I hope that at some point swatting becomes a felony akin to attempted murder.
It is only a problem in the US because the response itself is terrifying and often dangerous. Multiple people have died from "swatting" in the US[0].
"Swatting" should carry a jail term for sure. But police reform is a large component in solving the problem (and many other topical problems).
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swatting#Injuries_or_deaths_du...
https://theweek.com/articles/474702/indiana-law-that-lets-ci...
Edit: wow, just saw this part:
> Why did Indiana push this law? The state Supreme Court had previously ruled that citizens had no legal right to resist police officers, even in a case of unlawful entry
What a crazy ruling. I guess this law is checks and balances in action in two ways...
Now, if you’d really want to dissuade the police from making illegal raids, make them liable for all damages, slap on penalties and put the burden of proof on them. Police entered and cannot prove it was legal? Pay fine, repair damage. At the same time lower the bar for personal liability for the officers: Can’t demonstrate that they did at least the basic due diligence? Pay out of their own pocket.
Why not both?
I don't think it's necessarily wise for a homeowner to open fire when outnumbered like that, but it's their right to make that choice when armed intruders break into their home. (And really without the whole knock, announcement, warrant thing the home owner doesn't know the intruders are police.) Making this clear shouldn't exclude these other excellent ideas.
One challenge is that citizens side with the police in court.
Not all of us.
The overwhelmingly vast majority of "protect yourself from government tyranny" types want to massively curtail police powers.
I find this hard to believe. Back the blue, blue lives matter, thin blue line people are propagated by gun enthusiasts who use nice slogans like “government tyranny” to justify their positions in a shallow and emotional way. There’s no actual belief in government tyranny, otherwise they wouldn’t stand with the law enforcement arm of the government’s elevated agents.
Today the pasta was good.
Amongst the reasons they did, were situations eerily similar to what we call "swatting" (and no-knock warrants), which were some motivations behind the fourth amendment.
An amendment that we have, through twisted legal interpretations and arguments for expediency, managed to largely de-fang (civil forfeiture, I'm looking at you).
Well, that and the French navy.
Specifically, even in 1787 it was seeming likely that there was a good chance that at some point the federal government was going to abolish slavery by force, and the framers of the Constitution needed the southern states on board with the Constitution's stronger central government vs. the Articles of Confederation.
So, they probably intended weapons of some proportionate power compared to contemporary military weapons, but the ultimate underlying motivations are suspect.
On the other hand, I could imagine a world where in 1787 alcohol and/or marijuana were legal in some states and illegal in others and the framers were worried about federal troops imposing national drug policy on drugs that never crossed state lines. In that case, it seems more reasonable, which I guess lends respectability to their reasoning at a medium level of abstraction.
The difference is strong regulations disallowing carrying/transporting loaded weapons and enforcing storage requirements as well as a very different gun culture without the emphasis on handguns for self-protection.
There are also government subsidized shooting ranges that do not require these permits.
> 1.2 guns per citizen
After 1 gun, do guns truly become more dangerous? For someone opening a door, I don't think handgun vs AR vs shotgun is a very meaningful distinction - you're going to die if you get shot in the face
> loaded up to the gills
Isn't it true that one of the top arguments used against gun control that criminals will have the weapons anyways?
Therefore, as a LEO being summoned to a potential crime scene, isn't it true that they would behave in accordance with the person being a potential criminal, and therefore living outside of "guns per citizen" statistics? And therefore isn't the global approach to SWATting likely done without respect to the local environment, but instead in accordance with best practices of deescalation and safety?
I look forward to hearing you expand your thoughts.
As for entering the property, if there’s five people and one gun, that’s a lot different to five people and thirty guns.
44% of US households have at least one firearm in the house.
Not "a small group".
In terms of individuals of all ages, it's 32% of all individuals owning guns -- 45% of all men own a gun but only 19% of all women own a gun.
Therefore the population where it's unusual to own a gun is single women. Single men are also less likely to own a gun than married men.
If we look at those who are married, 52% of all married couples live in a household with guns.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/264932/percentage-americans-own...
32% of US adults say they own a gun. 44% of adults say they live in a house that has at least one gun.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/264932/percentage-americans-own...
However, I agree with your overall sentiment -- the distribution is far from uniform.
Also: 2/3rds of Americans don't own a gun, and only 44% even live in a house with a gun.
Ever notice that only in a very small number of cases does a "swatting" result in any danger to the officers, such as the homeowner shooting an officer? The number of times this has happened is in the single digits. Hint: that's because there's little danger to police responding to these sorts of calls.
In fact, there's very little danger to police officers in the US, period. They have a murder rate lower than the general population, because people know that cops don't give a shit about when you or I are murdered (nation-wide the clearance rate for homicides is abysmal, one of the lowest in the developed world) but if a cop is killed, the killer will be correctly identified, found, and arrested within hours.
