Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges • Hacker News Board

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#201

Post by 2OEH8eoCRo0 » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:28 PM UTC

mcherm wrote: post #25

ToucanLoucan wrote: post #9

Okay so like, genuinely not trying to do a "back in my day" fuckin thing here, but also: what the fuck is wrong with kids? Back when I was coming up, pranking at it's absolute worst was like, filling a dudes shoes with yogurt in the locker room, or like, putting plastic bugs in people's desks n shit. Why the fuck are teenagers trying to get each other murdered by cops!?

Fair question, but I would also like to ask "What the f** is wrong with cops?". Receiving an anonymous call claiming some not-particularly-plausible threat at a particular location probably DOES deserve a police investigation. I see no reason why it impels police to drag people from their house in chains, threaten to shoot them, or actually shoot them. If police responses were reasonable and proportionate to the plau…

Yeah wtf is wrong with cops being on edge when they think they're responding to a mass shooting. How dare they!

Future headline: Police ignore mass shooting because they thought it was a prank

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#202

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:31 PM UTC

nilamo wrote: post #160

bigiain wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the super weird (to people outside the US) insistence that the only possible response to gun violence (by gangsters, school kids, or cops) is "thoughts and prayers".

The solution is obvious, but we unfortunately continue to choose not to do it.

[deleted]

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#203

Post by slothtrop » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:33 PM UTC

rendall wrote: post #145

Loughla wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the acab is kind of rough, I'm absolutely with you on police accountability. If there was open and honest accountability, I don't think people would have as many problems with the police. The issue is that police operate in extremely high pressure novel situations all the time. Training only goes so far. After that, you're investigating mistakes versus violent intent. I'm not sure that's easy to do, and I'm cer…

> The issue is that police operate in extremely high pressure novel situations all the time. In the US, police officer does not even rise to top 10 most dangerous jobs. Groundskeeper is a more dangerous job than being a cop. The lack of training and toxic culture of policing is far more dangerous to cops than criminals are. The average US citizen simply does not, and should not, trust the average cop.

Danger =/= high stress/pressure situations

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#204

Post by bcdtttt » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:34 PM UTC

andrewla wrote: post #199

bcdtttt wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> They evolved out of warehouse guards and slave patrols. This is not accurate. The timeframe is not wrong; it is true that the concept of the modern police, at least in the US, was largely based on the Peelian model created in London in the 1820s. But saying it evolved from "warehouse guards and slave patrols" is ahistorical. Most modern police forces modeled after London's Metropolitan Police replaced night watch s…

While some night watches were public safety distributed among community members, they were often there to protect the goods of merchants rather than protect the ordinary citizens of an area from petty crime. As merchants grew, and their goods became more valuable targets, the merchants would hire on guards, but saw the opportunity to turn the existing night watch systems in place to their favor, essentially insisting on distributing the cost of guarding their goods across the community.

I'm not saying the night watches didn't evolve into police departments, I'm saying the night watches were co-opted prior to them becoming uniformed departments.

And slave patrols led directly into being police departments in some parts of the US. I do not claim that's in the history of all depts, but across the south there are many cases of patrols becoming formalized into police departments.

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#205

Post by valval » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:36 PM UTC

elzbardico wrote: post #174

The militarization of law enforcement and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

Not at all. It’s good that law enforcement have the tools to deal with serious threats. You’re just throwing around a fear word.

The big guns are hidden from sight anyway, and only brought out when need be. We don’t need any Oct 7th type attacks happening on home soil.

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#206

Post by LargeWu » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:38 PM UTC

valval wrote: post #205

elzbardico wrote: post #174

The militarization of law enforcement and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

Not at all. It’s good that law enforcement have the tools to deal with serious threats. You’re just throwing around a fear word. The big guns are hidden from sight anyway, and only brought out when need be. We don’t need any Oct 7th type attacks happening on home soil.

If they can be summoned by just placing an anonymous phone call with an unverified claim, that might be a problem though.

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#207

Post by karaterobot » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:40 PM UTC

elzbardico wrote: post #174

The militarization of law enforcement and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

The military model is that they are organized into units with training, and obey a central authority. On the whole, it's been an improvement over forming ad hoc posses of farmers and shopkeepers and arming them, or the medieval hue and cry model where someone screams and then everybody in town comes over and beats a stranger to death for having a different accent after dark. I'd love to see some statistics about how much worse it is now that we have professional police, though, if you've got any to share.

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#208

Post by slightwinder » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:42 PM UTC

valval wrote: post #205

elzbardico wrote: post #174

The militarization of law enforcement and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

Not at all. It’s good that law enforcement have the tools to deal with serious threats. You’re just throwing around a fear word. The big guns are hidden from sight anyway, and only brought out when need be. We don’t need any Oct 7th type attacks happening on home soil.

> We don’t need any Oct 7th type attacks happening on home soil.

USA has 1-2 mass shootings everyday on average. This is far worse than a singular big attack. And how long would the reaction of police to any big attack even take? Is it actually realistic that they will have a useful impact with big guns?

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#209

Post by gsck » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:43 PM UTC

pluc wrote: post #150

saghm wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a pretty light sentence for 375 murder attempts and threats.

It's only attempted murder because American SWAT is trigger happy, equipped literally like an army and shoots before asking questions or establishing context, that's hardly his fault.

Equipped like an army, unfortunately not trained like one.

Re: Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

#210

Post by adolph » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 3:43 PM UTC

bcdtttt wrote: post #204

andrewla wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They evolved out of warehouse guards and slave patrols. This is not accurate. The timeframe is not wrong; it is true that the concept of the modern police, at least in the US, was largely based on the Peelian model created in London in the 1820s. But saying it evolved from "warehouse guards and slave patrols" is ahistorical. Most modern police forces modeled after London's Metropolitan Police replaced night watch s…

While some night watches were public safety distributed among community members, they were often there to protect the goods of merchants rather than protect the ordinary citizens of an area from petty crime. As merchants grew, and their goods became more valuable targets, the merchants would hire on guards, but saw the opportunity to turn the existing night watch systems in place to their favor, essentially insisting…

>>> That concept is from the mid 1800s. They evolved out of warehouse guards and slave patrols.

>> This is not accurate.

> I do not claim that's in the history of all depts, but across the south there are many cases of patrols becoming formalized into police departments.

What percentage of current police departments were conversions from slave patrols? What is the source of this data?