Random Bag Searches on the Horizon

sullivan1985 wrote:Yeah this all sucks and its goingf to get annoying, but personally I would rather have my stuff randomly selected knowing I have nothing they wouldnt agree with. Yeah it might be against the constitution but if the TSA can cunduct a random full inspection at the airport whats going to stop NJt from doing the same on their system. Plus, your only going to look more suspicious by causing a scene telling a transit officer to f**k off when they want to see what you have.

Whatever. I'm not gonna let it bother me. There's nothing suspicious to me about a camera in my bag, a few railfan materials and a tripod in hand.

My feelings exactly. If they want to see what I got, fine by me. If its get me where I want to go faster with no troble, so be it.

Plus im usually carrying the same items.

We are giving the state and the police more power, and for what?
There is no relationship between baggage searches of airplane passengers and random search of transit passengers.
At an airport, every passenger has his baggage searched. The passenger's identity is known. The search is not random. If something bad is found, the prospective passenger is detained and questioned, then arrested if appropriate.

In the NJT and NY Subway cases, only a tiny proportion of passengers are cursorily searched. If they do not want to be searched, they can just leave. This is just a harassment and intrusion. It will not catch terrorists, it will just let cops rack up overtime and get us used to being searched by cops for no reason.

I would like someone on this forum, who advocates these random searches, to explain just how they will catch terrorists, deter terrorists, or make us safer. The only thing I have read on here that gives any kind of reasonable rationale was the member (was it Ken W2KB?) who suggested that if searches disrupted the routine of a potential terrorist, they might disrupt his attack plan. This is a very slim benefit for an elaborate and expensive operation. And the cost, aside from money, is the coninued erosion of our freedom, and the continued intrusion of cops into our lives.

sullivan1985 wrote:My feelings exactly. If they want to see what I got, fine by me. If its get me where I want to go faster with no troble, so be it.

Plus im usually carrying the same items.

Yeah. My aim is not to advertise my hobby—I try to keep a low profile when not active in picture taking- but when I am, I don't conceal it. I just be natural and do what I do. And you know what, at first it was very unnerving but now I am very comfortable with it and I try to show that feeling of being comfortable and it usually is picked up by other folks and or cops.

same here again. And youve seen me in action No way in hell can you miss me.

No one is invading people's homes without a warrant on this one. No one is wiretapping without a warrant.

Maybe you didn't hear of the USA PATRIOT Act. Sieg Heil!

This isnt some kind of Nazi act! This is the railroad making sure that some lunitic does bring something nasty on the train by attempting to scare them off by randomly selecting passengers. They do the same kinds of things at major stores and even DisneyLand (and at disney they check everyone and everything), and nobody gives any kind of crap. Dammit! Why do some of you just refuse to understand that if you just co-operate with the Transit Police that you will actually get where you have to go faster and maybe (hopefully) safer instead of being so stupid about it.

Jfrey, I would love to see you get on a train and refuse a baggage check and see what happens. Maybe you would take a bus but then they ask to view your bags youll end up walking instead.

Chill out and deal with it.

Lets go back several years further... which famous president sent armed troops with automatic weapons into a private home in Florida, overriding a state court's decision and kidnapped a child at gunpoint to send him back to .... Cuba?
Seig Heil indeed.

Rail travel is interstate commerce. Its a federal matter. Like it or not the local and federal authorities do have the right to random baggage checks on railroads just as they do on airlines just as they could on buses. All the ACLU can do is prevent us from displaying mangers or saying "God" on the PA system at PennStation (or banning the boy scouts from riding NJT). Since passengers have the option of walking away and not boarding if they refuse to submit to searches, there is no breach of "rights". To be honest, as a libertarian, I hate random searches. I still go by the Ben Franklin view of security vs liberty. But I understand why its being done. Its not a matter of "taking away rights" since that is not part of the equation here. Politicizing it does nothing except help people turn this forum into a Conservative vs Liberals slugfest in a matter where both parties might "think" they are doing the right thing but have stepped on rights ever since FDR started locking up Amercan born (citizens!) Japanese, Italians and Germans back in the second world war.

But hey!!!! Thats just my ever so humble opinion on a Saturday night....

BigDell

Thank you BigDell for the most sensible post amongst this predominantly nonsensical fracas.

sullivan1985 wrote:

nick11a wrote:Yeah. My aim is not to advertise my hobby- I try to keep a low profile when not active in picture taking- but when I am, I don't conceal it. I just be natural and do what I do. And you know what, at first it was very unnerving but now I am very comfortable with it and I try to show that feeling of being comfortable and it usually is picked up by other folks and or cops.

same here again. And youve seen me in action No way in hell can you miss me.

