Drone Drops Drugs Onto Ohio Prison Yard

Okian Warrior sends a report from CNN about an incident last week at a prison in Mansfield, Ohio, where a brawl broke out after a drone dropped a package of drugs into the prison yard. Prison staff had no idea at the time what caused ~75 inmates to gather and fight, but surveillance tapes clearly showed a drone hovering over the yard and dropping a package that turned out to contain tobacco, marijuana, and heroin. A spokesperson for the prison said this was not the first time they've had an incident involving a drone, but they wouldn't go into specifics.

Comments

Hmmm

[damn_registrars]

I wonder what else could be dropped into a prison yard by drone just to cause unrest? Even with the relatively high value of the cargo, it is still hard to see how the person who delivered it could reasonably expect to be paid for it. Maybe next time they should pack it with flour and sugar instead.

Re:Hmmm

[neilo_1701D]

Even with the relatively high value of the cargo, it is still hard to see how the person who delivered it could reasonably expect to be paid for it.

Doesn't have to be a payment. "Deliver this package into the jail, and we don't hurt your wife / children / etc". Coercion can be a wonderful motivator, too.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

it is still hard to see how the person who delivered it could reasonably expect to be paid for it

Friends on the outside. It's not as though people in prison are completely isolated.

Re:Hmmm

[MagickalMyst]

"Coercion can be a wonderful motivator"

Absolutely. Prisons are full of gangsters and organized crime members. It is very common for them to threaten or coerce employees to smuggle drugs inside.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder what else could be dropped into a prison yard by drone just to cause unrest? Even with the relatively high value of the cargo, it is still hard to see how the person who delivered it could reasonably expect to be paid for it. Maybe next time they should pack it with flour and sugar instead.

Hard to see why you think drug dealers would deliver on credit (tick).

Re:Hmmm

[gstoddart]

Even with the relatively high value of the cargo, it is still hard to see how the person who delivered it could reasonably expect to be paid for it.

You don't watch many movies, do you? Or missed the whole thing where the Mexican cartel guy had a tunnel excavated under the prison and "nobody noticed"?

As much as it sounds like a Hollywood fantasy, it's not like people in prison have no contact with the outside world, and don't have a lot of time on their hands to come up with new ways to work around the system.

Hell, you could do a Tarantino plot about the shit you could drop into a prison yard to create unrest.

Hell, have one drone drop in a bag of weapons and have another with a long zoom televise the the gladiatorial games which ensue.

It really was only a matter of time until drugs and other stuff started getting dropped into prisons. People have been doing low tech versions of this for decades, if not centuries.

Re:Hmmm

[Geste]

Think of more malicious use cases, like biological agents.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder what else could be dropped into a prison yard by drone just to cause unrest?

Hostess cupcakes.

Re:Hmmm

[wbr1]

I have been to prison. The payment occurs other ways. Could be mailed.. could be visiting room hand off. Could be a guard taking the money out for a cut. Very rare is extortion of someone on the outside. This ain't hollywood.

Re:Hmmm

[NatasRevol]

Some people just want to watch the world burn.

Drop small packets of heroin all over the yard. From 30 different drones. All at once.

Just for the LOLz.

Re:Hmmm

[nmb3000]

Even with the relatively high value of the cargo, it is still hard to see how the person who delivered it could reasonably expect to be paid for it.

Perhaps the operator never expected payment and is just some psychopath performing an experiment on the prison inmates and guards to observe what would happen. Round one was some drugs, perhaps round two will be a few knives or even a firearm.

If your goal is to instigate mayhem and destruction, a $600 quadcopter could offer a pretty high return on investment (but unfortunately to the detriment of others using them for benign purposes).

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder what else could be dropped into a prison yard by drone just to cause unrest?

Hostess cupcakes.

I believe in prison Twinkies are more popular

Re:Hmmm

[TWX]

Might be interesting to watch if pieces of a firearm are dropped-in individually, either over time or else in multiple portions of the yard to different competing gangs. Even funnier if something critical that couldn't be readily made from supplies on-hand was omitted.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

It works for the government, why not the mob?

Re: Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Drug dealer Credit - knowing who your family is.

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

And with that, you then just call the cops.... if someone is actually capable of hurting your wife and children if you don't do what they say, they are also capable of doing so even if you do... The reality is that in that situation, you are completely powerless to determine your family's future, as much as one might wish it to be otherwise, and the smartest thing you can do is get help, if you can summon it. If someone is willing to be so morally bankrupt as to do such a thing in the first place, why would you think they should be somehow morally obligated to be telling you the truth about not hurting your family if you do what they tell you?

I realize that the emotional pressure in such a situation can be enormous, but in actuality, maintaining a clear and rational mind in such circumstances is still ultimately your best course of action.

Re:Hmmm

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Or far more worryingly, the possibility that explosives might be dropped on public events or something similar. A co-ordinated attack could do a lot of damage.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Nonsense, everyone knows giving Hostess products to violent criminals instantly renders them docile. Don't you read comic books?

Re:Hmmm

[gstoddart]

Right, and a drone dropping drugs into the prison yard is in no way like something out of a movie.

Honestly, the world is a screwed up place, and this entire incident is meta enough to seem like something out of Hollywood.

Life imitating art and all that.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

More along the lines of Bob is in jail, and the gang demands that Charlie, Bob's brother does some deliveries, or else Bob will be used as a pincushion for the local gang's shanks. If killed, the prison administration will just say that Bob had it coming because he racked up a debt, when the "debt" was just his presence there in the facility.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Only if you brought enough for everyone. Otherwise... SHANK CITY!

Re:Hmmm

[bluefoxlucid]

That's my primary Xanatos gambit, honestly.

Fix education and solve poverty; repeal minimum wage; end all government intervention in education above the K-12 school level. End of homelessness causes major upheaval of market systems, as individuals no longer face starvation and death in the streets as counterpoint to low wage slave job, completely changing our culture. This allows repeal of minimum wage, which can be used as a published standard to make low wage values seem fair to the employee (strong diplomacy tool), thus leaving the employer negotiating with a stubborn candidate who won't settle for less than he believes he's worth. Without public access to individually-affordable college, businesses suffer unless they train their own workforce, making workforce development the only survivable business strategy (your competitors who do so will overtake you and throw you out of the market if you don't); they'll also risk loss of value if skilled employees quit, and so must create a workplace which makes the employee feel valued. Combined result? Every single individual employee now has the negotiating power of a trade union.

Fail? We continue on current welfare system, and with current broad education plans. Eventually, high minimum wages cause rapid overtake of automation, unemploying 47% of laborers. This cuts about half the consumer goods market, unemploying half of who is left, giving us around 70%-80% unemployment. Economy collapses. Food becomes scarce due to purely economic factors. America looks like France pre-French-revolution. Riots break out. Attempts to fix the economy by government force only increase production costs and make it impossible to provide enough goods (fuzzy projection; I have the converse theory, but it doesn't exactly apply here). Cities burn. Congress is executed. Union is dissolved, America is no more, weak states are consumed by larger states, and North America starts looking like Europe sans EU.

Both of these are utter chaos. One takes the path of making the economy more fluid and the laborer more powerful, causing rapid wealth growth, causing rapid technological development and rapid cultural changes; the other takes the path of letting the overweight system trip and fall and collapse into a flaming heap. Either way, I'll live in interesting times, not the stagnant and boring world I was born into (okay that's not fair: I was born into a world of rapid technological growth due to information management creating an economic bottleneck that computers opened up; now I'm trying to replicate that world by permanently widening the wealth channel, simultaneously protecting us from an economic collapse caused by mass labor displacement in already-stagnant markets. I didn't grow up in this boring world; I moved here against my will, and I intend to make it radical once more).

Re:Hmmm

[fustakrakich]

I can verify that! Well, actually it was the school lunchroom, but then nowadays school isn't that much different, is it?

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

They have HSBC (and others, no doubt) for that.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

what ever, this absolutely has nothing to do with life imitating art at all. if no movie, play, story, you name it had ever been made, this still would have happened. it's just people trying to smuggle stuff they shouldn't always find creative ways to do so, always!

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Hypothetically: Does anyone, when push comes to shove, trust the police to protect their family from those with the power to actually perform that kind of coercion?

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder what else could be dropped into a prison yard by drone just to cause unrest? Even with the relatively high value of the cargo, it is still hard to see how the person who delivered it could reasonably expect to be paid for it. Maybe next time they should pack it with flour and sugar instead.

3D printed guns

Re:Hmmm

[tlhIngan]

It really was only a matter of time until drugs and other stuff started getting dropped into prisons. People have been doing low tech versions of this for decades, if not centuries.

Heck, I'm surprised prisons haven't started putting up nets to prevent this. Especially after a helicopter (full size) was forced to land in the middle of a prison yard in Quebec so two inmates can escape.

Re:Hmmm

[dpidcoe]

The first few drops are drugs and other goodies. The last drop is a grenade inside a bag of flour.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, pack up the car with wife and kids, drive at least 2 states away, then go to the local FBI and report it. get off and back on to determine if your being followed. request witness relocation.

Re:Hmmm

[gstoddart]

Honestly, I assume for every new thing you put into stop one thing it just creates another class of problem for you.

I also assume there's nothing so far fetched it hasn't been tried.

Re:Hmmm

[Mr D from 63]

I wonder what else could be dropped into a prison yard by drone just to cause unrest?

The ultimate contraband....a 3d printer!

Re:Hmmm

[gstoddart]

what ever, this absolutely has nothing to do with life imitating art at all. if no movie, play, story, you name it had ever been made, this still would have happened. it's just people trying to smuggle stuff they shouldn't always find creative ways to do so, always!

And I'm not disagreeing with that, not even a little.

I'm saying it isn't possible to make up something and say "but that could only happen in a movie". Sometimes you see stuff in movies and go "yeah, no way" only to find it has a basis in truth.

I'm not saying the convicts watched a movie and said "hey, let's try that". I'm saying never underestimate the motivation of people who don't want to be there, and have lots of time on their hands.

So when someone says "this isn't Hollywood", I think "nope, we wouldn't believe it if Hollywood did it".

If it's physically possible, it's probably likely been tried, or will be if someone figures out how.