Being a cop in the US doesn't even rank in the top ten in terms of deaths on the job. Retail workers and cab drivers have a far higher homicide-on-the-job rate;
Pre-COVID the #1 killer of police, overwhelmingly, was traffic collisions, suicide, and heart disease.
During/after COVID, the #1 killer, despite police getting first-in-line access to the vaccine, was/is COVID. Completely preventable.
The reason these "swattings" are so dangerous is because police show up expecting a dangerous situation, confrontation, even though it's incredibly rare.
Far smaller population than the USA, and loads more variables to consider when comparing the two. But at least one country gets it pretty Damn Right with Guns!
That's because both countries are based on the continued enforcement of white supremacy.
> Keffals was swatted in Canada, and Canada has a far less extreme police and gun culture compared to the USA.
I think it's egregious that she was actually arrested for something that the police should have realized was fake, or simply been able to sort out in-person. However, her claim that she woke up with an assault rifle in her face was simply not true. In the context of American swatting, it's more like swatting-light since Canadian police actually require training and attempt to de-escalate instead of solving every problem with guns.
> Officers did not conduct what is sometimes referred to as a “dynamic entry” into Ms. Sorrenti’s residence. Rather, they knocked on the door, announced themselves as police officers, and occupants answered. Any attempt by uninvolved third parties to suggest otherwise is inaccurate and irresponsible.
https://www.londonpolice.ca/en/news/statement-from-police-ch...
The problem is the swatters know the exact type of call to make to elicit a SWAT response, usually involving someone being held hostage and in imminent danger of being killed. The police can't just assume people making that kind of call are lying, they have to respond as if it's real. It's not a problem of the police just responding to every call like that.
I don't think that's what they're implying at all, given the context is about swatting.
Do police in other countries simply not have the capacity to deal with people in imminent danger? Their response to getting a call claiming that there's a crazy person in the house about to murder the caller is to knock politely and ask questions? Seems more like the police in other countries suck then.
The problem is that swatting is enabled precisely because the police's response isn't appropriate. The fact that swatting is so prominent, let alone an issue in the first place, is a testament to that.
Police forces demonstrably: tend to be hyper-militarized, do not train or require de-escalation, do not face legal repercussions for unlawful actions, do not keep up-to-date with various trends and technology, etc. Going in guns-blazing isn't going to save anyone if you don't validate basic information like "is this the right house?" or "did this call purporting to be from someone in our city come from a random Google Voice or Skype number?" or "have we received fake calls from this address already?"
surprise escalation into an unknown, unverified situation where the only basis for the use of deadly force is whether the police feel there is danger. Of course they are in fear for their lives because they are leaping into the unknown, unprepared.
We hear about the militarization of the police. I hate that term. They are playing soldier, not acting it. Having been in the military, if we had a situation and the time we would monitor a location and find out everything we could. Apparently that wasn't passed along to the police, only the guns were.
Speaking from europe, we just don't have that here, at least not enough to have SWAT forces ready immediately.
I can't think of any times that it was a problem the SWAT team was not ready.
The big difference is, those units in Europe are a professiobally trained force and part of a professionally trained police force. And not somw wannabe commandos recruited from ill-trained police officers run by departments too small to even exist in Europe.
Federal.
SWAT ~= MEK, SEK
FBI HRT ~= GSG-9
That fact that citizens of the US have simply accepted that the latter is even remotely a proper response to even "someone being held hostage and in imminent danger of being killed" calls is both sadden, and maddening at the same time
I’m a member of a minority group that is currently experiencing an uptick in violence from the American public. I’m generally a good-natured person and tend not to make enemies. If someone is in my home with a firearm, they’re there to kill me for my perceived connections to big banking, a rational person does not commit random acts of violence like that.
You do, unintentionally, make a stellar point though. If someone in my part of America called the police because someone was trying to kill me, there will likely not be a police response once they see the last name of the target.
Hostage negotiations have a high success rate. It’s one of the very few things to be proud of about our law enforcement strategy. That being said, hostage crises generally happen in public places, and can only be successful if terrorism is not the goal. I would be deeply surprised if anyone decided to attack specifically me if their goal was not to strike fear into my community.
That’s horrible, it’s insane the lengths people will go to satiate their misperceived anger.
What are the violent acts being committed?
You see not every police dept in the world has removed all investigation from the responsibility of their police forces..
But more importantly, with an order of magnitude rarer killings, there is much less of a “we’re at war with the bad guys” culture. In some countries discharging a weapon brings automatic suspension for the investigation, even if nobody gets hurt. Cops simply don’t tend get trigger happy in this environment.
...(assuming EU) apart from hosting some of the deadliest wars in modern history.
