Connecticut Resident Stopped By State Police For Radioactivity 545
Okian Warrior writes "A Milford, CT man was pulled over when a state police car radioactivity scanner flagged his car as being radioactive. The man had been given a cardiac exam using radioactive dye, and had a note from his physician attesting to this, but it raises questions about the legality of the stop. Given that it is not illegal to own or purchase or transport radioactive materials (within limits for hobbyist use), should the police be allowed to stop and search vehicles which show a slight level of radioactivity?"
So (Score:5, Insightful)
Did they shoot him, claim it was self-defense, and ship his remains to Gitmo? Or did they check out his story and send him on his way?
Seems like a non-story to me.
Seems reasonable to me (Score:5, Insightful)
The headline makes it sound like the police searched his car, but the article doesn't say that.
Assuming there was no search and the officer simply asked him why the car was radioactive and was satisfied with the explanation, this sounds like an example of the system working.
I'm actually very impressed that these detectors are widely deployed and sensitive enough to pick this up.
Hey! This is America! (Score:5, Insightful)
Should the police be allowed to stop and search vehicles which show a slight level of radioactivity?
Seriously? What kind of donkey are you?
You're living in a Police State that monitors its citizens and foreigners to an extent that developing countries can only dream of, molests travelers before they can board a plane, hosts a fourth of the world's inmates, locks foreigners for a decade without trial on tropical islands, and recently murdered one of its own citizen without trial... And you're fucking worried about your car getting searched because it's slightly radioactive? How about wondering what kind of turd bought the cop a radioactive detector?
Defense Contractors (Score:5, Insightful)
So, basically, some defense contractor bribed a few key state officials and got them to convince everyone that taxpayer money should be used to outfit the police cars with (very expensive and profitable) radiation scanners.
Re:Seems reasonable to me (Score:3, Insightful)
Given that it is not illegal to own or purchase or transport radioactive materials (within limits for hobbyist use), should the police be allowed to stop and search vehicles which show a slight level of radioactivity?
Seems to me that if you transport radioactive materials on a highway you might be legally required to display one of those diamond-shaped Hazmat placards, and any reasonable officer could lawfully stop and question the driver about a possible violation.
How radioactive do you need to be? (Score:2, Insightful)
This guy must have been seriously active to be detected from several meters and through the shielding provided by his car. If it was that bad what risk was there to his family and colleagues? If I was a cop and detected radiation I would think twice about making an approach, get the guys in the rad suits.
Re:Seems reasonable to me (Score:5, Insightful)
I say yes. From a geiger counter's perspective, a legal, unshielded source could be indistinguishable from a very dangerous illegal source that's sitting behind a couple of inches of lead shielding. So long as the detectors only trigger false positives in highly unusual, easily documented circumstances like this guy's medical test, I see nothing wrong with his. If they went off every time somebody had a bag of potash fertilizer or a couple smoke detectors in their car, it'd be a problem.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
I is indeed a story of police doing regular police works (false alarms are unavoidable). Given that it is the third slashdot story about police/tsa behaving normally that I read recently, i wonder if slashdot is trolling us. (not the site itself, of course, but some guys strangely interested in us having our eyes roll when we see police or TSA mentioned)
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
There's not much legal precentdent either way as to whether or not slight radioactivity consitutes probable cause, but it's a very worrying slippery slope if it does. Cop wants to harras you? All he has to do is put a few drops of some nuclear medicine on your bumper (or worse, on your person) and you'll be stopped and searched thoroughly, just because he thinks you're guilty. Hell, he can just claim you registered, search your car illegally and haul you in for whatever he finds.
TL;DR: It's a slippery slope for due process.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
The legal question of probable cause is what is significant in this story, not that they stopped him and let him go afterwards.
Probable cause is a reasonable suspicion someone has committed a crime. That is the key point: there has to be suspicion of a crime taking place. Radioactivity in and of itself is not a crime since it is legal to possess radioactive materials or receive treatment from radioactive materials (with restrictions). Just detecting it does not imply a crime has taken place (except for neutron radiation or extremely high radiation in unmarked vehicles).
It is important to ensure that the police use the probable cause standard, even in oddball cases like this. The definition of probable cause is a central item to maintaining the dignity of citizens from unnecessary searches. Poo-poo it if you want, but this is a significant issue even if you can't see it.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
Seems like a non-story to me.
A non story, really?
Officer: I noticed you were doing the speed limit. So I thought I'd pull you over and make sure everything was ok. Officer: You aren't doing anything illegal, and have done nothing to make us suspect you. But we suspect you are a terrorist....