Re:Hmmm

[amicusNYCL]

I wonder if anyone bothered to check at Skybox Packaging, right next door to the prison.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Why bother with drones?

A reasonably well calibrated air cannon (like for pumpkin launches) or catapult could just throw them over the fence from a considerable distance.

Re:Hmmm

[digsbo]

They don't claim to offer drone drops to the prison.

Re:Hmmm

[davester666]

sure. go to the FBI with that story: "Some guys I never met before, and don't have a picture of or know their name, came to my house and threatened to kill my family if I don't do this illegal task. I want witness relocation".

your savings will run out before you get it. and you probably will die [either of natural or unnatural causes] before you get it.

Re:Hmmm

[im_thatoneguy]

I always assumed payment was easy, you have friends who aren't in prison who pay on your behalf. An escrow economy.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

heck, one could just use a trebuchet for a cheaper, robust solution...

but then again, there's some math involved.

Re:Hmmm

[Ralph Wiggam]

Or far more worryingly, the possibility that explosives might be dropped on public events or something similar.

The good news there is that the weight capacity of consumer class drones is still pretty low. A pound of heroin is a lot. A pound of explosives really isn't. You could kill a few people in a crowd. But if your goal is a large scale terrorist attack, that's not a very effective method.

Re:Hmmm

[ooshna]

Absolutely. Prisons are full of gangsters and organized crime members. It is very common for them to threaten or coerce employees to smuggle drugs inside.

Or maybe those people involved with organized crimes, I don't know organized it?

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

Assuming they have the ability to carry out such a threat, they are equally as capable of harming your family if you do what they say as they would be if you don't, so all you are doing by following directions that you wouldn't otherwise do for them is surrendering your own agency to them on nothing more than the *hope* that they won't carry out their threat. Can you honestly say you would trust such people to not harm your family regardless of what you do more than you'd trust the police to do everything in their ability to at least do their best to help?

Re:Hmmm

[Rich0]

Next step - drone drops cutters to cut through the nets, or something to burn them. How long before people start sticking guns on drones to take pot shots at the guards? If done from enough altitude so that the drone or muzzle flash isn't easily spotted the thing is going to be invincible to anything short of radar-guided AAA (which might just be radar-driven shotguns, but still).

Re:Hmmm

[Outta_the_way_peck!]

Any drone capable of handling the kickback from a gun is going to be easily spotted.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

If you do it once they'll use the same threat you keep you doing it. Why would they burn that bridge? The best part is they don't even have to pay you.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Constitutional law cases argued up to the supreme court say the work of the police is to maintain order in society, NOT to protect individuals.

So there is nothing hypothetical about this: No.

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

So you'd actually rather blindly choose to cling to what must be the tiniest shred of *hope* that people who would threaten your family's well being might somehow actually not hurt you or your family if you just do what they tell you before you'd trust the police to help? Wow... a true skeptic. I'd dare say that your mistrust is founded more on emotion than reason, however.

Of course, the police might not be able to save your family... I can't refute that possibility remains, but that's entirely outside of your control.... And there's certainly no small chance that the people who threatened your family would continue to blackmail you again and again, and in actuality even doing what they say doesn't remove your family from danger at all, so in actuality nothing you can possibly do in such a circumstance can give you any *real* control over the outcome, the most rational course of action in such a circumstance is to get help.

And that's not even considering the fact that having the police act on such a circumstance actually *IS* actually acting to protect the society, because if they threaten one person's family, they can threaten others... and keep on going through people's families, since the police supposedly wouldn't take any action to protect them (they protect society and not individuals after all, right?), until there's no society left.

Re:Hmmm

[Intrepid imaginaut]

And yet, this'll make your hair stand on end, an M67 hand grenade weighs less than a pound and has an effective kill radius of five meters and casualty radius of about 15 meters.

Now imagine someone buying a dozen drones and wiring them to work on a preprogrammed flight path over a busy sporting event.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

The FBI will take the complaint extremely seriously and will act on it very quickly.
However there may be nothing that they can do.

Of course, if you do do what the gangsters say then you are guilty of a pretty serious crime. So after that they own you and you will be doing it again, and again, and again.

choice is yours.

Re:Hmmm

[TsuruchiBrian]

If someone is willing to be so morally bankrupt as to do such a thing in the first place, why would you think they should be somehow morally obligated to be telling you the truth about not hurting your family if you do what they tell you?

The answer is contained within what you already said. If there is no trust in the person being coerced and the coercer, then the coerced really will have nothing to lose by going to law enforcement.

One easy way to destroy this trust is to do very things that you seem to be suggesting they will actually do (e.g. killing wives and kids despite cooperation, and/or not killing wives and kids despite lack of cooperation)

And no, criminals are not very reliable. But it doesn't take a lot of trust. Even a 50% chance or a 10% chance or a 1% chance of saving your wife and kids can be enough trust to foster cooperation.

Long story short, it is not in the interest of the criminal to punish people that cooperate. Whether ti's the actual government justice system, or a criminal pseudo justice system, the best way to incentivize behavior is clear and consistent enforcement.

Re:Hmmm

[TsuruchiBrian]

Some people love their families enough to try to save them, even if they are not 100% certain that the criminals they are dealing with are trustworthy.

I sure hope I am not related you.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

It depends on the criminals and how common the organized crime is. If it's common enough, they have incentive to cultivate trust to lessen the likelihood of the next guy calling the cops.

But if there's no expectation that their behavior will effect subsequent "transactions", then, yeah, you probably shouldn't expect them to be trustworthy. For example, if they're not part of an larger organization, syndicate, or community; or if the crime is a one-off; or if they think the truth will never get out.

OTOH, kidnapping and murder carry (or should carry) much different penalties. It's sort of like the scene in Heat, where the "bad guy" senselessly shoots the guard. Because the Felony Murder Rule makes them all culpable for the murder, they now have significantly much less incentive not to kill all of them, so they go ahead and do it. Whereas before the first guard got shot, the expected cost of a murder was more than the expected cost of leaving witnesses.

Some criminals are capable of making cold, rational decisions better than others, though.

Re:Hmmm

[ShanghaiBill]

Any drone capable of handling the kickback from a gun is going to be easily spotted.

Recoilless rifles have been around since WW2. Most of them are big, but the design could be scaled down to fit on a drone. They not only eliminate the recoil, but are lighter than a same-caliber standard weapon.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds like something Philip Zimbardo of the infamous Stanford prison experiment would do.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

This allows repeal of minimum wage, which can be used as a published standard to make low wage values seem fair to the employee (strong diplomacy tool), thus leaving the employer negotiating with a stubborn candidate who won't settle for less than he believes he's worth.

It really doesn't work like that. What happens is that the employer makes an offer and then tells you to "take it or leave it, there are other people who will take this job for that money," and that's it.

Also, if you removed minimum wage, my job would pay much less than minimum wage. Right now, it pays only marginally less than minimum wage.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Some people are experimenting with handguns on drones (America!) but it's nearly impossible to aim with any accuracy. Drones are twitchy, you'd need a miniature gun turret with stabilization and another camera (higher focal length) and smart software to track targets. As far as amateurs without the budget for a predator drone are concerned, long distance pot shots will be better taken with a human operated rifle for quite some time.

Re: Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Condoms preferably the ribbed ones extra small.

Re:Hmmm

[mjwx]

And with that, you then just call the cops.... if someone is actually capable of hurting your wife and children if you don't do what they say, they are also capable of doing so even if you do...

But, as an organised criminal, why go to all that trouble?

People put under pressure react in strange and unpredictable ways. Why do all of that when you dont need to. You just set up the drone and let it work automatically. Not as if there aren't enough people who have the knowledge and lack of scruples who wont set all of this up for money. Hell, they've probably got a few who are part of the organisation.

As for payment, the people on the inside have already paid for it, some with money, others with services (erm. as in cell block strongman, not escort).

Re:Hmmm

[mysidia]

"Deliver this package into the jail, and we don't hurt your wife / children / etc"

Or they could just call up this delivery to settle an existing debt, OR make a deal with someone to deliver the package in exchange for some benefit or favor.

Coercion is harder and riskier.

Re: Hmmm

[davester666]

Right. Two weeks later, the rest of the crew show up and wipe out your family.

Re:Hmmm

[cfalcon]

Eh, yes and no. I mean, would that work on YOU? You're some guy, you have a drone, some mafia dude comes up and starts making threats. Would you go ahead and commit a felony on his behalf?

Much more likely is, your neighbor down the street runs into some trouble, his friend knows a guy, helps him out of a tough spot. He's mostly paid back, then he gets a visit. He can't go to the cops without screwing over his friends and himself, and he can focus more on the small carrot instead of the big stick. I don't think the threat would need to be said or honestly even implied.

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

Some people love their families enough to try to save them, even if they are not 100% certain that the criminals they are dealing with are trustworthy../blockquote> Not surprising... Emotions tend to cloud rational judgement. Are you familiar with the sunk costs fallacy?

Re:Hmmm

[TsuruchiBrian]

Not surprising... Emotions tend to cloud rational judgement. Are you familiar with the sunk costs fallacy?

Yes I am familiar with the sunk costs fallacy which has nothing to do with what I am saying.

And yes emotions can cloud judgement, but it is also the basis for our values. If you value you're family, it is not irrational to consider the possibility that criminals may in fact keep their word.

What would be irrational is to prematurely count your family as a sunk cost, simply because you don't feel comfortable dealing with criminals who *might* intend to kill them regardless.

For example, people are often able to recover their loved ones from terrorists for ransom. If these people love their family members, it is irrational to simply give up on them simply because the people holding their loved ones are bad people.

I feel like I am trying to explain love to a robot or something. Humans value other humans through an emotion called love, not unlike how your kind values properly formatted data files.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Complete BS! Without any proof the FBI will just hang up and tell you good luck! I know so, I've called them a few times and have gotten the same response. No proof = good luck and have a nice day.

Re:Hmmm

[tehcyder]

Hypothetically: Does anyone, when push comes to shove, trust the police to protect their family from those with the power to actually perform that kind of coercion?

I'd trust the armed, trained police with massive resources much more than myself alone.

Just because you own lots of guns (if you're in the US), it doesn't mean that you are on a level playing field with a ruthless gangster organisation.