It's also not always that boring in other countries. Here is an example that involved more than some questions and leaving:
https://www.wjhl.com/news/local/18-year-old-arrested-in-cana...
Outside of North America, you don't have to worry about police violence too much in developed nations.
> An 18-year-old has been arrested in Canada after investigators traced “swatting” calls at Volunteer High School in Hawkins County and Watauga High School in Boone, N.C. to him.
Note that the caller was in Canada, but the swatting and presumably violent police response was in North Carolina. Swatting is as American as apple pie and baseball, IMO.
The article appears to describe a non-violent response, so you may be wrong in this case as well as about the normal outcome.
I know I can't win the argument you'd like to start about the absolute risk and whether it's tolerable.
I don't want to!
My point was about the variance, and false confidence that two small rates are truly different. Even when one is zero, so the other is infinity percent larger.
It's not that 1/1000 is "low" or "high" in terms of human cost - that is in the eye of the beholder.
The point is that the frequency of rare events is highly sensitive to random chance, and so even with hypothetical perfect records you can't pretend different numbers are necessarily different rates.
Much less if you guess at numbers based on prejudices.
"How to Lie With Statistics" desperately needs a sequel.
The thing that needs an overhaul is the decision making on when to actually send out the swat team. It's lazy, expensive, and dangerous to send them out for every opportunity without any investigation
I don't like the five-oh but going the route you're proposing will make some instances much worse with avoidable loss of life.
In this case, there is a demonstrated and repeated danger from these swatting attacks. They don't have proper risk management in the police forces of the us, as demonstrated by swatting killing people. The authorities being too slow is not a demonstrated problem, it's the opposite.
If the only information police had was a phone call from an anonymous VOIP number, then they'd be comparable.
[1]https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&c...
Especially the one where cops were already there.
This isn't a giant dial that says "cops go fast" <-> "cops go slow"
The overhaul we need is community oversight, community decision making and community policing.
A record of high profile cases where swatters get caught and incarcerated would be a great deterrent.
Specifically police need to learn about time, distance, and cover. Arrive on the scene and take cover a safe distance away from the perceived threat. Take time to identify the perceived threat and confirm they are really a danger. Only then should they attempt to deal with the threat if it actually proves to be one. This would have saved the life of Tamir Rice, a harmless child who was shot by a police officer who had not even finished stopping his car when he shot and killed the unarmed 12 year old. This would have saved the life of 22 year old John Crawford III who was shot by a police officer at WalMart. Crawford had picked up an un-packaged BB gun and then continued shopping. Someone misunderstood the situation and called the police. When officers arrived they ignored the lack of distress among other customers which should have been present, and fired shots at Crawford almost immediately upon entering the store.
There are many accounts like this. Police behavior leads to many unnecessary deaths and swatting is only a threat because of police failing to assess a situation firsthand.
Put in another, more unpleasant way, how many innocent deaths are worth one police officer death, because law enforcement justifies this due to (truly existent, but I think extremely overstated) danger inherent in the job.
But I think any rational mind can perceive it's way too far skewed in one direction.
It's an awful problem that will exist as long as people suck.
Right now, you could have extra caution for 911 calls which originate from VoIP. Pass a law that in five years telco CEOs are charged as assisting murder the next time a SWATing happens and they’d magically discover that egress filtering is easy to implement once you’re not looking at the revenue generated by spammers.
Second, you can argue anything will be a slippery slope (you should hear what people say raising the capital gains rate 1% will do) but it’s intellectually dishonest to pretend there’s no distinction between contributing to a violence death and “basically anything”. Operating critical safety infrastructure should carry responsibilities beyond the average business.
using a voice changer is asking for trouble... I would use synthesized speech
Is there a link to this? The government decided that calling another branch of the government for help is so dangerous it is an attempt to murder?
It's one thing that it happens, but the fact that it is being normalised is what's truly repugnant. 'Swatting' someone in Britain does not cause any deaths.
Of course those scam calls are guilty, but the police should also be less aggressive.
If the police would fix it's behavior swatting wouldn't exist.
One definition (there are many) of assault is as follows: "... the intentional application of force upon another person, directly or indirectly, without the other person’s consent. Classified as a criminal act, it can and will be tried in court."
WEAPONS ACT 1990 - SECT 78 Weapons not to be discharged or operated - a fine- but also usually, a range of offences related to use, possession, storage of the weapon and ammunition
CRIMINAL CODE 1899 - SECT 69 Going armed so as to cause fear (1) Any person who goes armed in public without lawful occasion in such a manner as to cause fear to any person is guilty of a misdemeanour, and is liable to imprisonment for 2 years.
469 Wilful damage (1) Any person who wilfully and unlawfully destroys or damages any property is guilty of an offence which, unless otherwise stated, is a misdemeanour, and the person is liable, if no other punishment is provided, to imprisonment for 5 years.