And THAT is the story.
Re:What if I dont know I am radioactive ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, because if we don't stop and search everyone, the terrorists will win.
This is a bullshit argument. People are killed over terrorism, but the level is not significant enough to justify clamping down and restricting the civil liberties of everyone. A police state is not an adequate response to terrorism.
Intelligence services, smart police forces, not supporting oppressive governments, and letting your people continue to be free and productive are more effective deterrents to terrorism than a checkpoint at every block.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What if I dont know I am radioactive ? (Score:4, Insightful)
If your nuke radiates as much as your body after a medical exam, then you either got ripped off by the arms dealer or should probably get a different doctor.
Radioactivity only stays private if shielded. (Score:5, Insightful)
> radioactive materials (within limits for hobbyist use),
Yes, but if they're sufficiently radioactive to be detected from across the street, and you didn't bother to put them in a shielded container for transport, I don't think getting pulled over and asked a couple of questions is necessarily entirely out of line. It is worth noting that the radiation was leaving the vehicle and having an impact on the external surroundings, which is how the police knew about it in the first place. Now, in the case of the dude who'd just had a medical scan with radioactive dye, that was fundamentally unavoidable (unless he wanted to stay at the hospital until it wore off, which could be rather expensive). Nonetheless, the police didn't stop him out of randomness, or because they were busybodies, or because they had something against him personally, etc. They became interested in him because of radiation that was emanating from his vehicle. That's not (or at least not entirely) a private effect. It's a public effect.
If you're transporting radioactive materials for hobbyist use, and you want them to be private (so that they will not get police attention without a warrant, for example), you could always just keep them in a shielded container, so that the radiation remains private. Frankly, that's probably a good idea even at home (whenever you're not actively working with your hobby). Think of it in the same way as keeping your dog on a leash.
No, that is not the question (Score:5, Insightful)
That is not the right question to ask. The right question to ask is should government be allowed to do ANYTHING trumping citizen's rights that has been granted in 1776 in the name of security or any other names.
The question to ask is whether a country of free men, which US of A declares itself to be, "the most free country in the world", should continue a practice of "preventing" crime, from the one hand, and start fullfilling people's right to think and act within the limits of the law, no matter how close are they to those limits, and, from the other hand, should the aforementioned country start punishing people for crimes swiftly, without any delay, thus enforcing the responsibility of people for their action, which is the other obligatory immanent nondetachable side to the aforementioned rights.
That is the question.
As for the type of questions you have posed, they have been leading the country nowhere. Scratch that, they haven't been leading the country nowhere, they have been leading away from original rights of the people to lesser and lesser rights. They have been leading country away from its original state to 1984 state.
It's time to reverse Martin Noemuller fable back and instead of warning others about "what do you do when they will come for you?" it is time to call people "let's stop them from coming after anyone". It's time for stopping calling for "stopping" the process where it is now, because, face it, the point is rather arbitrary, isn't it? It's time for starting to call for reversal of the process back to the origins of the US
In every persistent ideology, that is the one that had existed for even only slightly longer than 236 years, there always have been restoration/revival movement and if this country wants to claim to have any ideology beside the animalistic ideology "compete and survive", it must prove itself by having this type of movement as well.
Wait... There was a number of people that were doing that all the time, actually, scratch that, I know exactly, what that number is, it is nine at any given time of recent history. Correction: they were supposed to be doing that in our name, on our behalf, but they have been failing to do that miserably and silly us, we made a mistake of giving them a total carte blanche to go with that with impunity by removing any accountability of their actions.
This is all theoretical and rhetorical, because, face it, there is no ideology left in US except the one I characterized.
So stop asking your silly questions like:
and move on. It does not matter if you actually have this local small most likely Pyrrhic victory in this particular case. Without the principle of following the principles, without people who are ready to sacrifice their 401k, their MTV, their suburban houses, and unltimately, and very essentially, their lives for those principles, you will be just going from question to question.
Do you know why people had more rights in the most despotic countries of the past? Of course, not because the despots respected their rights in any way.
People of the past had those rights because government could not technically stomp on them, they did not have the means, the force, the technology. Now the government respect those rights only superficially more than their despotic brethren of the past, in reality it systematically and slowly takes away all rights of people except the right for panem et circenses. Oh, that "right" to circenses is fulfilled on full blown scale. There should be some kind of Moore law for the number of "channels of shit".