Oh yeah, fellow O'Sullivan, parnter in crime.

And if you're ever out in my kneck of the woods, let me know. Partners in crime once again. The only terrorist group we might possibly be involved with would be the IRA.

On a completely different topic, here is an old IRA joke that comes to mind. Mind you, this is a joke.

"Father, forgive me for I have sinned. I took out 40 miles of British Rail today."

"Oh my child, that is very bad. For your penance, say three Hail Marys and take out the stations."

Everyone keeps drawing the analogy to airline baggage searches. I don't know if those have been ruled on yet.

Whatever the police want to do to the outside of a bag without opening it up is fine with me. If they want to X-ray it, run bomb/drug/currency-sniffing dogs by it, swab it for explosives, shoot bursts of air at it and vacuum up whatever is disloged -- fine. If anything comes up, that then becomes the grounds for a search.

The point is, the police have to have some reason of suspicion particular to you to search INSIDE your bag. Just happening to be the fifth in line (or whatever calculus NJT is going to use) is not suspicion enough.

NJT would be well advised to have thoroughly-researched legal opinions from in-house and perhaps outside counsel before Monday morning. It might be money really well spent.

I know this is my first time chiming in on this subject, but I would like to clarify some things about the guy who got shot. This is taken from AP (Associated Press).

Sorry if my comments offend or are out of line.

LONDON - Police identified the man who was chased down in a subway and shot to death by plainclothes officers as a Brazilian and said Saturday they no longer believed he was tied to the recent terror bombings

It is great npow after he is dead that they deem that is is not linked. How can they tell if he was link anyways he is dead, and as they say "Dead men tell no tales", or something like that.

Police expressed regret for the death of the man at the Stockwell subway station, identified Saturday as Jean Charles de Menezes, 27. Witnesses said he was wearing a heavy, padded coat when plainclothes police chased him into a subway car, pinned him to the ground and shot him about five times in the head and torso.

I am glad I live in the US, even with an idiot for President, it has not come to this. I defintely would want the head of every cop involed if he was related to me.

Hours after the shooting, Police Commissioner Ian Blair said the victim was "directly linked" to the investigations into attacks Thursday and July 7. In the latter, suicide bombings on trains and a bus killed 56 people, including four attackers.


Police initially said the victim attracted police attention because he left a house that was under surveillance after Thursday's bungled bombings, in which devices planted on three subway trains and a double-decker bus failed to detonate properly. Stockwell is near Oval station, one of those targeted.

"He was then followed by surveillance officers to the station. His clothing and his behavior at the station added to their suspicions," police said Friday.

Umm lets see, if I had strange men following I would be acting suspicouis too, how was the guy to know that the cops was not trying to mug him or try to kill him even they was plain clothed?

But Saturday, a police official said on condition of anonymity that Menezes was "not believed to be connected in any way to any of the London bombings."

And that is why your concealing your identity so you can't get sued or lose your job.

"For somebody to lose their life in such circumstances is a tragedy and one that the Metropolitan Police Service regrets," a spokesman said on condition of anonymity, which is police policy.

Whats with all the secercy?

However, police did not explain what went wrong or say whether Menezes had done anything illegal.

Maybe cause he did nothing illegal, and they profiled him

Mayor Ken Livingstone said the killing was a "human tragedy" that was a consequence of the attacks.

"The police acted to do what they believed necessary to protect the lives of the public," he said. "This tragedy has added another victim to the toll of deaths for which the terrorists bear responsibility."

So your gonna blame the terrorist your for own men stupidty and trigger happiness.

Livingstone drew a hard line before the mistake became clear, declaring that anyone believed to be a suicide bomber faced a "shoot-to-kill policy."

And what is this "Shot to kill" policy gonna do, it is not gonna help you find out other targets or who all is involed.

The shooting was an indication of the nervousness and anxiety around the city of about 8 million people. A police watchdog organization, the Independent Police Complaints Commission, said it would investigate the shooting but make sure not to hinder the bombings probe.

Basically this is just gonna get swept under the rug and forgotten about.

Mahoot wrote:Does it say anywhere that you "have the right to use mass transportation"? No, its a service provided by private and public corporations. They have rules. If you don't want to follow the rules, in this case random searches, then don't use the system. No one is forcing you to get searched. It's a condition of riding, just as a random drug test is a condition of geting or keeping certian jobs. A drug test can be considered the ultimate form of invasion of privacy. But thats the condition of employment.

