Antivirus Pioneer John McAfee Arrested In Belize 367
First time accepted submitter rebelwarlock writes "McAfee lives in Belize and he says that he has become a target of the Gang Suppression Unit. He says the GSU came busting into his research facility in Orange Walk, killed his dog, took his passport, handcuffed him and arrested him on a bogus weapons charge. McAfee says he's a victim because he didn't donate money to a known U.D.P. Orange Walk politician."
About time (Score:4, Funny)
With any luck Norton is next.
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Re:Darn... (Score:4, Informative)
Udopeian Paradise (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, Belize is amazing and safe.
True police states are indeed safe and lovely to visit, for those who do not have to live in them or fear being able to leave ever.
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Re:About time (Score:4, Insightful)
I was thinking the same thing. The U.S. should have him extradited. Maybe charge him for theft for all the computer resources his products have taken.
Clearly... (Score:5, Funny)
...they were just warning him that his subscription was about to run out.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
...they were just warning him that his subscription was about to run out.
It's ironic that a man who works for an organization that uses the same business model: paying protection money so nothing bad happens to himself or his property, just had something bad happen to him for not paying a different organization protection money. Antivirus software is based mostly on scare tactics and it is an attempt at fixing the problem of poor digital hygiene. If people were just more careful with their data, and didn't use web browsers or other network software that allowed the execution of arbitrary code (Javascript, for example: 90% of the websites out there that use it could be redesigned to work without it) would find their risk of a virus or malware infection to be slightly above nothing. Of course, you can't eliminate the risk entirely, but there's no need to be dropping $50 plus a year on subscriptions either.
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Free antivirus makes your point moot. You don't need to pay $50 a year but it gives stupid people piece of mind that there aren't 50 million hackers stealing their grandchildrens pictures off their machine. Going without any antivirus on a windows machine is not the smartest thing to do unless you know what you are doing. It's basically insurance for those who don't give two shits about the sites they visit and can't be arsed to learn anything about security. Besides, it's not like he's forcing you to buy h
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
Frankly, I only need it when I surf porn sites and there, Microsoft Security Essentials does the trick. As far as I know, you don't even need to pirate that one.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
I only need it when I surf porn sites and there
Clearly you haven't read the next article [slashdot.org].
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Funny)
I only need it when I surf porn sites and there
Clearly you haven't read the next article [slashdot.org].
Or he doesn't surf religious websites.
Porn sites are more ethical, anyway (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Porn sites are more ethical, anyway (Score:5, Insightful)
This is right on track (Score:5, Insightful)
I was thinking exactly the same thing as I read Kupfernigk response. The sites which are least professionally built and maintained are most vulnerable to outsiders planting malware. Many of the less mainstream religious sites fall into this category of low technical management and are thus vulnerable.
Porn, being a huge industry, seems to get the attention of more skilled developers and administrators (if not actors and camera people). While surely some are not, and those will be vulnerable, I think most of the porn sites that are malware laden fall into the category of 'honeypots' with either fake or real porn placed with the deliberate goal of being a malware vector.
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Fantastic post. I agree with most of what you say - although I think the vulnerability of many of the least mainstream religions has a lot to do with the fact that they're running websites put up on the cheap, built and managed by amateurs. These sites are just more vulnerable than sites built and run by professional web site designers and administrators.
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Or (s)he gets a kick out of surfing religious websites
Then they count as porn :). Rule 34 and all that.
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Frankly, I only need it when I surf porn sites and there,
Why don't you just put a condom on your ethernet jack when surfing porn? Stops viruses 100%...
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
AV software is like car insurance
Only if your car insurance also lowers your gas mileage, decreases your acceleration & cornering & braking performance, and flashes your headlights, while honking your horn randomly, when you're just trying to drive from A to B.
Most commercial anti-virus software exhibits ~exactly~ the behaviors that people expect from a virus: degraded performance, consumption of disk and memory resources, intrusive popups, etc.
most of the time you are just paying for nothing but when you actually need it, it's pretty damn helpful.
