Police allow Apple investigators to search private home for iPhone prototype

[Lyric]

Apparently the SF police permitted corporate "investigators" from Apple to enter (and search) a private residence while they waited OUTSIDE.

What. The. Fuck. What's next? Privatizing search warrants? If the police have a warrant to search my home, it had damned well better be the POLICE who perform the search. You know...the ones who actually have accountability to The People? Is it even LEGAL for the police to allow a private corporation to perform a warranted search?

And worse still...the iPhone prototype wasn't even IN the house. So not only were corporate goons allowed to go through the private belongings of this resident, but they apparently did it for no good reason.

:wtf:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/mobile/09/02/iphone.5.prototype/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

[leveymg]

1. Good. Now, the owner has a nice invasion of privacy law suit against Apple & the SFPD.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. More than that - with the police assisting in the warrantless search,

thereby making the corporate investigators effectively agents of the state, he might also have a claim against the SFPD.

I realize that tech companies have a legitimate concern about industrial espionage, but this was too much.

[leveymg]

4. Somebody will have to sit outside the Principal's Office during recess for a week for this.

Been there, done that.

[Fumesucker]

2. Corporations are people..

And all people are equal..

You know where this is going, don't you?

Some people are just more equal than others.

I wonder how much electricity the UK could generate these days by hooking an alternator to George Orwell?

[SixthSense]

5. Fascism

it's what's for breakfast

[Johonny]

8. iFascism

Put an i in front of it and people will line up to be the first to be searched.

[QC]

13. +1!

[Odin2005]

6. This is what FASCISM looks like. Government of the Corporations...

...by the Corporations, and for the Corporations.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

7. Previous versions of the had no SFPD support and the SFPD claiming they would investigate it

Hard to tell which is the correct one.

Anyone who would allow a search without a warrant is a fool.

[Jackpine Radical]

12. Not necessarily.

Imagine them saying, "The police are right outside. Let us in or they're coming in right through your door with their guns blazing."

There is no more freedom from unreasonable search & seizure in this country.

[MedicalAdmin]

16. Step outside and lock the door.

State clearly and loudly that you do NOT consent to a search andyhen start dialing your phone.

First call is to the media, second (given that the cops were there) is to the FBI, then the attorney generals office, your lawyer, the mayor, etc.

Shine a light on the cockroaches. Maybe nothing will happen and you'll get searched but you lose the right to complain afterwards if you consent to that search.

[Jackpine Radical]

17. Yeah. I'm really ready for that. I have all those people on my speed dial.

So you come out your door & the cops decide you're assaulting them & shoot you down.

[MedicalAdmin]

26. I do have them on speed dial. What? You don't have a phone book?

And read the OP. It wasn't a swat team, it was rent a cops. They asked for permission to search. In short they ran a bluff and won. Hedge your bets. Or bend the fuck over.

[Jackpine Radical]

30. The police stood by outside while the private dicks went in.

I read not only the op, but the linked article.

And one would be lucky to have a cell phone with you, let alone a phone book, when hastily exiting into the arms of the cops.

[MedicalAdmin]

32. The phone book is so you can get those numbers on speed dial NOW.

And no way in hell would some private dicks enter my house warrant or not.

Make em show you I'd and prove that they have an authorized warrant. No ID = no entry. Thus I would walk outside with my cell phone and my camera on video record and I would lock the door behind me and deny permission.

I run apple at my company but this shut makes me sick.

[dgibby]

23. NEVER step outside.

Stay inside and make your calls, but never, ever step outside. You are subject to arrest on the spot if you do that.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

25. By stepping outside and closing/locking the door means if they arrest you

they can not search the house "incidental to the arrest". Why do you think otherwise?

[MedicalAdmin]

28. But then they don't get to search the house and you have basis to sue their asses.

And of course you don't walk out if they are ready to go swat on your ass.

If the idea is to keep them out of the house and they don't have a warrant walk out and lock the door behind you. If your goal is something else then do something else to achieve it.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

19. I turned away police without a search warrant recently

and then again when they showed up with one. It is not all that hard to do. In my case they were at the wrong address both times.

A while back I had some repo bubbas arrested and their truck towed to the far end of the county. You have to know the law and be willing to convince them that you mean what you say.

[MedicalAdmin]

29. +1 --- no warrant = no entry. Period. The same goes for my car.

Good work in standing up and asserting your rights.

Do you remember who said " if your rights can be taken away then you never had them in the first place."?

[Dawson Leery]

9. Fascism

[Fuzz]

10. Fuck.

[Lucian]

11. People need to speak out against this early...

so it doesn't become a normal part of our future.

[closeupready]

14. this is the road to fascism.

nt

[closeupready]

15. Separately, if we are going to redeem fascism, then are we prepared to cheapen the lives

of our brave soldiers in WWII who fought in Italy (and helped win the war) in order to bring down fascism?

[iemitsu]

18. this is the sort of story that gave me nightmares as a child

when i read about the nazis entered german homes looking for contraband people and literature, evidence of one's work against the corporate state.
i guess i need to build that room behind the bookcases.

[Safetykitten]

20. But it's Apple! How could they be evil? Come on...it's crazy talk.

[Rex]

21. See, corporations are people and Apple is the King of People!

When others say America is not controlled by corporations, laugh in their face and walk away.

[Safetykitten]

22. Exactly! And we are so fortunate to have a kind and benevolent king.

Apple gives us things for our fingers to play with!

[Rex]

27. They live by the motto - idle hands are the devil's tools!

:freak:

[Initech]

24. This is what happens when you allow our corporate overlords everything.

[Dreamer Tatum]

31. It's Apple. They redesigned the interior, made it sleeker, and now no one can hack the fridge. nt