, not the parent, have final rights in the environment of a child in controversial issues. Per Oklahoma Law Title 76 Section 76-8, the Child's human rights are violated by this presumption. Per similar law, the reporting of evidence in a complaint renders the person making the report voluntarily IMMUNE to prosecution for such evidence surrendered.
Arrest the social worker. Charge her under 18 USC 1091 (Genocide). It's the name for this.
End the American betrayal of civil rights. Do it "For the Children".
Typical gestapo government. It's like the security guard who found a bomb, incompetent police are unable to find a suspect so they make the security guard the suspect. The guy who traced the anthrax scare to his own lab, they also turned into the suspect. And harassed him and his family until he killed himself. It's typical.
And every time they miss the real perpetrators.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8z7NC5sgik
Another attack on music piracy. This is an attempt to put the fear of a ruined life into peoples minds when they are downloading music. Designed to increase the perceived risks involved, they have tried mass and high profile litigation to make people fear being fined. This approach seems a lot cheaper a few made up stories with some publicity would have a similar or greater effect. And the beauty of the link to child porn is that everyone is guilty no questions asked, and the associated stigma is much worse than a fine.
If this is not the case I hope I haven't given them any new ideas...
Unfortunately, the vast majority of people STILL believe what their government tells them. Most people here will still support the official 9-11 story despite the overwhelming weirdness of the whole event and the huge list of experts in the fields of demolition, architecture and engineering who expertly hold that there is definitely something wrong with what we saw at the very least.
And when asked "why are we in Afghanistan and Iraq?" "For freedom" is the most common answer.
It can't hurt to try these. It might well reduce accidents - it would certainly reduce stupid court cases.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
"I feel like I am guilty until proven innocent. That is not the way I understood the British justice system to work.
That is exactly how it works over there!
That is the same country where you can get ordered to pay damages for libel for making TRUE statements. The same country where if you trespass in a subway, you can be ordered (via an Anti Social Behavior Order) to not even talk to the people you were with or GET 5 YEARS IN PRISON! Yes, 5 YEARS OF YOUR LIFE LOCKED AWAY! For talking to people - for activity that would otherwise be legal except for the fact that the gov't for an order than amounts to a "bill of attainder" (a law restricting only you). The same country that has cameras on every street corner to use against you and controllers who will shout at you with loudspeakers if they even THINK you are THINKING of doing something illegal or that they don't like, such as being in a group of more than 10 people. The country that will revoke your drivers license if anyone tells the licensing authorities you might not be in perfect health. The country that is as close to George Orwell's 1984 in the civilized world.
Yes, the US has its problems, but the UK is plain scary!
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Then the cops are doing the wrong job. The CORRECT job description for a cop is to ensure that society (and, by extension, the individuals within it) suffer least harm on aggregate. Clearly, it is impossible to follow a least-harm doctrine if a cop is only trying to maximize their "clean-up" rate by arresting the innocent and allowing the guilty to go free.
ANY police force, doesn't matter where, doesn't matter when, that follows a doctrine of "look good" rather than "DO good" is a police force society is better off without. The problem is never with authority or government, the problem is with ILLUSION of authority and ILLUSION of government. The failure to tell reality from illusion is why corruption exists at all.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
My parent's house has a really fancy security system. The motherboard in the system eventually failed and would start occasionally sending signals to the police and fire-dudes. It happened like 7 times before the security company fixed it (cost them a fair bit for the false alarms). The police never once showed up. The fire truck, loaded with a ready-to-rock guys showed up every time within 10mins (which is amazing as the closest fire station is like a 10min drive away). My dad told me that now if anyone's broken in to the house, he's calling in a fire, cause the police won't fucking show up and the fire-guys are fit and ready-to-rock.
But he WAS guilty! of haivng a penis, that pervert.
You are instantly and forever my most favorite person ever.
I got here through a series of tubes
Perhaps not but the general advice remains sound. Avoid the police! Certainly don't contact them (there is practically no situation where they will be a net benefit to you). Cross the street to avoid them (unless such activity is obviously suspicious). If stopped and questioned by a policeman/policewoman don't antagonise them. If the situation is more serious (being arrested) do not talk.
It seemed like the cop Wanted to disagree with what the lawyer had said, but couldn't find any actual factual evidence for his position. I used to think my friend (who drove a gold-coloured Holden Commodore, a car often favoured by hoons) was paranoid about the police paying attention to him, until we were driving home one day, doing exactly the speed limit, and a cop car pulled a u-turn after passing us, and tailed us for a number of kilometers, obviously just to see if we'd do anything.
So he reported his own child pornography to the police?
Well here is a case of a guy calling the cops about her crack being fake. (it was real btw)
http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/61555-woman-calls-cops-over-fake-drugs
It's a UK website, but the case was in the USA.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
On the other hand, here in Australia, it's quite different. When I was on a Sys Admins list, every person who piped up with "wtf, I've just found kiddie porn on this computer I'm supposed to fix" was told by people with past experience to go to the cops and just hand it over wholesale (without doing Anything else to it). They all came back to the list with "well, that was easy, the cops just sighed and took my statement."
Are you a criminal?
