Are Communications Records of Americans Retained Forever? (seattletimes.com) 143
An Illinois prosecutor announced Friday that a Seattle man was wrongly convicted in 2012 of the abduction and murder of a 7-year-old girl in 1957, reports the Seattle Times. It was believed to be the nation's oldest cold case, but reader Trachman raises an interesting concern:
He finally got an an alibi, which was a telephone call which he made in 1957. While it surely is a good thing that an innocence has been proven, the case is also an evidence that American's communication records are retained infinitely.
Yes (Score:2, Insightful)
You really have to ask?
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People..... PLEASE... just destroy all those stupid records and data you have policy/access to...
all they do is turn you into the DEVIL marking other innocents with your sin.
Except in this case, where the records led to the exoneration of an innocent man.
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People..... PLEASE... just destroy all those stupid records and data you have policy/access to...
all they do is turn you into the DEVIL marking other innocents with your sin.
Except in this case, where the records led to the exoneration of an innocent man.
Exactly. Sometimes it's to the benefit of justice. Not often, but his instance would seem to be enough to justify it.
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NO. Because on balance when all the issues with it are summed up in total,
retaining the records has more potential for, and does, more harm than good.
It's just *too much power* concentrated arbitrarily in one place over people.
Destroy it.
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People..... PLEASE... just destroy all those stupid records and data you have policy/access to... all they do is turn you into the DEVIL marking other innocents with your sin.
Except in this case, where the records led to the exoneration of an innocent man.
Exactly. Sometimes it's to the benefit of justice. Not often, but his instance would seem to be enough to justify it.
Do you really think "they" are working hard to exonerate a lot of people? That "they" are interested in justice?
How would that even occur? One would have to look through all the data for individuals any time there was a trial, discovery, or charging of a crime, let alone civil lawsuit. Nobody got time fo dat!
The government simply is not interested in making more innocent people, you cannot control innocent people with threats of legitimate or illegitimate violence (all laws are backed by that) if they
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Do you really think "they" are working hard to exonerate a lot of people? That "they" are interested in justice?
Did I say that in my post, or did I stutter?
Some people ARE interested in justice, but not nearly enough. Yes, the system is pretty fucked up and broken, but this is what we have to live with right now.
If you want to reform the justice system, have at it, I'm all for it. I'd love to see some sweeping changes from the bottom right up to the top.
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> Do you really think "they" are working hard to exonerate a lot of people? That "they" are interested in justice?
If "they" means lawyers for one side or the other, yes. If you think that there is some secret agency dedicated to disproving jury verdicts, well that is clearly nonsense. OTOH, you apparently want all historical records destroyed as soon as possible to hide any evidence therein; Kurt Waldheim would have loved you, as he could have lived out his life as a respected Austrian statesman.
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brings up an another issue... surely they had someone testify that the records were at least probably true too? I mean, it wouldn't take that much to fake some 57 year old records?
that they werent used 57 years ago is another matter ..
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It's just a case of human packratting, only to be ABUSED later just because it's available and they can.
People..... PLEASE... just destroy all those stupid records and data you have policy/access to...
I bet that Seattle man would disagree. If not for this "forever" mode of data retention he'd still be in prison.
Okay, wait. Please read. (Score:4, Interesting)
You're looking at this wrong. The issue isn't correctly cast as "man exonerated because saving phone records is good thing" -- the nature of he problem, and what very much needs to be addressed, is "US justice system far too easily wrongfully convicts innocents."
Because if in fact the guy didn't do it, then whatever they had that resulted in a conviction was utter shite. Which is a 100% clear and unequivocal indication that the thresholds for conviction are too low by far.
And it would appear that in fact, he didn't do it. And THAT provides the critical indicator here. Just think about it: He didn't do it; but the court system managed to convict him on entirely wrongful (or lacking) evidence. Is that what you want if YOU end up in court? Speaking from deeply unfortunate personal experience, I really don't think you do.
The only way a conviction can occur of someone who is actually innocent is via lack of evidence, or fabrication of evidence, because there cannot be any evidence that actually indicates the person is guilty. A red sock is not a blue sock because it's not a yellow sock. It's a red sock if, and only if, it's a red sock.
So rather than screw us all (further) as to our privacy, we should stop screwing people in the courts. We can do that by setting the thresholds differently (and we should), or we can wait for technology to solve it by actually reading "did it" or "didn't do it" right from the accused person's mind. But if we do the latter, a whole lot of innocent people are going to to grievously suffer as a result.