When you actually need it, it's too late. As someone mentioned earlier, basic digital hygiene is the best solution. Beyond that a free AV package to run a one-time scan if/when something slips through.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
My AV package doesn't do any of those things. Sure, it isn't great, but it does not get in the way of my work and I am actually more efficient than when not using it. To the best of my knowledge, it has kept me clean the last few years. It's called Ubuntu, maybe you've heard of it.
Unfortunately, the Ubuntu virus prevents you from running (or causes malfunctions in) packages like Adobe Framemaker, Crystal Reports, Office 2010 with all components, H&R Block TaxCut, and many other applications. I am a Linux user myself, but that doesn't mean I have to also use Windows. It doesn't even mean that my Linux installations are immune to malware. And it'd be a heck of a lot easier to get malware onto an Ubuntu installation through social engineering than a distro where the default isn't to let a user run any program as root through sudo.
tl;dr: Get off your high horse.
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IIRC, that Ubuntu default of "user can use sudo" only exists for the first user created at installation time (unless they've changed this recently). With additional users, you need to add them to the sudoers group if you want to give them root access. (I could go check, but I know that it was trivial to create a user that doesn't have that privilege.)
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Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Interesting)
That is assuming that free antivirus is as good as paid, which in my experience it is not. I have had to clean up systems running so-called free antivirus and some of them had 30+ varieties of malware.
How do you know this? By trusting an anti-malware program?
I see your problem, and it isn't the AV software.
In truth, AV software, payware or not, is much like bicycle support wheels. They won't prevent you from crashing, and in the long run is a bloody nuisance, but can be useful for new riders or those with no interest in learning how to bike.
Disclaimer: I was the author of an AV program. It likely was the first such software being able to find newer viruses than the software and libraries, using heuristic algorithms and partial disassembly. It had one big flaw: It listed what the executable looked like it would do, the calculated probability, and expected the user to actually make a judgment. As I said, a big flaw.
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AV software is like car insurance, most of the time you are just paying for nothing but when you actually need it, it's pretty damn helpful.
Making freqüent backups is like car insurance. AV software is more like towing a spare car behind yours - sure, it might save you from being in a tough spot in a few conceivable cases (mostly if you neglect proper maintenance and care), but usually it just degrades the performance and efficiency of your vehicle and proves worthless in a likely pinch, like an accident or hijacking.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's ironic that a man who works for an organization that uses the same business model: paying protection money so nothing bad happens to himself or his property, just had something bad happen to him for not paying a different organization protection money.
Are you suggesting that MacAfee has been creating viruses? Because you're comparing it to an organization that is both the 'problem' and the 'solution'.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
They are just two things that depend on the same problem - the failure of Microsoft to introduce a viable security model in the 1990s and the lag relating to compatibility with Microsoft's 1990s software.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Informative)
Javascript, for example: 90% of the websites out there that use it could be redesigned to work without it
So what you are really saying is that you don't know how websites are made?
Javascript is a client-side scripting language that allows us to modify the DOM (the visible webpage) and make API calls to get data. Without it, there is a hell of lot we just simply cannot do anymore.
While it may be possible to implement everything in a server side scripting language like PHP, it will not be nearly as pretty or functional. Keep in mind, some of that pretty makes it fairly damned functional by creating UI that are not possible with server side only implementations.
Whether you like it or not we are going to continue moving towards browsers being merely dynamic front ends for applications and that simply requires client side code. Period.
The only other option is a metric butt-ton of RDP connections so that users can enjoy an application remotely and that is ridiculously impractical.
Saying that 90% of websites should be redesigned in such a fashion is quite comical.
Re:Clearly... (Score:4, Insightful)
Whether you like it or not we are going to continue moving towards browsers being merely dynamic front ends for applications and that simply requires client side code. Period.
The only other option is a metric butt-ton of RDP connections so that users can enjoy an application remotely and that is ridiculously impractical.
I just wish there was a better way to deliver remote UIs than AJAX (or "metric butt-ton of RDP connections"). It's a crude and slow hack (although a practical one) to use HTML for dynamic content. Even server side scripts are bit of a bubble gum or an afterthought at least.
There should be a dedicated protocol to deliver UI elements. Maybe there some day will be when this all just gets too messy.
