Teens trash hotel; police do nothing

[Eulogy]

Ghetto edit:
And if there's a law against that? Well, the police should have intervened anyway, because that law is clearly FUBAR and is unjust; any government dickwads that raise a stink about that law not being followed will have the public turned against them.*

That situation can very very easily turn lethal. All it took was one fucker bringing a gun or setting the place on fire. Don't tell me the cops shouldn't arrest the vandals.

*No, this is NOT the cops only applying the law when it suits them. This is about doing what's right, and when they look like heroes (and honestly, cops these days need the PR) what sane government ass is going to try to enforce the bullshit law?

[Korto]

First, there were like 30 of the little shits there. You honestly expect hotel staff to enforce rules on all of them at once? Especially given what influence they were under?

Second, you are seriously telling me that the police cannot intervene when some bastards are wrecking your shit, impoversihing you, and quite possibly putting your life in danger. By that logic, calling 911 is useless when a gang is defacing and smashing your house or ruining your shop.

What KS expects is neither here nor there. What's important is what the law expects. If, and I know nothing about Canadian law, IF once you rent a room, it's legally treated the same as a long-term rental on a house, ie, you more or less own the place, then it could well be that there was nothing they could legally do. There's no law against trashing your own stuff. It's not vandalism, it's "freedom".
Your comparison about a gang wrecking your house is complete idiocy. Unless that gang happened to rent the house off you first with a legal contract covering damages. Is that what you meant?
As for your second post, are you seriously suggesting police should be condemned for deciding NOT to break the law? I'm not fan of cops either (my wife suggests I have a problem with authority), but that seems to be raising the bar just a trifle too high.

And why this sudden talk of "threat to life" and "could have suddenly turned lethal"? There was no mention of that anywhere else. Needed to hype it up to "prove" the need for police involvement?

[someone_else]

technically kids smashing stuff may risk to get electrocuted or seriously wound themselves with crap falling on them.

but yeah, a couple cops cannot do much.

[SVPD]

Quite true. In the U.S., the police could certainly arrest them for Criminal Mischief, Criminal Damaging, or Vandalism depending on what state it was and which one applied. Canadian law may be different. It also may depend on exactly what was conveyed to the police; if you, for example, go to the hotel room and someone accidentally knocks the TV on the floor and break it, the police are not going to show up and arrest you for vandalism.

In the U.S., however, what the police cannot do is force the perpetrator to pay for the damage. Recovery of damage is a civil matter, or it's ordered by the judge after a finding of criminal guilt as restitution, but either way the police cannot go tell those doing the damage that they have to pay up.

Sure- but I think the innkeeper's main concern was getting the trashing to stop; the teenagers were smashing up his property all night. Every hour they spent breaking things probably added thousands more dollars to his repair bill.

I'm sure it was, and that's perfectly understandable.

There's also the fact that once you've rented a room from and innkeeper, it's a private space you've rented and the police cannot just go in there because the innkeeper says they can. That's a violation of the Fourth Amendment in the U.S. In order to go in and arrest the kids for.. well, for anything, the police need to have probable cause, and that may or may not have been satisfied by the information conveyed to them.

I would think that "they're tearing the light fixtures out of the walls and pissing on the beds" from an eyewitness would constitute probable cause for vandalism. Am I mistaken?

It might or might not. I can't say for sure in this particular case because I wasn't on the scene, didn't talk to the eyewitness, and most importantly, am not conversant with the Canadian equivalent for probable cause, nor any Canadian laws that equate to that Innkeeper's Rights Act that KS says applies in his state. Most importantly, is it still going on when the police arrive, and is there anything obvious about it. Presumably they were not doing this right in front of the actual cop with the door to the room or the window open, so it would depend. If you show up to a crime in progress and there's no evidence you can observe of what a witness said was occuring actually occuring, it's pretty hard to find probable cause to enter a private space.

I can't say there was no such evidence in this case because I wasn't there, but the question is simply not an easy open and shut one.