And if the customer was under investigation for it, you just destroyed evidence!
Expect a sentence of multiple YEARS in prison!
And if it is Federal, there is no parole, you are required to serve your entire sentence (minus a couple of weeks for "good time" if the prison staff likes you)
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Sorry I watch lots of old cop shows like Dragnet and Adam-12 where they say "policeman" a lot. Besides: The guy in the video is a policeman!
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
And if they keep the kids in foster care long enough, that is enough alone to have a termination of parental rights (*) granted (the judge is REQUIRED to grant it unless there are extreme justifications not to) and the children put up for adoption.
(*) This declares the parents to legally not be parents in any way whatsoever, no rights to visit or even contest the adoption, since they are no longer parents and thus not allowable "parties to an action" involving the children.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
No, it was preventative maintenance. If it was that obvious to you then it worked. It kept you from doing something.
This is a sig. This is only a sig. Had this been an actual sig you would have been informed where to tune for more sigs.
And they should have because apparently-- she *bought* it. Not found it, not given to her-- but *sold* to her. That means she participated.
I used to stop if I was a witness to a traffic accident. Not any more. Now I know why no one stopped when I was hit, even though there were multiple cars around, and it was the middle of the morning commute.
I am honoured, and I realise you have a psychotic ex, but studies suggest forever is at least 20% longer than most people expect. (p < 0.005)
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
Spoken like a true member of the 1% that own 90% of America and won't be happy until they own it all!
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Then doesn't that change it from a "right to remain silent" to "an option to remain silent"?
Seriously, if you can be outright doubted or accused based on solely on your decision to remain silent, it isn't really a right. You have the "option to remain silent" in any country, although the Brits are not likely to torture you for it.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
On their list of illegal equipment:
(K) a transformer
So I guess Texans fall into two categories: criminals, and people who don't own any electronics.
There are some sick Fa|{ers out there who do that kind of thing. I used to look at my fair share of uh... p2p videos. Once came across one that scared me for life. It was worse than goatsX. Haven't gone back to P2P in ages, and don't plan on doing it anytime soon.
Whoosh
The cheese stands alone...
Get a room you two!
Just say a lawyer told you not to volunteer anything, they will respect that, cause its what they would tell you if they were your counsel.
I am actually from the East Riding. This was Hull Social Services, not the East Ridings. Hull is a separate local authority.
I only please one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't looking good either. - Scott Adams
That's not necessarily true. If you're in a position to do so, you should cultivate contacts within your local police force: I did a network installation many years ago at a local police station, and ended up talking to many police officers while doing so, as training was included as part of the installation. While doing so, some asked me for help with their home computers, and I was happy to do so, off the clock, on my own time, for no charge, so that there was no conflict of interest with my employer at the time, who didn't do home computer service anyway.
:)
I've never abused those relationships in petty ways: I have a great lawyer that can "fix" speeding tickets, for example - I don't mind paying a fine, so long as I don't get any marks on my license, so I don't try to get them removed: He negotiates them to a non-moving violation, with the same monetary penalty, the state gets their money, he gets his, I get no insurance increases, and everyone is happy.
It's helped me quite a lot over the years. I had a neighbor who was an asshole and let his dog wander the neighborhood, for example: Everyone has unhappy about it, especially me, since the dog invariably shit on my lawn, but nothing was done, despite repeated complaints. I told one of the police officers I know, who took care of it by showing up at his house in his police car at the end of his shift one day, dog in tow... problem solved.
Other things such as that, over the years. Nothing drastic, nor illegal.
All it takes is a few hours per month with the various issues that home Windows computers are prone to. Unlike most people/companies that do home computer service, I actually configure them as I would the computers I maintain at my current employer (and as I have done since Windows 2000) and at home: Harden them with patches, AV, set up non-Administrator daily use accounts for all family members, have them set passwords, teach them about basic security and how to install software when needed, set up security on their home routers/WAPs (And make sure that they have all the passwords!). I try to implement the best practices that we do at my company, because I know that they work, and know that they will benefit.
Once done, the maintenance required is minimal, and I can easily do it remotely, and for free, without spending too much of my free time doing so.
My goal in cultivating them was initially to make them aware of me, and have them view me as one of the "good guys" (because I am!), with an eye towards perhaps having "leverage", should I ever need it. As the years have passed, I've gotten to know them: While there are some bad cops, I've learned that most are decent human beings trying to do a difficult, dangerous job, and what started as a semi-cynical way to benefit myself has changed over the years, much to my surprise: Having come to know them, their families, I now *want* to help them with their computer problems, because I can, and know that they cannot.
And one last thing? Believe me, the police are connected throughout a community, and word gets around, in ways that you would never imagine, and that has helped me and my family as well...
So, if you can, you could do worse than help a cop with your nerdly skills
Posted anonymously for obvious reasons.
You'd think the Beeb would get that right. o_O
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
The English (including Wales) court system is where right to not say anything actually started.