Re:Hmmm

[tehcyder]

Complete BS! Without any proof the FBI will just hang up and tell you good luck! I know so, I've called them a few times and have gotten the same response. No proof = good luck and have a nice day.

They could probably tell it was a thirteen year old having a giggle.

It's only in the movies that cops dismiss complaints out of hand, and thus force the plucky heroine to solve the case herself..

Re: Hmmm

[tehcyder]

That is precisely the kind of situation in which responsible gun ownership would stop the problem in the beginning. Someone comes into my home and threatens to kill my family, well, then he wins a free facelift courtesy of my 12 guage. Then call the cops to clean up the mess. Self defense is a right.

Yeah, there's no possible way they could phone, text, email or Facebook message you. They would definitely come to your house in person, and shout out the threat from the street, giving you sufficient time to find your shotgun and blast them when you opened the door.

Re:Hmmm

[tehcyder]

Constitutional law cases argued up to the supreme court say the work of the police is to maintain order in society, NOT to protect individuals.

So there is nothing hypothetical about this: No.

All the courts have said is that you can't sue the police for failing in your individual case. It doesn't mean that they won't even try, you idiot.

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

What would be irrational is to prematurely count your family as a sunk cost, simply because you don't feel comfortable dealing with criminals who *might* intend to kill them regardless

In such a circumstance, they've already said they intend to harm them if I don't do what they say anyways, so it's obvious that they have no compunction about harming my family in the first place. The notion that they wouldn't harm them if I do what they say because the penalties would be harsher for them if they did is one to be highly skeptical of because, again, they have already said they are willing to do such a thing if I don't do what they say, indicating an indifference towards how severe the punishment for harming them as opposed to kidnapping them is liable to be. In fact, if there *IS* any validity to the notion that harsher penalties would keep them from harming my family, then that would apply just as much to either buying me or the police some time to actually rescue them, so the most rational course of action is for me to at least *try*. Is there any reason that I *should* take them at their word beyond clinging to an entirely blind hope that they might actually be honest criminals? Sure, it's *POSSIBLE* that they might not harm my family if I do what they say, but that's not really up to me... my family's fate lies not in *my* hands, but in those of criminals. It's not that my family itself that is a sunk cost at that time, but unfortunately any feelings I possess for them are, because those feelings are not going to help them.

Re:Hmmm

[Agripa]

If someone is willing to be so morally bankrupt as to do such a thing in the first place, why would you think they should be somehow morally obligated to be telling you the truth about not hurting your family if you do what they tell you?

I agree, however . . .

And with that, you then just call the cops.... if someone is actually capable of hurting your wife and children if you don't do what they say, they are also capable of doing so even if you do... The reality is that in that situation, you are completely powerless to determine your family's future, as much as one might wish it to be otherwise, and the smartest thing you can do is get help, if you can summon it.

The same thing applies to law enforcement and they are under no obligation to help you in any way even if they caused the situation.

Re:Hmmm

[TsuruchiBrian]

The notion that they wouldn't harm them if I do what they say because the penalties would be harsher for them if they did is one to be highly skeptical of

I never said anything about penalties.

Is there any reason that I *should* take them at their word beyond clinging to an entirely blind hope that they might actually be honest criminals? Sure, it's *POSSIBLE* that they might not harm my family if I do what they say, but that's not really up to me... my family's fate lies not in *my* hands, but in those of criminals. It's not that my family itself that is a sunk cost at that time, but unfortunately any feelings I possess for them are, because those feelings are not going to help them.

So if there is a 1% chance of saving them, you'd say "Fuck it, there already dead", it's not even worth trying to deal with these criminals. I'm not willing to spend any more time, energy or money to get my family back, the expected value of the payoff is just not high enough."

If this is your attitude I'd say that you just don't value your family very much. Or at the very least, you don;t value them as much as you value other things in your life such as your time effort and money.

If my family were kidnapped by criminals I would do whatever was most likely to get them back, whether that was to go to the police, or not go to the police, or trust untrustworthy people, or not trust them, or try to raid their compound myself, etc.

My point is that it is irrational to assume that the criminals are irrational. They could be. But they could also be rationally self interested and a mutually beneficial arrangement could be found where I get my family back and they get whatever they want.

As I said, this is a pretty common scenario with kidnappers and ransom. Sometimes it goes well, sometimes it doesn't. But to say that dealing with kidnappers never yields a desirable result is just false.

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

On the contrary, I love my family dearly, and value them greatly, but I do not assume that everything that I am presented with is necessarily within the jurisdiction of my direct control. Rather than follow the directives of someone who clearly means my family harm, the most productive thing I can do at this point is attempt to secure a rescue without giving the people I am dealing with any further advantage by cooperating with them. I have ZERO assurance from them that they won't harm my family regardless, and even though it might seem like I would have nothing to lose by cooperating with them, in the end, doing what they say would still leave them with more of an advantage than they would have had otherwise, so in actuality, by *NOT* cooperating, I am actually maximizing my ability to subvert them.

Sometimes it goes well, sometimes it doesn't. But to say that dealing with kidnappers never yields a desirable result is just false.

I'm not saying it never yields a desirable result.... only that overall, it has the best chance of yielding the most desirable result.

It's not terribly unlike it how it is statistically better to switch doors when Monty Hall gives you a choice to do so after opening one of the prize doors that you didn't pick.

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

Law enforcement is presumably better equipped than I am to handle such people... so no, the same thing does not apply to them.

Also, they do have an obligation to help, just as certain as a fire department has an obligation to put out a fire even if you have not paid the applicable annual fees for emergency service to your home (although you would get billed quite heavily afterwards if that were the case), because to leave the situation unchecked can result in a much bigger problems if it should escalate beyond just the isolated incident,

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

or they could just use pressure cookers and bring them in with backpacks...

oh wait, that already happened.

Re:Hmmm

[TsuruchiBrian]

So here is what you are irrationally assuming:

1. That anyone who kidnaps your family and threatens to harm your family has the ultimate goal of harming your family. Obviously there is no point in cooperating with anyone whose ultimate goal is to hurt your family, but why assume that? If anything it's probably safe to assume the opposite is true.

2. Only having "direct control" over a situation warrants any sort of decision making. (e.g. what is the point in applying for a job, since you have no direct control over whether you will be hired).

the most productive thing I can do at this point is attempt to secure a rescue without giving the people I am dealing with any further advantage by cooperating with them.

Plenty of people in this exact situation cooperate with the perpetrators, and end up getting their family members back. In fact getting them back through a rescue attempt is far more likely to result in their death. It is not blind hope that people decide to cooperate with kidnappers, it is based on evidence of previous success.

. I have ZERO assurance from them that they won't harm my family regardless, and even though it might seem like I would have nothing to lose by cooperating with them

You absolutely have something to lose by cooperating with them. You also have something to gain (your family). And if they are good at what they do, they will make that abundantly clear.

in the end, doing what they say would still leave them with more of an advantage than they would have had otherwise,

Sure if you do it wrong. Why do any kidnapping victims ever get let go? Why don't the captors *always* just keep them even after ransom has been paid?

, so in actuality, by *NOT* cooperating, I am actually maximizing my ability to subvert them.

False assumptions lead to often lead to false conclusions.

I'm not saying it never yields a desirable result.... only that overall, it has the best chance of yielding the most desirable result.

That is also not true. I am saying that every situation should be analyzed, and you are saying it doesn't matter what the situation is, the best solution is to not cooperate in all situations.

It's not terribly unlike it how it is statistically better to switch doors when Monty Hall gives you a choice to do so after opening one of the prize doors that you didn't pick.

It is nothing like the Monty Hall problem other than the applicability of "probability". The Monty Hall problem is a 1 player game.

This if anything is like game theory where there are more than 2 players. You can both win, you can both lose, you can win and they can lose, you can lose and they can win, and society as a whole can win or lose.

The goal of the kidnapper is to get the ransom payer on their side to the detriment of society. The kidnapper wants the money or drugs or whatever. The kidnapper usually doesn't care that much if the victim lives or dies (but may). The ransom payer wants their loved one back (and so does the loved one). Society wants the kidnapper to be caught 1st, and the victim to live second.

Re:Hmmm

[Agripa]

Also, they do have an obligation to help, just as certain as a fire department has an obligation to put out a fire even if you have not paid the applicable annual fees for emergency service to your home (although you would get billed quite heavily afterwards if that were the case), because to leave the situation unchecked can result in a much bigger problems if it should escalate beyond just the isolated incident,

They have no obligation to help:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:Hmmm

[Montezumaa]

Wrong. In fact, you couldn't be more wrong.

Here, try reading the following:

Warren v DC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Gonzalez v City of Castle Rock: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
DeShaney v Winnebego County Department of Social Services: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

The above are only three examples, among many, that help show just how flawed you logic(or lack thereof) is. I am an ex-law enforcement officer(which I wish to point out that, just as I thought myself to accurately and effectively use all types of firearms, which my father began when I was very young, I also took it upon myself to learn the portions of US laws, Georgia law(O.C.G.A.), and local ordinances that applied to my career, how it could and would affect me, etc. 10 to 12 weeks, and up six months, at the most, leave little time for much real training), and I can also state with direct knowledge that "law enforcement" and "training" is almost as big of a joke, and a fallacy, as anyone thinking law enforcement exists to provide personal security, or any services, to any one citizen, or any group of citizens. That applies equally to all areas and functions of government, at the federal, local, and/or state level(s).

Re:Hmmm

[mark-t]

Pursuant to the precedents you've mentioned, it is true that they have no obligation to protect private individuals who are not in any immediate danger.... if, however, your family has already been kidnapped and such a threat is made against you, then the only justification the police might have to not investigate is if they did not believe that you were telling the truth, in which case they would then be obligated to arrest *YOU* for filing a false police report. They would, of course, need to have some basis for such a conclusion, and in practice, they would probably take such a claim quite seriously.

If your family is not in any immediate danger, then there is every reason to think that the people making a threat wouldn't be able to carry out their intentions on your family in the first place, particularly since you have been made aware of someone's intention to do so, and can take precautions of your own. You may, however, still go to the police... not so much for any protection in that case as much as to make them aware of the situation, which may equip them better to deal with a larger scale problem.