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Protocol isn't the issue. JS reduces the bandwidth and connections-per-second requirement on the server. If JS was implemented according to the strict spec it would be safe. The problem is dumb and lazy web designers who keep wanting to poke holes in the protection. Go to stackoverflow and look up the number of questions from people asking how to upload a file without bothering the user about it.
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There should be a dedicated protocol to deliver UI elements. Maybe there some day will be when this all just gets too messy.
VT52, VT100, VT220, ANSI and many others for pure text aficionados. RIPscript for those bent on graphics. It's all been done before.
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Funny you say that. If you access the "mobile" versions of a lot of sites they have no Javascript, load nearly instantly and often times have SUPERIOR UI to the "full blown" site that has a lot of meaningless crap.
Yelp is a good example. The mobile version of Yelp is simple and to the point. Is it spartan? Yes, but it's good enough.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
Not only that. He flees from the US to some tax haven so he won't have to repay society for all the money he extracted. The thing is, he forgot that living in such cheap places come with certain downsides. This was one of them, wait until he gets into a car accident or desperately needs medical attention, he'll remigrate faster than the popups appear for his antivirus programs. Karma est meretrix.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
He worked for NASA and for Lockheed Martin, both are government funded, whole or in part.
His company benefited from the legal protections of the US.
He moved to Belize to avoid multiple lawsuits.
Suck it up John; you chose a new devil and know it wants to know you.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, I have absolutely no sympathy for John McAfee. He made a choice, and has to face the consequences. TANSTAAFL.
If Belize was truly so much better, we would all live there. (Or, to put it another way, if McAfee was so much better than other AV software, we would all use it...)
I feel very sorry for the true victim here: the dog.
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Interesting)
Indeed, 1/3rd of Belizeans live in the USA [wikipedia.org], because the economic opportunities are lacking in their country, in no small part due to corruption of local politicians.
There also are incentives to move to Belize [belize.com], allowing you to move your household possessions, cars, etc. down there tax-free. Just pay the government a small fee.
I've spent time down there, it's a beautiful country, but with an odd mix of enclaves of super-expensive housing developments for expats, and shanty towns for locals.
Re:Clearly... (Score:4, Insightful)
They are not gifts. They are part of a contract. I give you tax money, so you provide to me protection (police), medical care, infrastructure (roads, zoning, depending on your country it could include gas, water and power), education (schools) and a few other tidbits.
I have a contract with my country. I pay tax for services they provide. The services are only available as a package, so I can at best choose between various countries and thus various packages. Provided I may immigrate, I can choose the best value for my money.
So there may be a "debt" to be paid. Who paid for his school and his medical care while he was not productive himself?
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Society enabled him; that results in a moral debt which he should repay.
LOL....sorry, no. I didn't ask to come into this world, and neither did McAfee. He doesn't owe anyone a fucking thing, least of all you and your corrupt "society." Our Founding Fathers would shake their head in disgust at your idea.
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But... But... Those were government armed goons! Only governments are capable of producing armed goons that want you to bribe them not to hurt you! I believe this because my entire philosophy collapses if I don't!
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Informative)
I know you're joking, but a lot of other people aren't and I can't respond to all of them. McAfee (the person) hasn't had anything to do with McAfee (the malware company) for nearly twenty years. He does pharmaceutical research now, and has nearly blown through his entire fortune in the process. Perhaps that's why he could no longer afford to pay the protection money ...er, I mean, make the "political donations".
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Would it be fair to say that John McAfee's legacy is somewhat akin to that of Phil Katz [wikipedia.org], plus or minus some hookers and blow?
It saddens me that these men, whose freely-available software was the defacto standard in the the late 80s and much of the 90s (not so much because of popular momentum, but rather because it really was quite good at that time) have fallen apart financially and perhaps otherwise, and -- in the case of Katz -- died in vain.
To me, it's as absurd as the prospects of John Carmack or perhap
Re:Clearly... (Score:5, Insightful)
What do you mean expendable? You do realise that those are adult people, yes?
In case of Katz, alcoholism is a self-inflicted thing that needs the participation and motivation of the afflicted to be cured. Only they can, in fact, cure themselves. How do you even expect us to help them if they do not want to be helped?
