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This burns me up: > These 118 con men and women were posing as contractors & preying on innocent homeowners in Hillsborough County, who were just looking to re

This burns me up: > These 118 con men and women were posing as contractors & preying on innocent homeowners in Hillsborough County, who were just looking to repair or improve their home," said Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister I am almost certain that's not what happened. Unless they each lied about having a contractors' license when asked, they didn't "pose" as anything, and aren't conning anyone. Based on the examples in this article, is there anything that doesn't require a license to do? Unhooking a toilet is apparently an advanced skill in Florida. I guess this is my reminder to give some more to www.ij.org

ravenstine 7y ago
> Based on the examples in this article, is there anything that doesn't require a license to do? Ironically, software development.
- WrtCdEvrydy 7y ago
  I mean, it's not like planes are falling out of the sky, we don't need standards and licenses.
  - nitrogen 7y ago
    Planes do have standards
    - kick 7y ago
      That's the joke. (Made more obvious by the fact that the 737 MAX controversy was over a software issue.)
      - silon42 7y ago
        The MAX is a system design issue... for reliability it should probably include at least a third AoA sensor.
      - jariel 7y ago
        No, it's not a joke. If Aviation didn't have a lot of standards, considerably more planes would be falling out of the sky.
      - Yetanfou 7y ago
        Not just a software issue in this case but a combination of software and non-redundant hardware in the default configuration with a single angle-of-attack sensor on each side. That missing sensor is far more likely to be related to bean counters than to software developers. Are bean counters licenced?
  - colonwqbang 7y ago
    Do you really think licenses would have prevented the 737 Max catastrophes?
    - luckyscs 7y ago
      Im pretty sure EE and AeroE engineers at Boeing have their FE and PEs
  - ReptileMan 7y ago
    737 max was coded to spec. So you are right - we need standards and licenses for managers and executives.
    - PhaedrusV 7y ago
      Unfortunately, it's hard to license or standardize integrity. I'd say what we're looking for is "accountability"
      - smaryjerry 7y ago
        Literally all a license is in many cases is just making sure a contractor has insurance and a bond to cover any issues. Getting a license takes less than a day to get And is a matter of filling out a form where I live if you have the insurance in place.
miles 7y ago
>> These 118 con men and women were posing as contractors & preying on innocent homeowners > I am almost certain that's not what happened. Right you are: "When the handyman says no, then the undercover detective moves the conversation to something else and then comes back to the question later in a different way," says Sammis. "By the time the handyman gets to the location, they want to make the homeowner happy and end up agreeing to perform work that they didn't intend on doing when they first arrived. The undercover detective[s] are just creating a crime that probably wouldn't occur otherwise."
- awb 7y ago
  > The undercover detective[s] are just creating a crime that probably wouldn't occur otherwise. Isn't that the definition of entrapment?
  - jacobreg 7y ago
    Not quite, it's causing someone to commit a crime they wouldn't ordinarily commit, so it all depends how pushy they were about it. If you could argue they coerced the contractors into doing the work, that's entrapment. But inviting them over under false pretenses and then simply asking them to commit a crime, while of questionable value to the community, isn't entrapment.
    - kbouck 7y ago
      a few illustrated examples of what does and does not qualify as entrapment: https://lawcomic.net/guide/?p=633 https://lawcomic.net/guide/?p=633
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
  - dwnvoted2hell 7y ago
    This is absolutely entrapment. Once someone someone has said no once, it becomes badgering. Contractors are not paid like most people. Often, they have to gain the favor of their customer to make sure they are paid on time, or at all. "Entrapment is a defense to criminal charges, and it's based on interaction between police officers and the defendant prior to (or during) the alleged crime. A typical entrapment scenario arises when law enforcement officers use coercion and other overbearing tactics to induce someone to commit a crime."
dgzl 7y ago
> Based on the examples in this article, is there anything that doesn't require a license to do? This is what Libertarians mean when they say regulations make everything cost more. This is what Libertarians mean when they say regulations make everything cost more / creates a black market.
jacobush 7y ago
So now it's not only the FBI cultivating terrorists, it's cops cultivating unlicensed professionals. Neat. Can we do this Software as Service style?
RaceWon 7y ago
> Unhooking a toilet is apparently an advanced skill in Florida. I am a former licensed master plumber, and I still hold a license to work as a plumber so I just want to weigh in here. I would never, Not Ever drink the water in Any industrial or commercial complex. Period. The reason is because although it is not technically difficult to "unhook a toliet" as you say it is even easier (especially now with the advent of Home Depot and Amazon selling all manner of "plumbing contraptions") to inadverntly create a potential cross conection. Here is the reason I do not drink the water (or or soda or soup or anything that uses their water supply): when I was a plumbing contractor one of my accounts was a wire and plating facility that made a lot of different automotive fasteners and what not (pretty cool mavhines btw), one day I walked into the plating room And I was Horrifired to see washing machine hoses attached to spigots literally laying in the plating solutions that contained Cyanide... no vacuum breakers no RPZ's (reduced pressure zone devices) nothing to protect the water supply from siphoning Cyanide back into it. Fuck that noise--never since have I drank the water, nor never will I again. And I have seen coutless cross connections since then in all manner of facilities. Not to mention not having a clue about proper material and methods while working on on natural gas or LPG sytems and so on, and so on. You can do a lot of damage really really fast if you're clueless.
- yostrovs 7y ago
  What about unhooking a toilet? Or installing a new kitchen faucet? Filling gasoline into your car is extremely dangerous too, which is why in Oregon and New Jersey trained professionals are the only ones allowed to perform the task.
  - irrational 7y ago
    >trained professionals Ha ha! Wait, you are joking right? I live in Oregon and they are about as trained professionals as the teenager working at McDonalds is a trained Michelin chef.
    - dzamie 7y ago
      Yes, they're using sarcasm to ridicule their parent comment's claim that someone hired to just unhook a toilet should legally NEED to be a licensed plumber, by comparing it to similarly low-skill tasks "needing" to be highly trained in case something goes wrong.
dragonwriter 7y ago
> Unless they each lied about having a contractors' license when asked, they didn't "pose" as anything, It is often the case, legally, where offering one's services for work requiring a particular license is, absent any explicit disclaimer, a representation that one has the legally-required license.
- function_seven 7y ago
  I get that, and I get the rationale behind it—legally speaking. I still don't think that this makes the preceding statement correct. ("These con men and women...", "...preying on innocent homeowners...") What really happens is that homeowners (and renters!) don't want to spend too much money on what they consider small projects, and handymen, rather than "preying" on "innocent" customers, are offering simple services for a low price. They're not conning anyone. I'd wager that most of the time everyone knows what's going on. The statement from HCSO is written as if they consulted the Hyperbole Thesaurus to edit the first draft into something with more "punch". I mean, I'm sure some subset of this bunch are actual scam artists holding themselves out to be something they're not. But my money is on the majority of them simply getting caught without a license. No need for mug shots and handcuffs and pearl-clutching public statements.

