Slashdot Mirror
D.C. Police Detonate Man's 'Suspicious' Pressure Cooker
An anonymous reader writes: Yesterday evening in Washington D.C., police officers on routine patrol spotted an unoccupied car parked near the National Mall. They deemed it "suspicious," and took a look inside, where they found a pressure cooker. They also claimed to smell gasoline. The officers called the bomb squad, and at 7:45pm they initiated a controlled detonation of the car's contents. Afterward, a search of the car found no evidence that it contained explosives or any other hazardous materials. The car's owner was located and arrested for driving on a revoked license.
and if so, did they reimburse the guy?
It's a slow news day.
If you can't take the pressure, you shouldn't be a cop.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
"...an odor of gasoline was detected"
In a fucking gasoline-powered car. Where do they find these geniuses?
You need a license to own a parked car? Was he seen "operating" the vehicle?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
They'll have to pry my slow cooker from my cold dead oven mitts
in a parking lot? That IS rather suspicious.
Especially if the cops revoked the owner's driving license just to accuse him/her of something or other.
And was the owner also the driver? It would have been nice for TFS to mention that.
So they screwed up, and then arrested him to validate their actions. Good job.
Since when are we crazy blowing up peoples personal property because they have a pressure cooker.
If your license is revoked, don't drive with a pressure cooker.
Is this a new season's advertising?
You seriously believe they don't?
Police have people for that.
That's great for them, they can ask for a budget increase next year!
In a car? Wait, what?
From TFA:
These news bits do just what they intend to do.
Make our heads shake back and forth.
Now lets do the right thing and charge the guy under some terroism law.
Way to go America!
Now we can all sleep safer.
We need universal background checks and registration of all pressure cooker sales.
Wow, you mean one time 0.00000001% of the world's population died from a pressure cooker bomb?
Better blow up ALL the pressure cookers.
The only thing dumber that this article is the police who blew up the pressure cooker. Maybe I'll put a big nitrogen tank in my back seat for a few weeks and see if I can meet some interesting new friends.
the BIG question is
"WHAT WAS IN IT !!!!"
i cook sauerkraut and sausage in mine for outdoor get to together's
and THAT keeps unrefrigerated in the car for a LONG TIME
"I don't pitch OpenSUSE Linux to my friends, i let Microsoft do it for me
Actually - yes. It does sound like they blew up a pressure cooker just for fun. Bullshit and paperwork? It's worth it, to some cops, if they can just get an adreneline rush out of it. WTF? They let the guy go, right? Obviously, they had NOTHING!
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Ban cube Vans! Ban wires! Ban duct tape! Ban shoes! It's for the children, after all. If we lived like we did 500 years ago, life would be much better because nobody would be out killing each other.
Oh... wait... nevermind.
http://www.usatoday.com/videos...
Pretending this is my office full of bitter coworkers..
Assuming the cops had good cause to check his license, assuming there is little or no doubt about him driving with an expired license (maybe he foolishly admitted it, or maybe he was caught on camera), and assuming the offense is one that routinely results in arrest (vs. a ticket-and-tow as some jurisdictions do) then it's a good arrest.
Without evidence that a motorist with a revoked license would typically only be ticketed (and towed), or lack of evidence that he was the driver, it's premature to claim that the arrest was done to cover up the other issue. The only legal tie between the two is that the suspicious car - or perhaps the driver's claim that the car was his car - gave the cops probable cause to check his license for validity. Other than that, they are separate and should be treated as such.
Now, does there need to be an independent investigation to determine if these cops used prudent judgment (vs. "looking for trouble" "judgement") - yes. If they were not acting prudently, does the police dept. need to issue an apology and pay damages? Yes.
Memo to self:
If I drive a car without a license and park it, and I see police activity around my car, call a lawyer and have HIM arrange to recover the car.
Memo to self #2:
If my license is revoked, call a cab.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Authorities may also have noted that cars have also been used to create explosive devices. Trucks too.
I think this AC has a good point. I don't know what it's like in the police force, but I'm pretty sure there's more to it than "ZOMG THE POLICE ARE INFRINGING RIGHTS!" They could very well be incompetent idiots, but given that they blew up someone's car, I'm guessing there's a bit more to it. People hate filling out paperwork.
Pressure cookers have also been used to cook delicious meals economically and quickly. That's actually why they're called pressure cookers.
or seize some cash from unsuspecting tourists from say Canada eeee drug dealers I mean from drug dealers.
