Safeway Club Card Leads to Bogus Arson Arrest 505
Richard M. Smith writes "Tukwila, Washington firefighter, Philip Scott Lyons found out the hard way
that supermarket loyalty cards come with a huge price. Lyons was arrested
last August and charged with attempted arson. Police alleged at the time
that Lyons tried to set fire to his own house while his wife and children
were inside. According to KOMO-TV and the Seattle Times, a major piece of evidence used against Lyons in his arrest was the record of his supermarket purchases that he made with his Safeway Club Card. Police
investigators had discovered that his Club Card was used to buy fire starters of the same type used in the arson attempt. For Lyons, the story did have a happy ending. All charges were dropped against him in January 2005 because another person stepped forward saying he or she
set the fire and not Lyons."
Still thinking? (Score:5, Insightful)
Are you kidding me? The wrongfully-accused was charged almost immediately, and now this guy fronted up and they're thinking about it?
Re:The wife? (Score:3, Insightful)
If the kid us underage, that would explain why they kept the identity a secret.
Re:Your Rights Online?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Happy ending? (Score:5, Insightful)
He was charged with and arrested for arson.
What part of this story is "happy"?
The only thing that stood between him and serious prison time (not to mention probably losing all of his friends, family and destroying his career and reputation) was that the criminal who was responsible came forward. Do you know how rare that is? His "fortune" here was like falling off a 110 story building and having a huge gust of wind on a still day scoop you to safety at the very last second.
Let's not even entertain the possibility that someone could have died in the fire. If that were the case, I bet nobody would have stepped forward and this guy would have taken the fall - all so Safeway could target their demographics better. More, he probably would have been sentenced to life in prison at the least and everyone would be cheering for his execution. Because, of course, he's guilty if he has been convited, so he should fry!
This was a stomach-churning close-call.
I suspect this is the Children... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What issue? (Score:2, Insightful)
Remember, he was CHARGED. You would hope the police would have figured it out before CHARGING him.
Do you know what it takes to have a purchase show up on your database with Safeway? All it takes is someone coming into the store and telling the cashier what your name is and your phone number (often just the last four digits).
If I wanted to burn your house down, but make sure you got the blame for it, I could just go into safeway and give them YOUR name and YOUR phone number, buy the equipment, set fire to your house and YOU would hang for it.
Re:Still thinking? (Score:5, Insightful)
To engage in pure speculation: A possible situation could be that the fire was started by one of his kids. They would've had access to his card (and typically, kids don't have much cash either). The man's wife allegedly first spotted the fire, which makes me doubt it'd be her.
This would explain both why the procecutor has not decided if they should be charged, and also why they're not providing any identification. Hanging a presumably already troubled kid out to dry in the media wouldn't be very constructive.
Re:The wife? (Score:5, Insightful)
You just go through the line and they say "do you have a Safeway Club Card?".
You say, "I don't have it with me".
The cashier will say "What's your last name and four digits of your telephone number?".
Give them a last name and a telephone number. Voila. In other words, you could get all of the information necessary to frame the other person on the basis of a club card purchase, by looking in a telephone book. Any half assed lawyer would know that and have the trial and charges dismissed in a heartbeat.
Re:Your Rights Online?? (Score:2, Insightful)
you get some measly shopping vouchers or gifts not worth their value
and the shop gets to target its market better
while they log exactly what you buy
which leads to this guy in this case, being screwed by this opt-in gathered infomation.
Makes pulling out those loyalty cards out of your wallet so encouraging huh?
His kid... (or some other child) (Score:2, Insightful)
His kid would have access to his Safeway card. (Another kid might have access to his phone number, which will work just as well.)
The confessor is not being identified. (Also suggesting a child.)
Re:What issue? (Score:5, Insightful)
Close call? (Score:5, Insightful)
This was a stomach-churning close-call.
I guess I have more faith in the system.
They'd have to convince a jury that this "noble, hard working volunteer firefighter who loves his adoring family very much and just, out of the kindness of his own heart, adopted a child into his home and family", started a fire to kill them all.
And apparently they planned on doing it with nothing but circumstantial evidence which would vanish once a trial started. Any defense lawyer worth a damn is going to have a Safeway employee on the stand explaining several different ways someone could use his Safeway Club Card #.
