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Mich. State Campus Cops Seize HDs With Riot Photos 48

Posted by timothy from the after-all-why-not dept.
Spintronic writes "This is old news here but others might be interested. There was a small riot here a few weeks ago due to the early exit of a certain basketball team. Because of riots years ago of a much larger magnitude and the black eye this is giving the university, the cops (local and campus I believe) are out looking to make examples. In their zeal they tried to get all the unaired footage and photos from the local media, who refused to comply. Not to let it go, they went on to seize hard drives from students who took digital photos that night. Here's info from the student nespaper, and here's an editorial."
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Mich. State Campus Cops Seize HDs With Riot Photos More

Mich. State Campus Cops Seize HDs With Riot Photos

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  • Actual Owners of the Images (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Agamous Child ( 538344 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @11:15PM (#5733233) Homepage Journal
    As I understand it, when you are taking pictures for use anywhere other than for personal use, you have to have the permission of the subject... IF these photos were taken of the "alleged" rioters and they were posted on the internet in any form (i.e. published) without the consent of the subjects.. then they could cry foul in the photos use in the investigation... NOW.. if the photographers in question were legitimate members of the press...and the photos were then used in those individuals "news" websites.. First Amendment rules would apply, right? I haven't slept in about 48 hours does it show?

  • Illegal Search and Seizure (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Hungus ( 585181 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @11:19PM (#5733243) Journal
    IANAL BIWWT (but I work with them)
    Sounds like a violation of the students rights by a long shot. While I am not a big fan of them, this is a good reason the aclu [aclu.org] exists. NOw if they had a court order for seizure of evidence that would be legitimate ... unless the students who took the pictures were shown rioting also then it would be illegal under self incrimination.

    • Re:Illegal Search and Seizure (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      NOw if they had a court order for seizure of evidence that would be legitimate ... unless the students who took the pictures were shown rioting also then it would be illegal under self incrimination.

      Considering a picture you have taken of yourself in the act of committing a criminal act as inadmissible since it would be 'self incrimination' seems like it might be of interest to those representing R. Kelly.

      Too bad the kids who were taking a video of themselves driving around shooting people with a paintb

  • Student journalism detector (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    They were doing good up to this point:

    But the student's willingness to cooperate with officer's unorthodox demands is understandable. Perhaps he was frightened as to what punishment could fall upon him if he wasn't helpful,

    I'm not a journalism major, but even I know you shouldn't say something like "Perhaps he was frightened..." when writing an article. It makes you look biased. And when your bias detector goes off, you start to quetstion the source... and the whole thing has much less impact.

    • IT WAS AN EDITORIAL (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      There is one news article and one editorial. Each seems quite appropriate, better than the usual crap in my hometown "real" newspaper. If you read that far through the editorial thinking it was a news article before finally getting the weird feeling . . . jesus, just go committ suicide. Fucking moron pontificating about journalistic standards and can't even read himself.

  • whew! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 14, 2003 @11:34PM (#5733298)
    Good thing I live in a country that specifically outlaws this sort of thing!

    Here in the USA, a citizen--

    what?

    IT DID?

    FUCK!!!

  • Misleading... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by smoondog ( 85133 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @11:43PM (#5733354)
    Once again it looks like the /. is misleading:

    Last week, police obtained a warrant to confiscate a computer from an on-campus student. But the warrant wasn't necessary because the student handed over the computer without resistance.

    Warrant: Yes. Seized: No. I read the article and it sounded like police stormed some guys house to hide evidence, implying that the evidence was some form of coverup. Jeez, they are looking for the identities of law breakers, and they had a warrant AND the person gave it to them freely.

    There is nothing wrong with the police collecting evidence showing a crime, if they know that evidence exists and the crime occured, IMO. What is the problem?

    If you had the gun that shot someone, they are allowed to get a warrant to collect that for fingerprinting. How is a video different than a fingerprint. It's still evidence.

    -Sean

    • Re:Misleading... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by charlie763 ( 529636 )
      If you had the gun that shot someone, they are allowed to get a warrant to collect that for fingerprinting. How is a video different than a fingerprint. It's still evidence.