In some states and possibly in D.C., ordinary traffic tickets require a police to witness you "doing the deed," but more serious crimes like DWI, reckless driving, and possibly driving with a revoked license do not. Yes, they require proof beyond a reasonable doubt to result in a conviction (assuming a fair trial *cough*), but that can be achieved legally through non-police witnesses, surveillance cameras (the cops can subpoena the ATM across the street or the toll-road cameras, and D.C. is littered with government-run security cameras), or even a non-coerced admission.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Unless it was a pressure cooker running Linux.
Pressure cookers have also been used to cook delicious meals economically and quickly. That's actually why they're called pressure cookers.
So have cars.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Sometimes the bomb squad will use a directed charge designed to shake the crap out of suspicious objects, but without blowing them to smithereens. The idea is to ensure that it can't go off, while still leaving behind evidence that can be analyzed.
Paranoid police ruin poor man's life.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Oklahoma City can attest to that.
I remember my mother cooking an old rooster in one. That tough old bird came out tender as a fryer. Hmmmm.....chicken and dumplings. Yum!
Probably the same guy that tried to blow up the chemical lab in junior high school.
They smelled gasoline near a car? How in the world could that happen?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Could be but it seems like a lot of people with a little authority start to get an "the end justifies the means" kind of mentality. They mean well but it creates a lot of hell.
Ummm, you must not know any EOD types. A disrupter tries to disassemble an explosive device faster than it can detonate. It is typically the first choice for suspected IEDs and has been for decades.
Of course, it will also cheerfully disassemble non-explosive items too.
Bent, folded, spindled, and mutilated.
The movie just became a prophecy, excuse me while I get a fresh double latte!
Have gnu, will travel.
Anyone smart enough to read the instructions has figured out that a pressure cooker -- a modern one -- is safe and saves a lot of time and energy cooking beans and potatos and vegetables. Yeah the old ones with the weight teetering on top of a vent were a bit dicey if the vent clogged up. The new ones with sealed spring valves don't have those problems.
So you want to encourage people to think those of us using them are out to hurt someone?
You're doing the harm.
If it didn't contain explosives, they couldn't detonate it. They blew it up by detonating something else next to it.
"My pot roast! Noooooooo!"
Do the police also blow up suspicious shoes and underwear?
So what you have here is something that isn't necessarily stupid, or even wrong, but should nevertheless be controversial.
Most of American voters, at least at the time they go into the voting booth, agree that the above statement represents a reasonably-best-cast practical policy.
Most American people, when they have stars in their eyes and think about the 1770s, or most times whenever you frame an issue as "civil rights," agree that the above statement is completely reprehensible and isn't the country they want to live in. They'd say that it you can't tell it's dangerous, then the government shouldn't infringe upon peoples' rights. Have probable cause, then use force.
What do you think? Does your opinion vary by mood, and by whether you're talking about civil rights vs security? Do you practice what you preach when you're voting?
An encrypted pressure cooker!
The lids of pressure cookers are all transparent as far as I know, so you should be able to see if it's empty...
Surely they would not have blown up a clearly empty pressure cooker... right? Right??
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It is clear that we must classify pressure cookers as a weapon of mass destruction, so that they are only obtainable by licensed cooks.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
So you want to encourage people to think those of us using them are out to hurt someone?
You're doing the harm.
The risks of terrorism and illicit drug production are only two of the risks of allowing this dangerous 'dual use' technology to be sold on the open market! A far more insidious problem is the destruction of essential vitamins in the pressure cooking process. Some of these are required for higher brain functions, like the ability to parse textual data for abstract meaning. In one recent study, over 70% of regular pressure cooker users were unable to detect irony, satire or even obvious jokes in posts on internet forums. The end product may be delicious but, like cannabis or Snapchat, the long-term effects on the developing brain can be devastating.
Maybe culturing some schedule I mushrooms?
When achieving sterility is outlawed, will all the outlaws become sterile?
Remember "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters"? Help make it a reality again! http://soylentnews.org
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Nobody is short on any "essential vitamins", especially among people who use pressure cookers.
Clearly this man should have had a barbecue and several cylinders of propane in his car instead! The police would have certainly let him be if that were the case.
I'm assuming it was obviously not a complex device, an empty rice cooker should be fairly easy to identify.
Anything made by the USA with a V8 in the "malaise era" is the anti-tesla.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
That'll keep those damned blacks from breeding! (Partially black here - I jest. Sadly I have to add that as some may think I am serious. Amazon needs to sell sarcasm meters.)