Re:Hmmm

[Agripa]

There were other court decisions that I left out. Even immediate danger does not create any obligation. Absent statutory law saying otherwise, only a "special relationship" confers any duty to protect. The case I remember is one where detectives were staking out a business like a liqueur store and did nothing while observing a robbery get out of hand.

Kidnapping is a separate issue (and crime) which law enforcement tends to take seriously if they believe you which is not always the case.

he warned us about this

[imatter]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Makes me think about North/South Korea border

[KatchooNJ]

I wonder how long it will be before someone tries to fly a private drone into North Korea. No doubt they will try to shoot that sucker down, but this somehow made me think of that situation.

Re:Makes me think about North/South Korea border

[ponraul]

The DPRK already flies "drones" with cameras over the border. http://www.nbcnews.com/news/wo...

Re:Makes me think about North/South Korea border

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only would that probably get you into some extreme trouble with the SK/US military/gov. but you'd most likely be responsible for the shelling of a few SK islands or whatever it is kim feels like doing that day

Re:Makes me think about North/South Korea border

[es330td]

The DMZ is more than 2 miles wide; a drone would be noticed long before it got to the border. I have no doubt that Great Leader 3.0 would consider that a hostile act and respond with rounds lobbed over the border. I don't think anybody in South Korea is excited about antagonizing the crackpot dictator to the north.

Re:Makes me think about North/South Korea border

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking of North Korea, how the fuck is it possible for them to hold James Bond for 14 months and closer to death every day, and the idiots at MI6 can't even keep him tied down overnight? What. the. fuck. is. up. with. that?!

Re:Makes me think about North/South Korea border

[StikyPad]

I wonder how long it will be before drones are more heavily regulated than firearms.

Amazon Prime Drone Test

[Anonymous Coward]

Amazon delivers all kinds of stuff now to just about anywhere.

Prisoners are a capative audience...

[__aaclcg7560]

Must be a test run of Amazon's new delivery service. I hope that the home service delivers to the door and not drop packages willy-nilly in the yard.

Re:Prisoners are a capative audience...

[Farmer Tim]

In all fairness it was a very secure yard. OTOH it was already full of thieves, so swings and roundabouts...

Re:Prisoners are a capative audience...

[fustakrakich]

Why aren't they using owls?

Re:Prisoners are a capative audience...

[ScentCone]

No. If and when there's even a tiny manifestation of Amazon actually doing such deliveries, it's not going to be to residential front porches. It's going to be to things like pre-designated safe spots on the roof outside the mail room at a corporate office park, or into something interesting like a jump-chute funnel set up for the occasion next to loading docks or in back yards where a delivery rep has made a survey on behalf of very regular customers. People have this vision of powerful package carrying drones buzzing around at patio-level in suburban neighborhoods, and that's just simply never going to be how it's done.

Can we please stop...

[Anonymous Coward]

...calling hobby kit remote controlled planes 'drones?'

Please?

Re:Can we please stop...

[Anonymous Coward]

No. Fuck You!

Re:Can we please stop...

[TWX]

RC Aircraft isn't as ominous sounding as Drone. So no, as long as the word brings ratings to the news stations they'll continue to use it.

Re:Can we please stop...

[smoothnorman]

At least not until you provide us with a significantly more useful term. Remember: it has to be monosyllabic, suggestive, memorable, and rhyme with "bourguignon".

Re:Can we please stop...

[Spy Handler]

Drones are to RC aircraft what dogs are to wolves. They are almost the same and have 99% identical DNA, but there are a few key characteristics that set them apart.

First, drones require little to no flying skills on the part of the operator. Think RC helicopters from >10 years ago, very difficult to fly and maintain (especially piston-engine choppers, which you had to have if you wanted any kind of serious flying capability). You had to be an expert to not only fly one, but also build and service it. Nowadays you buy a quadcopter and it's ready to go, literally right out of the box with zero setup or adjustments. Modern electronics and gyros means you need no skill whatsoever to fly; just push the throttle and hold it and it hovers.

Second, some drones have autonomous capability. With built-in GPS and advanced algorithms, they fly themselves. You punch in pre-programmed waypoints and the drone will fly there, loiter and drop a payload or take pictures or whatever, and fly back to you. It's not remote controlled anymore.

Third, "drone" is easier to say than "RC model aircraft", which is a mouthful and requires explaining what RC stands for if you're writing a news article.

Re:Can we please stop...

[pipingguy]

"First, drones require little to no flying skills on the part of the operator."

Reminds me of some now-gone professions that used to require skill, talent, knowledge and natural ability. To some extent the new tools encourage shorter term planning, result in a reduced pride of workmanship, enable more feigned competence and allow entry of otherwise unsuitable people into the field.

Re:Can we please stop...

[Kohath]

Main difference: realtime first person video downlink

Re:Can we please stop...

[drinkypoo]

Can you please stop starting comments in the subject line?

Anyway, how do you know that it wasn't a drone? A $250 plane, $50 battery and about $400 worth of assorted electronics including a Pixhawk autopilot module, a lidar, and an airspeed detector will get you 30+ minutes of flight time out of a fixed wing aircraft which can definitely carry and subsequently drop a cargo weighing a pound — and handle its own takeoff and landing. Is that enough like a drone for you? Remote telemetry costs more.

Re:Can we please stop...

[stackOVFL]

I once thought as you do. But I though about it and decided they are in a different class from R/C Aircraft. Here's may first cut as to why I think that: They're not R/C planes with wings and ailerons and such. Nor are they R/C helicopters (very hard to learn to fly). They are gyroscopically stabilized flying platforms. Next a R/C plane requires skill to pilot (normally) whereas these quad copters are very easy to fly. Minimal assemble skill is required to get it in the air whereas most R/C kits require skill and time to build. But my final reason to think of them differently: R/C Aircraft have not cause such a huge media kerfuffle as these drone. To attempt to minimize the impact on the innocent R/C crowd I will call them "drones"

Re:Can we please stop...

[drinkypoo]

I once thought as you do. But I though about it and decided they are in a different class from R/C Aircraft. Here's may first cut as to why I think that: They're not R/C planes with wings and ailerons and such. Nor are they R/C helicopters (very hard to learn to fly).

Wow, you have literally no idea what you are talking about. An ardupilot will turn any typical R/C plane or helicopter into a drone, which will fly itself. They cost around $30. If you want GPS, that's another $30-50. Lidar for elevation detection is about $50. Air speed, another $50. But if you want to run that lidar sensor you'll need a more expensive autopilot, about $200. You can use a sonic sensor on the $30 ardupilot, but that's really only good for quads and copters, not for planes. It is literally under $100 to turn basically any R/C model into a drone, or under $500 for a drone with autonomous takeoff and landing.

Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[XxtraLarGe]

They can't even keep drugs out of the prisons WITHOUT drone delivery. The entire war on drugs has cost the U.S. untold billions of dollars and what do we have to show for it? We'd be much better off as a country if everything was legalized and the money currently spent on drug war law enforcement/court system/prison system was spent on drug rehab for those who actually developed a problem.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[The-Ixian]

Couldn't agree more.

As alcohol has proven, most people use drugs responsibly because there are social and economic pressures to do so.

Legalize drugs, make a huge revenue stream on taxation of said drugs and now you don't have an entire army to employ and equip and you put the people you are currently fighting against out of business.... It really seems like a no-brainer

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[cyberchondriac]

I agree for the most part; maybe not quite so much where the really hard stuff like heroin is concerned, and their addiction has led them to commit violent crimes. The war on weed is certainly stupid, as are the ridiculous restrictions on sudafed because of meth cookers.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[bluefoxlucid]

We'd be much better off for social policy reasons, maybe. We'd be slightly better off for economic reasons, but only slightly.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[drinkypoo]

I agree for the most part; maybe not quite so much where the really hard stuff like heroin is concerned, and their addiction has led them to commit violent crimes.

That's not how it works. These drugs are cheap as hell to produce, that's why there's so amazingly much profit in selling them. Prohibition, yeah, but if they were expensive to make then the economics still wouldn't work out. The crime comes from junkies who can't get their fix... you can see where this is going.

The war on weed is certainly stupid, as are the ridiculous restrictions on sudafed because of meth cookers.

Now meth, that's a get-up-and-do-things drug. That's genuinely harmful to society. Sure, some people just get up and clean their bathroom. And some people go out and look for fun, in a condition in which their judgement is severely impaired. But yes, we wouldn't have stupid restrictions on antihistamines if we didn't have evil drug policy.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Ichijo]

As alcohol has proven, most people use drugs responsibly because there are social and economic pressures to do so.

Except when cities encourage irresponsible alcohol use.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[ADRA]

Well, certainly laws against drug -users- are certainly ineffective and very much harmful in any form of rehbilitation or 'common good'. Even if they limited the crime to a slap on the wrist non-criminal fine, it would probably be sufficient to keep drugs out off the (literal) streets.

As for dealers (carrying pounds of coke for instance), I'm all for locking them up the same as always. Its one thing to be supportive of those in the worst situations, and its another to carte-blanche welcome harmful drugs into common accessibility.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[ai4px]

except when the taxing authorities get too greedy! Taxes on cigarettes in NY cause people to smuggle them in, and in the case of one man selling singles, the cost was his life. Making a coveted thing legal is great and I wholeheartedly agree. Thinking you can tax it at a high rate is really no different than making it illegal... the result is a black market.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[SydShamino]

I live on a residential block behind a few bars. If they had less parking, there would be more people parking in our neighborhood. We got the city to create a residential parking zone, with towing for non-residents, but it's only for one block; drunks could just park deeper into the neighborhood and walk a little further. And the thing about drunks walking home at 1 AM from a bar is that they are obnoxiously loud, like to urinate on whatever they happen to be near, and occasionally toss a brick through a car window just for grins.

So no thanks, I'd rather have mandatory parking on site. If you want to stop drunks from driving, catch them as they pull out of the parking lot. Or build cities to better support public transportation, and have that transportation run late enough into the night to service the evening crowd. Or legalize Uber and let their drivers///suckers deal with puke in their cars.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[XxtraLarGe]

Now meth, that's a get-up-and-do-things drug. That's genuinely harmful to society. Sure, some people just get up and clean their bathroom. And some people go out and look for fun, in a condition in which their judgement is severely impaired.

