Hacker News Reader

Comment by ivanca | Hacker News Reader

Remember people, don't talk with the police: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wXkI4t7nuc

I'm curious. Suppose someone you love is abducted, and the police arrive minutes after the adbuction and can probably catch the abductors if they start the chase immediately...but although there were many witnesses not a single one will tell the police which direction the abductors ran, or what kind of car they drove, or the license number without talking to a lawyer first, because they watched that video.

Would you continue to recommend it?

And yes, a surprisingly large number of people who watch it say that in the above circumstances, they would wait for a lawyer before saying "the kidnappers drove north".

That's an emergency, one of the few times when you should say enough for them to be able to execute an immediate action; specially if you care about such action being performed. Further unrelated questioning should be avoided under the pretense that you need to talk with a lawyer.

Good. Glad to see there is some common sense here. The last couple of times this came up, some said even in an emergency you should stay silent, because for example if you tell the police the kidnappers drove north in a white Honda, and it later turns out you were mistaken (it was a cream Toyota and they drove northwest), you might be suspected of being an accomplice purposefully misdirecting the police!

The blanket statement “Never talk to the police” is obviously either not very well-thought-out or not meant to be precise. What if you're the victim of a crime? A more honest title for this video would be “Talking to the police will only make you more likely to be convicted of a crime”. An infinitely-selfish person might interpret that as “Never talk to the police” (although even that interpretation has its weaknesses), but a reasonable, respectable person should consider the positive consequences of talking to the police and weigh them with the possibility that they will end up being wrongly convicted of a crime.

If you're innocent and have information that could potentially help stop a criminal from committing more crimes (as in OP's case, assuming his story is true), I think that in most cases it's totally reasonable to talk to the police, since the benefit to society would almost always outweigh the small possibility of being wrongly convicted of a crime. If you know that you're suspected of a crime, or that the police are likely to suspect you of a crime after you give them information (as OP potentially could have foreseen), then the question gets harder. Even when you know that you're suspected of a crime, I still think "Never talk to the police" is often overly-selfish, depending on the circumstances.

When you are the victim may be the only exception; police everywhere is "overly-selfish" in the sense that they score by getting criminals; meaning anyone perceived as such by most judging figures.

Let's say you get pulled over and the cop asks you how fast you were going. Do you just not say anything?

You say "Am I being detained? Am I free to go?"

Yeah. When they say "do you know why I pulled you over?" they're looking for an admission of guilt.

Please. Then they charge you with uncooperative. You guys are assume all police officers are bad. I have seen officers asked and let people go after giving warning.

Let's be clever here, don't be dumb. The right thing to do is to turn on your cellphone's camera and start recording.

There's a conflicting opinion from a cop on Reddit. Basically he agrees that you should shut your mouth, not let them search your car just for the heck of it, etc ..., but when it comes to the question "Do you know why I stopped you?", playing dumb won't do you any favors. There's a lot of other useful info he says that are relevant to the thread.

http://www.reddit.com/r/everymanshouldknow/comments/1rsizj/e...

Yes = admission of guilt

No = admission of negligence

The only right answer is a non-answer: "Hold on, lemme get my license and registration."

No they aren't. They wouldn't pull you over if they lacked evidence. Are you seriously suggesting saying nothing even if it is abundantly clear what happened? If you admit it and explain why you did it(maybe it was just a stupid mistake) you have a chance of not getting a ticket. Only time in my life I was pulled over and I explained what happened and why I made the mistake. Got off with a warning.

* "Am I free to go? Am I being detained?"

* "I do not consent to any searches."

* "I wish to remain silent."

* "I want a lawyer."

Stay safe broes!

"I believe I was traveling two miles per hour under the legal speed limit, officer."

No need to make things complicated.

http://www.reddit.com/r/everymanshouldknow/comments/1rsizj/e...

some useful information. followed by a reddit thread which may be less useful.

I think a major qualifier for that video is "if you're suspect of a crime". In the post, our main character claims to not have expected to come under suspicion.

I am not an expert, but the speaker in the video is very clear that you should avoid speaking to the police under all circumstances. It does not matter if they tell you that you're a suspect or not. He gives an example of a colleague asking if he should speak to the police when he is not a suspect and his advice is, "no!"

I admit, I was inserting personal opinion when using the phrase "a major qualifier". I think it's silly and antagonistic to the problems we already see with our demographic and police to always have an adversarial stance against law enforcement.

Do you disagree? Are there examples where you would talk to the police? For example, if your home was broken into?

Always assume you are suspect of a crime while talking to the police.

That is exactly the wrong thing to take away from the video

No, that is emphatically NOT a qualifier for that video.

The point is that anything you say can be used against you for any of an infinity of possible crimes, while it can never ever help you at all.

So would you say that he's advocating to not depend on police help for anything (for the entirety of one's life), on the basis that it would require talking to police?

He appears to be advocating telling them the absolute minimum possible to achieve your objectives; and, in the case where you have been invited to say something, never to say anything. It is spectacular advice.

Though clearly the situation here is not one where the victim was invited to speak, if he had taken the advice to heart, he would have realized that speaking to the police in any capacity is extremely dangerous, and perhaps averted this disaster.

Engage the police, they are your neighbors.

people pay too much attention to hats

Confession: I cannot remember names.

But I will remember actions of a person. I've had more non-hatted folks fuck me over than the other.

Again just a single source of stats. Nothing to draw from.

In my experience the people who have fucked me over the most have been mean bastards who like fucking people over. Some of them have worn hats, but most of them didn't and some of the folk in hats have also helped me out and I suspect most of the mean bastards in hats were mean before they even got the hat and there are a fair amount of mean bastards wondering about anyway.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com