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
...
Poe, is that you?
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Unattended, records show the (absent) owner has no license - could be stolen. Pressure cooker - improvised bombs and pressure cookers go together like ham and cheese, Boston Marathon was a recent example.
The cops did their job and rightly erred on the side of caution, the only "injustice" is the guy will not be compensated for the damage to his car, neither the cops or his insurance company are liable. OTOH, he had no license, his car should have been parked at his home where it would have aroused far less official suspicion.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
When did they revoke his license, before or after they blew up his car?
with the PATRIOT Act set to expire June 1 expect the cops to find a terraist under every woodpile for the next week
Quinoa
The AntiJoey
The "Driver's" license was revoked after the explosion of the car by capitol "police".
Ha ha
At first I thought this news story was a joke.
Incredibly hilarious!!!
I can't wait till we find killer Smoothy machines which MUST be detonated!!!
First though, they will take away your pensions and your remaining rights.
Don't worry though, you will be perfectly "safe"...at least until they get everyone guns.
Then its time to move on from detonating ordinary household appliances to killing you, your wife, your kid and your dog.
Absolutely hilarious.
Keep in mind the National Memorial Day Concert was starting at 8pm at the Capitol with lots of people in attendance.
http://www.pbs.org/national-memorial-day-concert/home/
The car's owner was located and arrested for driving on a revoked license.
So they blow up his stuff, maybe ruin his car and to CYA they smelled gas. And in order to justify whatever, they arrest the guy for being poor. The car isn't being driven folks -- it's there because the man ran out of money. He COULD HAVE had it towed or any number of responsible things -- but, he didn't have money.
Being poor has been a criminal act -- let's face it, you can slip on all kinds of licenses, and run around without insurance because you trade feeding a family or medicine for taking a few legal risks 9 times out of 10. But now it's terrorism?
They should just admit they were a bit overzealous and compensate the guy for the pot -- maybe give him a tow or sell his car for him. The public interests are not served on this hyperbole.
While the Boston bombing did use a pressure cooker -- the average killing spree with a gun is far more dangerous -- and we've accidentally killed more people with prescription drugs and nobody is blowing up jars of Oxycontin (but who knows what bored people might do?)
The really annoying thing here is that the Police put out statements and the Press repeat them, that have anyone with functional BS detector saying; "Oh come on." This is more crying wolf and pretty soon, a real or fake terrorist attack is going to be huge, just so people don't treat the issue as a joke or a jobs program.
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
They know they are doing that, so they don't mean well.
The glass slipped from my fingers.
When we looked at the car, we had an idea or impression of the existence, presence, or truth of (something) without certain proof. Despite this, we acted. We took possession of an object that didn't belong to us and caused damage to it. Our actions could have resulted in a benefit to you, so you should forgive us of any wrongdoing towards others.
How much does it cost to blow up things safely?
...blowing up ham radio equipment. This action has probably been appreciated by neighbours, but it seems that US policemen are a bit too much paranoid, isn't it ?!?
how do you get charged with driving a parked and unoccupied car, especially when you aren't even at the scene? I like the old saying "PROVE IT!"
D.C. has speed cameras...no cop required to issue you a ticket.
Just another day in Paradise
But I don't see where they get off arresting someone for driving without a license when they weren't driving. Perhaps that's why his car was "abandoned".
They went from stealing people's lunch money to just blowing up their lunch.
Outlaw pressure cookers and only outlaws will have pressure cookers.
If it's like most jurisdictions, it's probably a "civil" (i.e. non-criminal) ticket levied against the car owner rather than the presumptive driver.
Other American jurisdictions have run into legal trouble when they try to use cameras to send misdemeanor (criminal charge) tickets to people with things like speeding and running red lights.
The distinction may be moot though, if speeding is merely a civil, not criminal, offense in D.C.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
So I'm very very curious to know how an unoccupied car "appears suspicious" to the cops... and based on this they had the rights to break into it and blow up stuffs inside...
Not only that, the guy that owned the car was arrested even though they were not able to prove that they guy drove the car there. Couldn't he have arrived at the mall with someone and that someone drove?
But wait!!!! They didn't have the probable cause to begin with... WTF?
Or, in this case, a What-If?
Glad I don't live in the US. This kind of story makes me want to go to a supermarket, buy a pressure cooker and take it home by public transport. Then forget it somewhere on the bus....