Meth used to be perfectly legal to buy and wasn't anywhere near the problem it is now. Just as with alcohol, and even "crack" cocaine, when you outlaw something, the potency tends to go up and the purity gets compromised because they cut it with whatever garbage they feel like adding.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

flog and/or cane drug users...much better than a fine.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[The-Ixian]

If you could alter meth to be less of a "keep you up for days" thing, the judgment would be a lot less impaired. The impairment comes from lack of sleep and the hallucinations that brings.

Tone down the super amphetamine aspect but leave the enhanced sexual pleasure aspect and you have yourself a real drug there...

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[alvinrod]

Actually, you still see benefits when decriminalizing harder drugs as Portugal has done.

It would be far better to spend the massive amounts of money it takes to house non-violent drug offenders in prisons on rehabilitating them in environments where it is cheaper to do so and won't make them want more drugs. Additionally, legalizing these drugs means that they generate taxable revenue which can be spent on rehabilitation programs and reduce the amount of money that needs to be spent on drug enforcement and housing prisoners, which has a nice side effect of allowing law enforcement to spend time dealing with other crime.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Ichijo]

If you wanted to open a bar in a city that doesn't stupidly allow people to store their personal property on taxpayer-owned land for free, wouldn't you be more inclined to either build abundant parking for your customers without the city forcing you to, or locate your bar near good transit options? See, both options eliminate customers parking in residential neighborhoods.

So it appears that in this case, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[drinkypoo]

Meth used to be perfectly legal to buy and wasn't anywhere near the problem it is now.

But then we started administering it to combat troops, who came home hooked on it. And they proceeded to get their friends and lovers hooked on it.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that's responsible use. In many communities overnight street parking is illegal. If the bar doesn't have parking, there is typically street parking somewhere nearby, or perhaps a pay by the hour lot nearby. Drunk, but not completely wasted drivers don't want tickets and figure they'll get some safely.

If a bar has a parking lot, the car can safely remain there overnight without trouble and the driver knows this. Thus he has no pressure other than the moths flying out of his wallet not to choose a cab or bus. And, if bus fare is what it is here, a drunk could easily ask for it from me---so long as I can lead them onto the bus (don't want to be scammed). But I'm not paying their $100 parking ticket, fuck that.

The unfortunate thing is when people who are vehemently anti-car get into the debate and try to spin it the wrong way, such as the fool you linked.

You know what *is* irresponsible, though? Journalism that includes statements such as this:

"If it were tougher to find parking around a bar, patrons would be more likely to walk, bike, get dropped off and picked up, or choose another watering hole."

Cycling while drunk is very dangerous and illegal. In fact, I can imagine it leading to even worse accidents, as drivers *know* running over a cyclist is certain death, whereas being sideswiped by a driver wandering in their lane is just very frustrating. That means the driver will do unsafe maneuvers like passing into oncoming traffic to avoid running over drunk cyclists.

He even thinks MADD is anti-drunk-driving. That's how out of touch this journalist is. He doesn't realize they're the modern incarnation of the WCTU. Their old leader left because of that. They have naught of value to say.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[NatasRevol]

Colorado has $100M+ in tax revenue from pot. Not much of a black market either.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Ichijo]

In many communities overnight street parking is illegal... If a bar has a parking lot, the car can safely remain there overnight without trouble and the driver knows this.

I see. Cities must force bars to provide abundant, free parking where they've made overnight street parking illegal. So they "fix" problems caused by a freedom-robbing law by adding another freedom-robbing law. It's a comedy of errors!

So as you can see, once again, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Lumpy]

The entire system is not for criminals it's for profit. Anyone thinks that a prison is keeping you safe is incredibly delusional.

The really scary violent ones, put down, like the guy eating a bag of human ears at his trial... safe to put that one to death. The rest community service.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Lumpy]

Or how about cops get off their asses and do their jobs and hang around the parking lot. Spot drunkard dave walking to his car, stop him.

Take away their cars and guns and force them to be civil servants they took an oath to be. So few cops get killed in the line of duty each year there is NO reason for them to be armed at all times.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

Better, sure, in the sense that at least you're admitting that you are literally violently opposed to the idea of human beings owning their own bodies?

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[XxtraLarGe]

Colorado has $100M+ in tax revenue from pot. Not much of a black market either.

There's a tipping point. It's not that you can't have any taxes, it's just that you can't tax too much. However, I think if pot was legal, and I wanted to smoke it, I'd probably just grow my own. I have a bad enough memory as it is though, so i just avoid it.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[drinkypoo]

Take away their cars and guns and force them to be civil servants they took an oath to be. So few cops get killed in the line of duty each year there is NO reason for them to be armed at all times.

I don't think the problem is the guns, I think the problem is the mentality, and hiring people with that mentality on purpose. And that mentality is that "civilians" (like the cops are, though they think otherwise) are a lower form of life.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, it's called the laffer curve. The exorbitant taxes on alcohol in Ontario mean that I bring plenty back with me after every US vacation (you're legally allowed to bring a certain amount back). I don't drink much already and $2 for what I can get in NY for under a buck keeps my thirst away. And, frankly, that's not the most egregious pricing there. This is getting closer, and not even of decent proof (never mind the idiotic label).

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[swb]

maybe not quite so much where the really hard stuff like heroin is concerned,

The problem with that is that from a pharmacology perspective, opiates aren't even as dangerous as alcohol. You can be on a maintenance dose of opiates for the rest of your life -- it's actually the preferred treatment for addiction via methadone or buprenorphine maintenance.

The problem with opiate use usually involves IV injection and addiction to the "rush" that comes after injection and the need to consume increasing amounts to get that rush. Combine this with illicit supplies of unknown potency and you end up with overdoses.

Alcohol is nasty, toxic stuff, but we (mostly, if you ignore the alcoholics, drunk drivers, domestic violence, the college students that die from alcohol poisoning...) manage to make it work because we have a couple of millenniums worth of experience with it and have elaborate laws, social customs and norms that basically keep most people from getting hopelessly addicted or dying.

There's no good reason we couldn't teach people how to use opiates on demand and avoid physical dependence.

I even question why it would even be bad if someone was addicted to some maintenance-type dose of an opiate. We expect people to take anti-depressants basically forever, yet no one crows over how "addicted" they are to them, yet these are people who take a drug every day because it makes them feel better. Why would it *matter* whether the drug they took was fluoxetine or oxycodone? It's not like fluoxetine is side-effect free, either.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

>I see. Cities must force bars to provide abundant, free parking where they've made overnight street parking illegal. So they "fix" problems caused by a freedom-robbing law by adding another freedom-robbing law. It's a comedy of errors!

Many of the communities banning overnight parking are in areas where it snows. It is expensive and difficult to plow streets strewn with cars. Depending on the area and how whiny residents are about having cars in front of their houses, the laws range from "heavy snowfall only" to "all winter" to "all year".

It is understandable that the city does not want to spend the extra it costs to plow streets full of cars, not to mention they wish to absolve themselves of liability for cars inevitably damaged by plows.

Now, I'm not suggesting the government isn't the issue and that people aren't better at solving their own problems (I completely agree and consider myself a Libertarian :) ), however, these are both cases which actually have relatively simple explanations that are likely to be arrived at by just about anyone who has to experience the issues at hand. The heavy hand of government sucks when it uses excuses to go full monty with parking bans even in the summer, rather than the obvious "There's a blizzard forecast tonight, no cars please" but, well, so long as people vote they're going to vote less for the minimum and more for the "How can I make my house look better and raise my property value?" or the equally dumb "How can we make driving more of a pain in the ass so by the time electric cars are here nobody drives, that way the 'climate change' excuse doesn't wear thin?".

Personally, I honestly believe that if there were no regulations at all regarding bars and parking, a vast majority of bars would have parking where there's any likelihood of someone driving to one. Actually, where I am, there isn't regulation regarding bars and parking (though I imagine that's uncommon) apart from rules about X handicapped spaces per Y sq meters of lot (if you have a lot). The only bars (and nightclubs) with no parking are deep in downtown where parking already sucks and anybody with a car works hard to avoid even accidentally driving there. There are, however, overnight parking lots not too far away, though they do charge. The majority of bars here do have parking and all of them allow overnight parking when they do.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[fafalone]

It's sad the people still have this breakdown in logic and their emotions overwhelm them when it comes to "seriously dangerous" drugs like heroin or crack. Just what part of the problem with these drugs do you think is ameliorated by prohibition? If anything, it's even more critical that these drugs are legalized:
-Cocaine and heroin represent the vast majority of global organized crime and related violence. The exact same points about never stopping other substances apply even harder here. Doesn't matter how "bad" the drugs are, you're never ever going to stop global organized crime from reaping billions upon billions of dollars through prohibition.
-Locally, it's these drugs that are responsible for the large majority of secondary crimes against non-involved parties, such as robbery and property crimes, to fund addictions. People aren't robbing and stealing for their pot or MDMA habits, which I assume aren't "really" hard by your standards. These crimes aren't committed because of the drugs inherent biological response pattern in an addict (unlike alcohol, which DOES make violent behavior more likely), they're committed because prohibition results in a cost structure that puts maintaining a habit very difficult without wealth or crime. Alcohol and cigarettes are cause dependence just as strong in an addict, and I guarantee if an addiction to those cost hundreds of dollars per day, you'd see the exact same related violence.
-Even when it comes to "really hard" drugs, there's simply no evidence that legalization would lead to increased addiction, because do you really think there's thousands and thousands of people just waiting to go out and get addicted to heroin if only it were available from a doctor or pharmacist? It's legal to possess all drugs in Portugal, and they have no such usage spike. When you redirect money towards education and treatment and provide an environment where there's no fear of arrest for admitting you're a user, usage rates actually drop.
-With the financial and other aspects of acquisition, addicts are unable to hold jobs for a variety of reasons, and as heroin maintenance programs in other countries have shown, a steady cheap legal supply returns these people to functional, contributing members of society that can hold down jobs. And obviously there's health benefits associated with a legal pharmaceutical supply like OD prevention the most well known.
-People like to talk about "the children"... what kind of world do you want for yours if they wind up experimenting? A felony where getting caught twice or violating probation requirements means a lifetime of stigma. Interacting with dangerous criminal gangs to get an unknown product. Prison. Stigma attached to getting help. There is ZERO evidence that if we just crack down harder we're suddenly going to win the war on drugs and heroin, meth, and coke will vanish from the world, so no matter how much you wish that were the case, you're stuck with the reality that drugs are everywhere and kids experiment. If my kids made that mistake, I'd want them to get a safe product from a medical professional and be provided with non-abstinence-based education and have stigma-free access to well funded help and not be labeled a criminal and tossed into a cage and branded for life if they get caught. What do you want for yours? "a drug free world" is NOT an option.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[mongothesecond]

Northern California was only six months into legal marijuana dispensary grows when "home invasion" robberies started. It turned out that there were only so many harvesting teams. A couple teams made extra income after the harvesting by selling the information on which houses had large piles of pot waiting to be shipped out. Its going to have to be legalized everywhere in the country before a number of the inherent problems will ease up.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[ihtoit]

antihistamines??

