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from the where-there's-a-will-there's-a...waze dept.
NYPD asks Google to scrap Waze's DUI checkpoints
The NYPD has sent Google a cease-and-desist letter, asking it to axe a Waze feature that allows users to mark cops' locations on the navigation app. Based on the letter first seen by Streetsblog NYC and CBS New York, authorities believe the feature is making it harder to enforce the law and keep the roads safe. The NYPD sent the cease-and-desist just a couple of weeks after Waze debuted speed camera notifications, but the cops' letter mostly focused on the fact that the ability allows users to give each other a heads-up about sobriety checkpoints.
[...] [Based] on the statement it provided to NYT, [Google] doesn't have any intention to give in to the NYPD's demand. It told the publication that safety is a top priority for the company and that "informing drivers about upcoming speed traps allows them to be more careful and make safer decisions when they're on the road."
Also at Gizmodo.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday February 08 2019, @03:51AM (16 children)
This is related to the concept that cops can't be video recorded in public.
When do cops learn that they are PUBLIC SERVANTS? They answer to us. We have the right to know what they are up to. If they wanted to be secretive, maybe they should have joint the SECRET service, instead of a civil police service.
Assholes. They may even win this, although as time passes, they are being forced to be more and more transparent. We aren't there, yet, of course.
One more note. Checkpoints are unconstitutional, in and of themselves. The only time they are fully justified, is during a manhunt. Kidnap, bank robbery, terror attack, things like that where they are looking for specific individuals. Stop a vehicle, look at each occupant, maybe ask for ID, then the vehicle goes on. DUI checkpoints are wrong, as well as unconstitutional.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday February 08 2019, @04:19AM (2 children)
It's hardly related. NYPD are just reaching here because they are butthurt.
You can find First Amendment audits of DUI checkpoints on YouTube, though. Some pass, some fail.
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(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday February 08 2019, @04:13PM (1 child)
What about 4th amendment audits on DUI checkpoints?
Sorry officer, my mistake. When I saw all the police cars parked here I thought I had found the donut shop I was looking for.
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(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday February 08 2019, @04:30PM
This might be what you're looking for (results vary by state):
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=DUI+checkpoint+refusal+honoryouroath [youtube.com]
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=4th+amendment+audit+dui [youtube.com]
Violation of the 4th amendment is not unlikely to occur during any situation where you argue with or film cops.
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by ShadowSystems on Friday February 08 2019, @04:23AM (7 children)
Google can rightly claim that such an order would violate their customers' 1st Amendment Rights. You can not prohibit the public from publicly & peaceably discussing public affairs, and a DUI checkpoint would fall squarely in this catagory. The cops may not LIKE that the public is discussing the checkpoints in such a way that warns other drivers of the locations of same, but trying to prohibit the public from doing so would instantly get the police sued for Constitutional Rights violations.
An anecdotal example of this was seen in my home town about a decade ago. A man had gotten busted by a DUI checkpoint & thought it had been unfair. He circled back around to a point about two blocks before the checkpoint, stopped beside the road, & held up a sign that read "DUI checkpoint ahead! AVOID!"
The cops tried to arrest him for interfering with the checkpoint, obstruction of justice, & every other bullshit charge they could think of to lob at him. All it took was his one call, made to a lawyer, & the case got dropped faster than you can say "Freedom of Speach". They couldn't stop a public citizen from peaceful protest, & holding up a sign angry about said checkpoint was dead-on "peaceful protest". His lawyer reminded the cops that the STATE didn't have enough money to pay his client's winnings should it go to court much less our CITY, so the city had to drop all charges.
The debate on if a corporation can have Rights is another matter, but their *customers* certainly do, & one of those Rights is the right to post their Free Speach about the actions of public employees engaged in their public duties in a public space.
TL;DR: the cops don't like it, tough shit. The Constitution is on Google's side.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 08 2019, @03:45PM (2 children)
Meanwhile, Mr Activist spent a night in jail, had his car towed, missed work, and paid his lawyer x k$ to make the problem he caused for himself to go away.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday February 08 2019, @04:24PM
AC above is one of the sheeple. There is no price too steep for asserting your rights. Ask the people who rebelled against England, to establish the US of A.