On one occasion, while working for the local government (Bogotá - Colombia) as IT manager, some old broken laptops got stolen overnight. Everyone could see the thieves came in from the roof through the sniper channels set up for coup-cases. Only police personnel have access to those channels. My boss (a lawyer by the way) appointed me to go to a police station and report the theft. So I asked one of the police officers assigned for the government security to tell me where the nearest police station was. He asked me to wait for a moment, came back and told me that he could take me there. I got inside one of the official cars with two policemen. We arrived at the police station, they asked me to leave my cellphone at the entrance, took me to a room full of detectives, and one of them asked: "where are the laptops?"... I replied: "I don't know sir, I just came here to file a complaint for the theft of 4 laptops at my office". He then had me give him all my documents. He kept asking me about the laptops again and again. They handcuffed me VERY hard. They hit me. They told me that I could say the truth and they would keep it a secret, or otherwise I would go to jail, where "every morning convicts are usually found dead on the floor". Lucky me, not all the laptops where robbed. So I told them: "as a measure of security, since assets were being repeatedly robbed (it was not the first time it had happened), I had my offices boss' driver take the remaining laptops to his house. I know that you are under a lot of pressure by the local government because there have been so many thefts lately. If you wan't you can say that those were the stolen ones, and I pay or respond somehow for the ones that got really stolen, saying that they were lost or something." Some of you might say that this is inviting the police to be accomplice of a crime... maybe, but I was under a torture situation, illegally detained, never got angry, they didn't let me call a lawyer, anything I said could not have been legally used against me under these circumstances. But, after going out to discuss their strategies, they took the bait... They told me that mine was a good idea and asked me to call and arrange a meeting point with the boss' driver to get the remaining laptops and make everybody think that no laptops got stolen. But their strategy was, in fact, to make them look like the real stolen ones and me incriminate the driver as an accomplice. The trip in car was awful. They took their chance and drove through the scariest quarters of the city, from time to time showing off their guns, stating that they were meaner than ordinary criminals, and even threatening boy with death who at one stop came by the window to ask for a few coins. They also told me what I had to say later in court... that I had broken into the office and stolen the laptops, to which I had to agree. I learned that when you're handcuffed, and hit on your ears, you instinctively become afraid of saying something they do not want to hear. We met with the driver, they got the laptops which were not stolen, we drove back to the police station, then they drove me to my house, and searched it, took some old damaged hard disks, made me sign a note to go to the police station the next day.
To protect and to serve... our own interests.
Hi,
I'm the AC that posted the above. I wanted to add one last thing, as my cop friends have told me: Always take the 5th, and keep your mouth shut, no matter what.
Let your lawyer talk, and if you don't have one, either get one, or have one appointed if applicable.
Under no circumstances should you ever talk to the police yourself, ever. Keep your mouth shut. Ignore the fact that this will anger them: Remember that they are NOT your friends. They are NOT looking out for you, regardless of what they say. Keep your mouth shut, remain silent, and take the 5th. If they try to shame you when you do so, and imply that they think that you are guilty by doing so, remain silent: What they think of you has no bearing at all upon your guilt or innocence - that can only be determined by trial.
Ignore their manipulations: They are not your friends, they are not there to help you in any way, shape or form. You do not owe them anything, and regardless of what they say, they are not there to help you.
You do realize that refusing to divulge your name when asked by a cop is grounds for being charged with obstruction of justice?
You do realize that when someone has stolen your car, you must contact the police if you want government assistance in finding your car?
These posts about never talking to the police are stupid; there are very good times when it is appropriate and indeed, mandatory, to respond when a police asks you a question.
Exactly what is wise for you to say is part of the discussion, but telling people to be silent at all times around cops is stupid and wrong.
I would love to watch what happens when you actually try this shit in the real world.
You can request a speedy trial and you'll get one, and the judge will continue it until the prosecutor is ready.
If you want to pull some stupid 'this lawyer isn't serving me bullshit' then they just add a contempt of court charge to you and hold you until you stop being a complete douche.
Its cute that you've heard some bullshit about a loophole in the system but those you describe don't actually exist. The judge will simply tell you no and be done with it, and no one will give a shit or help you because it'll be perfectly clear that you're trying to abuse the system.
I assure you, far more intelligent people than your silly ass have tried and failed.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
The problem is that retaining a lawyer can be expensive whereas reporting a crime to a police officer is relatively free.
The qualifier "relatively" doesn't really tell the whole story there. What's needed is a quick cost to benefit analysis.
Contacting a lawyer will definitely cost you something, but at best will increase your chances of keeping your freedom, and at worst, will only cost you money.
Contacting the police may not cost you anything, but if it does cost you anything, that thing will likely be some (or indeed all) of your personal liberties.
It's rather like quoting travel safety statistics about air travel compared to driving. Air travel may be "safer" in terms of incidents per mile traveled, but where an auto accident might do no more damage than a dented fender, an actual air accident is very likely to kill you.
I realize the comparison there is between talking to a lawyer and dying in an air crash, but there it is. It's still the right choice.
Obviously the young daughter is the one attracted to child porn, but I don't remember reading if it was CP in the article but only general mature adults. Unrelatedly, a Private Attorney General is the right class and standard of prescription to debate the instances of Private Law and Public law in the interests of Government. Private Attorney Genarals are the ones that would clean-up the courts, but they are the ones being sold-out the most.
