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Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

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Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#41

Post by adventured »

mtgx wrote: post #35
zaroth wrote: post #17

I agree 100% this is a perfect example of where we the people rely entirely on the judiciary to provide a remedy. That such an obviously illegal practice could continue for years unfortunately does not reflect well on any thoughts of swift justice. It should be possible to get a temporary restraining order against the city in cases like this within days of the first contested case. It should be easy to demonstrate th…

This is why the US needs a Constitutional Court so badly to vet bills after they get signed by the president, like other countries have. Then you wouldn't get stuck with unconstitutional laws for many years or even decades, letting them abuse an entire generation of people. Now the replies will go like "but the US has an adversarial justice system!". Yeah. Except for that whole three decades old secret FISA court tha…

Having either an adversarial system or constitutional court doesn't stop a government from using its power to do illegal, immoral, secretive, or plainly unconstitutional things.

Historically, and across pretty much every nation that has ever existed, governments have routinely chosen to disobey their own laws, do terrible things in secret, and so on.

I also fail to see how a constitutional court prevents FISA from existing if you have executive orders and national security doctrine (the two things that made FISA and the NSA spying possible). You'd need to throw out a lot of things to make a constitutional court work. As it is, national security doctrine would simply bypass a constitutional court check when it comes to creating FISA. You would have to try to elevate it above all possible counter considerations, and good luck with that.

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#42

Post by zaroth »

mapt wrote: post #40

You: The city is stealing my car without probable cause in an attempt to extort money from me. City DA: No they're not. What's your recourse here? Call the FBI or federal prosecutor and report an organized crime syndicate being run by corrupt law enforcement professionals? Because... isn't that what this is? Is there any onus, or even incentive, for them to listen and investigate? Is the only way to redress the probl…

Wish more people would simply call it what it is. If we can't even do that, certainly we'll never see an actual prosecution.

The name of a thing is important, and calling it exactly 'grand theft auto, extortion, racketeering, and fabrication of evidence / perjury' versus something like 'civil asset forfeiture' or in this case, not even that, it's a glorified falsified parking ticket!

I mean, how did this actually play out in court? "So, Your Honor, you're not going to believe what happened. I was going to drop my niece at the airport and these thugs pulled me out of the car, showed me a badge, impounded my car, and now want me to sign a document and pay them a stack of cash to get it back." Prosecutor, "Actually, we employ 170 people to do this, and we've done it 21,000 times".

The article they quote saying it's a corrupt money-making scheme for the city was an interesting read: http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20140724/long-island-city/ta...

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#43

Post by dang »

ukd1 wrote: post #6
bsder wrote: post #3

What's the deal with all the Forbes links redirecting to welcome? How do I stop this? I tried checking the "Warn me when websites try to redirect or reload the page" box in Firefox, but it doesn't appear to be stopping it. Presumably too many people are starting to use things like "Google Sent Me".

Can we just ban submissions from sites like this?

It's not that easy. First, which sites are "sites like this" varies from user to user. Second, in the majority of cases it's possible to read the article, just annoying. Third, HN optimizes for good articles, and good articles do appear on sites like this.

It's not a great situation but I don't think the alternative would be better for HN.

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#44

Post by dang »

bcoates wrote: post #16
ukd1 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can we just ban submissions from sites like this?

Here's a better, less Forbesy article that loads for me: http://www.amny.com/news/taxi-and-limousine-commission-seizi...

Ok, we've changed the url to that from http://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2015/10/13/j.... I'm not sure it's a better article, but probably close enough.

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#45

Post by bsder »

notwhereyouare wrote: post #7
bsder wrote: post #3

What's the deal with all the Forbes links redirecting to welcome? How do I stop this? I tried checking the "Warn me when websites try to redirect or reload the page" box in Firefox, but it doesn't appear to be stopping it. Presumably too many people are starting to use things like "Google Sent Me".

ad block. It makes the page completely blank if you have it enabled

But how are they doing the redirect in such a way that it overrides my choice to not allow them? And how can I stop it?

If I visit a link, I don't want them to be able to arbitrarily forward me to another link without my permission, thanks.