Re:Happy ending? (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh, that and an actual trial and conviction, then. Yes.
You're assuming here that the guy would have been found guilty. Which you would think is a big assumption, given that he in fact was innocent.
Innocent people are put trial every day. It's not a pleasant thing, but it's the only way the system can work, unless we somehow attain police and procecutors who never make mistakes.
But it's not just the procecutors. Courts make mistakes too, which is why you have the right to appeal. Depite all that, innocent people sometimes do get convicted. And that's the real tragedy, although it seems it more often has to do with incompetent defense lawyers (It'd be nice if the state provided people who could stay awake [sanluisobispo.com]).
But as I said, this was nowhere near a close call.
Re:What issue? (Score:2, Insightful)
Says someone who wasn't imprisoned for life.
Yeah let's just take our Prozac tell ourselves everything is good this way. Life in general is meant to be spent in a cell; it's just the way of things.
Those police, unlike all the other police in history and every court case known to man and without any precedent, would have proven he's innocent, instead of adding him to the overflowing prisons full of everyone else who was in a similar situation.
Re:Your Rights Online?? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Happy ending? (Score:1, Insightful)
Huh? I'm all for treating him as innocent as he hasn't been found guilty of anything but just saying that "he in fact was innocent" seems to be a big leap here. Using that logic we can say that everybody in the while world, including him, is innocent as nobody has been prosecuted.
Someone has 'confessed', they haven't been charged with anything and if they ever are then they might be found not guilty. This guy might get charged again and might go on to face trial. We don't know who did it.
Remember this... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you should ever find yourself on a jury. Chances are, had this gone to trial, he would've been convicted, and be in jail right now.
All the evidence is circumstantial and really pretty flimsy. The dog circling to the front door? Well of course he's going to detect that the family was in their own yard. While from movies we get these impressions of "superdogs" that do police work, in reality, such dogs are quite prone to make mistakes.
So his club card (not, apparently, his credit card-examine what's NOT said. The credit card would've been far stronger evidence. Had he used that, they would've worried about getting evidence from that and not even been concerned with the club card.) was used to make the purchases. So what? I signed up for my club card with bogus information. Sometimes, I forget the card, and I have no idea what BS phone number I put down, so I use my boss's phone #. He must have one of those cards, it always works. But I've certainly never been asked to verify my identity when doing so.
The real moral of this story-cops and prosecutors are often overzealous. When you are on a jury, do not ask yourself "Does it look like this guy did it?" Ask yourself instead "Has it been proven to me, beyond a reasonable doubt, that this person did it? Would I stake x years of my life on the fact that this guy did it?" Because you are staking years of someone's life on your decision. If you cannot say "I am sure"-even if you can say "I'm almost sure"-the vote is not guilty. Even if the other 11 say otherwise. Stick it out and hang the jury if you have to, but do NOT condemn a person guilty unless you are ABSOLUTELY sure. People are exonerated every day because some jury thought "probably did it" equated to "for-sure did it."
Re:What issue? (Score:2, Insightful)
Trust me, when it happens to you, you WILL feel wronged. You see, when they arrest you, they will do it in one of two ways. If you're lucky they'll get you when you're alone, with noone around to witness them brutalizing you. If you're unlucky, they'll get you at work, school, in front of your children, or some other humiliating situation. And when they see you being hauled away in cuffs, crying as most innocent people do when they are arrested, your life will never be the same. And don't even get me started on the ways they can (legaly) psychologically torture you while wait for your trial.
Re:The wife? (Score:5, Insightful)
I can't believe everybody just queues up and plays their privacy invasion game. What's next? "Identify for retina scan" to buy a pint of Ben & Jerry's?
The club cards are a paper thin scam. They raise prices slightly, then offer the club card to get slightly lower prices than they had before the card. Then, a couple of months later, after everyone is signed up, they raise the prices. You're now paying at least as much as you were before the card, and if you resist you're charged 30% more as a penalty for not voluntarily surrendering your personal information.
US currency does still carry the phrase "legal tender", right? I guess they can legally force you to pay a 30% penalty for paying in cash.
I'm not an anarchist, but it really is nobody's business if I want to buy a box of condoms, three tubes of KY jelly, 50 feet of rope and a jar of Smuckers (TM) strawberry jam.