Please agitate to fix what's actually broken. Don't consider a horrible mechanism "the answer" because it resulted in illumination of some other horrible mechanism.
Re: Okay, wait. Please read. (Score:2)
Yet is it also not true that the availability of such old records might enanble the reconstruction of other cold cases? Btw. your argument is in theory, sound, but in reality, there is always value in having an alibi, because it can shut down directions of investigation sooner, which benefits the wrongly suspected as well as the investigators.
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As far as alibi goes, yes, the system is so completely broken at this point that alibi is an important factor as to whether you will be convicted of something you didn't actually do. However, were the system operating reasonably and sanely, you could not be convicted without positive, assertive, objective proof that you actually did what you are accused of — not the lack of proof that you did. That's just religious thinking. "You can't prove there isn't a god, so there is one." It's toxic from word on
Significant error (Score:2)
"Lack of proof that you did" s/b "lack of proof that you didn't"
Sorry. Proofread, but... fail. And no post-posting editing because it's still 1990 here on Slashdot. New owners or not.
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The only way a conviction can occur of someone who is actually innocent is via lack of evidence, or fabrication of evidence
No, it can quite easily happen from simple bad luck. Most people aren't entirely unique in their appearance. If you took a picture of me when I was a teenager and compared it to a picture of my father at the same age, you wouldn't be able to tell which of us you were looking at unless you knew us both really well. I've been asked plenty of times over the years "were you at XYZ the other day?", when I wasn't, so there are clearly people around who resemble me enough for people who know me reasonably well to
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What you look like is not proof anything but what you look like. Proof of misdeed is PROOF OF MISDEED.
The most important right at hand here is the right not to be imprisoned or otherwise injured for something you did not do. And no, "I want my lawyer" isn't going to get you there.
The alternative is to begin requiring a standard of evidence higher than squinti
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But convictions aren't done based on absolute proof, because otherwise it'd be impossible to convict anyone ever.
If someone murders someone and their DNA is seen at the crime and they're caught on CCTV, and the murder weapon is found at their house, and they have motive, and they confessed during police interview, they could just block any requirement for absolute proof by simply claiming their DNA was planted, the CCTV was just a lookalike, the murder weapon was planted, and the confession was coerced.
In a
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On the evening of January 21st, a hit-and-run occurred in which the victim reported my license plate. That is evidence, and I have no reason to believe it's fabricated. I think she misread it, as the light was not good. Also, the car apparently looked a lot like mine (exactly how much I don't know).
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None of this is actually evidence of you being the hit-and-run criminal. None of it.
Which is not to say that a court would find those inconclusive third hand reports, or even less than that, sufficient to toast your ass. They do that all the time. So I'm glad you have an alibi.
But it brings me right back to the same assertion: a court that might convict on the terrible quality information you describe is inevitably going to randomly dispense major injustice, destroying lives on the one hand, and letting the
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That's Obama, of course.
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People..... PLEASE... just destroy all those stupid records and data you have policy/access to...
all they do is turn you into the DEVIL marking other innocents with your sin.
Unless you happen to be a falsely convicted innocent person who's alibi happens to be in the phone records.
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>>Are Communications Records of Americans Retained Forever?
The official answer is yes :
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/... [huffingtonpost.com]
The communication records of everybody are retained forever.
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I'm more surprised (Score:1)
Re:I'm more surprised (Score:5, Informative)
It was a collect call.
Businesses that don't record what monies are owed by a client don't last too long.
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Not just before touch tone
Phone handset type is meaningless; the records are generated by the switches in the central offices.
As late as 1974 we shared a party line with three or four other houses within a mile of us.
Not everyone was raised in Hooterville. I doubt that my parents ever used a party line - certainly not at home, even during the Depression.
I'm amazed these records still exist and still believe that this is probably an exception and that most records of this sort don't still exist, certainly not when there isn't a business interest.
Depends on what phone company you are looking at, but once the records became electronic (i.e., mag tape) it became just a matter of paying for proper storage. I expect that the Bell System kept them around just to give the statisticians at Murray Hill something to pract
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Its just the phone company billing data ... (Score:3)
I'm more surprised by the fact that they were doing it 60 years ago. Even before touch-tone phones.
Its just the phone company billing data, which phone companies have been collecting for about as long as they have been sending bills to people. All that has happened is that someone dug up the phone company billing data from 1957. Want to know what phone call "metadata" is? Look at your phone bill.
