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Judge: It's OK For Cops To Create Fake Instagram Accounts
An anonymous reader writes with a ruling that seems obvious in a case about police making a fake Instagram account. A federal judge in New Jersey has signed off on the practice of law enforcement using a fake Instagram account in order to become "friends" with a suspect — thus obtaining photos and other information that a person posts to their account. "No search warrant is required for the consensual sharing of this type of information," United States District Judge William Martini wrote in an opinion published last Tuesday. In other news, an undercover officer still doesn't need to tell you that he or she is a member of law enforcement if you ask.
Is anyone confused by the fact that cops can lie in the course of their work? Because thats something everyone should be crystal clear on: they can.
Or maybe people dont understand that things you share with a cop, even "off the record", can be on the record. That, too, is a myth that should be dispelled.
As long as the character they create is entirely fictional and not based on impersonating someone they know is a friend of the suspect, I'm fine with it. Cops running around trying to "friend" people in my name is not.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Oh yeah, because it's "on the Internet".
"In other news, an undercover officer still doesn't need to tell you that he or she is a member of law enforcement if you ask. "
What do you want him to do? Expose himself as an undercover agent on the whim of anybody who asks? Have you blab to everyone that he's a narc and probably get him killed or the case fucked up?
If you really need to ask then there is something wrong to begin with.
... is whether using pictures copied from other people's (seized) phones, accounts, what-have-you for such fake accounts is totally fine.
Posturing and making shit up is totally fine for US cops, we've known this for a long time. But repurposing seized pictures? IMO a lot less ok.
...if you have the ability to change the law to suit your needs.
I've always wondered if anyone has tried the exact opposite of asking an undercover agent if they are a cop.
Simply work under the assumption that everyone is a police or law enforcement officer. And only conduct business with them after signing legal contracts recognizing them as an agent of the law whereby they are authorizing your activity for some other lawful purpose like entrapping, errr I mean prosecuting someone else.
Let's say I own an internet business. I notice that a profile is fake and delete it off the system. Suddenly, I'm told by the police it was theirs. And, if I don't put it back up it's obstruction of justice. Note: Told to do so, not "here's a court order." Does the ruling make this scenario feasible? And if so, what is the liability for the company if they do or don't make the account viable again.
Care killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.
That's an interesting thought. It occurs to me that there are only a few acts which would normally be criminal, but have exceptions for law enforcement purposes. As one obvious example, a cop can't authorize murder, and everyone pretty much knows that. A cop can't authorize robbery.
For those things a court can authorize via a warrant, such as a search that would otherwise be trespassing, the defendant would need to have a "reasonable belief " that the conduct was in fact lawful. Having your buddy sign a document saying he's a cop doesn't get you anywhere since you don't actually believe he's a cop. Having a habit of asking all of your criminal buddies to sign such a statement, and signing it yourself claiming that you are a cop, would tend to show that you know it's a sham. You know that you're not actually a cop, so you probably realize that the other guys aren't cops either. Without a reasonable belief that it's true, the statement is worthless.
Don't confuse creating fake IDs versus what the DEA is doing by taking real people's names and photos and creating web pages impersonating those people.
I have no problem with fake IDs. I have EVERY problem with identity theft by the government!
There's a precedent for this that everyone should know. But it's in the Constitution of America"
But it's not a sham for the hypothetical real cop. The fact that all the documents signed by non-cops were sham documents isn't important.
/. -- it's likely to be wrong.
Note: don't get your legal advice from
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
What matters is whether the defendant has a "reasonable belief " that their conduct is authorized and lawful. The question isn't whether or not the statement is TRUE, not for the sham "cops" or the real cop. The defendant doesn't THINK that it's true in either case. They think they're perpetrating a burgalry, not executing a search warrant. Since they don't know of any actual search warrant, they've committed burgalry- even if there actually was a cop, and a search warrant. The warrant they didn't know about, didn't think existed, is not an excuse to commit burgalry.
Another example - officers are allowed to possess certain substances for law enforcement purposes. A drug dealer signs agreements with their associated dealers claiming that they are all cops, and all busting each other. They do not believe that. They are actually possessing them for the purpose of drug dealing, not for law enforcement purposes (intent to distribute) . It turns out that one guy is actually a cop, and he photographs the drug dealing possessing drugs with the intent to distribute. What matters is the actual possession with actual intent to distribute. Making marks on paper claiming that you're trying to bust each other doesn't matter a whit. The crime is a) possessing drugs with b) intent to distribute. If you actually possess the drugs and actually intend to distribute , you're actually guilty and actually going to actual prison.
While in prison, you can write a letter saying that you're not really a prisoner, you're an undercover agent spying on the prisoners.
So, in this judges opinion, can we make a fake Instagram account for him or the police?
Or is this act of lying purely something they reserve for themselves?
Because, you know, maybe this judge should start sharing his fondness for sheep and Barbie dolls.
Oh, wait ... if we did it, it would be a crime. And, I'm sorry, but if it's a crime for us, then you should have some form of prior authorization.