A recent Private Attorney General just got 4 years for basically Promissing to uphold the right of Citizen's Arrest over in Washington where the Statutes actually call for it in instances where the Mayor and the hired police have breached their office through Clearfield Doctrine. His name is DAVID REEVES MYRLAND (often David Myrland). Just look him up, as he was called the Grammar Nazi of Private Attorney Generals.
http://www.patrickpretty.com/2012/02/14/unbelievable-sovereign-citizen-imprisoned-for-harassing-mayor-of-kirkland-wash-files-lawsuit-against-federal-prosecutors-complaint-by-david-russell-myrland-apparently-alleges-grammar-cons/
The Court railroaded him as making direct threats when in many of his legal challenges he asserts that a Promise of Threat is not a direct threat, and it hampered the local law enforcement so-many times in related disputes around Washington that the Court actually started changing the use of grammar to gain him into a conviction. Imagine this: the same public servants that put old people in jail for failing to pay taxes or a fine will put you in jail for 4 years if you find a way to hold them accountable to their office. What he failed to attain was an Accord to that Court to the same dictionary of jurisprudence, because when the courts are in the wrong then they just dumb down everything like they didn't go to law school and Universirty for many hard years.
His website was http://www.yourremedyisinthelaw.com/
so I gave it to them while it was still lit.
Now they came for my Computer to look for Child Porn,
and I told them to go find Child Porn on their own Computer.
But in Soviet America, the COPS arrest you when they want to use your Computer to search for Child Porn.
When the accuser and the officer are the same, then by Clearfield Doctrine then there is a breach of trust and government becomes a private person able to hold property and sue and be sued and thus...
People are taught from kindergarten to put themselves in dishonour in the midst of a verbal transaction, so when people run across a cop who initiates a binding commercial transaction, they will invariably put themselves in dishonour with grave consequences. Its the words you choose, not weather you speak or not. Protip: The government has IP rights to your first and last name used together. (Remember that form your mom filled out? Probably not... ;) Saying that the title is 'you' creates a controversy, and makes you the loser by default.
Its not that government hates us, its that were collectively so wilfully ignorant that we don't deserve to be respected. Stop acting like property! Duh...
I wonder why my cuckoo clock just went off?
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
Maybe his wife put the kiddie pr0n there. Why must the male always be the one who takes the blame in these situations?
(So what if he is the only one who supposedly uses the laptop, or he is the one who reported it?)
If the case is already made, the prosecutor has absolutely zero incentive to cut any deals. And (s)he wont.
"Cursed is he who rises early in the morning..." Isiah 5:11
As NWA says, "Fuck the police"
Never report a crime? Never report a child pornographer?
What if someone burgles your house and leaves child pornography behind? You don't report it?
Well if (and that's if) she bought it in order to get it off the streets and give it to the police, shouldn't she be commended instead of arrested? There was a case in Sweden lately where some reporters investigating street gang crimes bought a gun from someone to see how easy it was to get hold of weapons and then went straight to a police station to hand it in. Most people would see getting a gun out of the hands of criminals as a good thing but a prosecutor there thought it was a better idea to charge them for it.
Maybe it is the recording industry dirty tricks team - I doubt a legitimate music site would have porn instead of music.
Good to see someone takes International Womens Day seriously.
In which case talking STILL won't help you.
Informative
"You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned, something that you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be used in evidence." (Horrible original punctuation modified slightly).
Not talking to the police can be an unbelievably stupid move in, say, the jurisdiction this actually happened in. That second sentence means you can use it in evidence, not just the prosecution.
Yeah, that's great and all except for one thing, handing a gun to the police seems to *increase* the likelihood that it will be put out on the streets.
That is all.
Really? "Never cooperate..." is "Insightful"? Funny, perhaps, assuming the author was kidding... never under any circumstances? That's a kind of irresponsible, oversimplified view, isn't it? Suppose you saw a guy throw a child off a cliff. You'd say nothing? Really?
In the defense of the authorities who decided to act, perhaps out of an overabundance of caution, the legal precept of Whomever smelt it... Dealt it may apply here.
If you downloaded k-pr0n onto your computer, and you realize someone might figure it out, what better way to cover than to complain that it somehow, magically appeared on your computer without your knowledge? Then you're totally covered.
If you bought drugs for example, and you become suspicious that someone may have seen you go to the place you bought the drugs, (and I mean illegal ones, not cough syrup...) you go to the police, and complain these pants you JUST BOUGHT had this baggie full of stuff in the pocket, which of course you have no idea what it is. Then when someone accuses you of buying drugs, you're covered, because if you bought them, why would you turn them in? It's a near perfect cover...
Perhaps the people who actually know WTF is going on here, i.e., the court, knows something that wasn't in TFA, so before several hundred people who don't know WTF they're talking about air their uninformed opinions, maybe an alternative that doesn't blame "THE MAN" could be considered. Afterall, just as the accused are sometimes innocent, sometimes, they're also guilty.
It doesn't matter where you are and how much about how they might whine "it will hurt your defense later", you still probably should not go out of your way to incriminate yourself.
