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The head of the FBI believes that a spike in violent crime in many cities may be due to officers' fears of showing up on Internet videos confronting suspects.
FBI Director James Comey told reporters Wednesday that a "viral video effect" is leading to less aggressive policing that "could well be at the heart" of an alarming increase in murders in many cities, according to an account recorded by the New York Times.
"There's a perception that police are less likely to do the marginal additional policing that suppresses crime -- the getting out of your car at 2 in the morning and saying to a group of guys, 'Hey, what are you doing here?'" he told reporters.
Comey's remarks came after he was briefed on rising crime rates in more than 40 cities during the first quarter of 2016. The director did not reveal specific statistics, and the FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
James Comey, welcome to the panopticon you dragged the rest of us into. It's rather a double-edged sword, isn't it?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 13 2016, @02:45PM
I've noticed a number of disturbing trends lately. Rising extremism. Increase in male suicide deaths. That guy who thought it was his god-given right to assault a protester at a Trump rally. The other guy who thought it was his god-given right to enter the women's bathroom in order to assault a woman he believe was actually a man. This guy [youtube.com] who attempted to murder two women working in a hotel lobby with his truck over a billing dispute, right in front of a cop's face! Of course, there's always the merry Christmas jihadists but at least we get a reprieve from those until late October.
I wonder if the root cause has something to do with this graph [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 13 2016, @02:56PM
It's the dark side of Metcalfe's Law. Today everyone is on the Internet and has a smart phone and is multitasking much more than folks did 30-40 years ago. The days of three trusted anchors on network TV are gone. Conspiracy theories gain currency rapidly.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Saturday May 14 2016, @02:24AM
Well, when the craziest ones stop being theories and move to facts that's going to happen. You couldn't convince people in the 90's that the government was trying to, or even wanted to, perform mass surveillance.
Thankfully, the powers that be are enjoying their own dog food, that being the complete and utter failure in security they engendered. Heroes like Snowden are whistleblowing more and more. So when there seems to be a constant flow of verified information confirming past conspiracies, and that inequality and injustice are condoned by the top as "design features", the public loses faith in government and their leaders.
We have practically no reason to trust the government, or assign any confidence in the integrity of the process. Why shouldn't I believe a conspiracy theory? In all seriousness, unless that conspiracy has elements like aliens or time traveling Nazi's, I'm inclined to believe it.
Greedy, corrupt, and treasonous buttheads rule over us like Feudal lords. If you present me a conspiracy theory painting our leaders as such, I'm going to see those elements as the ones most likely containing truth, as that behavior has been verified time and time again. Which is not something I felt in my naive youth.
The U.S government couldn't pay PR agencies enough to reclaim its honor, and short of a second civil war changing out government, I will never trust them again.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.