EFF and ACLU Expose Government’s Secret Stingray Use in Wisconsin Case | Hacker News Reader

EFF and ACLU Expose Government’s Secret Stingray Use in Wisconsin Case

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75 pointsDiabloD312 comments

The article convincingly describes some rather underhanded behavior by federal law enforcement appearing to violate 4th Amendment rights. Of course it's hard to empathize with criminals, well, because of their crimes. At the same time it's not hard to want to protect the rights of the people from overzealous police. It would be ideal for attorneys and other experts to comment on this case.

As portrayed in the article, an appellate court decision that the use of "Stringrays" requires a warrant before they are deployed would be a step in the right direction. I think there should be more restrictions on technologies that can grab thousands of communications at a time.

> Of course it's hard to empathize with criminals, well, because of their crimes.

The accused in the American justice system is allowed a defense. Empathy has nothing to do with that right.

Most people who are "criminals" were not convicted - they were plea-bargained. And many of those found guilty at trial were in fact innocent of any crime.

It also kind of depends on the crime. I would have less of an issue with these sorts of devices being used in, say, a kidnapping investigation, than I would if they were used to catch street-level drug dealers.

Does it really make a difference with or without warrant when police can ask secret courts etc to give judgements that can't be contested.

Let's not kid ourselves: between secret courts, tampering with investigative records, and institutionalized torture (now even of US citizens), we really are not much better than the USSR at this point.

No, we're still a lot better off than anyone in the USSR was. A number of defectors have written books you might want to familiarize yourself with. I recently read _The "Liberators"_, by Victor Suvorov; I recommend it.

He said better, not better off.

Indeed, I misread. Still, I disagree, and suggest that he read up on the subject. Even with the problems it has developed, our legal system is far superior to that of the USSR.

we really are not much better than the USSR at this point

Oh really? I guess I must've missed the part where over 10 million Americans starved to death under a program of forced collectivisation and a million more were killed by the secret police in a program of repression.

Yeah, I didn't think so. The US government has done enough to criticize already without resorting to hyperbolic statements like that. It totally cheapens your argument.

The defendant was out on parole, and had an arrest warrant issued for some other violation of his parole, and while sitting in a vehicle in the passenger seat, a weapon was at his feet. That's the entire context of this. A cop happened upon this vehicle and had "prior knowledge" that the defendant was in the car according to the police report [0]. I don't think he's even arguing that he had violated his parole, but that the cops are just flat out lying on how they found him.

Sure, parole violations are bad, but this is just petty, run-of-the-mill arrests they are using stingrays on.

[0] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2698299-12-1.html

At first its criminals riding around with a gun on their lap, but soon you will get a cop visit at work because cell site simulator detected you blowing 10mph past speed limit on some back road few days ago.

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