      I think it would be more like the police taking your wallet, photo albums, tax returns, personal letters, and a filing cabinet full of other personal information and belongings so that they can finger print your gun.

    • Re:Misleading... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Apreche ( 239272 )
      If I took picture of a crime, and the crime was comitted in a public place, then it is perfectly legal for me to take those pictures. I myself have not done anything illegal (except lots of mp3s, but that's not relevent). If the police were looking for tips and such I could, if I chose to do so, give them copies of those pictures in hopes for a reward. I could voluntarily give them whatever I wanted actually. But in order to get a warrant to get stuff from me, a non-criminal... Oh wait. You can't get a

      • Re:Misleading... (Score:3, Informative)

        by offpath3 ( 604739 )
        They have no right to forcibly seize property from non criminals. End of story.

        Unfortunately I don't believe this is true. Look up Zurcher v. The Stanford Daily. It was a case that went to the supreme court, where it was determined that police were in the right when they siezed photos of vietnam war protestors from the offices of the Stanford Daily. This case is why most newspapers destroy any pictures they don't publish.

    • Re:Misleading... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by PD ( 9577 ) <slashdotlinux@pdrap.org> on Tuesday April 15, 2003 @12:37AM (#5733594) Homepage Journal
      If I owned the pictures in question, and the warrant demanded that I turn over my entire hard drive, I'd see them in court.

      They can get a warrant for the specific photo evidence that they are looking for, and bring a blank CD for me to burn the photos on. They can't have a blank warrant to seize anything at all that exists on the computer.

      • Re:Misleading... (Score:3, Interesting)

        by phyxeld ( 558628 )
        If I owned the pictures in question, and the warrant demanded that I turn over my entire hard drive, I'd see them in court.

        IANAL, but I think that, with a warrant, they just could take it from you immediately and any legal case you could make would be after-the-fact.

        They can't have a blank warrant to seize anything at all that exists on the computer.

        Well, from many books and news stories I've read on the subject (of computers and the law), I think that they can and do. (Not to say I think it's right,

        • Re:Misleading... (Score:4, Funny)

          by ConsumedByTV ( 243497 ) on Tuesday April 15, 2003 @05:51AM (#5734426) Homepage
          You must live in another country than we do. In america we have the right to life, liberty and the persuit of freedom.

          We have the right to freedom of persecuition.

          When a police officer want's my computer they can't just take it good sir. No we have laws. They cannot take something and make me fight for it. That's against what I as an american feel is right.

          That sir is fascism. We don't support that in america.

          We are free, soon we will free your country too.

          Freedom will come to everyone that waits for but a moment.

    • Re:Misleading... (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      What was wrong with him just putting the images onto CD for them?

  • Copyright laws (Score:3, Insightful)

    by norwoodites ( 226775 ) <pinskia@ g m a il.com> on Tuesday April 15, 2003 @12:38AM (#5733597) Journal
    Can you use the copyright laws against the police? Once you shoot the camera, you become the owner of the copyright of that shot/movie (unless you give it up to someone else). Also can you use DCMA law against them if it was a digital picture/movie?

    Even though they enforce the laws, they are not above them.

    Also does not the first amendment give you the right to freedom to the press/speech, so they did not have to give it over because it was `speech' to have this picture/movie?

    Also if they were only going after the photos, they should not have taken the who hard disk.

    Yes the photos will help the police to catch the rioters but now it is about freedom to the press and speech.

    What is the `press' anyway, now with the internet anyone can be part of the `press'?
    • But if somebody A) took pictures of a crime in progress and B) posted some of those pictures on a web site saying, "Hey, look at the pictures I took of a someone committing a crime!" then the police are within reason to subpoena the photos to aid their investigation. This has been held up in the courts in the case of traditional photography, and it's not much of a stretch to apply the same to people with digital cameras.

      As to the matter of copyright, you would still hold copyright over those images (even i

      • Copyright doesn't prevent something from being introduced into evidence in a court of law.

