Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by chromas on Monday July 02 2018, @08:48PM   Printer-friendly
from the css dept.

Judge slams Tacoma for not releasing stingray records

A judge in Washington state has excoriated the Tacoma Police Department for withholding public records pertaining to its use of cell-site simulators, also known as stingrays. Back in 2016, the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington state sued the TPD on behalf of four community leaders, arguing that the department has not adequately responded to their public records requests concerning the use of stingrays, which included asking for a blank form authorizing its use.

"The [Public Records Act] establishes a positive duty to disclose public records unless they fall within specific exemptions," Judge G. Helen Whitener wrote in her Monday opinion. "This mandates that the City, upon receiving a request for documents, must first do an adequate search and then must produce the documents requested if there is not an exemption. The PRA does not require the City to analyze the reasons why the document is requested or to determine the relevance of the documents requested even if they are blank forms. The blank form taken in context of the other forms may have meaning to the requestor, and it is not for the City to analyze its relevance. To adopt the City's interpretation of the PRA would defeat the broad mandate of the PRA to allow access to public records not covered by and exemption."


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 02 2018, @10:06PM (10 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday July 02 2018, @10:06PM (#701598) Journal

    The civil war rhetoric is quite new, the last month or two maybe.

    It just means someone published a book or wrote an influential op ed. Doesn't mean a thing in the absence of blood in the street.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 02 2018, @10:50PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 02 2018, @10:50PM (#701614)

    In my original timeline, the riots began in late August this year.

    Divergence can cause small changes between timelines that otherwise present larger features leading to convergence in a Stein's gate.

    President Hillary Clinton will be remembered for the FEMA concentration camps. President Trump may be remembered for the ICE concentration camps. The larger features are the ruling class' attempts to resolve the inherent contradictions of the system that gave them their aristocracy. They will try anything and everything, even reducing every major city to irradiated ruins, to retain that power.

    Unless

  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by hemocyanin on Monday July 02 2018, @11:11PM (2 children)

    by hemocyanin (186) on Monday July 02 2018, @11:11PM (#701622) Journal

    Chris Hedges has some interesting comments on how quickly things can can change:

    As a foreign correspondent I covered collapsed societies, including the former Yugoslavia. It is impossible for any doomed population to grasp how fragile the decayed financial, social and political system is on the eve of implosion. All the harbingers of collapse are visible: crumbling infrastructure; chronic underemployment and unemployment; the indiscriminate use of lethal force by police; political paralysis and stagnation; an economy built on the scaffolding of debt; nihilistic mass shootings in schools, universities, workplaces, malls, concert venues and movie theaters; opioid overdoses that kill some 64,000 people a year; an epidemic of suicides; unsustainable military expansion; gambling as a desperate tool of economic development and government revenue; the capture of power by a tiny, corrupt clique; censorship; the physical diminishing of public institutions ranging from schools and libraries to courts and medical facilities; the incessant bombardment by electronic hallucinations to divert us from the depressing sight that has become America and keep us trapped in illusions. We suffer the usual pathologies of impending death. I would be happy to be wrong. But I have seen this before. I know the warning signs. All I can say is get ready.

    https://www.commondreams.org/views/2018/05/21/coming-collapse [commondreams.org]

    • (Score: 3, Disagree) by frojack on Tuesday July 03 2018, @02:06AM

      by frojack (1554) on Tuesday July 03 2018, @02:06AM (#701685) Journal

      There's been a Chris Hedges or three around every decade.

      Come on for christ sake, read a little history.
      Thomas Malthus ring any bells?
      Aldous Huxley maybe?
      Al Gore?

      https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/science/18tier.html [nytimes.com]

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday July 05 2018, @05:00AM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday July 05 2018, @05:00AM (#702853) Journal

      It is impossible for any doomed population to grasp how fragile the decayed financial, social and political system is on the eve of implosion.

      So... you're claiming that US citizens are unusually well-informed for a doomed population?

  • (Score: 2) by edIII on Monday July 02 2018, @11:45PM (2 children)

    by edIII (791) on Monday July 02 2018, @11:45PM (#701637)

    Actually, if you will note in my response to you, violence is here, and this was not an op-ed, but a group of people talking. Conservatives and Liberals on the panel both agreeing to that sentiment. No real push back that the idea was crazy, but seriously discussed.

    Homeless person saying the world is ending is one thing, a major newspaper putting Civil War on the front of it is another. One deserves more concern.

    --
    Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 03 2018, @04:02PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 03 2018, @04:02PM (#701972)

      I've been expecting inevitable chaos for some time.

      Though, realisically, a civil war may not be able to materialize. That's because we have mixed ideologies to the point that distinct groups don't really form. So you will have the neighbor v.s. neighbor chaos that will be total chaos rather than an organized war. Or maybe organization will happen, with the internet, it's possible.

      It would be really nice if we could provide more independence and freedom. You might not agree with everyone else's way of living, but you're much less likely to get into a fight with someone if you don't try to force them to do what you think is the "right" thing.

      That being said, corporations can exert too much power and should be treated differently. We can curtail the power of mega-corporations by enacting more fair contract consent laws, prohibiting arbitration agreements, eliminating trade secrets laws, making NDAs illegal, reducing copyright duration, restricting indemity agreements, prohibitng corporate ownership of corporations, etc.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday July 05 2018, @04:43AM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday July 05 2018, @04:43AM (#702848) Journal

      violence is here

      Not really. There's still high drama over a single death last year.

      Homeless person saying the world is ending is one thing, a major newspaper putting Civil War on the front of it is another.

      Not at all. The latter has no more likelihood or interest in being right than the former.

  • (Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday July 03 2018, @01:45AM

    by frojack (1554) on Tuesday July 03 2018, @01:45AM (#701676) Journal

    Its merely the talking point of the week by the smoking ruin of the Democratic party.

    When the same phrase is use on all the left media sites as if on queue, you know who got the memo.

    SCOTUS says President DOES have the authority to stop immigration from certain countries. (Several Circuit court judges bitch-slapped in the process). Next talking point - Hurry!!

    Lets Eliminate ICE.!!!

    SCOTUS says you don't have to suppress your religion to bake a cake for Gays? Next talking point - Hurry.
    Someone go kick Sanders out of a public restaurant.

    Next few weeks? Character Assignation on a grand scale regardless of WHO gets Nominated.

    So predictable. So ineffective. So childish.

    --
    No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.