ravenstine 7y ago

> Based on the examples in this article, is there anything that doesn't require a license to do? Ironically, software development.

WrtCdEvrydy 7y ago
I mean, it's not like planes are falling out of the sky, we don't need standards and licenses.
- nitrogen 7y ago
  Planes do have standards
  - kick 7y ago
    That's the joke. (Made more obvious by the fact that the 737 MAX controversy was over a software issue.)
    - silon42 7y ago
      The MAX is a system design issue... for reliability it should probably include at least a third AoA sensor.
    - jariel 7y ago
      No, it's not a joke. If Aviation didn't have a lot of standards, considerably more planes would be falling out of the sky.
    - Yetanfou 7y ago
      Not just a software issue in this case but a combination of software and non-redundant hardware in the default configuration with a single angle-of-attack sensor on each side. That missing sensor is far more likely to be related to bean counters than to software developers. Are bean counters licenced?
- colonwqbang 7y ago
  Do you really think licenses would have prevented the 737 Max catastrophes?
  - luckyscs 7y ago
    Im pretty sure EE and AeroE engineers at Boeing have their FE and PEs
- ReptileMan 7y ago
  737 max was coded to spec. So you are right - we need standards and licenses for managers and executives.
  - PhaedrusV 7y ago
    Unfortunately, it's hard to license or standardize integrity. I'd say what we're looking for is "accountability"
    - smaryjerry 7y ago
      Literally all a license is in many cases is just making sure a contractor has insurance and a bond to cover any issues. Getting a license takes less than a day to get And is a matter of filling out a form where I live if you have the insurance in place.

miles 7y ago

>> These 118 con men and women were posing as contractors & preying on innocent homeowners > I am almost certain that's not what happened. Right you are: "When the handyman says no, then the undercover detective moves the conversation to something else and then comes back to the question later in a different way," says Sammis. "By the time the handyman gets to the location, they want to make the homeowner happy and end up agreeing to perform work that they didn't intend on doing when they first arrived. The undercover detective[s] are just creating a crime that probably wouldn't occur otherwise."