        Exactly. In fact, /. readers were quite happy about that quite a while back when a big chunk of the Scientologists' copyrighted religious text was read into evidence during a lawsuit they had brought against some poor guy. They are pretty clever when it comes to legal machinations, but they didn't catch that one until it was too late. So their wacky religion was laid bare for all to read.

    • I retired from the Michigan National Guard, and everybody is probably aware of the fact that the NG has had significant roles in civil disturbances. One thing that was pounded into our heads was to use the press as much as possible. Durring a riot people often see themselves as anonymous, the sight of press cameras strip away this feeling of anonymity very effectivly, and often preserves life, limb and property.
      Having said that I think that the tactics used by the authorities in this case will probably back

  • strange... (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Mich. State Campus Cops Seize HDs With Riot Photos

    Didn't they just use their hands? Possibly gloved?

  • Remember the alleged RIAA "plot" to seed bogus media files into P2P networks? Well, this sounds like an excellent time for Michigan State students to Photoshop some interesting faces into the crowd of rioters, then wait for their HD to be nabbed.

    Make some of them really obvious, some not-so-obvious, and some of them pretty good. This should destroy the credibility of all the photos the cops get; they'll have no idea what's real and what isn't.
  • Those students witnessed a crime and are now in possession of material evidence. Imagine if I took a chance picture of your significant other being fatally wounded. Wouldn't you want the police to have that information to provide evidence to the killer's identity?

    Is it different because the students commited a misdeamenor? What if they vandalized your property?

    I'm skeptical of anything that goes through a college newspaper and then to slashdot. That sort of centrifuge can generate quite a spin.

    The one

  • Here's what disturbed me... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by UberGeeb ( 574309 ) on Tuesday April 15, 2003 @08:24AM (#5734792)
    ... about the article.
    Silverman said warrants must clearly define what police are looking for, otherwise searching through the other information could be invasion of privacy.

    "Computers are very personal things," food industry management junior Russell Enfield said. "There's a lot of information on there."

    But Ingham County Prosecutor Stuart Dunnings III said if police find any other evidence of crimes on the computer hard drive, they can be held against that person.

    "It's the same thing as being pulled over for speeding and finding a gun on the front seat," Dunnings said.

    So, I freely give them the pictures I took. While they are rummaging around they find my records for the side business I'm running, and my income tax records for the year. They realize I didn't claim the income from my side business on my income tax, and I get a nice visit from J. Random Suit from the IRS. All because I was helpful and complied with a request from the police department.

    Huh. And they wonder why no one trusts public authority figures any more.

    It's not "the same thing as being pulled over for speeding and finding a gun on the front seat", it's the same thing as being pulled over and having the police officer search your car. Something equivalent to the "gun in the front seat" analogy would be if the cops showed up, you let them in and handed them the hard drive, and in the process they saw the dead body of the mailman you murdered lying on the living room floor.

    In this student's situation, my answer would have been "No, you can't have the hard drive. But if you want to come back in a couple hours, I'll have copies of those photos burned to a CD and you can have that." Multiple copies, even, if they want them. Heck, if they've got a place they want me to drop those CDs off at rather than coming by again, I'll do it. I'm perfecly willing to provide help with an investigation if I can; I'm just not willing to potentially lose an 80G hard drive or potentially incriminate myself in the process.

    • You just summed up the article pretty well. As well as the current state of law enforcement!
      It's disruptive police threats like these that turn people mean! In reality, the procecutor was wrong--it's not like having a gun in the front seat. Many previous cases of search warrants have turned up stolen goods [reading serial numbers from your stereo while dusting for prints, looking for drugs]. If those were not the scope of the warrant then the officer was violating rights. That's been upheld in court

  • Encryption (Score:3, Insightful)

    by ralphb ( 15998 ) on Tuesday April 15, 2003 @08:35AM (#5734853) Homepage
    This is all the more reason to routinely encrypt all your personal data. The seized HD is not going to do them much good if they can't read the data.
  • They can have my hard drive when they pry it from my cold, dead hands.....

    If you aren't pissed off, you haven't been paying attention!

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