Kansas 'Swat' Perpetrator Had Already Been To Prison For Fake Bomb Threats (go.com)

More details are emerging about an online gamer whose fake call to Kansas police led to a fatal shooting:

• "After phoning in a false bomb threat to a Glendale, California TV station in 2015, Tyler Barriss threatened to kill his grandmother if she reported him, according to local reports and court documents." -- The Wichita Eagle

• "The Glendale Police Department confirmed to ABC News that Tyler Barriss made about 20 calls to universities and media outlets throughout the country around the time he was arrested for a bomb threat to Los Angeles ABC station KABC in 2015... He was sentenced to two years and eight months in jail, court records show." -- ABC News

• "Within months of his release in August, he had already become the target of a Los Angeles Police Department investigation into similar hoax calls... LAPD detectives were planning to meet with federal prosecutors to discuss their investigation..." -- The Los Angeles Times

• The Wichita Eagle reports that even after the police had fatally shot the person SWauTistic was pretending to be, he continued his phone call with the 911 operator for another 16 minutes -- on a call which lasted over half an hour.

• Brian Krebs reports that police may have been aided in their investigation by another reformed SWAT perpetrator -- adding that SWauTistic privately claimed to have already called in fake emergencies at approximately 100 schools and 10 homes.

Just last month SWauTistic's Twitter account showed him bragging about a bomb threat which caused the evacuation of a Dallas convention center, according to the Daily Beast -- after which SWauTistic encouraged his Twitter followers to also follow him on a second account, "just in case twitter suspends me for being a god." Later the 25-year-old tweeted that "if you can't pull off a swat without getting busted you're not a leet hacking God its that simple."

Barriss remains in jail in Los Angeles with no bond, though within three weeks he's expected to be extradited to Kansas for his next trial.

Comments

Police didn't care

[jandrese]

This guy thought he was a l33t hacker because the police hadn't caught him, but it seems like the first time they tried they were able to roll him up in a few hours. He's an idiot with a vastly inflated sense of self worth, and it got an innocent person killed.

Well, that's true

[drinkypoo]

We need laws which make it illegal for the cops to roll up on someone and execute them on the basis that someone claimed that there was a crime occurring at a specific address. In the best case, they are risking killing a hostage.

Wait, you meant anti-SWATting laws? It's already illegal to do what he did. That didn't stop him. You think making it more illegal would have stopped him?

Re:Well, that's true

[Anonymous Coward]

They had the caller WHO THEY BELIEVED THEY WERE SHOOTING on the phone AT THE TIME THEY WERE SHOOTING HIM, and didn't bother to interact with him using the established communications channel AT ALL.

At the end of the day, the police officer has a legal responsibility to say "do I see anything which says I need to discharge my weapon to protect the safety of myself or a citizen?".

And, I'm sorry, but if you roll up on a place and can't reconcile what you've been told with what you can plainly see, a little restraint is required from you.

What, exactly, was the kid who got shot doing when he got shot?

Everything I've seen suggests a cop with an itchy trigger finger and ZERO confirmation of a damned thing. Sorry, but being a police office doesn't mean you get to shoot first and ask questions later.

"A male came to the front door," Livingston said. "As he came to the front door, one of our officers discharged his weapon."

Livingston didn't say if the man, who was 28, had a weapon when he came to the door, or what caused the officer to shoot the man.

That's from the original news story here.

That smacks of a cop who was pissing his pants or was just so excited to shoot he didn't wait. And that is a fucking criminal act.

The actual shooting?? That's 100% on the cops.

Re:More proof we need more laws...

[Anonymous Coward]

What we need to do is fix our stupidassed phone system so this type of thing is no longer possible. The fact that you can spoof CallerID is absurd.

Re:More proof we need more laws...

[Anonymous Coward]

Unfortunately research has shown that its not the severity of the punishment that deters individuals from perpetrating those crimes, its the certainty of being caught. This individual knew the repercussions both legally and socially if he was caught, but he did it anyway because he was sure he could get away with it. He wasn't wrong either. Although he was caught, the current 911 system in this country makes it incredibly easy to hide your tracks. Various VoIP and online telephony services along with VPN's and fake registration info can make investigations much more challenging. In addition to that, 911 operators don't currently have the tools at their disposal to be absolutely sure where a call is coming from, especially in the cases of VoIP and mobile calls. We could do a lot more to stop this sort of criminal behavior before it even happens by making it a certainty that this kind of activity will be detected swiftly and dealt with.

OK but how about the dead people

[Anonymous Coward]

This is all fine and good but maybe lets discuss the innocent civilians literally killed by police for no reason? Over-response much? "To protect?" LOL, you mean "target pratice?" Just look at the facts, being a police officer is one of the SAFEST jobs in America but because they have been brainwashed and have triggers on guns they are the MOST dangerous people in the world.

These paranoid lunatics kill who knows how many regular innocent people and while some of it makes news, most of it is covered up.

It's time to discuss whether a military response is necessary for common household domestic matters.

Re:Dumber

[ShanghaiBill]

Better yet, just don't be a hazard to society.

Who is the hazard? The SWAT team went to a random address, based on an anonymous phone call, and killed the innocent occupant for basically no reason at all.

Barriss should be held accountable. But he didn't "murder" anyone. The SWAT team did that.

Can we go back to the actual killer?

[mi]

Ok, so this punk will get the punishment he richly deserved long before an innocent man was killed.

Now, can we go back to punishing the actual killer — the cop, who pulled the trigger? Unlike certain Michael Brown, this victim really was raising his hands. Why was he shot at? Why will not you and me be shot at in the same situation?

It sure seems like police are trying to throw all of the responsibility on the prankster, the better to protect one of their own... We should not allow that to happen.

Re:Dumber

[easyTree]

Perhaps the police and swat should be forced to dogfood their service.

Once per day, the home of the relative of a police/swat-team member should be swatted randomly. Pretty soon, procedures would change.

Re:Dumber

[Nehmo]

These are the kind of numbers we need for statistics to make sense. With 13% of the population making up 25% of a statistic, that percentage has a marked increase in chance/risk of whatever the statistic is made to show. In this case, risk of getting shot and killed.

You are correct, if black people are 13% of the population and 25% of people killed by the police, that's not right. However, saying "the majority of people shot by police are black" is still untrue and gives a very wrong picture.

Blacks get killed disproportionately more because they disproportionately behave in ways that give police the excuse to shoot. They commit more crime, drive more erratically, attempt to escape more, run more, talk back more, more often carry weapons, fight more, resist more, disobey more, and are simply more discourteous. The cops aren't racist. They kill plenty of Caucasians too.