Now the
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
Much easier to claim he smells dope. Requires no action and if he find nothing, well, maybe the smell came from elsewhere or he was just mistaken.
In this case, they were likely being worried about a dirty bomb.
Re:Defense Contractors (Score:2, Insightful)
Unlikely that they bribed the state officials; it's much more likely that defense contractors (technical support types) wrote in the risk and detector based defense into DHS material, that DHS pushed this, that the state guys saw that as a way to get a grant to "do something" and applied and got the grant.
There's no misconception that we can catch every dirty bomb by scanning highways and ports. The very effective theory is that if we make hte odds of failure significant, then the boogieman won't try that approach. Data analysis and interviews with our current opponents show that they're unwilling to accept the PR embarrassment of a failure, so they have a strong motivation not to get caught until after the event. In that sense, the sensors aren't effective to catch an attack executing, but to prevent an attack. This news article is part of that "we're not really competent enough to pull off a conspiracy" government bragging that their stupid expensive toys actually work.
My Father (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Seems reasonable to me (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, do you have to have done something *illegal* for the police to stop you and *ask* you something?
Some years ago I was stopped by a police car. While I was going "WTF" the cop walked up to my car and gave me my wallet that I left at the last tank stop.
Another scenario would be a cop looking for someone else entirely in a remote area stopping another driver asking if they saw that other car for example.
In this case, there was a car with an "unusual" radiation. It could have either bin a terrorist with a shielded much higher radiation source, some poor dolt who got sold a used garage from Chernobyl as a bargain, or someone who parked beside a trailer full of ex-soviet nukes a few hours ago at a dinner stop.
So in this case stopping the car and asking whether the radiation had a "normal" explanation seems quite reasonable. Walking up to someone or stopping someone and *asking a question* should always be within the legal rights of the police, as long as you have the right not to answer. If it's not, you get the effect that you have in the US that the police has to conjure something up to fine you with every time they feel the urge to stop you.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
Given that /. is mostly populated by nerds, we've actually missed the part of the story that is interesting.
The guy at the centre of the story said he was more curious than annoyed. I agree. I'm curious. I'd like to know more about these radiation monitors, and, for that matter, I'd like to get one for myself.
Making it too complicated. (Score:2, Insightful)
All he has to do is put a few drops of some nuclear medicine on your bumper (or worse, on your person) and you'll be stopped and searched thoroughly, just because he thinks you're guilty.
He doesn't have to. If the stop were actually challenged, all he has to day is that his detector showed radioactivity at that time or more likely, "I don't remember the incident your Honor." Now, all you have to do is prove he's lying. Good luck with that - even if you do.
Black people are pulled over for DWB all the time and how many times do you see court cases because of that?
The only times stops are questioned are when the cops actually find something illegal.
Re:GM Counter measurements are not Suspicions (Score:5, Insightful)
Bullshit.
"Reasonable Suspicion" would mean the Officer(s) was(were) guessing,
Reasonable suspicion isn't guessing. Reasonable suspicion is a >50% chance that a crime has taken place.
and the inconvenience of a "terry stop" is a very minor cost to pay
for the greater public safety.
What is the treat to public safety from a low level of radioactive material? Has anyone tried to determine this?
Let me do it then. There is no threat. This is just a useful fear that politicians like to exploit. The real threat is of the police encroaching on the rights of citizens which is occurring today, unlike the myth of radiological terrorism. If you don't feel this is true then please describe the attack vectors and sources of radiological materials that could cause significant damage.
Even if a "hobbyist" is transporting within CFR 40.13, for a detection to occur within a cruiser at a distance means that "something is spilling out"
or "radiating dirty" and that is not suspicion but probable cause.
No it doesn't. It could also mean than a citizen who hasn't violated any laws but received radiation treatment is driving down the road. There is no probable cause whatsoever. In fact, there is no case history of hobbyists transporting radioactive materials in such a grossly unsafe manner to set off police detectors. This implies that low setoff thresholds would likely be lawful citizens who received radiation treatment, which argues exactly the opposite direction as probable cause.
Be vigilant and observant, but not paranoid and irrational.
Really? You say that after your paranoid and irrational post?
Re:What if I dont know I am radioactive ? (Score:2, Insightful)
Nukes are shielded, both for security and reliability reasons, and also for safe-handling reasons. Therefore emissions from a nuke should be minimal.