Coercing people into surrendering their personal information to buy groceries is wrong. It's an abuse of technology. That so few people complain about this loss of privacy is proof of how bad things are in the United States of Sheeple. Hopefully there will be some more high tech screw ups where people are falsely accused, or similar problems arise from using this dubious source of data, and people will finally awaken to what a shady scheme this is. Until that happens, I'll go out of my way to find one of the few stores that don't abuse my privacy. Have we really fallen so far that Safeway's desire for marketing data has now superseded our right to privacy?
Every time I to argue for privacy like this, I get responses from neo-Nazis who comment, "If you didn't do anything wrong, you have nothing to fear." Well, apparently "nothing" includes being falsely accused of a felony and the public humiliation of being tried for attempting to burn your family to death in their sleep.
Anybody remember when the police INVESTIGATED crimes, rather than just subpeona DNA, credit card records, phone records, Safeway records...?
The fifth amendment guarantees that no US citizens can be forced to testify against themselves. If forcing some guy to provide a DNA sample isn't forcing him to testify against himself, I don't know what is.
Technology itself isn't responsible for our eroding privacy, but it sure makes it easier for those who want the power that comes with all the collected personal data.
I don't (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Close call? (Score:4, Insightful)
There's the conviction right there. The prosecuter brings in an FBI profiler who points out that firefighters are the first ones they check out when they're looking for an arsonist.
Most firefighters are good, hardworking folks. But the profession (and it is, whether you get paid or volunteer) also attracts those who have an unhealthy fascination with fire or those who are driven by internal demons.
Re:The wife? (Score:2, Insightful)
This is a big assumption here but doesnt that name and last four numbers actually get validated or something to determine if that account even exists? Can you give them any bogus information and it will work (like get reconciled later on the backend) or are you simply implying that you specifically give someone elses information that you know has one of those cards?
I actually use those cards all the time but not a single one has my real information. If authorities have my actual card, they would be able to pull up what I bought in the past but armed with only my address, name or phone number, they would find nothing. I guess they could setup some system to standby and wait until that specific card gets used again and then tackle me in the parking lot. I guess the point is, if you are going to commit a crime with something bought from the grocery store, use cash and spend the extra $0.50 that the card would save you.
Re:Insurance implications of Loyalty cards. (Score:3, Insightful)
First, they'll have an opt-in program where you submit evidence of your 'healthy' lifestyle, citing supermarket card tracking permission and such, in exchange, they'll be some sort of healthy living discount/rebate.
After it becomes widespread, they'll hike rates such that the 'discounted' rates will be equal to the normal rates from before. Their market will have volntarily jumped to the desired scheme.
denial (Score:3, Insightful)
Here's a tip. (Score:4, Insightful)
Trust me, getting caught won't justify the $0.30 savings you got on the matches and lighter fluid.
I don't know who's stupider: An arsonist who actually used a shopper's club card, or the police for assuming the arsonist was so stupid as to use a shopper's club card (and not to frame someone else). You would THINK the latter would be one of the first hypotheses entertained by the police before they go off and charge the guy whose name is attached to the card.
Re:um, I work with CC terminals,-it's simple reall (Score:3, Insightful)
Until technology to somehow photocopy a barcode is developed, of course.
Goddamnit. (Score:3, Insightful)
I've been saying for years that investigative techniques for computer crime are insufficient - maybe it's across the board.
Think it would help if we pulled shows like CSI and Law&Order off the air?
Supermarket card "evidence" is a joke (Score:5, Insightful)
- You don't need to present a shred of identification to get a card -- you don't even have to give the right address, since they give it to you right when you apply for it.
- You don't even need an actual card -- stores will allow you to enter a phone number in place of swiping the card -- and there's no way for them to know if you enter the right number.
If this was critical evidence in their case, they didn't have a case. (In which case, it's no surprise they jumped on the 3rd party who came forward to confess).Not Just the Media (Score:5, Insightful)
That was not the case here, but even if you're not in jail, the prospect of jail is a very stressful and disruptive experience: You need to appear in court multiple times, and perhaps pay for lawyers and bail. It also destroys relationships and careers, so it's really a problem with society as a whole.
