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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 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
Why would the victim be shocked? They shared the same car so they must be friends, right?
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.
The UK has strict gun control, which is just as effective as posting "Gun-Free Zone" signs.
The number of gun murders per capita in the US in 2012 was around thirty times that of the UK. Genuinely interested in what you think this difference is down to if not a strong legislative and cultural approach to gun control.
The mugger likely searched the victim on FB after the mugging.
And this is the reality. You can't do anything on Facebook (even searches) without being caught in one of their algorithms to increase their profit (in this case, by increasing interconnectedness).
What's even more scary is that Facebook is now tracking and advertising to you when they see you outside of Facebook [1]. This combined with the fact that Facebook trackers are everywhere infested on most sites, means without some means of being ignored [2], you could be tracked even if you didn't visit FB.
Paranoia: it's healthy now.
[1] http://www.theverge.com/2016/5...
[2/CH] https://chrome.google.com/webs...
[2/FF] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-...
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I think what GP may be referring to is the actual underlying story here, which the BGR article linked seems to have wrong. Omar Famuyide was in fact brandishing a gun and pointed it at the victim's head, and said gun was found abandoned in the car (a white BMW) two days later.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/u...
He also fired a shot inside of a massage parlor:
http://www.birminghammail.co.u...
And in case you consider those two sources to be somehow less reliable than BGR, here's a third source:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-eng...
So yeah, he did in fact commit these crimes while brandishing a gun, and there are even a few photos of said gun.
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.
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.
"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.