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#46

Post by mapt »

zaroth wrote: post #42
mapt wrote: post #40

You: The city is stealing my car without probable cause in an attempt to extort money from me. City DA: No they're not. What's your recourse here? Call the FBI or federal prosecutor and report an organized crime syndicate being run by corrupt law enforcement professionals? Because... isn't that what this is? Is there any onus, or even incentive, for them to listen and investigate? Is the only way to redress the probl…

Wish more people would simply call it what it is. If we can't even do that, certainly we'll never see an actual prosecution. The name of a thing is important, and calling it exactly 'grand theft auto, extortion, racketeering, and fabrication of evidence / perjury' versus something like 'civil asset forfeiture' or in this case, not even that, it's a glorified falsified parking ticket ! I mean, how did this actually pl…

"“They’re stopping cars without legal justification all the time,” said Kaeckmeister, who in the past year has gone to two tribunal hearings to testify before a judge that his superiors forced him to seize a car when he didn’t have the evidence to do so."

His superiors pressured him to steal a car by threatening to fire him, and to fabricate evidence, perjure himself, and file false police reports in order to hold it for ransom without legal basis. It shouldn't make a difference whether he's in the traffic enforcement business or the puppy breeding business, the same actions are a clear crime regardless of his background; He wasn't even under duress by the definition of that word used in the courts, though perhaps whistleblower protections apply (if they still exist).

Dude's just confessed, before a judge, to a massive profit-seeking criminal conspiracy over and above what was authorized by local legislature. Arrest somebody.

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#47

Post by gharbad »

spectralblu wrote: post #5
pbreit wrote: post #2

Is this an Uber thing? I didn't see it mentioned.

Uber wasn't explicitly mentioned, but it just sounds like the TLC is overly trigger happy in seizing cars, presumably because of the uptake in services like Lyft and Uber who in the TLC's eyes are skirting around the law.

By "skirting around" do you mean "blatantly flouting"? Because that's the truth of it..

Uber, Lyft, et al are just central dispatch for gypsy cabs. I don't see any reason they shouldn't get massive fines or seized vehicles in all locales they operate.

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#48

Post by ende »

liquidise wrote: post #39
mtgx wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some reason, Courts so far have agreed to buy the government's whole twisted logic that "things can be guilty of crimes", and under that twisted logic it seems to make sense to do that.

Very true. I am still awaiting the day this is extrapolated to gun rights and watch the hypocrisies rain.

Hypocrisies?

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#49

Post by c22 »

This is a stupid grammar nitpick I only offer in the hopes that you find it useful for your writing. No dismissal of your arguments or denigration of your character is intended.

I think you want the word "affected" in your second paragraph. Effects are the result of causation, whereas affect refers to the causation. The citizens were affected by the effects of this policy.

Re: Judge: NYC Seizing Thousands of Cars Without Warrants Is Unconstitutional

#50

Post by tajen »

mapt wrote: post #46
zaroth wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wish more people would simply call it what it is. If we can't even do that, certainly we'll never see an actual prosecution. The name of a thing is important, and calling it exactly 'grand theft auto, extortion, racketeering, and fabrication of evidence / perjury' versus something like 'civil asset forfeiture' or in this case, not even that, it's a glorified falsified parking ticket ! I mean, how did this actually pl…

"“They’re stopping cars without legal justification all the time,” said Kaeckmeister, who in the past year has gone to two tribunal hearings to testify before a judge that his superiors forced him to seize a car when he didn’t have the evidence to do so." His superiors pressured him to steal a car by threatening to fire him, and to fabricate evidence, perjure himself, and file false police reports in order to hold it…

The problem is it grants legitimacy for a parallel network of justice enforcement. When there are so many stories about constitution being violated with FISA, SWAT teams, police stations using military gear, TSA, systematic torture, drone strikes without fair trials, civil asset forfeiture and now systematic seizure of cars, who could we blame if, say, Anonymous decided to take it to the street and burn houses of every single TLD agent? Is US justice still acting on the name of the lowly, or is the constituion so blatantly violated that the people will fund and sponsor an "alternative network"?
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