Author: Joe from MassPrivateI

The Newspaper

The Tennessee General Assembly is taking steps to rein in roadblocks and the use of license plate scanners by police. On Wednesday, the state House Criminal Justice Committee will consider a Senate-passed legislation prohibiting police from participating in roadblocks designed to collect DNA from motorists. On the same day, the House Transportation Subcommittee will take up another Senate-passed bill to limit the use of automated license plate readers (ALPR, also known as ANPR in Europe).   Continue reading “Tennessee Lawmakers Take On Roadblocks, License Scanners”

MassPrivateI

Article first appeared in PrivacySOS.org:

MA – The Commonwealth Fusion Center (CFC) under the auspices of the Massachusetts State Police and the Boston Regional Intelligence Center (BRIC), run by the Boston Police Department.

1. The CFC safeguards the exercise of First Amendment-protected political activity.   Continue reading “How Fusion Centers are violating our rights”

Ars Technica – by Cyrus Farivar

A small company in Texas has produced the TraqCloud, a new, significantly cheaper way to track anyone or anything using GPS. TraqCloud, in its promotional materials, is marketed for luggage or kid tracking, but using such a tracker against a suspected cheating love interest, a sneaky business partner, or local law enforcement is now simple and inexpensive.   Continue reading “Spy tech goes cheap: Track your car, kid, or enemy for $10 a month”

Mass Live – by Jack Flynn

SPRINGFIELD — City officials have agreed to pay $28,000 to settle a lawsuit by two women claiming they were strip searched by Springfield police officer Carla Daniele in front of male officers and passing traffic in 2009.

The women, Meredith Blakeslee and Darlene Palazzi, will receive $14,000 each in exchange for dropping the suit filed in U.S. District Court after police stopped their vehicle on Plumtree Road and searched them for drugs.    Continue reading “Strip search lawsuit against Springfield police officer Carla Daniele is settled for $28,000”

Times Union – by Bob Gardinier

Troy – Another notice of a pending lawsuit was filed against the city, this time by a former college student who claims police officers slammed him against a truck, punched him and used a Taser on him for jaywalking.

One of the officers was named in two other cases in which defendants claim use of excessive force.   Continue reading “Ex-student accuses Troy cops of excessive force”

Political Blindspot

Tiffany Rent is eight-months pregnant, but that didn’t stop a Chicago police officer from using a taser on her. The assault and arrest occurred Wednesday morning outside of a drug store on Chicago’s South Side.

The Chicago Police Department Superintendent Garry McCarthy said that even though Rent was only a week or two away from giving birth, “you can’t always tell whether somebody is pregnant.”     Continue reading “Chicago Police Use Taser On 8-Month Pregnant Woman Over Parking Ticket Comment”

The Newspaper

For the first time, police in North Carolina are allowed to turn on their lights and siren to pull over any motorist, even when they have done nothing wrong. In a ruling last month, the North Carolina Court of Appeals for the first time in the state created a “community caretaking” exception to the Fourth Amendment. It was used to convict Audra Lindsey Smathers.

On May 27, 2010, Smathers had been driving her red Corvette down Highway 280 when Transylvania Sheriff’s Deputy Brian Kreigsman pulled in behind her. She was driving at the 45 MPH speed limit, and the deputy noted nothing suspicious or illegal. Suddenly, a large dog ran in front of the Corvette. She hit the dog, which caused the car to bounce.   Continue reading “North Carolina Appeals Court Upholds Traffic Stop Without An Offense”

The Newspaper

The Tennessee Supreme Court decided on Thursday that the only use for roadside sobriety tests is to collect evidence against motorists, using them to convict individuals for driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI). The high court justices overturned an appellate decision from 2012 that found a driver who passed six of the tests with flying colors should never have been arrested (view 2012 ruling). David D. Bell was arrested on May 13, 2009, even though the trial judge found no evidence of impairment in the sobriety tests when he reviewed the dashcam footage.   Continue reading “Tennessee Supreme Court Says Cops Can Ignore Sobriety Test”

The Common Sense Show – by Dave Hodges

We no longer have to ask foreign refugees what it is like living inside a police state. All we have to do is to read the daily accounts of innocent Americans being abused and murdered through the excessive use of force being used by local police who have been federalized by the Department of Homeland Security.