By contrast, medical radioactive agents are designed to be emit radiation from the body (in the form of gamma rays), in large enough quantity that they can be detected and accurately quantified and localised (with a good signal to noise ratio) within the shortest amount of time possible. In a number of cases, it would be possible to do a medical scan with 10% of the dose, but the scan would require lying on the scanner for 4 hours, leading to motion blurring and poor resolution, as well the radioactive agent getting metabolised by the body which may change is biochemical function (and as the biochemical functions of the dye are what determines the diagnostic information produced, this is a problem), and being ludicrously expensive and inconvenient.
The optimal dose is therefore dependent on the maximum acceptable time (usually 15-45 minutes, depending on the scanner's sensor size and amount of body to be scanned, and the specific type of abnormality being looked for), maximum acceptable radiation exposure, etc. It has been known for some centers (particularly in the US), to use higher radiation doses in order to reduce cost. E.g. a common type of heart scan requires 2 isotope injections - one for "stress" and one for "baseline" - these are then subtracted to give the final result. As the isotope has a half-life of 6 hours, best practice is to leave 24-48 hours between the studies - with a lot of centres giving 2 appointments a week apart for convenience. However, some centres may book the 2 studies for the same day; morning and afternoon. But this requires a "double dose" of isotope for the afternoon study, in order to boost the "baseline" signal over the noise of the residual "stress" isotope.
Unfortunately, there are few suitable isotopes with half-lives well matched to this time scale. Most isotopes have half-lives between 2 and 6 hours, which means that easily detectable emissions will remain for a considerable period after the test is complete.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
So the conversation probably went:
"Good afternoon sir, I've stopped you because your car seems to be radioactive"
"Yes, I've just had a medical procedure involving a radioactive isotope, here's a letter from the doctor."
"Thank you sir, sorry for the inconvenience."
"That's quite alright, those detectors are very sensitive aren't they?"
"Yes sir, have a nice day."
So in other words, "policeman does the job he is paid to do and nobody cares except people responding in an alarmist manner on some website or other".
You know, on Slashdot they would have covered this from an entirely different angle, looking at the technology required to pick up relatively low radiation levels from cars. Oh....hang on...
Re:What if I dont know I am radioactive ? (Score:5, Insightful)
It is a Way of Life (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:So (Score:3, Insightful)
He can't pretend to smell dope until after he pulls you over. So he needs two BS excuses to search your car. With the radioactivity excuse he can claim one BS reason to do both. Clearly more efficient.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
That's kind of the point. Police acting normally includes stopping people on the highway and questioning them when there's no evidence of a crime having been committed.
What are they going to net in a sweep like this? Mostly patients like the above and delivery trucks with boxes of smoke detectors or lantern gas mantles. Maybe a few scientists.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hey! This is America! (Score:2, Insightful)
There's quite a difference between getting shot while shooting back at a cop, getting shot at by the military while participating at the ennemy's side on the battlefield, and receiving a bombshell over your head in a peaceful area due an executive order. In the third case, irrespective of how lunatic was, a democracy worth it's name issues an international search warrant.
Re:So (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh, is that like driving while black?
Yes except worse. If you are pulled over for DWB you get an overworked public defender and maybe an all white jury that assumes you must have done something wrong. If you are stopped for DWT anywhere in a constitution free zone you just get GITMO'd indefinitely, no trial no lawyer.
DWB = ridiculous, bigoted, illegal, etc
DWT = we turn into the DPRK
Re:So (Score:3, Insightful)
Evidence of a crime means that you see something out of the ordinary that is consistent with a crime. You stop a car and there is bed sheet soaked in blood in the back, and a machete lying next to it. Evidence of a crime? One could argue that it is just evidence the guy had been hunting and hadn't learned the first thing about how to clean and butcher a deer.
You stop a car with two guys dressed in black and notice that next to them are two black ski masks, a hand written note (you can read the part that says "give me all your money"), and some empty bags. Evidence of a crime in progress or about to be committed? The guys where on their way to a rehearsal of a play in which they have the role of bank robbers.
It is possible to be doing everything in a way that would be consistent with what you consider "normal" but that would still give of a strong sign of a crime having been committed or about to be committed.
Given how rare it is for people's cars to give off radiation, and the potential for such radiation to indicate that a catastrophic crime is about to be committed, a police officer would be highly negligent if he didn't stop and investigate such a car.
Re:So (Score:4, Insightful)
The police detected an anomaly and saw fit to investigate. Did they say they suspected the guy of a crime?
