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I found this particularly disturbing: > In June, the police came looking for a teenage girl whose parents reported her missing. The police made Lee and Saba si
by patrickmay 11y ago
I found this particularly disturbing:
> In June, the police came looking for a teenage girl whose parents reported her missing. The police made Lee and Saba sit outside for more than an hour while the police decided whether they should get a warrant to search the house for the girl’s phone, and presumably, the girl. When Saba asked if he could go back inside to use the bathroom, the police wouldn’t let him.
>
> “Your house is a crime scene and you two are persons of interest,” the officer said, according to Saba."
The police shouldn't be able to detain someone for over an hour without probably cause and without arresting them.
- craigmccaskill 11y agoWould not the location tracking telling them the girls phone was inside the house be probable cause? Seems more reliable than a dog alerting on a car.
- cmiles74 11y agoWhoever said that the phone location tracking was anywhere near this level of reliable? IMHO, it's really only good as a sort of hint on where your phone _might_ be.
- anikamariam 11y agodo you think the police care?
- phil21 11y agoWhich is more reliable than other pieces of evidence that meet the probable cause bar. Such as a police dog alerting. Certainly seems to meet the (pathetically low) threshold to me at least.
- such_a_casual 11y agoYou must have missed the article where a judge ruled the police are not responsible for making sure technology is reliable, even drug tests: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10814544 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10814544 (Police plan and execute a SWAT raid based on a bogus field test of tea leaves. Judge ruled the police are not responsible for knowing that the tests are completely inaccurate.)
- harryh 11y ago"might be" absolutely constitutes probable cause.
- sp00ls 11y agoI don't know. Out of curiosity I just tried Find my iPhone on my own device which has been sitting in the same location in my house for about an hour completely untouched. Apple's interface shows my iPhone about a half mile away in a house I've never visited or been in before. There is a big circle around my device (which doesn't even include the actual location) but the actual dot is somewhere I've never been before. I've refreshed it about 5 times now 2-3 minutes apart and it is absolutely convinced that I am at that location. I avoided touching my iPhone during this experiment to mimic a real life scenario where the phone is out of reach. If I were in a scenario where I believed a family member was taken against their will to a location I would absolutely want a search, but this experiment makes it pretty clear why Find my iPhone is not probable cause to me.. Still trying to figure out why multiple 'pinpoint location' requests are showing somewhere about a half mile away from my real location. I would think that that type of request would push something to the phone which would power up GPS for accuracy, but it doesn't appear to be so.
- rayiner 11y agoThat's probably not a fair description of the accuracy of the technology. Out of a random sample of 100 locations, how often would the technology yield the right house? I bet it's over 50%, which is definitely sufficient for probable cause.
- superuser2 11y agoYou don't need a certain conviction for a search warrant, you need probable cause.
- duaneb 11y ago> The police shouldn't be able to detain someone for over an hour without probably cause and without arresting them. They can't. The police officer in question was wrong and they did not exercise their rights.
- anikamariam 11y agothey have the right to detain those people on reasonable suspicion.
- duaneb 11y agoYea, but it's unclear how the "find my iphone app" could ever lead to reasonable suspicion by itself. Among other things, they seemed to be cooperating, not resisting, and all the evidence is from a third party—no immediate evidence would have produced any reasonable suspicion. This is an abuse of police power from a position of ignorance. Do you really think that would hold up in court? I sincerely hope not. The man should have been allowed to use his own bathroom.
- anikamariam 11y agoyes it will hold up in court. Police don't let suspects out of detention just because they complain they have to pee. High-tech state-of-the-art tracking technology from Google and Apple indicates that these people are somehow involved in the disappearance of a missing person. How dumb would the officer look if he let a suspect destroy evidence, escape, or otherwise pull something on the claim that they have to pee?
- pjc50 11y agoThey had probable cause: the last reported location of a missing teenage girl was their house.
- mentat 11y agoReported by something that has <90% accuracy? Less than 99%? It matters...
- manyxcxi 11y agoWhat if it was only 51% accurate? It's still more likely than not that the address is correct. Assuming the police respond in a way that doesn't result in injury (financial, property, or person) I think it's reasonable for them to check it out. Go get the warrant and see if the person or phone are in there. No warrant? Piss off. In this particular case, why can't the local PD/Sherrif/agency see the damn pattern, record the note, and proceed with meaningful caution? That's what would annoy me the most.
- nanofortnight 11y ago'Probable cause' doesn't require 99% accuracy. It's a legal term with a well-defined definition. 'Probable cause' is slightly higher that 'reasonable suspicion' but much lower than 'beyond all reasonable doubt'. Essentially, it boils down to: Would a 'reasonable man' (another technical term) suspect that something is the case? If yes, one has reasonable suspicion.