This issue goes far beyond American notions of Miranda.
If I were on the jury, I would most certainly take a defendant's refusal to answer questions as a very, very strong indicator of guilt.
You only incriminate yourself if you provide evidence of your guilt, in which case I have no sympathy.
The question of whether some laws should not exist to be broken in the first place is a diferent matter altogether.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Perhaps she bought it to prevent the dealer from selling it to a child and to obtain evidence for the police to use against the dealer? Why else would she have called the police?
Clearly, there is a moral lesson here: if you don't know enough about your computers to keep child porn off them, you will probably not be an effective parent.
Who said anything about child porn? Where did you get that from?
I think you've set a new slashdot record as you haven't even read the first line of the fucking summary.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
It's disparaging that a man who hasn't even been charged is basically being treated like a criminal. I guess when it comes to kids, it's guilty until proven innocent to everyone's satisfaction.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
and if I were on a jury I'd take the defendant's refusal to answer questions as an indicator that they don't really trust the police and they thought the best thing to do was to keep quiet. When you're in a car accident you're not even supposed to apologise for it having happened as it's seen as an admission of guilt so it makes sense to keep quiet when dealing with the police.
The police are just going start arresting everyone without a target on their forehead.
FRA: STFU GTFO
I think you've set a new slashdot record as you haven't even read the first line of the fucking summary.
"Child abuse" does not imply or equate to "child porn". Really, you need a broader imagination.
Advice for reading any news: skip the blurb and read the article. The header is only going to be a journalists interpretation, not the reported facts.
If you read TFA, you'd see that the entire article only talks about him finding porn, and "child abuse images" is only used by the journalist in the opening line, unsubstantiated by the article following it.
You set no new records, though - jumping to conclusions is on par for slashdot.
No, it's worse than that. If you need to rely on something in court that you could have mentioned you have to explain (convincingly) why you didn't. Not wanting to talk to the police is not a very convincing reason.
Most people seem to think that if you have nothing to hide then you have nothing to fear, so refusing to talk means you must be hiding something. You will be judged by these same people.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
isn't 'po-po' the correct name, these days?
btw, avoid talking to po-po. just say no to po-po.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
we are all criminals.
seriously. its by design.
they can pick a fight with any of us. each day we all break dozens of laws. it keeps us in fear. it works, too!
again, by design. all societies have this 'bug'.
think about it.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
On the other hand, here in Australia, it's quite different. When I was on a Sys Admins list, every person who piped up with "wtf, I've just found kiddie porn on this computer I'm supposed to fix" was told by people with past experience to go to the cops and just hand it over wholesale (without doing Anything else to it). They all came back to the list with "well, that was easy, the cops just sighed and took my statement."
That's actually different than this situation. Of course the cops aren't going to charge you if you are fixing a computer you don't own and find child porn on it and report it. That would be like the cops arresting you because you were in someone else's house fixing the sink and noticed some obviously illegal dealings going on.
While this issue is not MUCH better than if the cops arrested you in the situations I mentioned above, in this situation it was HIS computer, so it's not QUITE as bad.
I read with interest the stories about prosecutors and cops trying to force people to hand over passwords to their confiscated machines.
Many here and elsewhere believe that those accused should just hand over the password. That the cops will open the folders and find nothing, and then they are free to go.
The question is really: what is to stop the IT team searching your now helpless, decrypted box from simply copying in a few kiddy porn files into the hard drive? Instant guilt.
They have the ability to change file dates and such - it's just software - and they probably have toys from Microsoft and others that give them such abilities.
And who else HAS kiddy porn casually strewn around but the kiddy porn IT team at a prosecutor's office?
The question to ask is, again, now that we've given them prosecutorial nukes to destroy people, why on earth would you trust them? They can pick off people at will. Political dissidents, harassment complainants, people at border crossings - all they need is your password and a few minutes with a USB flash drive, and you are public enemy number one.
The problem is that retaining a lawyer can be expensive whereas reporting a crime to a police officer is relatively free.
In the UK (where this incident occurred) there are quite a few lawyers who are willing to provide an initial consultation on most matters completely free. If you can't find one of those, a lot of home insurance policies come with access to a free legal helpline, and those helplines can be very informative on most matters.
Legal advice is easy and cheap to come by. Don't let anything put you off getting some.
I tried to buy MP3s at Amazon.com. They wouldn't let me, because I live in Canada. I guess they are looking out for my best interest. I have to pay a levy already, so I shouldn't have to pay for the music.
Yes it is 2012 and I thought mankind had got over all this angst about using words with man in them when the word might equally apply to a woman. Newspeak is not wanted or required.
Is it really that hard to put 2 and 2 together?
The opening line said "child abuse images". The rest of the article described them as "pornographic images".
Did it ever occur to you that the headline might - just might - have been correct? And then, as the relevant fact had already been stated, it wasn't repeated later in the article?