The police shouldn't be seen as just arrest machines. They've more roles than that. What if the guy was hauling radioactive materials below the threshold allowed for civilians but in an unsafe manner? They'd be there to tell him that it's not safe. It's a rare and strange enough occurrence that I don't see a problem with that.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, since all they need to stop you and investigate is *reasonable suspicion,* I'd say that this stop was entirely within the bounds of good sense and reason.
If the radioactive dye in his body was enough that they recommend he "stay away from infants" for 24 hours, and give him a note explaining that he has had a test where he was injected with radioactive materials, I'd say he's probably emitting a bit more than "background" radiation.
As such, there is a *reasonable* suspicion that something criminal is happening, because it is uncommon, and unhealthy, for people to walk around emitting ionizing radiation. It is *reasonable* for a police officer to say, "Wait, what? Why is this car emitting radiation?" Once he investigated the situation, it turns out that there was no cause for concern, and he sent the man on his way.
This is exactly how it's supposed to work.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
You think that cops should be allowed to detain you (you're placed under temporary arrest during a traffic stop) merely to give you helpful health and safety information?
Re:So (Score:3, Insightful)
Are you fucking kidding me bro? "Regular police works"? I can only conclude from your odd grammar that you must be a native of another country than the U.S. who fundamentally cannot understand the freedoms we hold dear in this country.
God help us all if you are an actual citizen of this formerly-great country.
When the fuck did it ever become normal and accepted in America to pull people over for anything less than an actual traffic or equipment violation ??
This is TYRANNY.... plain and simple....and you have no problem with it?
What the fuck is this country coming to?
Re:So (Score:4, Insightful)
If you have a broken tail light, a cop will pull you over and tell you to fix it. That's helpful safety information. The cop isn't going to arrest you for that. The word "arrest" has a specific legal meaning, and a traffic stop isn't an arrest.
Re:So (Score:5, Insightful)
The police detected an anomaly and saw fit to investigate. Did they say they suspected the guy of a crime?
His only crime is being the citizen of a police state.
Of course they didn't suspect him of a crime. Don't you get it? This radiation nonsense is a smoke screen, yet another excuse to randomly pull people over and search them with no reason and against the Constitution. It's the hand of tyranny in action.
The police shouldn't be seen as just arrest machines. They've more roles than that.
Absolutely not. There should be minimal numbers of police, just enough to handle serious (actual) crimes. They can butt out of the rest. I do not want the police involved in my life, period. This leads to tyranny every single time.
What if the guy was hauling radioactive materials below the threshold allowed for civilians but in an unsafe manner?
What if we followed the Constitution and stopped buying into the tyrants' bullshit excuses used to justify taking our freedoms while we cheer them on?
It's a rare and strange enough occurrence that I don't see a problem with that.
And that's sad.
Re:Invasive search (Score:4, Insightful)
To be fair, those kinds of roadblocks are illegal in certain states. If I stay in the US for much longer I would very much like to move to one of them. Stopping and interrogating people who have done nothing wrong is true police state behavior. An absolutely disgusting human rights violation.
Re:So (Score:3, Insightful)
When the fuck did it ever become normal and accepted in America to pull people over for anything less than an actual traffic or equipment violation ??
THIS. Flamebait? Fuck THAT. When did it become okay for the cops to pull you over just to find out what you're doing? It's not illegal to travel with radioactives, and for noncommercial purposes and transporting small amounts you don't need a placard. Frankly, I'm not too happy to see the cops pull someone over with one brakelight out, either. It costs money and risks the officer's life AND the citizen's life in many cases, especially being pulled over on a highway. Why not just record their license plate number and have the DMV send them a postcard asking them to refresh their lamps? Answer, because it's an opportunity to see if you can shake the citizen down for anything else, and it has very little to do with public safety. Nothing, really, unless BOTH your brakelights are out.
Re:So (Score:3, Insightful)
Given how rare it is for people's cars to give off radiation, and the potential for such radiation to indicate that a catastrophic crime is about to be committed, a police officer would be highly negligent if he didn't stop and investigate such a car.
I sometimes wonder how my country got so fucked. Then I see ignorant bullshit like this, and I don't wonder anymore.
It's because people as ignorant as you are running the show. It is NOT rare for cars to give off radiation. These kinds of medical tests are NOT rare. Radiation has NEVER ONCE been evidence of a catastrophic crime about to occur, nor has any crime EVER occurred where radiation detected in advance would have been evidence. Repeat after me: no such crime has EVER occurred. It's a Hollywood fantasy. Only a water-brained cauling fool would buy your argument. Turns out that's over 50% of my countrymen.