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Mugger Arrested After Victim Spots Him On Facebook's 'People You May Know' (bgr.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from BGR: In a somewhat bizarre story which proves that truth is often stranger than fiction, a serial mugger in England was arrested after one of his victims spotted him under Facebook's 'People you may know' section.Originally reported by the BBC, 21-year old Omar Famuyide had a long history of theft, muggings and armed robberies to his name. Not too long ago, Famuyide brandished a knife and stole a car.
Flash forward a bit, and the victim of said car robbery was recently shocked to see Famuyide's face pop up as a suggested friend he might want to add on Facebook. The victim promptly called the police who quickly managed to tie him to a large number of other violent crimes. By the time the dust settled and the full extent of Famuyide's criminal rampage was revealed, Famuyide was sentenced to 17 years in prison.
His Facebook profile ultimately led to charges of robbery, attempted robbery, and possessing a firearm.
Flash forward a bit, and the victim of said car robbery was recently shocked to see Famuyide's face pop up as a suggested friend he might want to add on Facebook. The victim promptly called the police who quickly managed to tie him to a large number of other violent crimes. By the time the dust settled and the full extent of Famuyide's criminal rampage was revealed, Famuyide was sentenced to 17 years in prison.
His Facebook profile ultimately led to charges of robbery, attempted robbery, and possessing a firearm.
The mugger likely searched the victim on FB after the mugging.
FB saw one person searching out another and suggested the pairing to the victim.
With only 50 FB friends and a hidden profile, FB gives me suggestions all of the time.
Often, the suggestions only make sense if the suggested friend had tried searching for me on FB.
Criminals MAY acquire and use guns, but it makes prosecution MUCH easier because by possession they have committed an irrefutable crime already.
US homicide rates are about 3 times higher. Lets be clear here, the rest of the world doesnt envy the US; when it comes to gun law we genuinely believe that you are totally and irredeemably batshit insane, and can only watch in horror.
Seriously though. Do you think the guy that is willing to stick that knife into you gives a shit about the law saying you can't carry a knife? That's the silliness of such laws. You make it impossible for law abiding people to have any means of defense and render them helpless while doing nothing to impede the lawless. If I'm willing to murder and or rob you then why do I care about a weapons charge?
What use is your do when the criminal is pointing a gun at your head? What happens if you miss? What happens if you drop your gun because you're terrified. If guns are magic wands that keep you safe, why doesn't the US have the lowest crime rate in the developed world? I'm not against gun ownership but I'm tired of the bullshit.
Because it allows police to have good reason to arrest someone when they stop and search them and find the knife. Why is this so difficult for you to grasp? Stop trying to peddle your idiotic American gun culture on the rest of the planet. It is clearly the reason why you have so many shootings. I enjoy my city and I don't want it to become a dangerous shithole like the US is.
I guess we just define freedom differently. To you, freedom is walking down the street feeling safe because you're allowed to carry a firearm. For me, freedom is walking down the street feeling safe without needing to carry a firearm.
And we have much lower crime rates again if we pretend all the high crime areas in our countries don't exist. Fuck me I'm sick of that stupid argument.
By that logic the gang areas should be super safe because they're full of guns. Home invasions are virtually unknown in the area I live in but there are few guns, legal or otherwise. The causes of crime tend to be poverty, family breakdown, poor education and sociopaths. There is no shortage of criminals in Eastern Europe where there are virtually no black people.
Why are police stopping and searching people? Have they done something wrong? Given that police don't have x-ray vision or mind-reading powers, how many people do you think police would have to stop and search before finding someone in possession of something illegal? How many daily searches would you tolerate?
So, on the extremely small chance that someone physically stronger than you, threatens you (without a gun of course) and you happen to have a gun and can operate it effectively while freaked out (and not accidentally shoot someone else or yourself which is more likely), you're willing to sacrifice all the other lives lost to guns? Like children under 5 who die or kill others every week in America because they kill themselves with a misplaced gun?
You're pretty sick.
"the rest of the world doesnt envy the US; when it comes to gun law we genuinely believe that you are totally and irredeemably batshit insane, and can only watch in horror."
That's an understatement.
Other countries after massacres think "hmm, perhaps we should do something to fix this".
And fix it.
American's seem to think that massacres means more guns should be introduced and start buying more while screaming "Obama about to tell the army to attack Texas and take all my guns!!!". That's right, ask all the soldiers that come from Texas to attack their own families. Yet a large proportions of American's genuinely believe that will happen, just like they believe the world's only a few thousand years old.
And now they've got Trump one step away from punching the big red nuke button.
"Batshit insane" just scratches the surface of how messed up America is.
I don't understand why the tons of accidental shooting deaths and injuries, in addition to all of the intended shootings that happen just because one or both parties are armed and the situation escalates, are totally acceptable to those that cite 'defense'.
I'd think the freedom not to die from some irrational fucktard's anger, or from some stray bullet going though your apartment wall due to some dude next door playing with his gun, might be a little more important than this almost-entirely-hypothetical 'freedom' to 'defend' yourself.
Plenty of US cities have laws like you suggest. They are the cities with the worst gun crime.
Strangely, you made the guy's point for him. Your country's laws are such that the only people with weapons are criminals, so much so that the sight of a weapon identifies someone as a criminal. This is common knowledge for the non-criminals in your country. It's probably also common knowledge for the criminals. You all do have a point though; if the criminals know that nobody has any means to defend themselves beyond their fists, then there is less need to carry a firearm. Criminals can overpower victims with far less.
I don't quite understand the suggestion that anyone was trying to tell your country how it should run. I think you should have whatever laws you'd like in your country. Uniform laws breed ignorance, much like the content of your comment. With diverse laws, we have actual data from different jurisdictions. It's never pure, because there are always confounding variables, but it's enough to make a pretty strong argument for leaving 2nd amendment rights in tact for the people that want to exercise them.
The UK had a similar ratio lower murder rate before they enacted gun laws. I'm an Aussie and our murder rate has declined at about the same rate it was declining before our gun laws.
When I left school in QLD you could buy military style semiautomatics over the counter, no license, no waiting period. We didn't carry them about like Americans seem to. A few mass shootings and they got banned. But even with the mass shootings our overall murder rate was declining and was far less than the US.
I suspect that bringing in gun laws like the UK and Australia have to the US is a recipe for disaster. It would be more likely to spark a civil war than decrease deaths.
There's a reason for that risk of civil war and that is the second amendment. In Australia our gun laws were brought in legally. John Howard demanded the states implement uniform gun laws or he would have a referendum to change the constitution to give the federal government the power to do it. If our laws had violated our constitution I might have stocked up on guns like many Americans do.
If I was American I would be totally against federal gun laws without constitutional change.
Guns have one purpose: To maim or kill another living being, either a human or an animal. There is absolutely no other use for a gun. Using a gun to intimidate someone, is to threaten them with the possibility of being maimed or killed.
Even target shooting (which I sometimes participate in myself) is nothing more than training for using a gun to maim or kill.
That's it. Firearms have literally no uses that are non-destructive.
Eat the rich.