There is no differnce between this and a DWI roadblock.

Most people agree, I'd rather be spot checked than blown up.

1. The average person is not quite as aware of NJT policy changes as I am in the first place. I bet this won't necessarily be displayed anyplace prominently.
2. It will not work anyway -- how do they expect to do random searches without delaying people, wasting hours, collectively, of people's time. If there are to be searches, they should be targetted at areas and objects that make sense, not harass the average person into not taking the train. And let's face it, I could park a truck bomb under any rail bridge I wanted with no problem.
3. Pretty sure that train stations are more and more becoming public places. I'm not sure how that would affect rules like these.
4. DWI roadblocks haven't had it easy constitutionally either. Besides, in those situations, they are checking YOU and whether or not you are drunk. They are not asking to go through your things -- that would be considered an illegal search, without your consent.
5. These checks are not going to stop anyone from getting blown up, but they will waste PLENTY of money that needs to go into making rail more available to people in new areas. There is only so much money, and if we keep diverting it to this stupidity, eventually this will be the only thing we spend money on (when if we treated the cause, not the symptom, we'd be somewhere).

NJT Rider wrote:We have to be realistic, we are no longer in the days where our security is taken for granted. We have to live and adjust to these changes.

I love this new answer, basically straight out of the mouth of the president. Sounds so mature and paternal, and unfortunately no one takes the time to think about it any deeper than that. It is sad to hear people repeat this one over and over when we make another concession for "security."

"They that can give up Essential Liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." - Benjamin Franklin

Mahoot wrote:I haven't heard ANYONE who disagrees come up with any other plan to make the system safer.

Deal with this situation we are in diplomatically or politically before it ever gets onto our transit system. Things don't happen in a vacuum -- there is a reason this stuff is going on.

sullivan1985 wrote:Jfrey, I would love to see you get on a train and refuse a baggage check and see what happens. Maybe you would take a bus but then they ask to view your bags youll end up walking instead.

Chill out and deal with it.

I will be refusing to have my bag searched. I'll let you know how it goes.

ryanov wrote:

NJT Rider wrote:We have to be realistic, we are no longer in the days where our security is taken for granted. We have to live and adjust to these changes.

I love this new answer, basically straight out of the mouth of the president. Sounds so mature and paternal, and unfortunately no one takes the time to think about it any deeper than that. It is sad to hear people repeat this one over and over when we make another concession for "security."

"They that can give up Essential Liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." - Benjamin Franklin

Well to be perfectly honest with myself and with others, this new security thing is more of show than of security. Shows passengers "Hey look, we're doing something to make you safer."

nick11a wrote:Well to be perfectly honest with myself and with others, this new security thing is more of show than of security. Shows passengers "Hey look, we're doing something to make you safer."

Except if you happen to be a Brazillian National who got murdered by British police for no reason. Now they are telling us that more innocent people may be shot. So make sure when you ride the trains you don't fit the "profile" of a terrorist. It may cost you your life.

Bag searches, cops with semi-automatics, all enough for me to stay in my car.

You miss the whole point sullivan1985, there is alot going on here, and law enforcement has no clue. First, if Im riding a subway to catch a train and I have to stop to have my briefcase searched, I miss my train, and then miss an hour of work. Now I also have to deal with trigger happy transit cops. With all the cops we have riding trains with their fingers on the trigger (as they do in DC), one of these nervous guys are likely to shoot first and ask questions later.

If I decide to wear a light jacket on a long train trip because the A/C is too cool for me, is that going to make me a target because I also have a laptop bag with me? And what if I'm listening to my CD's on my headphones are they going to think the wires from my headphones are something other than that? How far will this go?

ryanov wrote:Deal with this situation we are in diplomatically or politically before it ever gets onto our transit system. Things don't happen in a vacuum -- there is a reason this stuff is going on.

And our government fails to see the big picture as to why its going on in the first place. Not to mention, for every transit officer sniffing people's bags, that's one less officer riding the train or keeping a watchful eye on everything else.

What worries me most is all of this of course is directed at our urban centers which have all been on the upswing over the past few years. Will this be the cause of the next flight to the suburbs where its 'safe'?

Frankly, I'm not willing to give up freedom or privacy in the name of national security. For those of you that do, there's great places like Korea, China and Russia where you will fit right in.