- mentat 11y agoReasonability breaks when the implementation requires technical knowledge to assess and has specific undisclosed issues in cases that matter.
- true_religion 11y agoThe law isn't written to allow for a perfect implementation to exist. It's there so on average, most people will agree that the police did the right thing. If most people have no knowledge of the implementation details of technology, they'll happily allow said searches to continue. On the whole, many laws are like this. They are made so we can all live together and nothing more.
- beeboop 11y agoStories like this further my conviction to simply never answer the door if it's a police officer unless they specify having a warrant. They can't detain you if you don't answer, and chances are the officer will escalate the situation on his own if he wants a reason to detain you. There is nothing to gain and everything to lose.
- harryh 11y agoCivilized society depends on the cooperation of the law abiding populace. It's your civic duty to answer the door. It's a categorical imperative.
- chad_strategic 11y agoObey at all costs!
- manarth 11y agoCivilized society depends on well-articulated laws that enable citizens to understand what is legal and what isn't, and allows Police to make use of force when it is appropriate, and prevents them from using force when it isn't. "The legitimacy of policing in the eyes of the public is based upon a general consensus of support that follows from transparency about their powers, their integrity in exercising those powers and their accountability for doing so." Edit: the principal is known as "Policing by consent", or the Peelian Principal [1], which is fairly common in the UK. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_Principles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_Principles
- mbostleman 11y agoIf it was my daughter, yes ;)
- dntrkv 11y agoNow flip the situation around. If there was a missing girl being held there and the police didn't check it, how would people react? The chance of checking and making sure while in the process inconveniencing someone far outweighs the chance of not checking. Sure it sucks, but what are the other options? If you are the parent of this missing kid and the police tell you your child might be there but they can't look into it, you would be ok with that?
- Bjartr 11y ago>what are the other options Go to a judge, communicate the situation, and maybe get a warrant if the judge deems it appropriate. That's how the system is designed to work. >The chance of checking and making sure while in the process inconveniencing someone far outweighs the chance of not checking. >If you are the parent of this missing kid and the police tell you your child might be there but they can't look into it, you would be ok with that? There are good reasons we don't let emotional parents head the investigations of their missing children. The laws constraining law enforcement exist to stop harm that used to happen at their hands, but no longer does because those laws are in place (modulo lack of enforcement). If there are situations where the law is an unreasonable constraint on law enforcement, then we should change the law to take that scenario into account, not argue for carte blanche to take whatever action is deemed maybe possibly useful.
- dntrkv 11y ago>There are good reasons we don't let emotional parents head the investigations of their missing children. And where did I suggest that? There is a huge difference between having a parent head an investigation and asking a police officer to check out a potential house where someone's kid may be held. And the couple was well within their right to not open the door to the police. I'm not suggesting the police should have the ability to detain people indefinitely, but they do need some ability to carry out questioning / searches if there is a reasonable suspicion. I know, reasonable suspicion is really vague and abused but what is the alternative? Anytime a cop sees suspicious activity they need to head over to the court and get a warrant? They would never get anything done.
- jrochkind1 11y ago> The police shouldn't be able to detain someone for over an hour without probably cause and without arresting them. Once I got stopped and they decided they were going to get a drug dog, and then a warrant, for my car. "Am I being detained?", I asked. "No, you're free to go." "Wait, I can just get in my car and drive away?" "Oh no, we're holding your car as evidence." I was in the middle of nowhere. I don't know under what grounds they can do that (or if it was actually legal), but the grounds are presumably much less then actually detaining you. But it amounts to the same thing. I don't know on what grounds they could prevent people from going back in their home even if they aren't being detained (are you really going to leave and not observe whatever the cops are going to do to your home?).
- abhorrence 11y agoIANAL, but my understanding is that you can't be detained (or rather a traffic stop cannot be extend) to wait for a drug dog [0]. Already you should have been able to leave. Additionally, the "no, you're free to go" bit sounds like an officer trying to find a loophole, since the standard for whether or not you're being detained is if a reasonable person would assume they were free to go. Despite the officer telling you that you were free to go, I suspect most people in the middle of no where without a car would not assume they truly were. Plus, calling your car "evidence" at that point is a bit... weird. [0] http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/14pdf/13-9972_p8k0.pdf http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/14pdf/13-9972_p8k0.pdf
- jrochkind1 11y agoOh, he made it clear that I was able to go wherever I wanted, in the middle of nowhere, I just couldn't get in my car, let alone drive it anywhere.