Re:Still thinking? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yep, the loss of a few freedoms is a small price to pay in exchange for a little security. I suggest we begin with repealing the fifth and first amendments. And that pesky second amendment, too.
Re:Supermarket card "evidence" is a joke (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What issue? (Score:2, Insightful)
Feel free to revise that statement after you have been wrongly accused and charged and fired from your job and had to spend thousands of dollars and up to a year or more to defend yourself. Speculation is easy. Until you actually experience it, you have no idea of how you're going to react. As more and more evidence comes out on how broken the system is, you are going to have a harder time trying to defend it. You "defense" of it here is pretty weak, and just shows that you may be benefitting too much from the status quo to ever, ever take a truly critical look at it. You're just too comfortable with the way things are to accept that there are serious problems that need correcting now. We should be up in arms. This is intolerable, and it happens more often than you would like to admit.
Here's a tip.. (Score:3, Insightful)
And they don't even know that I exist.
Re:The wife? (Score:5, Insightful)
Who says that the "personal" information has to pertain to you? Just invent some and give it to them. There is no law that says the info you give them has to be yours and they really have no way to check up on the whether the data pertains to you, someone else or to some non-existent person. They can still use the bogus info for their marketing statistics, just that they have no correct data on who bought what to give to the cops on demand. As the cops find out that most of the "personal" data the grocery store has is not associated truthfully with anyone, they'll stop bothering to even ask the grocery stores for it.
Re:The wife? (Score:1, Insightful)
Don't just punish Safeway; pick a store that doesn't have a card-type system. They're still around. You'll have to hunt for it, and it'll be inconvienient, but if you're paranoid about security at least you'll feel better. And, if enough people do it (never happen) the stores might re-think the whole card thing, which I personally detest.
Re:Insurance implications of Loyalty cards. (Score:3, Insightful)
a. live more healthy
b. pay more money
This would kill the obesity problem. The only thing that ever affects people is money.
The problem as always just lies in the implementation. If you buy your vegetables at the farmers market without a card and then you only buy crap at supermarkets.
Re:Close call? (Score:2, Insightful)
And what If He had actually bought the fire-starters, for His Fireplace or BBQ, and the Arson Perp took them to use to start the fire?
The Perep could have also bought Firestartes of his/her own at Safeway as well, once they were used there would be no way to tell if the Starter was one that was bought by the Firefighter or the Perp!
Really the fact that the starters were bought at safeway, and the fact that the firefighter had bought startes Is not evidence!
If I repeat I have nothing to hide, my life can be an open book long enough do you think I will belive it?
Re:The wife? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is another of those things that has little effect on criminals and terrorists but can royally screw over an honest citizen. I feel pretty much the same way over our local tollway I-Pass system: they roll over for the cops and attorneys on transponder data all the time. It's time we wake up and realize that the dubious "benefits" provided by mass acquisition and insecure long-term storage of personal information is probably not worth the effort.
Re:The wife? (Score:4, Insightful)
If the stores are really only interested in anonymous data to analyse purchase patterns, then why do they link the purchase data individuals??
Why even bother with the "loyalty" programs? You can collect data on every single sale that is processed and analyze it till your balls fall off. Nothing is stopping a business from holding anonymous data and using it to their benefit.
So why bother? I'm sure it isn't to help law enforcement, because it costs money and these are businesses we are talking about - they don't make any money from policing. Personally identifiable information is held in the hopes of either:
i. offering consumers targeted advertising or
ii. selling the data to another company.
usage of the data against you by the long arm of the law is just an added bonus...
Admissibility of grocery cards as evidence (Score:2, Insightful)
This is not necessarily a problem with the cards themselves--it is a problem with the misuse of the raw data at the wrong level of granularity. The point of supermarket loyalty cards is to find trends that can be used for marketing purposes. As such, the standard of accuracy for any *individual transaction* is not necessarily that stringent, because what counts is the *aggregate* after individual errors cancel out. The probability for error with any individual transaction is too high to throw someone in jail over that alone, even temporarily.
Perhaps there's a case for wrongful arrest here, given the way that the charges seemed to rely entirely on the abuse and misinterpretation of data. More likely, though, the man should consider suing Safeway for damages stemming from mis-representing the data to the police in a way that construed more accuracy to individual transactions than it deserves.