I can buy loratidine over the counter - in fact my local supermarket has it next to the tampons and bandages.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a lot to show for it if you have invested in the prison industrial complex. If we didn't incarcerate people for non-violent victimless crimes, business owners would lose all those excellent profits.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Ichijo]

Anyway, there's more than one way to prevent customers of a business from parking in residential areas. When cities dictate to businesses how to prevent a problem instead of just the what to prevent, that's micromanaging.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[mjwx]

I live on a residential block behind a few bars. If they had less parking, there would be more people parking in our neighborhood. We got the city to create a residential parking zone, with towing for non-residents, but it's only for one block; drunks could just park deeper into the neighborhood and walk a little further. And the thing about drunks walking home at 1 AM from a bar is that they are obnoxiously loud, like to urinate on whatever they happen to be near, and occasionally toss a brick through a car window just for grins.

So no thanks, I'd rather have mandatory parking on site. If you want to stop drunks from driving, catch them as they pull out of the parking lot. Or build cities to better support public transportation, and have that transportation run late enough into the night to service the evening crowd. Or legalize Uber and let their drivers///suckers deal with puke in their cars.

You can do what Australia does, give every police officer a breathalyser and training on how to use it. If you blow over the limit you have the option of accepting the punishment or requesting a blood test that will be more accurate.

High range drink driving is so rare over here that anyone blowing 0.10 or over (twice the legal limit) is national news.

Also make the punishment fit the crime. Not just fines, revoke their license or impound their car if they keep driving on a suspended license.

As for parking at bars, there's plenty of reasons why you should have it. I could be the designated driver, drinking soft drinks whilst shuttling my drunk mates about, I could have just popped in for 1 beer with colleagues after work or I might be there for a meal with family or friends and not consume enough alcohol to put me over the legal limit (or any alcohol at all).

If you want to reduce drink driving, you need to target the culture that permits it, not the means. If you take away the car parks all the drink drivers will do is park on the street. If they're willing to risk a DUI charge, do you honestly think a parking ticket is going to stop them?

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Zargg]

Has it not occurred to you that people can go to a bar and drink, and upon leaving, still be under the legal limit?

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Ichijo]

If something is legal, does that automatically make it morally right?

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[kheldan]

It isn't just drugs. Where I live, in local news, I heard about how the County board of supervisors had written and passed a rule that said vending machines in County facilities had to contain at least 50% food products that were 'healthy'. When the current contracts with vending machine operators was up, none of the companies except one bid on the contract; the one that did, said they could only provide about 25% 'healthy' snacks. The reason why: the 'healthy' snacks don't sell. At all. They'd sit in the machines until they were expired and had to be thrown out. People would just go somewhere else to get the unhealthy snacks they wanted instead, even if it was inconvenient for them. That's the sort of world we're living in: people want what they want, regardless of whether it's going to probably kill them 20 or 30 or 40 years down the road. They'd rather smoke and drink and eat shitty foods because they taste good, and never get exercise because it's less pleasant than sitting around smoking drinking and eating shitty food that tastes good. Or doing drugs. Or whatever. So of course if you try to tax something to make it less appealing people are going to turn to illegal sources to get the shitty unhealthy things they want anyway.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Zargg]

Not always, but in this situation society has specifically defined what is responsible use, which means that you can go to dinner, have a drink, and drive home. I find that morally right for people to follow what society has defined as normal and acceptable behavior.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

Cops sitting in the parking lot of a bar is called entrapment around here (NYS). On the other hand the police do appear to be lazy here as well. I watched someone cut off a police car while doing a "right-on-red" in front of them (when the cruiser had right of way) and they still didn't bother. They said that they were going to start actively monitoring the cars parking under no parking signs within the city... the result was that they ended up removing the signs, as it was easier than the paperwork. If the cops around here don't get their name in the news paper they won't bother.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's think about legalisation. I really don't support people wasting their lives with drugs. It is just sad. That being said locking up people who are not really causing other people any real problems is worse. Certainly I could see drug rehab programs being part of insurance plans, provided the person seeking treatment is actually trying.

Health insurance works on the idea that a pool of people pay for the ones who get sick, but what if the person is deliberately trashing their health with drugs? Certainly, if drug abuse was detected when you got sick, and that abuse is related to why you are sick, then I think you should have a bigger bill.

Now, what about the case of government assistance. Should that be reduced if your taking drugs to the point of being unlikely to be able to hold a job? That seems reasonable to me, yet you can't entirely ignore those that are hooked on drugs and desperate. It is better to give them a place to go to get some sleep and a meal when they need it, than to toss them in jail. Once there you can try to get them off the crap. At any rate, the point being to try to minimize actions that encourage people to be non productive, which is another sad thing about all the people in jail for non violent crimes.

I think it is something like 1% of the population is in jail, so you loose the productivity of 1% of the populous, plus the productivity that all those involved in the system of police, prosecution, judicial, and prison systems related to those cases, plus the sheer money drain to pay for all this which comes from the rest of the populous. According to wikipedia the cost of all this stuff is more than 200 billion dollars a year.

I personally think it would be cheaper to fix the laws so people that don't need to be in jail aren't and to also spend money on after school programs and programs that help make sure people don't fall into the cracks that leads to them being in jail, since that way they end up productive...

All in all while neither the Democratic nor the Republican philosophies are perfect, it does seem to me that the Democratic ones are more interested in fixing problems, while the Republican ones seem more interested in either punishing people, ignoring problems, or just making wild unrealistic feel good statements, like if you just elected me, I would get Iran to do everything we could ever want and then some, or my favourite, "We can solve all our problems with people dying from guns so frequently with more guns.'' The last they of course stick with despite all evidence to the contrary.

Maybe we need a constitutional amendment to teach logic and reasoning in school...

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

if you just wanted to smoke some, I doubt you'd put in the investment of the several months it takes to grow it lol. And if you have cats, forget growing it as they love it too and will constantly seek to consume / destroy it.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

like adderall? lol

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

I'm assuming you've never actually lived with an "opium addict". The changes in attitudes, the loss of perception, snappiness, angry outbursts, nodding off, reduced metabolism, I could go on and on. My "sample size" isn't just one person either. There really isn't a "maintenance-type" dose, the human body quickly become tolerant and needs more for the same euphoric effect and at the same time the numerous side-effects become more pronounced.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[swb]

I had a hand injury that resulted in my left ring finger being amputated at the distal joint and my middle finger being fused at the distal joint.

60 mg/day oxycodone for two weeks, 5-15 mg for another 3-4 months. I was supposed to take the 60 mg dose for longer than two weeks, but dialed it back just as soon as the pain levels were manageable because the somnambulism and sluggishness were too much to take.

Quit before the pills ran out, never once had an urge to get more or keep taking it. No physical signs of dependence I could tell (ie, no mystery flu-like symptoms, increased pain perception, etc) Yes, the euphoria was nice but even at lower doses it made me kind of sluggish a couple of hours after taking it which was kind of a disincentive.

If opiates are so addictive, why wasn't I hooked after months of opiate use? My theory is that I didn't take the large doses (which were about 10 mg/4 hours) for a long enough time to truly gain physical dependence. My lower doses were spaced enough that the half life was shorter than the time between doses, inhibiting physical dependence. Can't really explain the lack of psychological/habit forming dependence other than the euphoria wasn't good enough to outweigh the sluggishness.

My larger point, though, seems illustrated by this -- you can take opiates without raging addiction and that it's possible indicates that it's how you take it that determines how likely you are to get addicted. I agree that chasing the euphoria/rush contributes to addiction, but I didn't really see a big change in the euphoria. I used to chew my tablets for faster onset and I think the euphoria was pretty consistent throughout.

The opiates are always addictive and leads to uncontrolled addiction line of reasoning doesn't explain why everyone who has ever used heroin isn't dead, either. I suspect that the volume of heroin sold versus the number of serious addicts doesn't line up and there are users that don't fit the media narrative who DO hit a maintenance dose on their own which they don't exceed. Physically dependent? Probably, but so long as they're functional they probably can stay at that level indefinitely. It's the entire theory behind methadone and buprenorphine maintenance.

It's kind of the same with alcohol. Alcohol is addictive, but only some people become addicted to it. Mostly because people follow rules and control their dosage and don't become addicted.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[XxtraLarGe]

I can buy loratidine over the counter - in fact my local supermarket has it next to the tampons and bandages.

Anything with pseudoephedrine in it. I use Claritin D (loratidine w/pseudoephedrine sulfate) and you have to sign a statement that it is for your use and you're not going to sell it to meth dealers, i.e. you're not a "smurf" as they put it in Breaking Bad.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[cyberchondriac]

I suspect some of that comes down to genetics too; some people seem more predisposed to addiction, particularly alcohol, than others. Yet others simply have more willpower, still others perhaps less stress in their lives - there are a number of factors, but agreed, not everyone becomes an addict. I've dealt with all that too, due to a messed up lower back/herniated discs and degenerative disc disease. For a while though, the best thing for it was going to the gym.. until I overdid it and blew my back out twice in a 4 month period.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Lumpy]

Yes if they act like thugs? yep. if they talk to you and say, you are drunk, I am not letting you drive, but I will call you a cab.

THAT is being a public servant and not scumbag street thug the typical cop loves to be.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[swb]

I think ultimately among people who get addicted there's probably some kind of natural imbalance that is fixed with opiates.

