Boston first US city to perform random commuter searches

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http://www.cnn.com/2004/TRAVEL/06/08/boston.transit.search.ap/index.html

personal freedoms, Big Brother, homeland security blahblahblah

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 19:34 (twenty-two years ago)

If someone tried to search me before I had my first cup of coffee of the day, I'd bite their head off.

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 19:35 (twenty-two years ago)

This will last two seconds.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 19:39 (twenty-two years ago)

And it won't hurt?

....okay. Go ahead.

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 19:40 (twenty-two years ago)

What the fuck is it going to take before people start rioting?

― Casuistry (Chris P), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 20:41 (twenty-two years ago)

We were talking about how this is going to be completely ineffectual at lunch today. Also, all of us minorities at the table pretty much resigned ourselves to missing trains pretty much all the time due to "random" selection for searching.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 20:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Did they find any random commuters?

― Michael White (Hereward), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Hey, at least it's creating jobs for the people who do the searches.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Hey, at least it's creating jobs for the people who do the searches.

You just know that this is going to end up like East Germany when something like one out of every four people was working/informing for the Stasi.

― Elvis Telecom (Chris Barrus), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:59 (twenty-two years ago)

Haha! ETOTM.

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, they'll have people to search the searchers.

― Michael White (Hereward), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:06 (twenty-two years ago)

If someone tried to search me before I had my first cup of coffee of the day, I'd bite their head off

Bite? Just the head?

Man, if someone tried to search me before coffee in the morning, I tear out their heart and show it to them before they died.

― martin m. (mushrush), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:15 (twenty-two years ago)

The definition of irony: this (*cough*) service is undoubtedly paid for by the lucky commuters of Boston.

― Aimless (Aimless), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:25 (twenty-two years ago)

how do you search a computer

― s1ocki (slutsky), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:28 (twenty-two years ago)

Are you posting from the British isles?

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:29 (twenty-two years ago)

We were talking about how this is going to be completely ineffectual at lunch today.

This is exactly the attitude people had when Bloomberg said said people weren't going to be able to smoke in bars any more.

― Oliver Wendell Holmes (Oliver Wendell Holmes), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:31 (twenty-two years ago)

I think the two are hardly comparable.

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:32 (twenty-two years ago)

No kidding!

ineffectual smoking ban = people will still smoke in bars

ineffectual commuter searching = terrorists will still be able to blow up the T

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 22:54 (twenty-two years ago)

Well, so much for thinking that Boston might be slightly more mellow than New York (though the Boston thread pretty much disabused me of that notion anyway).

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 23:17 (twenty-two years ago)

another reason to hate Boston!

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 01:31 (twenty-two years ago)

If the authorities search someone and find contraband (say drugs), can the person be arrested, charged, and convicted for that crime? Would the search hold-up?

― Debito (Debito), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 01:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Here in melbourne in the area I live, they've apparently started testing taking drug sniffer dogs to night club queues that can apparently sniff for people with coke/speed/e on their person.

Something about that seems REALLY WRONG and I dont know wether it'll be enforced elsewhere in the city.

― Trayce (trayce), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 02:37 (twenty-two years ago)

i hope they never do random dog sniffs for fear and desperation

― the surface noise is generally somewhere between 'in some spots' and 'throu (ele, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 02:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Or "I havent bothered showering for 3 days cos I'm too depressed". Man, it'd be over for me in that case.

― Trayce (trayce), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 02:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Um did I just admit all that aloud? Shit.

― Trayce (trayce), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 02:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Just great. The week of the WTO riots here, you couldn't get into the block my office building was in without your work ID. Scary. And not only that, but I'm sure they'll be holding trains for people until they're cleared. What a colossal . . .

― Rickey Wright (Rrrickey), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 07:01 (twenty-two years ago)

nobody's answered my question. isn't that scenario the most striking civil liberties concern? Does anyone know anything about the legalities of searches?

― Debito (Debito), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 07:33 (twenty-two years ago)

the only controversial thing i ever have on my person is my nobber

― the surface noise is generally somewhere between 'in some spots' and 'throu (ele, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 07:49 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm glad I'm not the only person that misread the thread title and the article title as "random computer searches". Maybe it was the paranoia-inducing report on the morning news that police were now going to be "routinely policing internet chatrooms to guard against paedophiles". Crikey.

― Possibly Kate Again (kate), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 08:01 (twenty-two years ago)

isn't that scenario the most striking civil liberties concern? Does anyone know anything about the legalities of searches?

The Justice Department has already released data that shows the major "law enforcement tools" of the PATRIOT ACT have been used primarily in drug busts, not anti-terrorism.

― hstencil (hstencil), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 12:39 (twenty-two years ago)

oh the conspiracy. glad to see the fat guy still needs to get laid

― kephm, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 13:09 (twenty-two years ago)

― hstencil (hstencil), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 13:10 (twenty-two years ago)

i am exhausted by conspir. theories & my other post was directed towards the story not your post hstencil

― kephm, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 13:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Citizens should be able to do random searches on each other and on government officials and their offices. In a free and open society, you have to be willing to acccpt some of that.

― dave225 (Dave225), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 13:59 (twenty-two years ago)

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