We are not their baby-sitters. It's their lives to do with as they please. And who knows, perhaps Katz liked it that way. Drunk driving aside, who are we to tell him he can't do it that way? I wasn't there and I didn't know the guy so I will certainly not act as if I had the right to judge.
Re:Clearly... (Score:4, Insightful)
Drug addiction always comes from a need that cannot be filled by the addict otherwise. It's not a solution for that problem, but it's an escape. Nobody gets hooked on heroin because they think it's so cool and so funny. It is invariably the wish to get out of the unbearable situation they are in.
Likewise with alcohol. And society can do quite a bit in such a situation. I don't know the actual situation for Katz, but I'm fairly sure he didn't drink because it was so much fun.
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There certainly are always ways to fill that need, but people can't see them. Unfortunately, people are generally not omniscient, and experience is a really crappy way to gain information: You get it after you needed it.
Re:Clearly... (Score:4, Insightful)
In case of Katz, alcoholism is a self-inflicted thing
He was depressed, you fucking self-absorbed moron
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There is no telling how "successful" people feel. Take me, for example. I am, at least when it comes to economic success, very successful. I have more money than I need, I could afford whatever I want (ok, my wishes concerning what money can buy are fairly conservative... unless it comes to IT-hardware, which isn't that expensive, 6k buy already a kickass workstation, 10k buy a kickass server...), despite paying roughly 50% tax (yeah, I'm not in Belize or any other tax haven, but who cares about money).
But
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Interestingly his wiki profile says something very different.
"On May 2, 2012, McAfee was arrested for unlicensed drug manufacture and illegal weapons in the Central America country of Belize." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee [wikipedia.org]
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That line was added by a bot, so who knows where it was pulled from or who wrote it?
I don't know the truth of the matter, but of course the "authorities" are going to make that accusation if they want to punish a medical research lab. It's the "crime" that best fits the "perp". Having additional perspective is fine, but it's no more definitive than his statement at the moment.
Check the citation... (Score:5, Informative)
From Wikipedia:
Beginning in February 2010, John started a new venture in the field of bacterial quorum sensing.
His new company QuorumEx is headquartered in Belize and is working towards producing commercial all natural antibiotics based on anti-quorum sensing technology.[6]
From the cited article:
http://edition.channel5belize.com/archives/69891 [channel5belize.com]
Analysts at the Forensic Laboratory, and personnel from the Ministry of Health were taken to inspect the facility and samples of an alleged antibiotic apparently being manufactured at the Laboratory were also taken for analysis.
The Ministry of Health has already confirmed that no licence has been granted to McAfee or any of his agents to manufacture antibiotics in Belize.
Doing so without a licence is an offence under the Antibiotics Act.
Then, there are bits that seem a tad... not directly related to the alleged main issue of the police action:
Present on the premises at the time were John McAfee, his girlfriend who is a seventeen year old Belizean minor, five security guards.
...
Further investigation led into a query regarding the employment of the security guards. This revealed that only two of the four guards on the premises were licensed to act as security guards.
...
At the end of the search, three of the security guards were arrested and charged for "Providing Security Services without a License".
Also, the dog was not shot dead. It was "fatally wounded".
The same dog then attacked a B.D.F. soldier who responded by fatally wounded the dog.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What's the difference between killing the dog and fatally wounding it?
Re:Check the citation... (Score:4, Insightful)
No, "fatally wounded" means not instantly killed, but it will die from its wounds no matter what. "Mortally wounded" is what you're thinking of.
Re:Check the citation... (Score:4, Insightful)
This. The guy is 66 and has a 17 year old girlfriend.
He seems to assume laws don't apply to him (even if it's legal in Belize to have a 50 year younger minor as your girlfriend, it's morally questionable).
The thing about moral values is that they apply to those who have them; applying them to others is bigotry.
You don't know anything about the moral values of John McAfee and his girlfriend, and judging them by yours is bigotry, unless you are also ready to be judged by, say, Sharia moral values.
I'm not saying it doesn't raise a worry, but I'm also not judging. I don't know enough to do so.
WTF? (Score:3, Interesting)
His dog didn't do anything! I wouldn't be shocked to read that members of PETA shot someone from the GSU in the next few days.