Heck, you could even do some due diligence and look up a few other sources, mr. "skip the blurb and get to the source". Here's a couple:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2110921/Council-bans-daughter-contact-Nigel-Robinson-child-porn-images.html
"A father has been banned from being alone with his eight-year-old daughter after telling police he accidentally accessed child porn while attempting to download music from the internet."
http://legacy.roadrunnerrecords.com/blabbermouth.net/news.aspx?mode=Article&newsitemID=170852
"a British man has been banned from being alone with his eight-year-old daughter for up to a year after he accidentally downloaded images of child pornography while attempting to download an album from former GUNS N' ROSES guitarist Slash"
I had engineering professors at RPI that were part of the list of experts that analyzed the aftermath back as an engineering undergrad last year.
From asking these experts randomly on the spot and separately, they all hold that the uncontrolled fires in the buildings were very significant to the collapse of the towers and that demolition charges were the least likely of the possibilities.
Seriously. Go find a few other professors that were part of the list of experts and not at RPI in case RPI has some insane bias/corruption. See how many of them give a greatly differing analysis.
You're confusing the police force with the courts. The job of the police is to bring offenders before the courts, where the courts decide if the person is guilty or innocent.
And they should have because apparently-- she *bought* it. Not found it, not given to her-- but *sold* to her. That means she participated.
If I buy it and give it to the police, that's one less rock that can be sold to the children.
Or Apple's for not checking whether something already existed before patenting it anyway...
public defenders are NOT working for the same entity as the cops. In many locales the PD assigned to you is either a private attorney who is ON RETAINER to assist the public defenders office when needed OR the in some cases the PD office is a private firm that contracts with the city to provide legal services to the indigent.
PDs are very real attorney's who in many cases have a lot of more training than that DA assigned to prosecute you.
"Don't be so humble - you are not that great." - Golda Meir
I'm pretty sure, from what I've seen, that you have no rights of any kind in the UK.. oh they may exist on paper, like here in Canada, but the exercise thereof implicates your guilt...
Sure, and by the same token, if you buy a gun and shoot the cop, that's one less gun that can wind up back on the streets at the hands of the cop-- that cop, anyway. But how do you know that was her intention and not merely what she stated when she was caught. Even if she had a prepared statement in her purse saying "I'm buying rocks to help the children.", how do you know it isn't just an elaborate ruse she can play in the event that she gets caught buying crack? I mean, all this is simple-minded stuff. You're going out of your way to find silly "what ifs" to try and justify a weak position. If-- perhaps-- she was a journalist, with a hidden camera crew in-tow, and a written assignment plan, approval from her superiors, etc-- and doing an expose on just how easy it is to buy crack-- that *might* be different, and debatable... in front of the judge, assuming she were caught. But, if it were me, I'd still run her in just to make sure, since it's unusual behavior and something that probably warrants getting checked-out further.
"Don't call the Police" - a direct mis-quotation from the blog of PC David Copperfield
"Every time you talk to the police you will regret it." - Youtube "Don't Talk to the Police"
Nobody has ever talked themselves out of a crime. Don't talk to the police.
Advice from a cop: Don't call the police -- they will not make you happy.
What an excellent video! Thank you for finding it.. !
The term you want to use is "police officer" or "law enforcement officer", or even "pig" if you hate them, but not "policeman"!
It's 2012 for crying out loud!
and women, no wait.... females - damn- .... ladies? shall hereby be known only as "ladies" or "persons with the aesthetically pleasing reproductive organs (thanks House!)" because clearly "woMEN" is sexist, and not a deeply ingrained part of our language that we can honestly admit doesn't really matter because its 2012 and the last time a woman was running for president hardly anyone actually laughed at her; and there are more important issues for feminists today, like the fact that the US legislature is trying to write laws on female reproductive health rights without actually understanding, to any significant degree, what female reproductive needs are past the point of sticking their dingle-dangle in a lady's hoo-haa. once congress figures out that birth control is something taken daily regardless of how much sex a given college coed is having, I think you can safely mobilize the troops to address the continued proliferation of "man/men" as a suffix.
England != UK. You still have a right to silence in Scotland.
Weaseling out of things is important to learn. It's what separates us from the animals... except the weasel."
spot on!
Clearly, there is a moral lesson here: if you don't know enough about your computers to keep child porn off them, you will probably not be an effective parent.
And yet, I hope you realize... there is a kernel of truth in there.
-AI
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion
Better call Saul.
And remember, some states require that if you invoke the right to a speedy trial they have X number of days to comply or drop the charges (the docket is SO full of killers and rapists, that unless some prosecutor has a hard dick for you, they'll drop).
States... which do not exist in the UK, where this story is from.
Moot, I know.. cause it's /. but still germaine.
-AI
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion
- Visit youtube - Search "Don't talk to police" Both a lawyer and a policeman explain why you should never volunteer information. - Practice your Miranda rights (remain silent).
Even better. Search for "Michael Badnarik", then click on the constitution class. Learn about your actual rights--not just privileges granted to you by the courts. Any privilege given can be taken away, but rights are unalienable.
I think it's easier just to say "Fuck the police".
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
Why do you think that people with a JD who NEVER passed the bar are used as PDs in many large urban centers!
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
Anecdotal story: I had a single-mother friend whose daughter broke her arm in a playground accident. The next day at school a teacher asked what happened, and the child joked that her mom broke it. Social services all but broke down the mothers door, and my friend was a hair's breadth from losing her daughter completely. The worst part is that they (mother and daughter) had a great relationship up to that point, but that event pushed a wedge between them that never fully healed.
