Guilty until proven innocent

"Funktheduck" (funktheduck) 12/02/2015 at 11:47 • Filed to: None

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!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Ever wonder what the government does with all the data it collects about you, even through plate readers?

Well, in LA they want to accuse you of soliciting prostitutes just for driving through an area known for prostitution. They “hope the wives, girlfriends, and mothers will open the letters” to teach these “Johns” a lesson. Note: you do not have to commit a crime or anything to receive one of these letters. All you have to do is drive through an area they set the cameras in.

They don’t care if you got lost or even had a legitimate reason for being in the area. The LA government just wants to possibly ruin your life for being in an area where they don’t want you.

I frequently cut through “bad areas” to avoid traffic or to get to clients. I’ve been solicited, seen hookers picked up and dropped off, and caught some in the act. I’ve never participated in any of those activities but if I were in LA they’d be trying to break up my family even though I’m conducting legal and legitimate business.

Ever gotten lost and ended up in a seedy part of town? Got a good short cut to avoid traffic? If this passes in LA you better not ever get lost or find a new way home or to work because it will come to your city.

TractorPillow > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 11:52

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Agree with all of your points, but also, what a complete and utter waste of money.

450X_FTW > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 11:54

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For what purpose? People know by looking around if they are in a “bad” area or not, they dont’ need a letter sent to them. And since this is government, I’m sure each letter cost $300 too.

Funktheduck > 450X_FTW 12/02/2015 at 11:59

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The purpose is to shame “Johns” to stay away. But it assumes everyone in the area is there for something illegal. Waste of money, invasion of privacy, and probably violates our constitutional rights.

Chris_K_F drives an FR-Slow > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:01

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Los Angeles City Council member Nury Martinez issued a statement on the plan: “If you aren’t soliciting, you have no reason to worry about finding one of these letters in your mailbox.”

This is the worst reasoning for any government measure, and a direct path toward an eventual police state.

450X_FTW > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:03

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They’ll just make a law that says “this does not violate any rights” and BAM it’s legal. Kind of like Stop n Frisk laws

HammerheadFistpunch > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:03

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This is pretty much a terrible idea all around...who let the social media manager dictate policy?

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:04

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How Stasi of them.

DoYouEvenShift > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:13

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Wow this is ridiculous!

A simple text message would be cheaper and faster. Get with the times, even restaurants send texts when your table is ready.

Funktheduck > Chris_K_F drives an FR-Slow 12/02/2015 at 12:15

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“Nothing to see here. No need to worry about silly little things called Rights. Just don’t do anything bad. What’s bad? Whatever we say.”

El Rivinado > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:16

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Oh look at that, another stupid, pointless, idiotic program designed to waste taxpayer money and do nothing of value, all to appease the “Progressive” crybabies that make up the vocal majority and minority simply because they live oop north and make all the moneys.

Yep, my state's on it's top form. I can't wait to get enough money to move to El Paso.

Sneaky Pete > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:19

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Can we just let Ra's Al Ghul burn LA to the ground? It’s a festering cesspool with no redeeming value.

450X_FTW > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:19

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We don’t have any rights. Nothing is a right if there can be restrictions put on it. - George Carlin

Funktheduck > Sneaky Pete 12/02/2015 at 12:21

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My gf was just there. She hated it.

Future next gen S2000 owner > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:23

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One more reason to never move to LA

Funktheduck > DoYouEvenShift 12/02/2015 at 12:24

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That's not the point. They want the women in your life to come across the letter. Their sole purpose is to target men because going after the prostitutes is sexist.

DoYouEvenShift > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:29

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I was just joking about the text thing.

Sneaky Pete > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:32

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I lived near there for 8 years and worked there for 3.

Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:32

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Why not just legalize prostitution? That would make the city money and provide more safety for the workers too. Instead they'll just try to ruin people's lives, even if they did nothing wrong. Makes perfect sense to me. :/

Santiago of Escuderia Boricua > El Rivinado 12/02/2015 at 12:33

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Lolwut. Dude, progressives are for legalization of prostitution

TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:35

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What should happen is the Council members who voted for this should be on the hook personally for all the Libel suits that will inevitably be filed against the city.

TractorPillow > El Rivinado 12/02/2015 at 12:36

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Haha I am being forced to move to El Paso. See you there!

BigBlock440 > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 12:54

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Don’t worry, if you’re not doing anything wrong, you’ve got nothing to worry about. The government can be trusted to track your movements, no way this power could ever be abused.

Funktheduck > Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! 12/02/2015 at 12:58

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Sex is a sin. Paying for sex is a double sin. That’s why God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah*.

*thats not why but no one actually reads the bible anymore.