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Informative)
Why are you shocked and surprised? This happens every day in the United States in drug raids. Whole family is sitting down to dinner, just chilling one evening, then the door explodes (gotta love those no-knock warrants) while armed thugs swarm in, family dog gets a bullet (well that pomeranian could have gotten a cop and given him an infection ya know), kids are screaming while mom and dad are roughly thrown to the ground. Thugs take their time searching through the house and snickering loudly at mom's sex toys. Sometimes people even get shot for absolutely no reason.
Welcome to the creeping tyranny of a police state. Not so fun to actually be a part of one, is it?
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
They do it to intimidate the owner, the same reason they break down unlocked doors. It's violence that is easily written off as property damage.
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Funny)
if I was swat, I wouldn't want a 120lbs german shepard trying to tear my leg apart.
A 120 lb German Shepherd is a seriously fat dog unlikely to attack anything but its food bowl.
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Then surround the house, and allow the person to turn themselves over in a CIVIL manner. That means they will probably call a LAWYER to check your warrant and such... Imagine that. They do this for PURE intimidation.
Everybody who's on SWAT should have their home (if they have kids) or their parents home "secured" before they can go on missions. Get to have everybody cuffed and hauled off to the station.
I always find it funny that a household dog "might" be trained to attack so they HAVE to shoot it (after k
Here's your legal advice Mr. McAfee (Score:5, Insightful)
Get the hell out of there as soon as you can. If the corruption is that bad you won't be getting a fair trial.
Re:Here's your legal advice Mr. McAfee (Score:4, Insightful)
At least he's saving on income tax.
Re:Here's your legal advice Mr. McAfee (Score:4, Funny)
Are you kidding? He'd have to go through airport security before he could get back into the US. He's better off there.
Re:Here's your legal advice Mr. McAfee (Score:5, Funny)
*psst* You might wanna check a map.
Obviously... (Score:5, Funny)
He needs better protection.
Question: Why does this guy live in Belize? (Score:5, Informative)
Answer: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/145/fantasy-island.html [fastcompany.com]
Re:Question: Why does this guy live in Belize? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Question: Why does this guy live in Belize? (Score:5, Insightful)
There's quite alot of foreshadowing in the fastcompany article:
Then there is the $1 million patrol boat he donated to the Belizean coast guard. (In a letter to The New York Times, he described it as an act of philanthropy; later, he tells me he had to bribe members of the coast guard to prevent them from hassling his ferry business: "This is a third-world country. I had to bribe a whole bunch of folks.
indicating that he routinely gives large, overt, public bribes to get whatever he wants in Belize
Then there's this:
"And so a pair of police officers came to visit him. "We are sorry that we have to tell you to stop building that wall," they said. "I am sorry that I have to tell you that I am going to build it anyway," he told them, and they left. To McAfee, this exchange was proof of the evolved level of discourse in Belize, where a person is largely left to do as he pleases. . . At the time, I thought that he was simply being argumentative. But McAfee seems to want freedom without limitation. Needless to say, few of us exercise this sort of freedom. It tends to be very expensive."
Either he is willfully ignoring the fact that this seems to have been a small-time shakedown attempt or he is completely oblivious to it. Did he really think Belize patrolmen (note, not the environmental cops) are so genuinely concerned about shoreline regulations?? He doesn't seem to realize by being so brazen about describing large bribes to the press he's just inviting even bigger, less polite shake-downs in the future, which sounds exactly like what (unfortunately) just went down. Did he really think that request for a campaign contribution for the guy employing police hitsquads was purely optional when bribes for building permits, import permits, business titles, etc. for his dozens of shell companies were not?
Sure, it still sucks, and I feel sorry for him, but it really does sound like he specifically chose Belize because he liked how pliable the laws were if you had money and it never occurred to him that cuts both ways...
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (Score:4, Informative)
Then there is the $1 million patrol boat he donated to the Belizean coast guard. (In a letter to The New York Times, he described it as an act of philanthropy; later, he tells me he had to bribe members of the coast guard to prevent them from hassling his ferry business: "This is a third-world country. I had to bribe a whole bunch of folks.
indicating that he routinely gives large, overt, public bribes to get whatever he wants in Belize
Bribing foreign officials is a violation of the US law Foreign Corrupt Practices Act [wikipedia.org]. So it's surprising that he would admit this to a journalist.