awb 7y ago
> The undercover detective[s] are just creating a crime that probably wouldn't occur otherwise. Isn't that the definition of entrapment?
- jacobreg 7y ago
  Not quite, it's causing someone to commit a crime they wouldn't ordinarily commit, so it all depends how pushy they were about it. If you could argue they coerced the contractors into doing the work, that's entrapment. But inviting them over under false pretenses and then simply asking them to commit a crime, while of questionable value to the community, isn't entrapment.
  - kbouck 7y ago
    a few illustrated examples of what does and does not qualify as entrapment: https://lawcomic.net/guide/?p=633 https://lawcomic.net/guide/?p=633
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
- dwnvoted2hell 7y ago
  This is absolutely entrapment. Once someone someone has said no once, it becomes badgering. Contractors are not paid like most people. Often, they have to gain the favor of their customer to make sure they are paid on time, or at all. "Entrapment is a defense to criminal charges, and it's based on interaction between police officers and the defendant prior to (or during) the alleged crime. A typical entrapment scenario arises when law enforcement officers use coercion and other overbearing tactics to induce someone to commit a crime."

dgzl 7y ago

> Based on the examples in this article, is there anything that doesn't require a license to do? This is what Libertarians mean when they say regulations make everything cost more. This is what Libertarians mean when they say regulations make everything cost more / creates a black market.

jacobush 7y ago

So now it's not only the FBI cultivating terrorists, it's cops cultivating unlicensed professionals. Neat. Can we do this Software as Service style?

RaceWon 7y ago

> Unhooking a toilet is apparently an advanced skill in Florida. I am a former licensed master plumber, and I still hold a license to work as a plumber so I just want to weigh in here. I would never, Not Ever drink the water in Any industrial or commercial complex. Period. The reason is because although it is not technically difficult to "unhook a toliet" as you say it is even easier (especially now with the advent of Home Depot and Amazon selling all manner of "plumbing contraptions") to inadverntly create a potential cross conection. Here is the reason I do not drink the water (or or soda or soup or anything that uses their water supply): when I was a plumbing contractor one of my accounts was a wire and plating facility that made a lot of different automotive fasteners and what not (pretty cool mavhines btw), one day I walked into the plating room And I was Horrifired to see washing machine hoses attached to spigots literally laying in the plating solutions that contained Cyanide... no vacuum breakers no RPZ's (reduced pressure zone devices) nothing to protect the water supply from siphoning Cyanide back into it. Fuck that noise--never since have I drank the water, nor never will I again. And I have seen coutless cross connections since then in all manner of facilities. Not to mention not having a clue about proper material and methods while working on on natural gas or LPG sytems and so on, and so on. You can do a lot of damage really really fast if you're clueless.

yostrovs 7y ago
What about unhooking a toilet? Or installing a new kitchen faucet? Filling gasoline into your car is extremely dangerous too, which is why in Oregon and New Jersey trained professionals are the only ones allowed to perform the task.
- irrational 7y ago
  >trained professionals Ha ha! Wait, you are joking right? I live in Oregon and they are about as trained professionals as the teenager working at McDonalds is a trained Michelin chef.
  - dzamie 7y ago
    Yes, they're using sarcasm to ridicule their parent comment's claim that someone hired to just unhook a toilet should legally NEED to be a licensed plumber, by comparing it to similarly low-skill tasks "needing" to be highly trained in case something goes wrong.

dragonwriter 7y ago

> Unless they each lied about having a contractors' license when asked, they didn't "pose" as anything, It is often the case, legally, where offering one's services for work requiring a particular license is, absent any explicit disclaimer, a representation that one has the legally-required license.

function_seven 7y ago
I get that, and I get the rationale behind it—legally speaking. I still don't think that this makes the preceding statement correct. ("These con men and women...", "...preying on innocent homeowners...") What really happens is that homeowners (and renters!) don't want to spend too much money on what they consider small projects, and handymen, rather than "preying" on "innocent" customers, are offering simple services for a low price. They're not conning anyone. I'd wager that most of the time everyone knows what's going on. The statement from HCSO is written as if they consulted the Hyperbole Thesaurus to edit the first draft into something with more "punch". I mean, I'm sure some subset of this bunch are actual scam artists holding themselves out to be something they're not. But my money is on the majority of them simply getting caught without a license. No need for mug shots and handcuffs and pearl-clutching public statements.