Way to "think of the children"....
The flip side of your argument is that the right to remain silent implies you cannot present evidence that exonerates yourself (because if you could but didn't, then it comes back to your "option to remain silent" argument). Which I understand is generally true in the United States, and it also seems ridiculous -- you essentially have an *obligation* to remain silent, with possible punishments if you do not, because you can only incriminate yourself and not help yourself.
I think the right to remain silent generally means you can't be convicted solely on the basis of your silence, which is a weaker claim that doesn't have the same problem where anything you say can only be used against you.
In the US, you can remain silent and not incriminate yourself but still present evidence that exonerates yourself, as long as you aren't the person doing the testifying. Be it video tape, witnesses, data logs, etc.
The basis for this is "It is better for 10 guilty men to go free than 1 innocent man be convicted.", which is (or used to be) the foundation of western jurisprudence.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
When in jury duty on cases involving an individual vs government, always nullify the law.
In all cases where gov't is on one side and individual is on the other, government is always wrong and individual is always right.
You can't handle the truth.
My sister and her husband were driving home one evening (it was dark already) in spring. On their way home, there's a pretty significant dip in the road which, earlier that day was perfectly passable. Unbeknownst to them, however, heavy rain had caused a flash-flood to cover the road in a few feet of water and, while the road had been closed, it was so poorly-signed that they never saw it and the ended up plunging right into the water, totaling the car. Being the good people that they are, they reported it so that other drivers wouldn't suffer the same fate.
And, what did the responding officer tell them when the wanted to retrieve their belongings? Nope, even though you were able to safely exit the car on your own, you can't go back and get your stuff, it's not "safe" (as if their colleagues gave a shit about "safety" with their not-even-half-assed job on the road closure signage).
And what did the chief do when the responding officer reported the incident? He ticketed them for driving on a closed road.
They fought the ticket and won, but still had to pay a $50 "administration fee" (so you get screwed either way), they still had to spend the gas to get to and from court and they still had to deal with the logistics of it all.
The silver lining is that the insurance coverage ended up paying them more than they would have gotten by selling the car, not that it was any thanks to officer dick-head who thought it right to ensnare some unfortunate couple to meet quota.
Next time they get into car trouble, they'll be calling dad to bring over the 4x4 pickup and a tow-rope and leaving the self-serving pigs out of it.
I view it a bit like tuning an engine - there are many options that affect many things. It depends on what your goal is.
Unfortuantly, at this point the USG is equivalent to an old naturally aspirated V-8 with serious carbon buildup problems.
I don't read AC A human right
The problem I have with this 'rule' is the question of 'what's a law'? I mean, how do you decide what's a single law?
I mean, take the law against rape. You can have forcible rape, date rape, statutory rape, aggreviated rape, etc... Does the law against rape, with all those subclauses, count as a law, or does each subclause count as one?
Do we say 'the heck with it' and go by word count - in which case laws end up reading like poetry(fewest words possible), and possibly being vague?
I don't read AC A human right
mh, the laptop has been sent away for investigation ? are they gonna interrogate it until it tells them where it got the prOn or something? Monty Python was great but lately the UK takes absurdity to new levels.
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?
Sadly this is true and even the ones that actually have to do the work would tell you so if they weren't in fear of their jobs.
A friend works in the state crime lab finding CP on suspected computers (he keeps trying to recruit me but fuuuuck that noise) and he says a good 80%-90% of those they bust frankly shouldn't ever be in jail at all but simply get mental help as they are "social retards" as he calls them. he says they are as easy to spot as can be because it ALWAYS follows the same pattern, first they collect regular porn, then the basic fetishes, then trannys and S&M and finally beastiality and CP. He said you look into their backgrounds and most avoid as much human contacts as possible and frankly aren't a threat to anybody, one hadn't even left his home since 1997 and had to be tranquilizer darted like an animal because of the way he shrieked and freaked the fuck out if you touched him in any way. he said if you locked one of them up in a room with a kid they'd go hide in the corner rocking, as they don't want to be touched by anyone.
He said in a sane world those types would be given treatment which would free he and his colleagues from months worth of court time so they could actually be trying to track down real predators but sadly prosecutors don't want to go after those as they nearly always cross state lines and then they don't get the big headlines that help their political career. Just another case where as long as they are "doing something" even if that something is stupid, pointless, counterproductive, or even takes away our rights like the guy thrown in prison for writing his thoughts on a page or the one in jail for comic books, well as long as it looks like they are doing "something" that is all that matters, just like in TFA. Oh and in case anyone is wondering "the shrieker" as they named him will be sitting in a 6x9 for the next 65 years, so since he was in his 30s when they put him in and it costs over $100,000 to house an inmate (they usually can't place them in general pop, so stick another $50k on top of that for special protection) so if he lives to 80 you are looking at $7.5 million. for just the one. Wow...I can see why they want to privatize prisons, there's money to be made!