People who consume them in a way that's easiest to develop significant physical dependence (IV use, increasing dosage to increase the rush/euphoria at ingestion, etc) develop dangerous addictions that led to problems -- overdose risk as well as strong physical dependence coupled with the difficulty obtaining supplies that leads to all manner of social problems.

People with less aggressive usage patterns develop a physical dependence, but because they don't experience the strong euphoria of IV injection or consume large quantities that produce heavier physical dependence end up hitting a maintenance dose that makes them feel good but doesn't require constant and rapidly increasing dosages.

This was largely what addiction to opiates looked like around 1900 when oral opiates were commonly used -- pharmacists knew who the repeat customers were, and that may have helped keep them on more maintenance dosages.

Big picture, I would suspect that some people have a natural opiate imbalance that is "fixed" with low dosages of opiates, just like people with serotonin imbalances are fixed with low dosages of SSRIs. From what I've read, a lot of long term opiate users on maintenance doses say it just makes them feel "normal".

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, resident of Colorado here.

Yes, we get that tax revenue and many businesses have sprung up around legal pot but there is a black market.

The black market exists for Colorado tokers because the taxes on recreational pot are high. I still have my black market connections from before pot was legal and they don't charge as much.

Even before recreational marijuana was legalized the source of my pot was from "medical marijuana" that had been diverted to the black market.

Of course, for non-state residents the black market has grown as people cross state lines, purchase more than non-residents are allowed to (7 grams for non-residents) and drive back to their home states and for growers who go back to wherever they came from with it.

I don't have hard statistics but anecdotally it seems like there has also been an increase in illegal growers who hope their crops will not be noticed amongst all the legal grow ops. Most of that pot seems to be destined for other states.

Those could be alleviated by reducing taxes (compare them to alcohol taxes sometime - it's astoundingly high) and legalizing nationwide.

There is also the issue of medical marijuana being about half the price of recreational pot in retail stores and medical recommendations being reduced to a joke or perhaps an annual bribe to a quack depending on how you look at it.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

Health insurance works on the idea that a pool of people pay for the ones who get sick, but what if the person is deliberately trashing their health with drugs? Certainly, if drug abuse was detected when you got sick, and that abuse is related to why you are sick, then I think you should have a bigger bill.

Let's take that to the logical conclusion: anything you do that affects your health, or that could affect your health, or that in some cases in known to affect other people's health (and thus potentially could affect yours) should lead to higher health insurance bills for you.

Therefore, if you're a bit overweight, your bills are higher. Ok, that seems fair. In theory, people can do something about that, and I'm tired of hearing doctors talk about the obesity epidemic.

But what if you're a programmer or engineer, and thus almost by definition have a high stress job? Stress has direct physiological implications, it's not just something that "is in people's minds". Long term stress will lead to health problems? Shouldn't these folks pay higher health insurance premiums?

You don't have a well paying job like that? That's probably a source of stress in itself.

You tell me you have a long commute? That's a stress issue right there. People with long commutes should pay more.

What about all those city folks breathing the less-than-clean air of the cities? That's a health issue, shouldn't folks from the city pay more? People with short commutes should pay more, if they live in the city!

Where do we draw the line on things people do that affect their health, if we're going to demand they pay more for health insurance?

And, to take this one step further, if they have to pay more, won't that be likely to increase the stress in their lives, thus requiring them to pay more yet again?

Another thing to think about: all that private medical info will have to get reported to the insurance companies, who will doubtless be just as good at IT security as anybody else that doesn't specialize in it, which is to say "really bad".

Maybe we need a constitutional amendment to teach logic and reasoning in school...

We already teach logic and reasoning, in a class called "geometry". By logic is inherently limited to the assumptions one makes. The problem is giving people enough additional knowledge of the world they live in to be able to make sensible arguments.

This means a lot more education in applied science, history, and social science. Care to make the high school degree require another few years so we can get all that in? And what about all the future engineers and programmers who think its ok to not take classes in all that "soft stuff"? Do we let them get away with it? And how do we keep the system from turning everything into standards based education that only teaches memorization (like so much of the rest of the world)?

All in all while neither the Democratic nor the Republican philosophies are perfect, it does seem to me that the Democratic ones are more interested in fixing problems, while the Republican ones seem more interested in either punishing people, ignoring problems, or just making wild unrealistic feel good statements

There's no denying the Democrats are better at propaganda. Unfortunately, a lot of the problems we have result from their attempts at "fixes". You see, they get themselves re-elected by selling people hope that things will get better, through plans that seem like a good idea to the ignorant but aren't financially or economically sound. The net result is long term harm to the economy (and we've got some really big time bombs ticking away as a result). While they're just as corrupt as the Republicans, the Democrats probably do more harm. Both parties, of course, do considerable harm.

Re:Another indication of the failed war on drugs

[SydShamino]

If you wanted to open a bar in a city that doesn't stupidly allow people to store their personal property on taxpayer-owned land for free, wouldn't you be more inclined to either build abundant parking for your customers without the city forcing you to, or locate your bar near good transit options?

No, you would provide a small number of narrow and insufficient parking spaces, so customers can barely squeeze in and out of their stupidly oversized trucks or give up and park illegally in the lots of neighboring stores and businesses. Or they'll go park on a street anyway, paying a meter if the "storage" isn't free.

See, both options eliminate customers parking in residential neighborhoods.

Not even in the slightest. I don't think you understand people, especially people who frequent bars.

So it appears that in this case, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.

Oh, well you had an agenda to push. No wonder.

Welcome to Club Med...

[Anonymous Coward]

AKA the U.S. prison system. Where you get free drugs, healthcare, lodging, education, food, and sometimes internet. Where crime does pay.

Re:Welcome to Club Med...

[Ichijo]

This is why prisons, or something like them, should be open to everyone, without having to commit a crime or join the military.

Re:Welcome to Club Med...

[Anonymous Coward]

The borders are wide open, free perks for anyone crossing, why not?

Re:Welcome to Club Med...

[barc0001]

You mean "healthcare", "lodging" and "food". Haven't been paying attention to the medical neglect in the prison system I presume? Or the roach infested prisons, and the prisons handing out green bologna sandwiches and moldy bread?

It's like the good old days from a Dickens novel in some cases.

Before I die...

[invisibletank]

Drones are everywhere, being used for everything! Before I die, my estimate is that I will need to destroy some with a crowbar...

EMP

[ThatsNotPudding]

Is it possible to fashion an 'EMP gun' to at least direct the majority of the pulse at a target? Maybe just a jammer to interrupt either the GPS signal (or more likely) the remote control signal. Have to add it to the guard tower arsenals.

Re:EMP

[The-Ixian]

Hmmm... I hear sound waves are also effective against drones...

Re:EMP

[ledow]

Did you miss the bit where nobody noticed the drone until they checked the CCTV after the event?

Re:EMP

[Anonymous Coward]

Something like this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dj0q1EfIPww

Re:EMP

[jklovanc]

Is it possible to fashion an 'EMP gun' to at least direct the majority of the pulse at a target?

And then that pulse hits parts of the security system and it goes offline.

Maybe just a jammer to interrupt either the GPS signal (or more likely) the remote control signal.

It is against FCC rules to deploy radio wave jammers. The FCC won't even allow prisons to jam cell phones.

Re:EMP

[Rich0]

Is it possible to fashion an 'EMP gun' to at least direct the majority of the pulse at a target? Maybe just a jammer to interrupt either the GPS signal (or more likely) the remote control signal. Have to add it to the guard tower arsenals.

It actually is a lot harder than you think.

EMP has to be REALLY powerful to do something like fry circuits, and you can imagine the havoc that could cause in general (that drone is far away, lots of other computers are a lot closer even if not being aimed at). I don't know how long-range you can even direct EMP generated using conventional means - the stuff that wipes out cities is basically a byproduct of a nuclear explosion (as far as I understand it this is basically just synchrotron radiation from ionized air).

A GPS jammer is also hard to do since there is a simple countermeasure - put foil around the underside of the drone. The GPS satellites are above the drone, your jammer is below the drone. Your jammer is also going to cause a lot of problems with GPS systems all over the place.

Re:EMP

[Asgard]

http://hacknmod.com/hack/diy-e... would do it, and probably be highly dangerous to anything else along the beam -- such as a jetliner.

Re:EMP

[ihtoit]

doesn't stop the police and security services deploying jammers that aren't FCC certified (they'll never get certified because their single purpose is to interfere with radio communicaitons). Doesn't stop me from keying a bleedbox at 934MHz when I'm out on my bike either, you should be driving not fucking Facetiming with your lover.

Re:EMP

[ihtoit]

a SMALL EMP pulse can be had by ramping an arc welder to the max and shorting it through a four inch bolt.

Re:EMP

[Anonymous Coward]

Assuming drone here means quadcopter can't you take them out with a gloried party popper? Shoot something that tosses a bunch of pretty ribbons at (over) it

Re:EMP

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't stop me from keying a bleedbox at 934MHz when I'm out on my bike either, you should be driving not fucking Facetiming with your lover.

Newsflash: Not everyone inside a car is the driver.

Not that you actually act on the Internet Tough Guy fantasy you just posted, mind you.

Re:EMP

[jklovanc]

doesn't stop the police and security services deploying jammers that aren't FCC certified

Citation please. Even if true the police are allowed to a lot of things the others are not.

Doesn't stop me from keying a bleedbox at 934MHz when I'm out on my bike either,

Like the guy in Florida who was arrested for using a jammer. The issue is that jammers also interfere with legitimate calls like 911 and emergency vehicle communication.

you should be driving not fucking Facetiming with your lover.

Your jammer does not differentiate between driver, passengers, pedestrian or people parked on the side of the road. Basically you are causing no one to be able to use a cellphone near your bike. I would call that entitled. In fact, jammers decrease safety as they distract more from driving because the device does not work when it should. The driver will spend more time distracted trying to get the phone to work.

Re:EMP

[ihtoit]

search for PKI jammer, ESC Law Enforcement Supplies, the Homeland Security Act 2002, the fact that CELL PHONES COME WITH WARNINGS THAT THEY'RE NOT TO BE USED TO MAKE EMERGENCY CALLS, the Apple IMEI killswitch patent, the fact that TETRA (ERT radio systems) uses UHF rather than VHF hence is not vulnerable to commercially available jamming equipment, oh this is a pearler: the Metropolitan Police Service (a CIVILIAN agency) claims National Security considerations as an excuse to refuse to confirm that it is in fact using IMSI catchers and other equipment to interfere with OTA communications during times of what they would refer to as "civil unrest". This is the only link I'm giving you, search the rest yourself: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com... they're all over the fucking place.

