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Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

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Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#61

Post by gamblor956 »

jboy55 wrote: post #16

A long time ago I was in a relationship where my SO took my car and refused to give it back. I called the police to report it stolen and they said that since I had lent the car to her in the past, this was a case of someone not abiding by an agreement, and it was a civil matter and I would need to retrieve the car or a PI would. This was California, so other states probably have different laws, but I would have to th…

The police gave you bad information.

California law does not have any sort of "prior use" exception to theft laws. Letting someone use a car in the past does not give them cart blanche to borrow it again without permission in the future.

You ex stole your car. If they police did not do anything, the proper response would be to take your complaint of inaction to Internal Affairs or your local elected representative. And then to take the car back yourself, or to hire a PI to retrieve the car or a lawyer to issue a demand letter for the return of the car.

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#62

Post by itake »

pitaj wrote: post #36
ethanbond wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can't they be compensated directly for the financial damages and then put the perpetrators in prison for all the damages that can't be moneyed-away?

How does imprisoning someone help the victims in any way? People have some really fucked up ideas of justice. Justice should focus first on making victims whole, then on rehabilitating the perpetrators to prevent victimization in the future. Imprisonment serves neither of those goals.

> Justice should focus first on making victims whole, then on rehabilitating the perpetrators to prevent victimization in the future. Imprisonment serves neither of those goals.

The perpetrators are the employees at Hertz that made the decision. Issuing a fine to the company does not rehabilitate or penalize the decision makers.

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#63

Post by mindslight »

pitaj wrote: post #36
ethanbond wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can't they be compensated directly for the financial damages and then put the perpetrators in prison for all the damages that can't be moneyed-away?

How does imprisoning someone help the victims in any way? People have some really fucked up ideas of justice. Justice should focus first on making victims whole, then on rehabilitating the perpetrators to prevent victimization in the future. Imprisonment serves neither of those goals.

> How does imprisoning someone help the victims in any way? People have some really fucked up ideas of justice.

I see where you're coming from in general, but the standard for non corporate executives is imprisonment. Even if it's a "fucked up idea", it's the status quo.

Arguing against imprisonment in the context of corporate criminals doesn't do anything to change that status quo. Rather it just helps perpetuate the dual class justice system where the upper class gets respect and treated like humans while the faceless lower class gets draconian sentences to be "tough on crime".

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#65

Post by 411111111111111 »

pitaj wrote: post #36
ethanbond wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can't they be compensated directly for the financial damages and then put the perpetrators in prison for all the damages that can't be moneyed-away?

How does imprisoning someone help the victims in any way? People have some really fucked up ideas of justice. Justice should focus first on making victims whole, then on rehabilitating the perpetrators to prevent victimization in the future. Imprisonment serves neither of those goals.

There are several reasons why prison sentences make sense in this scenario.

Or phrased differently: without prison sentences the whole situation becomes a pure numbers game: did they get more money out of the false reports/not fixing the bugs causing this misbehavior then they now have to pay in damages.

These kinds of crimes will continue to become the baseline if there are no real consequences to the people actually being responsible for the deeds (this includes the CEO).

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#66

Post by vkou »

pitaj wrote: post #20
nickvanw wrote: post #6

These stories are awful - this wasn't just an administrative headache for people, they served real time and has real consequences. Filing a false police report is a crime, it would be nice to see that enforced against the company in one way or another.

Personally I'd prefer customers be directly compensated than companies just be fined or people imprisoned.

We can, and should do both. Filing a false police report is a crime, and if your boss is telling you to do it, it's organized crime.

"Someone told me to do it" is not an excuse for criminal behaviour, and neither is "We constructed a bureaucracy that results in us engaging in criminal behaviour".

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#67

Post by LanceH »

CSMastermind wrote: post #57

I travel quite a bit for both business and personal reasons. This means I'm driving a rental car for 100+ days a year. I've tried all the major rental brands and Hertz is a terrible experience even when they're not calling the police on you by mistake. Their systems don't work quite right, there's a bunch of hidden fees, and their customer service is lacking at best. I swear by Enterprise and purchasing the extra ins…

The last 3 years I've had occasion to use Budget on an "I need a rental now" basis.

I've had a good experience because they just don't seem to care. That is, the employees working there just check in/out, sign the paperwork, that's it. I haven't had to spend a lot of time turning down questionable options and upgrades. There haven't been turn-in inspections where they claim that tiny scratch on the car with 160k miles is my fault.

They just seem to get me checked in so they can get back to their phone. It's not a premium experience by any means, but it's simple.

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#68

Post by fencepost »

Atlanta Black Star has a nice writeup including some of the more egregious examples. One of the criminal cases didn't even get dismissed despite public statements that it would be, apparently it was finally dismissed when it went to trial in October.

https://atlantablackstar.com/2022/12/04/hertz-false-stolen-c...

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#69

Post by luckylion »

pitaj wrote: post #48
jonny_eh wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How does imprisoning someone help the victims in any way? People have some really fucked up ideas of justice. Sending people to prison for committing crimes is "fucked up"? We can quibble over which crimes deserve what sentence, but we shouldn't outright dismiss the possibility of imprisoning white collar criminals.

> Sending people to prison for committing crimes is "fucked up"? Unironically, yes. Prison is super fucked up. Prison time barely acts as a deterrent. It doesn't reform criminals. It has high costs for taxpayers. American prisons are entirely inhumane. Even heard of prison rape? Even violent criminals shouldn't have to endure what goes down in there. With modern technology, house arrest is far better. Even for extrem…

> Prison time barely acts as a deterrent.

What? Why aren't career criminals more brazen in their acts, if not for fear of punishment (which means: prison)?

I totally get the point that you can't just increase the prison sentence and expect the deterrence to scale, but suggesting that punishment "barely acts as a deterrent" sounds insane, especially when we're talking about calculating criminals like Hertz executives. It's not like they have the uncontrollable urge to make false police reports because of some weird psychological defect.

Re: Hertz to pay $168M to customers arrested due to Hertz’s false police reports

#70

Post by xdennis »

pitaj wrote: post #48
jonny_eh wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How does imprisoning someone help the victims in any way? People have some really fucked up ideas of justice. Sending people to prison for committing crimes is "fucked up"? We can quibble over which crimes deserve what sentence, but we shouldn't outright dismiss the possibility of imprisoning white collar criminals.

> Sending people to prison for committing crimes is "fucked up"? Unironically, yes. Prison is super fucked up. Prison time barely acts as a deterrent. It doesn't reform criminals. It has high costs for taxpayers. American prisons are entirely inhumane. Even heard of prison rape? Even violent criminals shouldn't have to endure what goes down in there. With modern technology, house arrest is far better. Even for extrem…

The primary reason to lock people up is punishment. It's crime and punishment, not crime and deterrence, or crime and reform, or crime and efficient use of taxpayers' money.

Those are all nice-to-haves, but justice is an equal exchange of bad things done by you to bad things done to you.

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