Punishment in special cases 1 Destroying or damaging premises by explosion If— (a) the property in question is premises; and (b) the destruction or damage is caused by an explosion; and (c) either— (i) anyone is in or on the premises when the explosion happens; or (ii) the destruction or damage actually endangers anyone’s life; the offender commits a crime. Penalty— Maximum penalty—life imprisonment.
but what you will find is that this sort of activity rarely happens randomly- usually there is a relationship between the victim and the attacker- so something related to stalking, extortion (demanding money with menaces) etc. And those all carry heavy possible penalties. (5 years, 7 years etc)
> Whoever discharges a firearm as defined in section one hundred and twenty-one of chapter one hundred and forty, a rifle or shotgun within five hundred feet of a dwelling or other building in use, except with the consent of the owner or legal occupant thereof, shall be punished by a fine of not less than fifty nor more than one hundred dollars or by imprisonment in a jail or house of correction for not more than three months, or both.
This is the law that would definitely apply. Interestingly, it appears that there is a bill before the state legislature that would cover specifically shooting at a dwelling (with intent to hit it), which would carry 5 years/$10k fine.
Depending on particular fact patterns, it might fall under attempted murder, reckless endangerment, or other charge in a similar vein. This sort of stuff tends to be extremely jursidiction-dependent.
So I'd guess the answer to your question is something like: for the same reasons that men commit the overwhelming majority of violent crime, which probably has something to do with evolution and testosterone and culture.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/648093/australia-impriso...
Also, it doesn't require a 10 year sentence — it refers to "not more than seven years or fined under this title, or both.". [2] That literally means that no prison time is required. There is a cap on prison time, and it could be completely eliminated if a fine is given instead. Not exactly harsh treatment!
It applies to land in states that is owned by the US government, which can include a lot of land thought of as inside states (national parks and military bases are the goto examples here). If you want real fun, try working out which law applies when you're on tribal land.
It does not matter if you think how is police operate is unreasonable, what matters is that what they do is well known and established, and the outcome is foreseeable.
Also, if your best defense is “this isn’t attempted murder, it’s just terrorism” I have questions.
How can the caller be more culpable than the one actually commiting the crime? This literally never happens in the history of crime.
I mean yes, cops are mostly above the law, and in the US they definitely murder enough (disproportionately PoC) people without consequences to be a problem.
But in this case police are being told their are people with guns threatening to kill people, which is exactly the case where police are ostensibly justified in using force.
Police killing a swatting victim is meaningfully difference from police making up a fake claims to get a warrant, breaking down a door without notice, and then shooting at anyone who moves, or pulling someone over, asking if they have a gun, and then shooting them if they say yes, etc
The SWAT team didn't intend to hurt innocent people. They thought they were saving innocent people. The swatter was intentionally terrorizing innocent people.
What you just said is "if someone falsely accuses another person of a crime, and the police arrest them, then the police are guilty of kidnapping", "if someone falsely reports a house fire and fire fighters break into the house to put it out, they are guilty of breaking and entering", etc.
Emergency services respond to the reported emergency, for SWAT that often involves an immediate threat to people's lives, so they come in with the expectation that they will need to use force. Now the increasing occurrence of swatting means that US swat teams should be aware of the possibility of false call outs, but they have to deal with "is this a case where me turning up results in someone killing their family if I don't stop them immediately, or is it a case where some dude on the internet doesn't like someone else?".
The whole point of a swatting is police are being told that the victim is has a gun and is threatening to kill people, which is effective because you get the same call when there is an actual person with a gun threatening to kill people.
Now US SWAT does have an issue (imo) that goes with US policing in general of putting safety of police/swat above anyone else, which is a real issue, but as everyone knows this it merely adds to the "you knew your actions had a significant likelihood of getting someone killed".
I’m simply pointing to the most similar Federal crimes and pointing out that the sentences are proportional. For comparison, Federal attempted murder-to-hire is only 10 years and that’s clearly a much worse crime.
Tragically there’s now over 1000 cases of swatting per year. Only one person (Andrew Finch) has been killed by police. (The swatter in this case was charged with involuntary manslaughter and got 20 years in jail).
It’s not comparable to murder because it’s much more likely that someone would be killed by you offering them a ride in your car than by swatting them.
My car rides don't come with a 0.1% chance of death. I'm not that bad of a driver.
Let's calculate it. There were 42,915 traffic deaths in the US in 2021.[1]
Americans take 411 billion trips per year.[2]
That's 42915/411000000000 = 0.00001% chance of death per trip. So a driving trip is 10000x safer than being swatted.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in...
[2] https://www.bts.gov/statistical-products/surveys/national-ho...