Slashdot Mirror
Two More 'SWAT' Calls in California -- One Involving a 12-Year-Old Gamer (ktla.com)
In January an online gamer in California was arrested after at leat 20 fake emergency calls to police, one leading to a fatal shooting in Kansas. But this week in California there's been at least two more fake calls:
- A 12-year-old gamer heard a knock at his door Sunday -- which turned out to be "teams of Los Angeles police officers and other rescue personnel who believed two people had just hung themselves." The Los Angeles Police Department "said there's no way to initially discern swatting calls from actually emergencies, so they handle every scenario as if someone's life is in danger," according to the Los Angeles Times. The seventh-grader described it as "the most terrifying thing in my life."
- 36-year-old David Pearce has been arrested for falsely reporting an emergency at a Beverly Hills hotel involving "men with guns" holding him hostage. A local police captain later said that the people in the room had not made the call and in fact might have been asleep through much of the emergency. The Los Angeles Times reports that there's roughly 400 'SWATting' cases each year, according to FBI estimates, adding that "Some experts have said police agencies need to take the phenomenon more seriously and provide formal training to dispatchers and others to better recognize hoax callers."
Meanwhile, in the wake of a fatal shooting in Wichita, Kansas lawmakers have passed a new bipartisan bill increasing the penalties for SWAT calls. If a fake call results in a fatality -- and the caller intentionally masks their identity -- it's the equivalent of second-degree murder. "The caller must be held accountable," one lawmaker told the Topeka Capital-Journal.
The calls are often to a NON-EMERGENCY number, since 911 would route it to the SWAT'ter's local 911 service center. Calling a non-emergency number about a life-and-death issue should be a big clue. Apparently, that's what happened in the SWAT'ting that caused a death recently.
Anything that elicits an armed SWAT response should be considered an attempt to kill the SWATee.
There is no other reason you'd send an armed response team into a situation that split second decisions mean more people may die.
Once swaters start publicly getting 20+ years for single swat attempts it'll put off a fuckton of others.