As for touch-tone dialing, dialing information was detected mechanically long before that with rotary phones. It was just a matter of counting "clicks" rather than recognizing the frequency of tones.
Re:Its just the phone company billing data ... (Score:5, Interesting)
A long, long time ago (back when the Sun was new enough to still have a price-tag hanging off the side), I had a phone that had had the rotary section removed. It was meant for inbound calls only. For one reason or another, I ended up needing a phone for a short while and needed to make outbound calls. With a little practice, you could press the button to mimic pulse-dialing and actually make outbound calls on that phone. I kept it around, after no longer needing it for that purpose, just as a novelty.
This was the 1970s and the phones all came from the telephone company back then. Also, we didn't have nearly as many amusements as we have today. Being able to dial out just by pressing the receiver button repeatedly was a good party trick - it was a simpler time.
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It's actually quite a bit easier than that if you ever need to do it... Just tap the hook-switch over and over, just as fast as your finger is able to, until it starts ringing.
You see, the highest pulse value is 10 for a 0, so tapping-out anything more than 10 pulses will immediately dial a zero and connect your call to an operator (before tapping even stops). You can just tell the opera
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Yup. With some practice, you could get pretty good at it. I'd not say that I was as fast as I was when I'd turned the rotary dial but I was pretty speedy. The thing is, unless you forced the rotary dial back - it was pretty slow returning to its original position so I had a slight advantage but was still not quite that fast. I imagine that I might have gotten that fast if I'd practiced enough.
Also, it's kind of amusing that you got the response you did - I noted the AC below your post commenting on 911. Yea
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In high school (early 70s) we had use of a computer timesharing service (Leasco Response Inc utilizing HP 2000A computers) via a TTY Model 33KSR and an acoustical coupler, but a dial lock was placed on the phone outside of normal class hours. A small bunch of us would frequently stay after classes and dial up using the pulse method on the hook button.
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So it was impossible to dial 911 on the phone. Good to know that college's were stupid even back then.
911 didn't exist in the 70s.
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AND long distance calls all used a 0. Area codes - required for long distance all had a 0 in the middle.
NYC: 212
Chicago: 312
LA: 213
(The list goes on)
Maybe you lived in the boondocks? That's where the area codes had time-consuming "0"s.
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Maybe you lived in the boondocks? That's where the area codes had time-consuming "0"s.
Nice theory, but the area code for Washington DC is 202, and has been since the 1940s. Additional counterexamples are easy to find by those who wish to do so.
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Zero (0) or one (1) in the middle digit meant a long distance call, at least in the North American Numbering Plan, until there traditional area codes started splitting (mainly because of cell phones needing so many more), and all the switches needed to be reprogrammed. Humorously, each and every new 8yy area code also needed special reprogramming on the switches, as well.
That may have changed in the last few years since I worked at a telecom, though.
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Area codes - required for long distance all had a 0 in the middle.
Huh? My area code was 513. This was in the 1960s.
Direct dialling of long-distance calls required leading off with a "1". I still remember the TV commercials when this was introduced, letting people know they could now dial these calls without operator assistance by using 1.
Pulse is going away (Score:3)
One of my business locations is fed by an optical data line, which aside from the (awesome) network connection, also provides the only standard telco POTS line brought into the business, sourced directly from the box where the optical connection comes in from outside. Switchhook dialing absolutely does not work. DTMF (Dual Tone Multi Frequency), or you get nothing.
I asked about it when we got the optical interface; they told me straight up, "no."
Being a suspicious typ
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Well, it still works at home. Since you are on a special trunk, your POTS line probably doesn't go into a node that is required to handle clicks (or doesn't despite FCC regs, since who would ever complain?), since it is business-only.
Re:I'm more surprised (Score:5, Insightful)
What's really bothersome is not that they were collecting the data but that he had to prove his innocence instead of the State having to prove his guilt. It's a disturbing trend where we're proving innocence as opposed to relying on the State to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. (Or more likely than not, in the case of civil matters.)
As a defendant, you should never have to prove your innocence. The verbiage might seem trivial but it's the underlying concept, and how important it is, that makes me alarmed. Not that long ago, I had a conversation on /. where the person thought it was outdated and "stupid" that it was better for ten guilty people to go free than one innocent person be jailed.
Sadly, I'm not even remotely kidding about that conversation. I'm not exaggerating and it is not hyperbole. They not only stated that but they made comments that supported that sentiment - before and since. They're not alone, they had people who openly agreed with them. I should not have to prove that I'm innocent. Not at all. Needing to find an alibi, from that many years ago, is crazy. Given the time that has passed, the case should have not been prosecuted unless it was so air-tight that an alibi would not have made a difference. That's awfully close to, if not being past, the line where one is proving innocence.
