Nope. Not a photo from Iraq.

Who needs politicians creating a police state when these scumbags are helping create one for us through badly designed 911 services.

Doug Bates and his wife, Stacey, were in bed around 10 p.m., their 2-year-old daughters asleep in a nearby room. Suddenly they were shaken awake by the wail of police sirens and the rumble of a helicopter above their suburban Southern California home. A criminal must be on the loose, they thought.

Doug Bates got up to lock the doors and grabbed a knife. A beam from a flashlight hit him. He peeked into the backyard. A swarm of police, assault rifles drawn, ordered him out of the house. Bates emerged, frightened and with the knife in his hand, as his wife frantically dialed 911. They were handcuffed and ordered to the ground while officers stormed the house.

The scene of mayhem and carnage the officers expected was nowhere to be found. Neither the Bateses nor the officers knew that they were pawns in a dangerous game being played 1,200 miles away by a teenager bent on terrifying a random family of strangers.

They were victims of a new kind of telephone fraud that exploits a weakness in the way the 911 system handles calls from Internet-based phone services. The attacks — called “swatting” because armed police SWAT teams usually respond — are virtually unstoppable, and an Associated Press investigation found that budget-strapped 911 centers are essentially defenseless without an overhaul of their computer systems.
[…]
Swatting calls place an immense strain on responding departments. The Orange County Sheriff’s Department deployed about 30 people to the Bateses’ home, including a SWAT team, a helicopter and K-9 units. It cost the department $14,700.

One guy had it done to him three times! Don’t you think that after the first call the cops would have flagged his number to check before sending SWAT a second AND third time? Cripes! Hopefully they find the swatters and let loose the SWAT team from hell on them!




  1. brm says:

    #7 jobs:

    STFU, I’m pretty conservative, and I think the cops are totally to blame here. Too much of this, “shoot first – ask questions later” bullshit.

  2. Steve S says:

    #29 Mr. Fusion said,
    “If you read the article you would be aware that the “kid” received five years. ”

    I actually did read the article but I missed that part the first time through.
    I will shut up now.

  3. ECA says:

    Iv always wondered WHY TV version of 911 is ALLOT better then the REAL THING.
    Caller ID, AUTO TRACE, AUTO LOCATE incoming calls.
    INTERNET phone service?? VOIP?? Umm, ISNT THAT ABLE TO BE TRACED??

    “Ellis was putting an Internet-based phone service for the hearing-impaired to nefarious use. ”

    I would think the tech is OUT there, and that MOST of it is cheap..

  4. Thomas says:

    Someone please post Dvorak’s address.

  5. Mr. Fusion says:

    #34, Thomas,

    I don’t think it would be posted in plain sight. You will need to look for it.

  6. Glenn E. says:

    And yet, when you need them to respond to a real emergency or natural disaster situation. The minutes tick away, while they consider if it’s part of their job. Or if it’s in the district that they cover. Or some damn trivial excuse. The Katrina delayed response, being a good example. These SWAT team screw ups have been going on for decades. I heard of one a long time ago, but I can’t find the deals now. Something about an antique gun collection, being their call to action.

  7. Angel H. Wong says:

    They won’t do a thing until either a little white girl or a rich Conservative guy gets killed.


0

Bad Behavior has blocked 9320 access attempts in the last 7 days.