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Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

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Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#101

Post by root_axis »

m0zg wrote: post #91
scotty79 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like you are saying that better police cannot exist. But it exists in every first world country except the US.

That's only because those countries aren't, in fact, the US. The US is a pretty violent country compared to just about any other first world country. The policing methods employed elsewhere are (IMO) unlikely to work here. It'd be hilarious to send London policemen to Chicago or Detroit and have them "deescalate" things with gangs there.

Well, Detroit and Chicago gangs exist inside minority communities, i.e. not the vast majority of America, including in this particular story. SWATing is not a problem in the hood.

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#102

Post by m0zg »

root_axis wrote: post #101
m0zg wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's only because those countries aren't, in fact, the US. The US is a pretty violent country compared to just about any other first world country. The policing methods employed elsewhere are (IMO) unlikely to work here. It'd be hilarious to send London policemen to Chicago or Detroit and have them "deescalate" things with gangs there.

Well, Detroit and Chicago gangs exist inside minority communities, i.e. not the vast majority of America, including in this particular story. SWATing is not a problem in the hood.

:-) https://www.google.com/search?q=swat+chicago+hood

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#104

Post by dragonwriter »

oh_sigh wrote: post #103
Hamuko wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's saying that swatting only happens in America. Which is pretty much the case.

Do other countries even have SWAT teams?

Other countries usually have police tactical response teams and/or separate paramilitary police forces to which high threat situations are escalated. The details, of course, differ considerably from country to country.

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#105

Post by aspaceman »

RickJWagner wrote: post #94
shalmanese wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have to get into the mindset that police reports are fundamentally untrustworthy sources of information. We have enough evidence accumulated over the years to make it abundantly clear that police reports are primarily about constructing a narrative that absolves police of culpability and secondarily about describing the true nature of an event. Police reports read individually all sound individually reasonable but…

No, I disagree. We need to change society back to the point where people are decent and don't fool around with public resources like cops. First responders are life-saving. Mis-using them is seriously anti-social behavior. That's what needs to be changed.

A bunch of trigger happy folks with guns are not "first responders". Big difference between paramedics and folks who just want an excuse to shoot people.

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#106

Post by peteretep »

root_axis wrote: post #100
peteretep wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How's it devoid of substance? The issue is about the fact that the legal system distinguishes between manslaughter and murder, has different burdens of proof for each, and you've come back and said "well in my opinion it's the same". And that's nice for your opinion, but if you worked in the legal system in any capacity you'd know that the two things are distinct, and the reason they're distinct is there's a differen…

It's devoid of substance because it's a sarcastic and condescending quip about whether or not my comments qualify me as a prosecutor in your view. That's not the topic at hand and it's pretty obviously a low quality response meant to insult rather than address what I wrote. Anyway, I'll defer to your credentials as an experienced prosecutor, but it seems pretty reasonable to me that painting an individual as an immin…

> but it seems pretty reasonable to me that

It seems pretty reasonable to me that everyone should just give me all their money and I should get a pony. But nobody really cares about my opinion there because I am just making shit up, completely devoid of any factual basis.

> but I don't see any details that preclude that possibility

You are literally working off the linked article that says what charges the prosecutors decided they could probably make stick. Literally, faced with an expert opinion by someone with all the relevant facts, whose job it is to distinguish between these things, you are saying "I don't care because I have my own legal opinions based on my hopes and dreams".

This doesn't strike me as materially different from climate change denial or anti-vaxxing.

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#107

Post by Haga »

LanceH wrote: post #45
chipperyman573 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm a little surprised you didn't mention anything about police being held accountable when responding with unreasonable force to anonymous tips I think the logic behind this is that if the tip was correct then trying to talk it out/etc could end much worse for everyone involved. You have to remember that, to the best of the officer's knowledge, there is a live hostage in a building somewhere that needs to be saved…

There is no "best of the officer's knowleedge", though. They have zero knowledge of the situation. They have an unsourced phone call. They know exactly that one person has made a claim on the phone and too often they don't bother looking past that and it is completely reckless. I can't even conceive of the same thing happening in the military (been there, done that). "We got a call the enemy is in that build." "suit…

At the end of the day you will always want to go home more than follow the law. Americas weapon laws put everyone postcall in a defacto civil war zone. In war zones the law, civil conventions and concepts collapse. Its your tribe vs the others. Quite frankly for this situation americas swats are remarkable civil.

Ps: the military has its own track record on fire first and then sort them out later. They blew up whole towns in Iraq for one sniper-with everyone on it. So bad example. The watch and wait often only happens in spy movies. In reality it's protect our boys preemptive at all costs. If one dies you have alot more to answer for then 40-50 locals die. Those can be labeled asymmetric after exitus. And quite frankly theire surviving relatives thirsty for revenge will cover your war crime up. One week later that sleepy town ruin is a Hotspot.

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#108

Post by AstralStorm »

usefulcat wrote: post #97
root_axis wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First hand experience isn't needed to condemn the unnecessary murder of a completely innocent and terrified man. The police should not burst into the homes of innocent citizens and shoot them to death. Being scared is not a valid excuse.

That's a straw man. No one is arguing that that is ok.

The police force actually are.

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#109

Post by AstralStorm »

omeid2 wrote: post #82
onetimemanytime wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, that's a different issue and separate from calling the Swat teams. The cops are told that murder has happened and a person that had "killed" his family member has zero to lose, so yeah, cops are afraid. The person that sees 20 armed cops or has a grenade thrown through his window will freak out and not act rationally. Recipe for disaster, all because someone made that call. 19 years old going to jail for 20-25…

I am no army general or special forces specialist but one has to wonder why is throwing a grenade or any other aggressive action is the first line of action for any highly tactical large team with arguably the world's most advanced tech? The consequences of the situation is perhaps up-to-debate but that is missing the point, the SWAT teams shouldn't be acting reactionary and out of fear, they should be, well, tactica…

Don't they have thermal cameras at the very least to take a peek inside? Marksmen who could take a look inside? Someone who can listen in?

Very sloppy operation if they just shot a guy standing in the open.

Re: Three Men Charged in ‘Swatting’ Schemes

#110

Post by AstralStorm »

djsumdog wrote: post #56
aharrison wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a little surprised you didn't mention anything about police being held accountable when responding with unreasonable force to anonymous tips. If we are going to start talking about fixing this issue, I'm not sure getting rid of blocked numbers is going to materially impact these outcomes. Likewise, what is your recommendation on eliminating the threat of burner phones?

There's an audio clip of the 911 call posted on here. It wasn't an anonymous tip; the person on the phone pretended there was a situation/serious domestic dispute. The police should have still been more accountable, but let's get the context right.

Sure, and that is a bad reason to go in guns blazing. It is even worse than if it was a hostage situation. It is even worse if the subject capitulated and went outside. What could they do, take aim at someone and then get shot?

This is stupid trigger happy gangster style policing.

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