This is just... weird. And I don't think it has anything to do with "oh well the contract-fetishizers signed a contract agreeing to pay for damages, which makes the police powerless!"

I don't know what to tell you about that. I don't see that this has anything to do with "contract fetishizers", whatever that is.

[Simon_Jester]

I didn't come up with that idea either, it's got me stumped too.

[SVPD]

First, there were like 30 of the little shits there. You honestly expect hotel staff to enforce rules on all of them at once? Especially given what influence they were under?

I don't think you understand. If there isn't probable cause to go into a rented hotel room, or a warrant, American cops cannot enter the hotel room. They don't suddenly gain the legal authority to do so because the

Second, you are seriously telling me that the police cannot intervene when some bastards are wrecking your shit, impoversihing you, and quite possibly putting your life in danger. By that logic, calling 911 is useless when a gang is defacing and smashing your house or ruining your shop.

How was anyone's life being put in danger? What information was conveyed to the police that, under applicable Canadian law, allows the police to act?

The fact that you are offended by the situation does not suddenly grant the police new powers. It is incredibly revealing that all of a sudden when the police are saying they didn't have the power to act and therefore, didn't (i.e. complied with the law as they understood it) this is also unacceptable. This is the height of trying to create excuses to find fault with cops. Seriously, endangering their lives? Gangs? Really? Yes, it's truely a sign of life-endangering criminal gang activity to put holes in drywall and piss on the beds. I'm certain Mara Salvatruca 13 is adding this to their list of preferred tactics as we speak.

[SVPD]

Ghetto edit:
And if there's a law against that? Well, the police should have intervened anyway, because that law is clearly FUBAR and is unjust; any government dickwads that raise a stink about that law not being followed will have the public turned against them.*[/quote[

The public is going to "turn against government dickwads"... because the police refused to intervene when a few drunk teenagers trashed a hotel? If by that, you mean the hotel owner is unlikely to vote for them next election, maybe.

Are you really, seriously saying the police should ignore things like the search and seizure requirements of the 4th amendment, or it's Canadian equivalent, and go into private hotel rooms without probable cause, and that if they don't a law saying a hotel room you rent is a space with a reasonable expectation of privacy is somehow unjust?

That situation can very very easily turn lethal. All it took was one fucker bringing a gun or setting the place on fire. Don't tell me the cops shouldn't arrest the vandals.

So now the police can enter private areas without probable cause simply because someone could possibly have brought a gun or could possibly set fire to something? Well, I guess we can just dispense with the entire concept of warrants then!

Here's a clue: By your definition of "could easily have turned lethal" almost any situation could easily turn lethal." It;s patently obvious the criteria you're using for that are "what argument allows me to bitch about 'pigs'", not anything to do with the law, people's rights, or any sort of reasonable estimation of the likelyhood of a fatality.

*No, this is NOT the cops only applying the law when it suits them. This is about doing what's right, and when they look like heroes (and honestly, cops these days need the PR) what sane government ass is going to try to enforce the bullshit law?

Aside from the fact that we recently looked at a poll indicating that the cops do not have any significant public image problem in the U.S. (again, can't speak to Canada), it is about the cops applying the law. The problem isn't whether it suits them it's that it doesn't suit you in this case. More importantly, "doing what's right" cannot be arrived at without a consideration of the larger issues of what the impact is on the rights of people to their privacy if we suddenly toss such rights aside when drunk teenagers trash a hotel. It's significant to the hotel owner, but in the larger societal scheme of things a trashed hotel is not nearly as big an issue as privacy rights.

The law you are calling "bullshit" is the one that says "the police cannot just enter your private space whenever they feel they need to". So pretty much any "sane" government is going to enforce it and even quite a few "insane" ones as well. Sorry, but contrary to what a lot of people here like to think, simply proclaiming that what you oppose is "insane" does not make it so.

[Illuminatus Primus]

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