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Never is never. Never talk. Even passing by near them is dangerous. A couple of years ago I was just walking to the supermarket, in a saturday morning, in my residential area, and there was a police car stopped on the other side of the street with two cops inside. Oh, I am a caucasian, four-eyed typical 40 year old nerd. One of them called me, dropped of the car and started to question me. Somewhere during the talk, I suddenly realised that he was trying to provoke me just because I was wearing a local soccer team shirt, and he was clearly a supporter of the local adversary soccer team. At some point, the other cop decided to get moving and the whole thing ended in a snap. But I still wonder what could happened if both of them were not fond of my soccer team.
I have not read the many comments posted on this issue. Why? I don't want to. However, as a lawyer, judge, civil libertarian and humanist, it appalls me that this person can be persecuted and denigrated by the legion of politically correct idiots, who, like vultures hovering over roadkill, are more than happy to victimize him in celebration of their hatred of men. That is all that it is. Is this a society worth saving?
I think this is a very good example of premature reaction to a headline, with insufficient information being offered for an understanding of the action by authorities.. Social services simply do not place a restriction like that without having good reason. No reasons are given here. The porno pictures are not the reason if he reported them. When the police and social services went to the house they discovered something else, either on the computer or in discussions with the family. They cannot reval what that something was because the investigation is continuing. The case is interesting on a salacious level, but is not particularly unusual. The plain facts are worthy of reporting, but the analysis is entirely premature and poor journalism. Time will reveal the truth but it is most likely not worth waiting for
Heavy is the head that wears the tinfoil hat.
It's disparaging that a man who hasn't even been charged is basically being treated like a criminal. I guess when it comes to kids, it's guilty until proven innocent to everyone's satisfaction.
In any state in the US the social services (which have different names depending on the state) child protection services (often called CPS) can take a kid into custody without either the parent or kid even being accused of a crime. The kid goes into foster custody which may be a home-like setting or an institution like a jail. When a kid is removed, unless it's a high profile case, the parents and kids are usually separated forever. The process is fueled by federal money the state agencies get. It has nothing to do with genuine protection. This is sometimes hard for inexperienced people to believe, but it's quite true. Put in plain language: The state governments kidnap kids. I don't read much on the subject anymore, but if you're interested you can begin at Ric Werme's site: http://wermenh.com/dcyf.html
(||) Nehmo (||)
I am indigent, I will only speak to a court appointed public defender, do NOT do what the first one tells you is in you own best interest! Remember the cops and the public defender work for the same entity, you have the right to fire one after the other with the mantra He does not represent my interests, keep doing this until they are forced either to drop the charges or retain a private attorney for you. And remember, some states require that if you invoke the right to a speedy trial they have X number of days to comply or drop the charges (the docket is SO full of killers and rapists, that unless some prosecutor has a hard dick for you, they'll drop).
It's not that simple.That won't work. For starters, the judge can simply deny you the change of attorneys after the first one (or more). Theoretically, you could appeal on the grounds that the judge should have granted you new attorney, but you'd already be in prison or jail. And there are other holes in your stratagy.
(||) Nehmo (||)
I was belted by my step father for 8 years.
8 years.
The closest single word I can use to describe my childhood from 7 to 15 years old is "torrture".
Yes.
Child services does nothing.
My father has been screwed completely in life. Imagine not seeing your children, except rare visits, for 8 years of your life.
I feel for this man. He has learnt an important lesson: Never interact with the Legal System unless you absolutely have to. Poor guy.
As a retired Texas lawyer with criminal law experience, including a lot of court-appointed defense experience, who has also been a crime victim, I suspect that the author of this comment does not live in Texas. You say you are indigent, thus can't afford to pay for legal representation yourself. Any lawyer the state pays for is going to be in exactly the same position, but any who are any good is not going to sell you out. Where I practiced, in any given case, court-appointed counsel made more money the more work he did defending you, and, of course, he has the same motives to build a string of wins, but, if you, the client, lose, you may have to pay it back in any event (so win). In better economic times, I have known lawyers who were less than welcoming of court appointments, which pay less than direct private retainers, but the current Second Great Depression has made a lot of lawyers who used to try to avoid appointments now sing jup for all they can get.
Samantha, Do you know how ignorant you sound? The complexities of computer geeks who can always find a way to stay a step ahead of the best virus developers and put porn sureptitously on your computer are legendary . Not being technically adept at computer literacy is a reason to lose your kids? A good hacker could have YOUR hard drive brimming with porn by lunchtime if he wanted to. I'm sure if that happened you'd drive your kids down to child protective services and voluntarily turn them over, right?
That wooshing noise going past your head isn't the air conditioning. Next time, look at the moderation. :)
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
Police are the worst criminals of all. Every interaction i have ever had with the police, even when i have called them for help, has always made the situation worse. They have never helped me with anything, they have cost me money, property, threatened and harassed me even when i was nothing but polite and compliant and cooperative. They have made my life and the life of everyone i know more difficult and unpleasant and have never helped anyone i know with anything. Who would want to be a cop? Bullies and thugs who got made fun of when they were kids and now they're going to take it out on all the regular people. And if you're black forget it all you'll ever get from cops is an ass-whooping and a bunch of lies.