(Score: 2) by Oakenshield on Friday February 08 2019, @04:29PM
In other words, you owe him a debt of gratitude for his own self-sacrifice to prevent bullies under color of law from violating the rights of his fellow citizens. You post infers that he must have considerably more intestinal fortitude and honor than you.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Oakenshield on Friday February 08 2019, @04:24PM (2 children)
I'd like to believe this was true but it fails the logic test. If someone were "busted" at a DUI checkpoint, there is very little chance they would be arrested, processed, released, recover their vehicle, make a sign and have time left to return to the scene while the checkpoint was ongoing. This sounds like urban legend or wishful thinking.
(Score: 2) by dx3bydt3 on Friday February 08 2019, @10:10PM
Here in Canada They would be checking vehicle registration, insurance and motor vehicle inspection as well. Expiry or lack of documentation for any of those merits a fine, but you go on your way. Presumably something similar could apply in the state in question.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 09 2019, @04:58AM
That story partially true. Similar things have happened across the country, but the most recent ones I remember happened in Ohio and Connecticut.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday February 08 2019, @07:37PM
I seem to recall, when I was younger, they went after a local radio station that listed all the area speed traps and lost handily.
I couldn't find it with a quick Google, though.
I did find this one from MO, where a guy was flashing his lights to warn people and won on first amendment grounds.
Missouri Judge Says, 'Yes, You Have A Right To Warn Other Drivers About Speed Traps' [thecarconnection.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday February 08 2019, @04:10PM (4 children)
A transparent police state with absolute power is still a police state.
Being transparent doesn't make it more desirable.
"Being forced to be more and more transparent" could mean two things:
1. the transparency undermines their bad behavior and may become an effective check on such bad behavior
2. the transparency is despite the bad behavior which is now so deeply entrenched that complete public exposure and transparency cannot possibly threaten their bad behavior
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(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday February 08 2019, @04:26PM (3 children)
The transparency helps to expose how fraudulent the various police forces, and police practices are. That is a good thing, in and of itself. You can't correct a problem that you don't know about. You MIGHT correct problems that you are aware of.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday February 08 2019, @04:48PM (2 children)
I can't disagree with that. But once it moves beyond the event horizon of correctible, then transparency about that fact simply doesn't matter and won't save you.
I seriously wonder if things have already become so dysfunctional that, other than some small gains here and there, the system will implode. I hope not. But I wonder.
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(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday February 08 2019, @05:09PM (1 child)
There is hope. Look at BLM, Black Lives Matter. That bunch is about 70% full of shit, but there is truth to what they say. A lot of unarmed black men, especially of military age, have been more or less executed by the cops. Locally, a young black man ran from the cops, and took refuge in a pond. Officially, he drowned. Nothing mysterious about that, right? Young guy, all out of breath, runs into a pond in the middle of the night, trying to hide from the cops. The coroner finds that he died of drowning. But, Mother examined the body, and found six bullet holes in his back. Hmmmm . . .
Shit like that has been going on for as long as Euros and Afros have lived on this continent. But, public scrutiny seems to be slowing that, somewhat. Ubiquitous video catches more of them than ever before. The status quo is changing. The attitude of judges that a cop's word is reliable is slowly changing, in the face of all that video.
There is hope. Don't expect dramatic changes overnight, but things are changing.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday February 08 2019, @06:04PM
I do see the changes you are talking about.
Look at YouTube videos of interactions with cops about five years ago. Photography is a crime. Or police body cams were considered invasive. "Would you want to work with a camera watching you all day?" (was the argument used) Police not releasing camera footage that showed misconduct.
There seems to have been a big change. Departments now seem to be less willing to protect obviously bad cops. This is in part due to the explosion of clear video evidence of bad cop behavior. One in particular was arresting a nurse for refusing to draw blood from an unconscious man . . . who was a reserve cop. Look at recent YouTube videos, and the cops own videos show interactions, even violence, shootings, etc. It's no longer secret, and they seem (mostly) to have adapted to being in the public eye.
But we have many other societal problems. I'm not convinced (but am hopeful) that they can be fixed. The fact that we are so deeply politically divided should be disturbing to people rather than the Rah Rah Rah My Side My Side!!! The lobbying and corruption. Other things that we should all be able to agree about that should not be divisive.
In a nutshell: I see some things get better, gradually. I'm not fully convinced things won't go off the rails. But I am hopeful. Maybe because the alternative would be so awful.
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