Slashdot Mirror
Thieves Who Stole Cobalt-60 Will Soon Be Dead
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "The Washington Post reports that the carjackers who set off international alarm bells by absconding with a truckload of highly radioactive cobalt-60, used in hospital radiotherapy machines, most likely had no idea what they were stealing and will die soon from exposure. The robbery occurred as the cobalt-60 was being driven from a public hospital in the border town of Tijuana to a storage facility in central Mexico. While waiting for daybreak at a gas station in the state of Hidalgo the drivers were jumped by two gunmen who beat them and stole the truck. "I believe, definitely, that the thieves did not know what they had; they were interested in the crane, in the vehicle," says Mardonio Jimenez, a physicist with Mexico's nuclear safety commission. The prospect that material that could be used in a radioactive dirty bomb had gone missing sparked an urgent two-day hunt that concluded when the material, cobalt-60, used in hospital radiotherapy machines, was found along with the stolen Volkswagen truck. The cobalt-60 was found, removed from its casing, in a rural area near the town of Hueypoxtla about 25 miles from where the truck was stolen. Jimenez suspects that curiosity got the better of the thieves and they opened the box. So far the carjackers have not been arrested, but authorities expect they will not live long. "The people who handled it will have severe problems with radiation. They will, without a doubt, die.""
The karma in this case seems rather disproportional. Yeah, what they did was horrible, but death, esp such an ugly death, seems a bit out of balance.
You've been watching too much tv
I completely and utterly disagree.
You clearly haven't been the victim of any robberies at gunpoint. It is terrifying and life-changing and most victims usually end up with some sort of PTSD. It takes a sick and depraved mind to commit such acts, and those responsible fully deserve death. There are far too many people in this world to allow people who are willing to kill to continue to breathe the same air as the rest of the population.
Which is defined as Karma, for your convenience.
Having been jumped and beating unconscious, I still do not wish a painful horrible death on the people who did it.
Yeah, you see, but you're being rational about it. Others seem ready to be driven by unabated hate.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
How badly would the drivers have had to been beaten for it to be more proportional?
I thought the US was supposed to be a christian country and slashdot was supposed to be am mostly american site (I say mostly because I am actually british)?
Didn't Jesus say:
'You have heard that it was said, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth". But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer. If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.'
So in other words even though there are shitty people in the world then anyone who considers themselves a christian should strive to not seek revenge against such people by killing them or wishing them to be killed. Instead they should forgive and leave any judgment for the lord. Wishing an agonising death upon them would then surely never be proportional, no matter how harshly they beat their victims.
But of course nobody in the US seems to actually give a shit about this part of Jesus' teachings or else you would not have the death penalty.
I dont read
Being the one beaten is one thing.
Being a friend or relative of the one attacked usually is far worse. Stuff like having a friend's son whom you grew up with tasered to death (the thieves wanted to know "where the valuables were", and kept pulling the trigger until the victim's heart gave out) makes one not really empathetic with violent criminals who do this sort of stuff.
I don't think this one was karma but rather Darwinism. I'm sure the containers had plenty of warnings. They were crooked and DUMB.
They will, without a doubt, die...
Or at least 93% of us, since 7% of all humans who have ever existed are alive today.
The karma is not for what they did but what they could have done with it.
Good point. And your mom should be charged with prostitution, because she could do it.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
The dirty bomb, as a weapon of mass destruction, is a myth.
Absolutely correct, however a dirty bomb isn't really a weapon of mass destruction, it's a weapon of terror. Given the fear economy that has been driving the US for the last decade or so, I imagine it would be a highly effective weapon too.
..Mullah or Pope, Preacher or Poet, who was it wrote: "Give any one species too much rope and they'll fuck it up"?
This, right here.
There is no call for capital punishment on a carjacker. However, if a couple of them die painfully after giving a couple of innocent folks a severe beating, doing so at gunpoint, and all because they were too dumbassed to ignore the warnings splayed all over the container?
I really cannot bring myself to feel bad about the outcome.
For those who feel otherwise, look at it this way: When you use a lethal weapon to commit a crime, you state to the world that you are willing to kill innocent people in order to get what you want, no matter what. From the moment when you point that gun at someone, your life is automatically forfeit should you die as a result of committing that crime. It doesn't matter if you died instantly because the victim shot back, or because every orifice you have is slowly bleeding out of your swollen body due to radiation exposure... you got what was coming to you.
Oh, you're dying a painful death from the stuff you stole and some bleeding-heart type on Slashdot says I should show you some sympathy? Okay: you'll find sympathy in the dictionary between "shit" and "syphilis".
On the plus side, maybe the next person contemplating violent acts to get what they want will think twice because of these two Darwin Award winners?
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
They stole a truck with no idea of the cargo's value or importance, and probably didn't even care if someone else could die if they stole it. It might have been medical supplies, vaccines, food rations, anything. And if they'd gotten involved in a high speed pursuit they could have killed someone just running away. Not to mention their willingness to threaten deadly force in the act, which would have given the driver grounds to use the same in self defense, even without the cargo being lethal.
Which would itself only increase any self defense fatality in being justified if the thieves had gotten shot.
They jacked a rig, had no concern for the value of human life, and it bit them in the ass. To be blunt, they had it coming.
The fact that the authorities aren't even going to be responsible for punishing them means they have nobody to blame but themselves.
Sheesh? All I was suggesting is that asking why they choose one method of theft over another is, well.... because they are likely dumb and it didn't even occur to them.
It might be worth considering that just because a person is wrong doesn't mean that is the end of the story. Criminals are generally a symptom of larger social issues. Morality is nice and all, but, just stopping at the morality of it and deciding they were wrong; is simultaneously correct and useless. You may as well be pointing out that water is wet.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"