Otherwise this judge has said "we can commit crimes, you can't" ... which will pretty much confirm that the law deems themselves above it. In which case this judge's new Instagram account should be interesting to see.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Given that this entire thread is about police lying (and getting away with it), I think your suggestion is silly.
I'll try explaining it the other way around, with a real-life case. There have been several cases that fit this pattern.
A cop wants to bust a bad guy. That cop gets his wife, a teacher, to pretend to be the DA and tell the bad guy he's authorized to do $crime. Cop busts the bad guy.
In court, bad guy says "the DA said I could ... at least, I thought she was the DA. The real DA replies "I never said a word to the guy. Some teacher said it was authorized, but she has no authority to authorize anything."
In such case, the courts have consistently held that the defendant is not guilty, because they THOUGHT that their actions were authorized and therefore lawful.*
So you see it doesn't matter if the person "authorizing" it is really a cop, a teacher, or a DA. What matters is what the defendant BELIEVES - whether they are trying to commit an act that is criminal or they are trying to aid law enforcement. The legal term is "mens rea", which means "guilty mind",'also known as "criminal intent ".
You are free to think that the courts should have done the opposite and found the person guilty when the "DA" actually isn't a DA. You can think it's wrong or right, but what actually sends people to prison or not in such cases is their actual belief - did they believe their act was authorized or not. The actual identity of the authorizing party does not matter under law.
* This mention of mistaken belief reminds some people of the phrase "ignorance of the law is no excuse". Ignorance of the LAW generally isn't an excuse, but mistake of FACT IS an excuse. "I didn't know poisoning my husband counts as murder" is no good. "The bottle said 'blueberry syrup', so I thought it really was blueberry syrup that I put on his food" is a valid defense. Here we're talking about mistake of fact - the defendant thought the person was (or was not) a proper authority.
Cops Lie all the time, they are trained to be untruthful to attain information or to trick a suspect into giving up information. As such the community has lost faith and respect for them.
Rule #1: Do not talk to law enforcement, ever, "I would like to speak with an attorney"
That is a myth.
Is an activity really consensual when one side is committing a fraud?
"Our government... teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy."
"To declare that in the administration of criminal law the end justifies the means to declare that the Government may commit crimes in order to secure conviction of a private criminal would bring terrible retribution."
"The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding."
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
Not all 4 legged animals are dogs and I don't think that your reversal of the scenario proves the point.
Can a court really throw out a document, signed by a genuine cop authorizing the person to commit a crime? The cop knowingly signed the document. Isn't this more important than the beliefs of the thief? The thief could explain his belief as "I thought that I was authorized if any one of us was a cop". So, his belief is premised on a factual basis that happened to be unlikely, but true.
Niether your opinion, nor mine matters -- all that matters is what a competant court decides. I wonder if there are any cases where this has actually happened?
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
He must be white otherwise the cops would just shoot him.
Ignorance of the LAW generally isn't an excuse, but mistake of FACT IS an excuse.
Unfortunately, though, we now have far too many laws, including contradictory laws. Even if somebody had their own legal library, every year some things change. A hypothetical typical, reasonable citizen could not possibly know them all, much less be reasonably expected to. They wouldn't have time to do anything else.
So here's my question: since our common law system is supposed to be based on the reasonable man principle, and it is provably not reasonable to expect the average citizen to know most laws, much less all, how could ignorance of the law NOT be a valid excuse?
> The cop knowingly signed the document. Isn't this more important than the beliefs of the thief?
The defendant is on trial, not the cop. So what matters is whether the defendant knowingly committed the crime. (Some crimes have a standard such as "recklessly" rather than "knowingly"). When determining whether Joe is guilty, courts look at Joe's actions and Joe's intent.
If the cop violated Constitutional rights to get evidence, one penalty for the cop is that they can't use the evidence. There happens to be a side benefit to the defendant in some cases, but the goal is to discourage the cops from performing unlawful searches. In the scenario at hand, I don't see any Constitutional right being violated, so a motion to suppress would be without grounds. Unless you can articulate some _Constitutional_ grounds to suppress that I'm not thinking of.
Either your reading skills or logic skills appear to be faltering. Why would the defendant want to exclude the document? Obviously he/she would not. So most of your post is irrelevant.
When you can get the criminals to do the same, I'll agree with you.
Since there seems to be nothing preventing your "logic" from being urtaken further, we might as well rephrase your statement:
"When you can get the criminals to quit breaking the law, I'll expect the police to do the same."
That should be illegal - at least without the express written consent of the people being impersonated.
Yes, the cops have done this and the person sued. I would love to hear what happened in that law suit, because impersonating someone else is a very different matter from creating a fake account.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
is this not entrapment?
Government and people who work for government will lie, cheat, and steal to get what they want out of you unsuspecting citizens. Anyone who thinks that this doesn't or shouldn't happen is a naive fool. Be aware of who you talk to and what you say. Now do I think it's right? Nope, but that is the pragmatic view that I have to take. All this does is set up an environment of utter animosity and distrust. Live and reputations are at stake but the state doesn't give two shits about that.