Bunch of fucking amateurs. You have six plainclothes officers "on patrol" for minors in possession of alcohol. That's absurd. I go to college in a city where the cops understand that underage drinking is a thing and won't hassle you unless you're asking for it.
Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
31–40 of 44 posts
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#32Expect to see more of this with the systematic destruction of the 4th amendment. The U.S. domestic policing agencies have become militarized in both tactics and weaponry. There is no middle ground anymore. Either they are in full battle-rattle complete with assault vehicles, automatic weapons and drones or undercover in plainclothes. Any reasonable person in her situation would be confused and scared beyond their wit…
This is why the War on Drugs is so evil -- it's being used as the foundation of this destruction.
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#33I liked Hacker News better when it was a place for sharing and discussing start-up based news. Not to say that these other types of articles are not worthy of reading and sharing. But I can get them elsewhere.
Since "Hackers" have often have an attitude of disobedience, it's not surprising that articles related to law and abuse of power are considered news worthy. This isn't "Startup News".
To be fair, it used to be.
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#34I know this has been beaten to death here, but I am starting to see a disturbing trend coming out of US policing/justice system. That trend is the laying on of multiple charges when someone pisses off the authorities.
It's one thing when the federal prosecutors do it (Swartz, Brown et al) and now even low level enforcers are doing it.
Is this what I have to look forward to if I ever return to the country of my birth? I cross the road at the wrong time, the arresting officer takes a dislike to me and adds 3 extra charges to the jaywalking charge which ends up with me spending 3 years in prison because I was running late for an appointment?
I've tried to stay out of these HN NSA and other political stories, but there is one thing I've noticed as a business consultant: the attitude and beliefs of top management always end up filtering down to the rank and file employees.
Is this what is happening to the US justice system? Will you one day walk into the local DMV get into an argument and end up with 15 (technically correct) charges against you, bankrupt and in prison?
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#35Expect to see more of this with the systematic destruction of the 4th amendment. The U.S. domestic policing agencies have become militarized in both tactics and weaponry. There is no middle ground anymore. Either they are in full battle-rattle complete with assault vehicles, automatic weapons and drones or undercover in plainclothes. Any reasonable person in her situation would be confused and scared beyond their wit…
>It's pretty GD scary - how are we supposed to identify the good guys? The bad guys are the ones initiating aggression - it doesn't matter what uniform they wear (or non-uniform). The 4th amendment is being destroyed because other amendments are also being weakened that would normally protect it. The 1st and 2nd amendment could easily protect this shocking situation from occurring. The 1st allows us the free speech t…
"Just one incident of a citizen defending themselves would see the immediate halting of these kinds of thuggish tactics."
That turns out not to be the case with our modern "the most important thing is to get home safe" law enforcement officers who replaced old fashioned peace officers, and the prosecutors and judges who support them, for there are a lot of incidents where this has happened. Here are two particularly heinous ones where Southerners defended themselves in no-knock raids, first got killed and had drugs planted to make it look good, the other was sentenced to death, and eventually plead to manslaughter (making him a felon), the 10 year sentence was less than time served:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathryn_Johnston_shooting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cory_Maye
This is one of the greatest fears of the armed citizen; this case in Arizona is a typical example with the normal outcome, dead citizen (his rifle on safe, he hadn't even made the shoot/no shoot decision or had decided the latter), nothing happens to the cops: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jose_Guerena_shooting
(Well, I suppose the most common example is puppycide, tangible in a way that most raids aren't, but that's not what you're talking about.)
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#36I know this has been beaten to death here, but I am starting to see a disturbing trend coming out of US policing/justice system. That trend is the laying on of multiple charges when someone pisses off the authorities. It's one thing when the federal prosecutors do it (Swartz, Brown et al) and now even low level enforcers are doing it. Is this what I have to look forward to if I ever return to the country of my birth?…
15 is an exaggeration, but yes.
For more details, including a good thesis on what drives this, an explanation for why you can have a dramatic drop in national crime rates without layoffs in what I've taken to calling the police-judicial complex, read this book, Arrest-Proof Yourself: An Ex-Cop Reveals How Easy It Is for Anyone to Get Arrested, How Even a Single Arrest Could Ruin Your Life, and What to Do If the Police Get in Your Face (http://www.amazon.com/Arrest-Proof-Yourself-Ex-Cop-Reveals-A...), and decide if you want to return to this sort of environment.
This was reified for me when I retired to the SW Missouri town I was born and raised in and an officer played a game of chicken with his vehicle and my body. From my time on the East Coast I was an experienced enough pedestrian to see that he would barely miss me and stared him down, but I'm pretty sure this was designed to get the average local to run, "crazy cop trying to kill me!", which would generate a fleeing an officer arrest statistic for him per the book.
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#37I liked Hacker News better when it was a place for sharing and discussing start-up based news. Not to say that these other types of articles are not worthy of reading and sharing. But I can get them elsewhere.
Since "Hackers" have often have an attitude of disobedience, it's not surprising that articles related to law and abuse of power are considered news worthy. This isn't "Startup News".
I think you misunderstand the meaning of the term "Hacker" in the context of this site. From Google:
Hacker: 1. An enthusiastic and skillful computer programmer or user. 2. A person who uses computers to gain unauthorized access to data.
It sounds to me like you are confusing the second definition with the first. This is a site for people to find the the most relevant news regarding technology and anything else that people with such interest would find intellectually stimulating. The article has nothing to do with technology but does fit into the intellectually stimulating category if people here are interested in it but do not confuse that with this being a place to discuss "disobedience" as you put it.
You can think of this site as being "Technology Enthusiast News" with startups being one of the primary focuses of discussion.
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Since "Hackers" have often have an attitude of disobedience, it's not surprising that articles related to law and abuse of power are considered news worthy. This isn't "Startup News".
I think you misunderstand the meaning of the term "Hacker" in the context of this site. From Google: Hacker: 1. An enthusiastic and skillful computer programmer or user. 2. A person who uses computers to gain unauthorized access to data. It sounds to me like you are confusing the second definition with the first. This is a site for people to find the the most relevant news regarding technology and anything else that…
I used the definition of "hacker" the creator of this site gives: http://www.paulgraham.com/gba.html
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#39I liked Hacker News better when it was a place for sharing and discussing start-up based news. Not to say that these other types of articles are not worthy of reading and sharing. But I can get them elsewhere.
You can find endless streams of startup gossip elsewhere as well. Just saying.
Can you recommend a particular site?
Re: Bottled-water purchase leads to night in jail for U.Va. student
#40how would they have known she was underage, yet not known that it was bottled water not alcohol? Why would it be appropriate in any situation to pull a weapon for a possible underage drinking charge? There is too much about this that doesn't add up - there should be an investigation.
The obvious question being - who gave these morons a gun instead of a flashlight?
The question we would ask after that is who gave those morons a flashlight instead of a nothing.