New Mexico Police Use Myspace to Catch Teen Drug Users

[addicted2hc]

Just found this article on dancesafe.org about a guy who posted pics of his plants and marijuana use on myspace... heres the article.

http://dancesafe.org/

On the front page.

[Sitbcknchill]

Why are people so stupid?

[radiometer]

What a fucking retard.

[Colby]

what an idiot

[Diphenhydramine]

People that put any incriminating shit of themselves, like a picture, online is pretty dumb, unless you can remain anonymous.

[markdahman]

Is it safe if u kinda paint brush your face and never Admit that their yourse or in your posession?

[Forthesevenlakes]

Originally Posted by markdahman

Is it safe if u kinda paint brush your face and never Admit that their yourse or in your posession?

it could probably still lead to some unwanted questions, like why is it on your myspace or computer, etc. but if they cant identify it as you , swim guesses it would be okay. like as long as its not chilling on some online profile with the caption "ME AND MY COCA PLANTS! LOL!!!!" and an arrow pointing to your head with your name...yeah swim doubts itd be evidence without things like that.

[ryanstein]

cops couldnt do shit to swiy, if swiy posted a picture with the face blurred out and if u never admitted to being involved. although they could break into swiy's house with a search warrent but as long as swiy doesnt have anything then, of course, ur in the clearing...every1 should just cover all there bases b4 tryin to b brave with drugs...

ryan

[Nagognog2]

Q: What do you call a drug-raid on your home based on spurious information found on the internet posted by someone who likes to joke - which turned up nothing?

A: A Retirement Fund.

[Cure20]

Ive heard of worse, I once read an article of a guy somewhere in Canada who had a grow-op in the house next door, and he had his whole security system running on wireless cameras, running off a laptop that was online.
Now here's the kicker - There was motion sensers on the camera's so everytime there was motion in certian areas of the house, it would send an alarm to the laptop...Im not sure how, sounds "Sopisticated" ( please notice the sarcastic quotations)
What ended up happening was someone tried breaking into the house during the day when noone was home, and the alarm kept going off for a few hours, and a mailman came buy to drop off the mail. He ended up calling to police because he had thought an elderly person had hurt themself and need some assistance.

[DrMuffy]

Los Alamos police keep a 6-foot, purple bong in their evidence locker -- a token they confiscated after regularly monitoring teens on MySpace.com.

They say the homemade paraphernalia is proof that it works to fight crime by trolling the popular online social network.

``It's become a really good tool for us to use,'' said Officer Doug Johnson.

Johnson and Detective Andrew Goldie started exploring MySpace in 2005. The set up their own profiles and started searching for Los Alamos teens. They said what they found disturbed them.

Many sites on MySpace are a lot like online diaries, accessible to the world. While Los Alamos police are still relatively new at this form of online sleuthing, other law enforcement agencies across the country have been at it for a while. MySpace cooperates with investigations and even provides a ``law enforcement investigators guide,'' which shows police how to use the site.

``MySpace supports the vision of providing a safer and more secure environment for all MySpace users,'' the guide says. ``Accordingly, MySpace is committed to a high level of cooperation with law enforcement.''

People post information such as their birth dates, height, weight, hometowns and relationship status. Often people trade photos, music, homework information and phone numbers. One hundred million people have MySpace accounts, and new users sign up at a rate of 230,000 a day. The site says its minimum age for signing up is 14, but it's well-known that people lie about their ages on the site.

Search for Los Alamos on MySpace, and you'll find a site for the atomic bomb, a person who calls himself Cheese Man and a site by a user self-named Jesus, who posted a picture of Jesus holding a bong with a title that says ``repent.''

Los Alamos police say they've busted parties after reading about them on MySpace, caught teens playing with dangerous explosives, arrested people for drug use and even found a pedophile preying on Los Alamos teens. They said they've confiscated a hookah -- a tobacco smoking device that kids were using to smoke pot -- bags of marijuana and a number of beer funnels besides the 6-foot bong.

In all, they say they've made about 10 arrests and handed two cases over to federal agents.

Teens have mixed opinions about police viewing their MySpace profiles.

Chaney Chranifill, 16, a student at Los Alamos High School, said people should know what they post is public information. ``I feel that it serves people right, though, truthfully,'' she said. ``I feel that if people put their lives on the Internet, they are vulnerable and put in a risk that police will taken advantage of.''

But what police find on MySpace should not be used as definitive proof, said 17-year-old Megan Goldstein. ``I think there are more active ways of finding out what is happening in the community instead of sitting in front of a computer stalking kids,'' she said. ``I think they should use it as evidence to question, but not to accuse.''

Kids in Los Alamos have figured out police are viewing their sites. Users have removed incriminating material, selected a setting that makes their profiles private and made up codes words to veil their transgressions -- for example, a keg became ``wedding cake.''

Santa Fe Police Chief Eric Johnson said his detectives don't monitor the site for teens, but they might use it to investigate child predators.

Doug Johnson said Los Alamos police are finding a lot of information on MySpace that teens should not be giving out, such as phone numbers and addresses. That makes them easy targets for predators, he said.

``We run into the false perception that `I'm old enough to use this,' '' Doug Johnson said. ``There's this great assumption that kids are able to use this wisely. But they just aren't.''