Theme song for this thread (Score:3)
Move to Israel the corruption there is much more (Score:3, Insightful)
Move to Israel the corruption there is much more "user friendly" and you probably enjoy all the hustling and haggling. It might be a religious country, but sure ain't when it comes to economy and politicians themselves. And yea, you'd be able to make some deals and keep your weapons if you move to the territories. Being a goy you'd be surrounded by unfriendly on both sides of the green line.
Old joke (Score:3)
An Englishman, an American and an Israeli are discussing the cost of living in their countries. The Englishman says "I earn $50000 a year and it costs me $50000 to live, so I'm doing OK". The American says "I earn $100000 a year and the cost of living is $50000." The Englishman says "What do you do with the other $50000?" The American says "It's a free country, I can do what I like."
The Israeli says "Well, my income is $10000 a year and the cost of living is $50000 a year". The Amer
Sounds similar to tactics.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3)
...but did it kill your dog?
Well that's funny (Score:3, Insightful)
Not too long ago, I think maybe on Sunday or Monday of this week, the conservative blogosphere was all atwitter over some alleged "enemies list" that Barack Obama keeps of people who donate to competing campaigns or refuse solicitations to donate to his.
You want a real enemies list? Go look at what happened to John McAfee and be thankful you fucktards still have your house and your pets and your family with you.
The conservative histrionics this year is just out of this world.
Re:Well that's funny (Score:5, Insightful)
the conservative blogosphere was all atwitter
You Sir are my grammar hero of the day. What a beautiful sentence :)
Re:Well that's funny (Score:5, Insightful)
When the president of any country publicly calls you out by name and says you're on the "wrong side of the law", you have every reason to be afraid. Especially when the president's appointees have openly practiced and justified the unlimited detention and the killing of citizens without due process.
Claiming that it's "conservatives" are against this is a pretty disingenuous way to defend this kind of behavior. Especially considering it's likely a conservative president will likely be elected at some time in the future. When he tries these things, will you defend it then, too?
Gang Suppression Unit (Score:2)
Funny, the first thing that went through my mind before reading TFA was that they had arrested him for running a scam whereby his organization made viruses to boost his antivirus software sales numbers...
Maybe he should have kept paying his taxes ... (Score:4, Insightful)
... in the good ole USA. Many pretty places to live there, too.
Re:Maybe he should have kept paying his taxes ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Comment on Belize's Facebook page? (Score:2, Interesting)
Leaving a few comments on Belize's page could have some effect. I for sure am not traveling to Belize because of this.
https://www.facebook.com/TravelBelize [facebook.com]
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U.D.P (Score:5, Funny)
Probably has to do with McAfee blocking scam sites (Score:3)
John in trouble again? (Score:3, Interesting)
It sounds like a bad day that never should have happened. Of interest, John got himself run off the Hawaiian island of Molokai not too many years ago by local activists angered by his attempt to come in and be a savior against drugs. He was running full page ads in the local paper with pictures of neighborhoods where he alleged drug transactions were regularly going on. He even started his own newspaper to carry on the battle. Next thing you knew, they were all over his case to the point that he had to auction off his property, including a never lived-in and nearly completed beach house and some other property he had here at significant losses. Even his auctions raised a lot of negative stuff from the activists. He may be a good person but he has a penchant for pissing off the wrong guys.
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In any case, the Fast Company article referenced by @lanner makes it pretty clear why McAfee cleared out for Belize: he's liable to lose a wrongful death lawsuit in Maricopa County Civil Court [maricopa.gov] (search on case# CV2008-009723) related to the half-assed sky trike tour company he let a 22 y.o. nephew run.
Too Often, Killed His Dog (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm hearing too often about police raids that involve killing someone's dog in the process. I'm coming to think that killing a person's dog -- whether the person is innocent or not, and the dog most likely is completely innocent -- is a tactic now of police forces around the world to intimidate and harm the suspect regardless of the validity of the raid. Are police being taught that it is just safer to kill any dog they come across? It has gotten to the point where I'm rooting for the dog to win at least once.