What used to be the beacon of hope, has rapidly become the spotlight of tyranny. I am speaking of America, both then and now.   Continue reading “What is it like living in a police state?”

Washington’s Blog

“Once You Give Up Your Rights, You Can Never Get Them Back. Once You Turn On That Police State, You Can Never Turn It Off.”

Richard Clarke is one of the four White House panelists on NSA spying, and the former top counter-terror czar in the Clinton and Bush administrations.   Continue reading “White House Panelist On NSA – and Former Counterterror Czar – Says NSA May Enable a “Police State””

My SA – by GUILLERMO CONTRERAS

SAN ANTONIO — Judges in Bexar County got them. State and federal prosecutors in San Antonio and South Texas got them. So did defense lawyers, court clerks, secretaries and bondsmen.

And now courthouse regulars are scratching their heads, struggling to remember what they spoke about with a defense lawyer at the center of a federal corruption investigation.   Continue reading “FBI to courthouse: Your phone has been tapped”

The Register – by Jack Clark

A former White House security advisor has suggested that you, dear reader, are naive if you think hosting data outside of the US will protect a business from the NSA.

“NSA and any other world-class intelligence agency can hack into databases even if they not in the US,” said former White House security advisor Richard Clarke in a speech at the Cloud Security Alliance summit in San Francisco on Monday. “Non-US companies are using NSA revelations as a marketing tool.”   Continue reading “Prez Obama cyber-guru: Think your data is safe in an EU cloud? The NSA will raid your servers”

Courthouse News – by MATT REYNOLDS

LOS ANGELES (CN) – After a Hawthorne police officer shot a man’s dog to death in front of him, and video of it went viral on YouTube, police falsely and maliciously charged him with six felonies, the man claims in court.

In a civil rights complaint against the city and three officers in Superior Court, Leon Rosby claims that on June 30, 2013, he was driving in his car with his 2-year-old Rottweiler, Max, when saw police responding to a residence in the Hawthorne, near L.A. International Airport.   Continue reading “They Serve, Protect, and Shoot Your Dog”

Courthouse News – by CHRISTINE STUART 

HARTFORD (CN) – In a bizarre twist to a civil rights issue, a news photographer claims in a federal lawsuit that Hartford police wrongfully arrested him for using a drone to photograph a fatal car accident – at an elevation of 150 feet, far too high to interfere with police, as officers claimed.

Pedro Rivera, a photographer and editor for a local television news station, claims he was not breaking any laws or hindering emergency operations by recording police activity after a Feb. 1 fatal car accident.   Continue reading “U.S. Newsman Says He Was Arrested for Using a Drone Camera”

KIRO News – by Essex Porter

SEATTLE — A new surveillance idea in Seattle is putting some people on edge. Police want to use facial recognition technology to scan surveillance video to identify possible criminals. But the proposal comes after the National Security Agency scandals sparked the revelations of Edward Snowden. Now many people are worried about their privacy rights, including the right not to be monitored by their government.   Continue reading “Seattle police want to digitally scan surveillance video”

Washington’s Blog

The U.S. Government Condemns Authoritarian Regimes Which Use Anti-Terror Laws to Stifle Journalism

It is widely known that authoritarian regimes use “anti-terror” laws to crack down on journalism.

But this extreme tactic is becoming more and more common.  The Committee to Protect Journalists reported a year ago that terrorism laws are being misused worldwide to crush journalism:   Continue reading “Authoritarian Regimes (Like the U.S. and Britain) Treat Reporters Like Terrorists”

The Newspaper

Private companies that spy on motorists are suing the state of Utah over a law that limits commercial use of automated license plate readers (ALPR, also known as ANPR in Europe). The firms Digital Recognition Network Inc and Vigilant Solutions told the US District Court for the District of Utah that they have a First Amendment right to photograph motorists, identify the vehicle and record the time and GPS coordinates in a searchable database accessible to clients nationwide.   Continue reading “Utah: Repo Men Sue To Overturn Private License Plate Reader Ban”