The fact that the records are kept is secondary to that - and kind of disturbing but there's not much we can do about it unless we wish to enact legislation to prohibit or require data retention. Right now, they're free to retain those records. It'd also be a bit difficult to ensure records are not kept.
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What's really bothersome is not that they were collecting the data but that he had to prove his innocence instead of the State having to prove his guilt. It's a disturbing trend where we're proving innocence as opposed to relying on the State to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
By a jury of your peers. Most of your peers are gullible and hate baby killers.
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By a jury of your peers. Most of your peers are gullible and hate baby killers.
The problem isn't that they hate baby killers. In fact I think it is great that they do.
The problem is that they don't understand that the baby killer goes free if they put the wrong person in jail.
I don't like the saying "better for ten guilty people to go free than one innocent person be jailed".
It implies that the guilty persons will go to jail if the innocent is jailed too, not that the innocent takes the guilty persons place in prison.
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Have you READ the original transcript? Maybe the prosecutor was particularly eloquent, the evidence in his favor, and the evidence against (thus in favor of acquittal) pathetically bad. Just because the defendant hasn't confessed and asked to be locked away for life and a day doesn't mean that the jury is wrong, merely incorrect in this one case (assuming that the defendant made the call which supplied an alibi and not one of his friends or associates). The accused baby killer certainly seemed to the ent
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What's really bothersome is not that they were collecting the data but that he had to prove his innocence instead of the State having to prove his guilt. It's a disturbing trend where we're proving innocence as opposed to relying on the State to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
By a jury of your peers. Most of your peers are gullible and hate baby killers.
A jury of your peers is meaningless when the lawyers get to hand-pick those peers.
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In that case, you'd get pretty much mostly 'not guilty' verdicts, even for defendants who are guilty as heck. They're the safe choice.
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You're spouting nonsense... They did have ample evidence indicating his guilt. It has always fallen to the defendant to provide a defense, and counter / refute the state's (otherwise-compelling) incriminating evidence.
You don't seem to know what "beyond a reasonable doubt" means... It has never meant "1
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They did have ample evidence indicating his guilt. It has always fallen to the defendant to provide a defense, and counter / refute the state's (otherwise-compelling) incriminating evidence.
Apparently it wasn't enough since we know he is not guilty. In fact, the standard IS that a defendant should be able to sit silently and find himself acquitted is he didn't do it. The defendant DOES have the right to speak in his defense, of course.
This being a really ancient crime, the prosecutor really did owe a very high duty to be sure since after 50 years the those witnesses who aren't deceased probably only remember the events in caricature.
In this case, In a sane world, there would be a good case for
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That's pure nonsense. I can't imagine where you pulled that from.
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They used to teach civics in high school.
Beyond reasonable doubt doesn't mean we sorta-kinda think he's guilty. It doesn't mean "he must be guilty or they wouldn't have arrested him". It is the prosecutor's job to PROVE guilt beyond reasonable doubt. Not SUPPOSE his guilt.
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Sure, but sometimes the evidence does point in the wrong way. Eyewitnesses make mistakes, and people do get found in guilty-looking situations. Sometimes, people (not necessarily the police or prosecutor) fabricate evidence.
If a case gets to trial, there's normally a lot of evidence against the defendant, since normally the prosecutor won't ask for a trial otherwise. This means that the defendant isn't likely to be acquitted without a defense. This doesn't mean that the jurors are returning guilty ve
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If the prosecution is fabricating evidence or concealing exculpatory evidence, then the system has already been violated. In the case at hand, the prosecutor DID have the exculpatory evidence.
Meanwhile, the judge is supposed to make sure the jury understands the standard of proof required and if he isn't convinced that they do, he has the power to vacate a guilty finding.
Note that I'm not saying the defendant SHOULDN'T offer a defense, just that they're not supposed to have to. But if he does not and ends u
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You must have had a HORRIBLE civics teacher, to lead you to believe that "a defendant should be able to sit silently and find himself acquitted". What did your civics teacher tell you the defense lawyer was even meant for?
Yes, but "beyond reasonable doubt" doesn't meant the prosecution has "100% sure, absolutely irrefutable and infallible proof". Indeed the defense lawyer's job is to explain and neg
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The defendant has a right to a defense and typically hires a lawyer to help make sure the system works because human beings are fallible and sometimes corrupt. Since we don't always live up to the ideal, it is necessary.