Re:EMP

[ihtoit]

by the way, it is NOT illegal to OWN jamming equipment in the UK. A 934MHz PMR is considered jamming equipment but since the band was co-opted for GSM mobile services way back when, it's been illegal to OPERATE IT. Notwithstanding the fact that the police RARELY pursue such usage since it is practically impossible for them to differentiate between a 934MHz rig pair and a GSM phone conversation. They would have to literally catch you in the act of keying with the radio's display clearly showing Tx in the 934MHz band.

Re:EMP

[Anonymous Coward]

In other words, you have nothing, you know it, and you're desperately trying to hide your shame with a demand that the other guy shoulder the burden of proof for supporting the spurious claim that YOU made and couldn't support.

Re:EMP

[jklovanc]

PKI jammer, ESC Law Enforcement Supplies, the Homeland Security Act 2002,

Like I said, law enforcement is allowed do things the general public is not.

CELL PHONES COME WITH WARNINGS THAT THEY'RE NOT TO BE USED TO MAKE EMERGENCY CALLS

The FCC even has a page about it.

the Apple IMEI killswitch patent,

That kills one phone not all phones in an area.

confirm that it is in fact using IMSI catchers and other equipment to interfere with OTA communications

IMSI catchers do not interfere with communication

As for law enforcement using cellphone jammers try this scenario. Someone finds a bomb with a cell phone attached to it. Wouldn't it be prudent to jam cell phone signals in the area so it can not be remotely detonated while it is being defused? It might go off when the jamming starts but one can clear the area first.

PS. Using all caps just makes me laugh. Yelling is a sure sign of a weak argument.

Re:EMP

[Anonymous Coward]

Last I checked 'EMP guns' and jammers were quite illegal. Not to mention: how would the guards play around on facebook all day with EMPs and jamming going on?

Re:EMP

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

It's also against FAA rules to take out any flying craft, RC drone or 747. You can't even legally shoot one down if it's sitting outside your kids window filming them getting dressed.

Re:EMP

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

that's why all my bombs have a suicide circuit that goes off if it looses signal! And a motion detector so nothing can get within 10-15 feet of it.

Re:EMP

[ihtoit]

PS. Using all caps just makes me laugh. Yelling is a sure sign of a weak argument.

and calling out a stuck capslock key is a sure sign of an OCD freak with nothing to say.

Re:EMP

[jklovanc]

Considering you went back to lower case letters I call BS. We both know that is yelling on the internet.

Re:EMP

[jklovanc]

Like I said, clear the area before jamming the signal. As for the 10 to 15 feet range, if you do that it can not be set up near people defeating part of it's purpose.

The bomb is going to be defused or go off. I would rather have it go off when I had control of the situation rather than when the bomber wanted it to.

The war on drugs:

[Kohath]

Obviously a wise policy because it's clearly working great.

Re:The war on drugs:

[fustakrakich]

For some people, yes!

contraband cellphones are persistant problem

[peter303]

They always seem to find some in comphrehensive sweeps. Smaller old flip phones hide better. Getting them charged can be an issue in some prisons. So I presume outside communication is universal.

I remember a wardens petitioning the FCC for a jam-zone. But the FCC universally denes such requests, Plus the legal workers like using their phones anywhere.

Re:contraband cellphones are persistant problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Hang a very large net over the top of the prison yard walls or cage the whole thing in. Problem solved.

Re:contraband cellphones are persistant problem

[drinkypoo]

So how many layers of chicken wire do you have to hang to completely block cellphones? Is it just one? That stuff is cheap enough to where it's fairly feasible to actually do that.

Re:contraband cellphones are persistant problem

[wbr1]

Many prisons are starting to use stingray type devices. If they cannot jam, they will track. Enough data points from called persons will easily track down the potential owners of a phone.

http://www.ibtimes.com/new-tec...

I was never a gang member, but due to my background I was the 'fix-it' guy. See if you can make a soldering gun out of pencil and an AC adapter. Then use it to desolder parts from devices to fix others...

I was a fair hand at this trade, and because it was pretty harmless, most of the guards ignored it. I was however trusted, and often phones came to me to either fix a busted charger/charge port, or for flip phones with a hard to conceal charging base, wire in a different charging mechanism. Those were fun jobs. Far better than replacing the thermal fuse in a fan coil.

Re:contraband cellphones are persistant problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Cell phones tend to be pretty high frequency, you would need to end up with pretty small holes.

Just using sheet metal would probably be easier.

Re:contraband cellphones are persistant problem

[drinkypoo]

Cell phones tend to be pretty high frequency, you would need to end up with pretty small holes.

I am math-deficient, so I'm not even going to try. How small?

Radio jamming needed

[superdave80]

Between drones and cell phones, we are going to have to start allowing prisons to jam radio frequencies around their immediate area to prevent this. The technology is too cheap and widespread to think that they can keep an eye out for drones and smuggled cell phones.

Re:Radio jamming needed

[The-Ixian]

I guess the low-tech solution would be to just cover the open yards with some kind of mesh.

Re:Radio jamming needed

[jklovanc]

Jamming is not all that selective or containable. The FCC does not allow prisons to jam cell phones because it can effect cell phones outside of prison and interrupt emergency services. What do you think would happen if someone died half a mile from the prison because they could not contact 911?

Re:Radio jamming needed

[plover]

Aside from the illegality of jamming radio frequencies, drones can be programmed to guide themselves to and from a destination without requiring an operator to fly them via real-time radio control. Jamming would be a very expensive solution that would be completely irrelevant before it was even deployed.

Drones mirror the Internet

[kheldan]

Just like the Internet, they're a wonderful, innovative, imaginative idea originally developed by inspired, educated minds, created with the full intention of being something helpful to mankind.. and just like the Internet, are now being twisted and perverted into something to aid and abet acts of stupidity and criminal activity.

I like these precise little drones, I think they're pretty damned cool, really, especially since I saw the earlier videos of whole fleets of them, flying in complex, dynamic, ever-changing formations, like some aerial court dance; it made me wonder what incredible things can we do with this? But then people had to get their hands on them, and do stupid things with them, and now criminal things with them. Now they're going to be on a downward slide towards being illegal for the average person to own, or at least so highly regulated that you may as well not bothers. Nice going, people, great job fucking up something cool for 99.99% of us yet again.

Re:Low-tech versions

[Anonymous Coward]

Not a long time ago, there was this new story about a cat that was caught with similar payload tied around its body. One low-tech equivalent, right there (though controlling a cat is a lot harder than controlling a drone).

Obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

So, why didn't the guards have #8 shot?

Simpler methods

[phorm]

Indeed. There are plenty of lower-tech ways that drugs get into prisons. For example, here's a good example caught right on camera (yet officials are still scratching their heads as to where this stuff comes from).

What???

[Anonymous Coward]

I read about this three days ago. Only now it shows on /.??? Talk about your obsolete news site. I'm tired of seeing old news here. Goodbye.

Re:What???

[xenotransplant]

I told my local newspaper printer the same thing. He didn't care. Do you think slashdot does?

Drone shipping has no boundaries

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently prisoners use Amazon Prime too.

Package was wrapped in panties

[Anonymous Coward]

and a lave bra, that someone is probably wearing as we speak.

Drone used by lazy drug dealer.

[Lumpy]

What a stupid idea to use a drone. you can EASILY use a trebuchet or other setup to lob them into the yard from a distance. hell you can set up a nice big slingshot to do it without attracting any attention.

Unlike a slow moving device that is obvious as hell as it sounds like a large hive of angry bees.

Re:Drone used by lazy drug dealer.

[ihtoit]

at 1500 feet you won't even hear a micro UAV like a quadcopter, much less see it.

Re:Drone used by lazy drug dealer.

[Anonymous Coward]

Drones can travel MUCH farther than a trebuchet, and can fly high enough to be inaudible and impossible to spot. With a trebuchet you'd need to be within 2000 feet of the yard, and you'd have to be accurate enough at range to land inside the yard; not an easy proposition.

Re:Drone used by lazy drug dealer.

[stackOVFL]

Except in this case they did:

but surveillance tapes clearly showed a drone hovering over the yard and dropping a package that turned out to contain tobacco, marijuana, and heroin. A spokesperson for the prison said this was not the first time they've had an incident involving a drone, but they wouldn't go into specifics.

finally

[MossStan]

a viable use for drones.

I'm more concerned with the people being

[waspleg]

assassinated by them than by prison yard drops.

Re:I'm more concerned with the people being

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd rather be assassinated than murdered. Makes me feel important.

NCIS

[ihtoit]

I thought this sounded familiar.

(not "Kill Chain" or "Twilight", I'm thinking the one where a drone bird (a toy, pretty much) was used to drop something into the yard of a Federal slam and McGee has a play with the retrieved vehicle, much to the amusement of DiNozzo).

Helicopter...

[Etherwalk]

A guy in Quebec got boosted from prison by a helicopter coming to pick him up. A *Helicopter*. Drones are cheaper and an easy way to get stuff in.

The end result will be prisons will likely be given permission to shoot down drones within a geofenced area.

its about time..

[Anonymous Coward]

While I do not encourage others to break the law, but this is a long time and coming..
Look at good fellas,
drones are one way, smuggling is another,, seriously, the drones u can stop, but the addiction you cannot..

instead of sensationalize this event, why not sensationalize the new plan to get inmates clean???
Whats wrong with re-hab in prison?
I mean it is a correctional facility right? Correct the addiction and the behavior..
fuc*ing stoopid!

simples

[Anonymous Coward]

don't have prisons.

Worthless drug addicts

[Anonymous Coward]

I love technology, but I hate what potheads do with it.

yep.

[Anonymous Coward]

Prelude to Deathmatch sports betting. guns knives "care" packages etc...

Drug them into submission?

[Rande]

Why not just give them as much heroin and weed (and other downers) as they can consume? The police confiscate plenty that would otherwise just be destroyed.
Keep the prisoners chilled out to the max.