The Apple 5C is an older phone not even manufactured by Apple anymore, and, for the longest time, Apple had capabilities that allowed them to brute force iPhones under direction of a court order. Apple has some concern, clearly, about it's customer's security, but doesn't care as much about this particular iPhone Model's security, as it does about the general principle that, without explicit legislation such as [1]CALEA 47 USC 1001-1010), that technology companies such as Apple would then come under the whim and direction of all sorts of requests - there is no explicit restraint in the All Writs Act of 1789 - they can now be told by police agencies to do effectively anything necessary to the pursuit of an investigation - and you know, with 100% certainty, that once the "good cases" are used as an excuse for this, the crappy follow on scenarios will also be making use of the All Writs Act of 1789.

It's massive, massive overreach - and if Apple doesn't draw the line here, it will quickly spin out of control.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_...