Aptly named (Score:5, Insightful)
I bet you thought they were a (gang suppression) unit,
but they're actually a gang (suppression unit).
The Three Ps (Score:4, Interesting)
Priests, Policemen, and Politicians. I just watched a documentary about a famous, now-defunct Black comedy club in Chicago called _All Jokes Aside_. The former owner noted the big city phenomenon of the 3Ps showing up when a business gets successful looking for handouts. And, if you don't pay up, each one will do their best to make you pay for it. In his case, he took care of the police, but not the politicians who made it a point to make sure he couldn't get a liquor license when he decided to relocate.
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shit like that happens (Score:2)
Lesson learned (Score:3, Funny)
There is a simple lesson here. Don't live in third-world shit holes like Belize. First world shit-holes like America are bad enough.
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that's the risk of 3rd world countries (Score:2)
You think you're saving money, but you do give up some guarantees.
Oddly, it works out worst for the richest people. The "suggested donations" required to ensure fair treatment tend to get larger the richer you are. Or just the richer they think you are.
They didn't "kill his dog" (Score:3, Informative)
They killed one of his eleven dogs (three of which attacked them). They also arrested three of his four security guards for not having the proper license to work as private security in Belize.
But hey, the more I read about the guy, the more I dislike him.
He created the McAfee antivirus, which alone is enough to take pleasure in his misfortune.
He has a 17-year-old girlfriend. Don't get me wrong. I think it's perfectly okay for a 66-year-old guy to have a 17-year-old girlfriend, as long as 66-year-old guy is me, when I'm 66.
He fled the U.S., tried to renounce his citizenship, etc. etc. etc. to escape from 5 civil suits that have been brought against him.
He moved to some third-world tax haven country where he thought the U.S. wouldn't be able to reach him (or his money).
He greased a few palms like he was supposed to do, then he got uppity and decided he wasn't going to give this one gentleman any money because, you know, he'd already given a million dollars to the police department.
He has ELEVEN dogs. In most cities in the U.S., that itself would be illegal. He hired four security guards, 3 of whom were unlicensed.
And then when the shit hit the fan, he started crying to the American Embassy to get rescued. Excuse me? Is he an American citizen or isn't he?
Re: (Score:3)
They're just emulating US Police.
http://www.theagitator.com/?s=puppycide [theagitator.com]
Re: (Score:3)
While I agree with you that requiring licenses for firearms is foolish, I don't think that was really a factor here. He had licenses for his firearms, and he was still charged for their possession. If the police are corrupt enough to trump up charges on you, given the will, they will have little trouble inventing something.
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That never would have happened to a rich white guy
If he was a rich white guy, he wouldn't be protesting against the government, he would be buying politicians, instead.
And he would pay someone else to beat his wife for him.
No, it isn't (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The article itself is pretty amazing too.
On Monday at six o’clock, I was awakened by the sound of a bullhorn
(...)
and for fourteen hours outside in the sun, I sat handcuffed without food or water. We got water around noon.
(...)
They (...) took me to Belize City. Fortunately we had copies. We showed up later at the police station with the copies. Even then it was difficult to get out.
Fourteen hours between six in the morning and noon? Being locked up in the police station first, and then showing up at th
Re: (Score:3)
Awoken at 16, handcuffed outside the building for 14 hours, the first 6 of which he went without water. They were all taken to the police station after the search. It's crappy writing, but the guy's a programmer, not a Pulitzer prize winner.
What I find more incredible is the fact that he believed that this kind of shit wouldn't happen in somewhere like Belize...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I did read it properly, he just didn't write it properly. Everything I quoted, was copied and pasted directly from the article. He did say they were without food and water for fourteen hours and they got water around noon. And the bit about being taken to Belize City (in handcuffs? Incarcerated?) only to show up later with copies of his licenses (free to go back to get those after all?) is pretty unclear as well. Crappy writing indeed, but anyway, I guess the big picture is clear enough.
Re: (Score:3)
All this pedantry is making me thirsty...