We unfortunately are scared of sex and nudity in this country and do our best to control all aspects of them. Hell, in Georgia you can’t call a vibrator a sex toy and sell it. It’s a personal massager. Go into any store that sells sex related things and they’re all covered in stickers that say “for novelty use only” because it's required by law. It's indecent to call it a dildo therefore is and should be illegal to do so here.

Funktheduck > TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. 12/02/2015 at 13:01

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Won’t happen. Just like the line in Fight Club “it’s not ‘your vibrator’ it’s ‘a vibrator’ was found in your luggage”

They'll use legalese to imply you were picking up hookers without actually saying it.

El Rivinado > Santiago of Escuderia Boricua 12/02/2015 at 13:01

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I put it in quotes for a reason. It was meant to be a jab that the people that identify as progressives in my state are some of the most backward thinking people I've ever had the misfortune of meeting.

Funktheduck > BigBlock440 12/02/2015 at 13:03

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Exactly. No one ever said “absolute power corrupts absolutely”

No government has ever abused power.

Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 13:05

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I agree, it’s stupid. I say make prostitution legal. If you want to sell your body, you know, since it’s YOUR BODY, you should have a right to. I’ve spent a little bit of time in Europe and people over there aren’t nearly as uptight about sex and nudity as we are in the US.

BigBlock440 > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 13:10

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That quote doesn’t even make sense, I don’t know why somebody would say such a thing.

TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 13:14

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More reasons I’m glad I no longer live on the West Coast.

Funktheduck > Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! 12/02/2015 at 13:14

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Go into a game stop one day. You’ll increase your odds if you go around the launch of a MW type game. Parents will be buying war games with grisly death scenes for their small children. The employees are required to mention it’s rated mature and you will hear 9 out of 10 times from the parents “but no sex or nudity right?” “No sir/ma’am” “ok, good”.

Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 13:20

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And some of those kids are GOOD too. A former coworker of mine used to play GOW and Halo online and he had his at the time 7 year old son play with him. Man, he was unstoppable in FPS's. I always hated not being on his team. lol

Funktheduck > TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. 12/02/2015 at 13:24

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East coast best coast?

Funktheduck > Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! 12/02/2015 at 13:27

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Haha. No kidding. Back when I used to play more often I would come across kids who would just wipe the floor with me. Easy to get good when you don't have adult responsibilities

RallyWrench > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 13:53

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As a Californian, my general rule is that nothing good happens south of Point Conception.

jariten1781 > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 14:23

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While I’m in agreement that this is ridiculous/waste of money...what constitutional rights do you think it violates? It’s not privacy since a car being driven on a public road confers no reasonable expectation of privacy...that throws out 4th amendment. It’s not due process since it’s not ‘accusing’ you of a crime so throw out 5th and 14th.

While dumb, it’s probably legally defensible. Amongst other arguments, they’re going to argue that this is no different than if a neighbor saw you there and walked over to tell whoever answered the door that it’s a dangerous/whatever part of town.

Funktheduck > jariten1781 12/02/2015 at 14:32

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Yeah.

Maybe tracking without a warrant? The courts said it was unconstitutional to place gps devices on vehicles without a warrant but tailing/watching wasn't. If I remember correctly there had to be a human element or the government would/could just track everything everyone was doing.

jariten1781 > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 14:55

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Yeah, that gets into the total legality of license plate cameras though. While still an open question, it’s likely that ship has already sailed. I find it very unlikely there will be a sweeping ruling against them since they have a lot of legitimate uses the courts will be reticent to squash entirely. Listen to a scanner when an amber alert goes out or an armed robbery occurs, they get hits on the plate scanners and are able to quickly vector units there...even across state lines.

IIRC the GPS ruling was continually interpreted wrong in the media. It was a few years ago so I haven’t read the opinion since so some details may be a bit off, but the opinion of the court ruled it as a trespass since the physical installation affected the owners personal effects. There were other arguments in the concurring opinions, one which you stated, and one which talked about how it constituted a search due to it continuing to track in non public spaces where the owner had a reasonable expectation to privacy; but those are merely interesting and don’t carry a lot of weight until some other defendant runs it up the chain attempting to use those arguments.

CB > Funktheduck 12/02/2015 at 18:47

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I actually attended a John School (no, not because I was charged, it’s just in my line of work/education) to see what it’s all about. Apparently community groups in certain areas of Ottawa are pretty much always on the lookout for cars that shouldn’t be in the area. The example given was that if you circle a block more than once, they’re probably already written your plate number down and tried to get a small description. And they hand all this data over to the police.

Guess what happens when a sex worker goes missing or is murdered? Cops take a list of all the people charged with sexual assault, previous attenders of John School, and the owners of the plates, and go knocking on doors. Which is understandable, but also kind of sucks, because you’re right, what happens if you did get lost in one of those neighbourhoods? And how do you explain to a spouse or the people you live with why the cops were at the door?