Comments

1
So they're holding people who might commit a crime, versus people who have committed a crime or are suspected of committing a crime? I'm confused. Are we under a new legal context?
2
Good. Hope they'll charge them with aiding and abetting homicide. @1, the cops know his family is helping him, which is a felony. They're completely within their rights to bring them in for questioning. Until you know a damn thing about the law, stfu.
3
I don't know, rutabaga pie, you tell me.
4
They're holding people who it appears have committed the crime of aiding and abetting. Also called being an accessory after the fact. Also called hiding the bad guy from the cops.
5
So, at the risk of being accused of being soft on crime, is there actual evidence that all of the people who are being detained by angry and heavily armed police officers have committed crimes? I mean, we're being told that some of them may have abetted, but is there at least some evidence for all these people? Because I hate to think that we're just scooping up everyone who's unlucky enough to be related to this psycho.
6
All right, Judah, but how long can the police hold someone without charging him with a crime?
7
@5, I'm actually excited by the fact that "we're just scooping up everyone who's unlucky enough to be related to this psycho." Mainly because I doubt 'luck' has anything to do with it. I'd bet half my salary that his family is only marginally less sociopathic than he is; that's the way these things typically run. I do hope there turns out to be justification for it, and that many of them end up charged with felonious assistance in a multiple homicide.
8
Looking at the damage they caused the places and the FACT that American CITIZENS are Innocent until PROVEN guilty, somebody needs to tell the cops to stop overreacting.

Now.
9
@6 - 72 hours I think.
10
I came back from Vancouver, BC this evening and there were police cars with flashing lights checking every northbound car at the Peace Arch and truck crossing. Also saw many police cars pulling cars over on northbound I-5 on the drive back to Seattle.
11
@10: I was headed to Vancouver on Sunday evening and saw the same thing. The border crossing times said 5 minutes. Once you got past the checkpoint, that was somewhat accurate, heh.
12
@10: I wonder if the strong regional police response would be the same if the victims were something other than cops, for example illegal immigrants or low income urban residents.
13
Just going on this article, the legal basis of this "round up" does sound pretty tenuous. Abeting this guy's escape is certainly a serious crime, and it sounds like the police have evidence that some of this guy's acquaintances have done that. But it also sounds like they are bringing in more acquaintances that just those some, more like as many as they can get their hands on.

Perhaps this impression is wrong. Perhaps they have evidence (emails, phone calls, texts) implicating everyone they are bringing in. Perhaps they are asking acquaintances to voluntarily come in order to put themselves above suspicion.

Or perhaps the cops are just willing to step a bit over the line on this case. In which case, if I were one of those acquaintances rounded up without any evidence implicating me personally, I would be calling my lawyer and telling him to prepare a seven-figure wrongful detention lawsuit.
14
David Wright: Let's say the police arrest someone, hold him for 48 hours, and then release him without charging him (maybe they concluded that they simply didn't have enough evidence, or the prosecutor exercised discretion not to prosecute). Does that give rise to a seven-figure wrongful detention lawsuit? If so, why isn't every jurisdiction in the United States bankrupt?
15
Mindbender @ 14: They aren't bankrupt because police generally don't go around arresting people whom they have no evidence commited a crime. Having a DA decline to prosecute or having futher evidence exorerate a suspect is a very different matter than never having had probable cause in the first place.
16
So apparently he's been captured?
17
I sure wish that the police were this vigilant in capturing a murderer of a non-police citizen here in our fair land!
18
Billy Chav you are Friggin' crazy.

Did you not see the niece crying, saying that her uncle has never been to her place, but the police completely wrecked her place? Your preconceived notions are just that. I am sure the police are rounding up some because they have some suspicion that they are helping the suspect, and others they are rounding up just to cut off potential resources - real or imagined.
19
@18 - that's what they do when they want to execute someone in a revenge killing.

Sad, but true.

You only have rights in this nation if you're white and rich.
20
They aren't bankrupt because police generally don't go around arresting people whom they have no evidence commited a crime.


It figures that a self-described libertarian knows jack all about how the police actually operate, but I suppose knowing how the world ACTUALLY works vs. how it's supposed to work in libertarian la-la land would proscribe giving up libertarian fantasies.

It also figures that a libertarian is in love with the idea of launching multimillion-dollar unfounded lawsuits willy nilly rather than, oh, tackling actual problems in the actual real world.
21
Libertarians are usually clueless.

And, quite frankly, usually close to insane.
22
@12 I get your point but I think it's understood that murdering police is a more egregious crime than murdering civilians, because police are the enforcers and protectors, so cop killers are anarchists of the first order, and they put us all at danger. Also in this case the expectation of repeat crimes was high, similar to the DC snipers, in which case the manhunt was also intense.

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