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I would jump on the chance to go to prison instead of remaining in a county jail. I've spent a weekend and a couple of nights in jail. It wasn't too bad, it was North Carolina where I spent the weekend. If I were sentenced to six or more months, I'd ask to be sentenced for at least N+1 days so that I could go to prison instead of serving the time in county. County is where the inmates are. Prison is where the convicts are.
I did work at a military prison but I was mostly outside - I was an escort/chaser (tra
Re: testimony convicted him, also no phone record (Score:2)
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IANAL, but I've read that hearsay testimony can be admissible if it's from the deathbed. There are requirements that the person giving the testimony realize that she's going to die, and that she does die.
Why was this a conviction by judge? The guy had the Constitutional right to a jury trial.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
As far as digital work with databases at a national level, 1969 was the first real mention of national collection that was searchable and gated to select clearance access in the UK based on the 1965 US vision of the Community Online Intelligence System (COINS).
Later phone collection could be see with early
Not a new document (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not a new document (Score:5, Informative)
Correct. The telephone records were part of the case records - it is those case records which have been preserved. What changed was information that the crime could have been committed earlier, which if true, would have rendered the telephone call irrelevant as an alibi. When the information that the crime was committed earlier was discredited, the phone records in the case file became relevant to him again.
This is completely not a case of phone records being retained indefinitely.
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I know you're trolling, and likely trying to make the left look like they're lunatics, but I think even the average person on the left is keen on the idea that innocent people should not go to jail just to give a family some closure. I don't even think the people on the extreme left generally advocate such things. No, I'm pretty sure that all facets of the political spectrum don't want to put innocent people in jail just to give the family closure. That would be stupid.
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as long as it's not Trump or Sanders.
Of course, we can point to many moments in human history when we'd have been better off with the status quo than what the change bought us.
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"New evidence included recently subpoenaed phone records proving that McCullough made a collect call to his parents from a phone booth in the city of Rockford"
Which suggests that the phone records were newly acquired.
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Bah, facts. You have no business bringing facts into this. They may just show how ridiculous the whole story is or how incompetent and viscous "law" enforcement is.
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Viscous?
Vicious, perhaps?
Anyway, more likely the original defense counsel was crap than law enforcement somehow railroaded the suspect by suggesting that an earlier time was possible, thus making the alibi moot. That would be like assuming an evil Jessica Fletcher mis-solved the case.
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Neato! (Score:2)
Can us little people see please? I'm be pretty interested in the stacks of transcribed phone-calls between my grandfather and his mistress.
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As well they should be (Score:2)
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Re: As well they should be (Score:1)
See the Church Committee hearings. These people think they are above the law, like the Bushes and Clintons.
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So, bascially you like to have proofs and prove to people. I do that too. ;)
The word you're looking for is "indefinitely" (Score:2)
Although the meaning was not lost, really, folks, and my dear slashdot editors, the word you want in this case is indefinitely. This concludes today's lesson, when you mean that there is no time limit.
Lol (Score:2)
Remind me, in the future, when some politician preaches about forgiveness, that the forgetfulness part is on hold indefinitely.
28 January 1878 (Score:2)
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Well of COURSE they would keep those records, probably laminated on a wall, somewhere (probably at Verizon :-). Alternately, donated to Rutgers.
No, the collect call was noted by FBI (Score:2)
No phone records were produced to clear his name. It was an old FBI report, and (from the FBI's POV) his alibi had been established while investigating the case in 1957. At that time the FBI had either requested and examined the phone records and verified the collect call. While conducting a preliminary investigation an FBI agent may have simply called the phone company and requested the information, noting it in the report. They would not have requested a paper record of the call unless it established his
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Strictly speaking he didn't get convicted until 2012.
So the FBI couldn't find jack in the late 50s, then some local prosecutor (from the article, I'd guess a County Prosecutor) decided to close the case, this poor guy a) was fired from a job for a reported statutory rape (the crime he was convicted of seems to be [wa.gov] attempting to seduce her, but not actually seducing her), b) did not actually have any of the paperwork he'd used to establish his alibi in 1957 because that was 55 fucking years ago, and c) gave o
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Call transaction metadata is used internally for billing, satisfying current legal obligations, marketing, transaction analysis, and trending analysis. The last two reasons allow the carrier to plan for infrastructure upgrades to meet projected future demand. When you sign your service agreement you are effectively giving the carrier the rights to use your data for all of the above reasons.