Hot on the trail and catching up to the speeder, James hit a roadblock. Inncent lives were at stake. Of course, officers are sworn to protect and serve – even if those that need protection are on the featherier side of things.

The violator got away. Damnit, foiled by ducks again.

[via reddit]

According to a Fox 11 report on the incident, two parties directly across the street from one another received very different treatment this weekend. One house party was attended by mostly white students, and the other by mostly black. When dozens of police in riot gear showed up, witnesses stated, the white party was told to quiet down while the black party was dispersed. Six people were arrested in the aftermath.

Charges of excessive force and racial bias have been levied against the LAPD and a student protest took place on campus this week. According to the Fox 11 report, the LAPD and USC administrators will be meeting to discuss a possible forum on racial profiling.

Los Angeles Local News, Weather, and Traffic

A 12-year-old that identifies himself as Jeremy Drew last year approached a Las Vegas police officer to question him about parking on the sidewalk. The video, which was posted in September 2012, now has over 3.1 million YouTube views.

In the video, the officer can be seen returning to his motorcycle with some sort of iced beverage in-hand. Drew asks him if there is some sort of emergency which would justify his parking on the sidewalk, then asks for the officer’s badge number. The officer refuses repeatedly and eventually drives off.

(Via BoingBoing)

The Miami Herald is reporting that Opa-locka police Sgt. German Bosque attended an appeals hearing on Wednesday, where an arbitrator heard testimony to determine his fate as a police officer.

According to the Opa-locka police department, Bosque had left his police-issued AR-15 assault rifle with the father of his girlfriend, a violation of a 2008 settlement that allowed him to continue working as a police officer. The department is attempting to fire Bosque for the sixth time.

Bosque, who was fired in October, was defended at the hearing by the Miami-Dade Police Benevolent Association, which argued that Bosque had left the gun in a locked warehouse that only he and his girlfriend’s father had access to. Bosque is hoping that, once again, he will be reinstated with back pay.

According to the Herald report, Bosque has been accused over the years of beating a handcuffed suspect, beating juveniles, hiding drugs, stealing from suspects, defying orders, lying, falsifying police reports, and calling in sick to take a vacation. He is currently under investigation for the alleged battery of a domestic dispute suspect.

The Australian Federal Police announced yesterday evening that they arrested Matt Flannery, a 24-year-old IT professional from Point Claire. The police allege that he attacked and defaced a government Web site earlier in the month. Interestingly enough, the police also say that he’s a “self-proclaimed leader” of LulzSec.

The police say Flannery used his position within an IT company to hack a number of clients. The police also warned that he would have attacked more Web sites had he stayed employed with the company.

Flannery faces two counts of unauthorized modification of data to cause impairment and one count of unauthorized access to, or modification of, restricted data. The police note that the maximum penalty for the former is 10 years and 2 years for the latter.

What’s interesting about all of this is that the police say he’s a “self-proclaimed leader” of LulzSec. Members of Anonymous and others have come out on Twitter to dispute this claim:

This absolute bullshit great work feds u busted a ddos fag >> Self-proclaimed LulzSec hacking leader arrested in NSW abc.net.au/news/2013-04-2…

— Anonymous Australia (@AuAnon) April 23, 2013

#AFP trying to make this like they cracked the big case yet we dont even know what hack it was some big hecker #lulznot

— Anonymous Australia (@AuAnon) April 24, 2013

Self-proclaimed leader of #Lulzsec in Australia is trolling. Police are dumb.

— K for Kallisti (@Kallisti) April 24, 2013

“He is a well-respected person within the Anonymous community”, said Brad Marden, cyber-crime ops co-ordinator, AFP. Anonymous disagrees.

— Asher Wolf (@Asher_Wolf) April 24, 2013

#BREAKING!!! EXCLUSIVE:We have a picture of the leader of @lulzsec #LulzSec taken 5 minutes ago. twitter.com/AnonymousWWN/s…

— Anonymous (@YourAnonNewsKR) April 24, 2013

As an added bonus, Gizmodo AU dug up this video of the alleged LulzSec “leader” singing along to Grease:

[h/t: BBC]

Check out this video for Taser’s AXON Flex:

And this one from TheVerge:

TheNextWeb spoke with Taser CEO Rick Smith:

Talking to us earlier this week, Smith suggested that automated vehicle number plate recognition and driving license recognition were obvious quick wins, with face recognition of wanted criminals and missing persons a possibility further down the road. “We see this shifting to more real-time applications over the next decade,” he said, adding that Taser is working towards a future in which police records are gathered in real-time, using technology like voice-to-text conversion to capture statements and other spoken evidence. The company plans to roll such tech into Evidence.com.

While using a third-party cloud solution may seem like an odd step for police forces to take with such sensitive data, Smith says that it allows the technology to be introduced much more easily, quickly and cheaply than if it had to be integrated on-site with existing IT systems at each force’s HQ. He says that 90-95% of the police forces using AXON Flex opt for using Evidence.com over integrating the cameras with their own systems. Data is protected with two-factor authentication logins (using Google Authenticator, SMS or email) and 256-bit SSL encryption.

Google has been conjuring up images of Terminator ever since it introduced Glass, but Robocop capabilities are starting to sound a lot more plausible. Of course, they’re still talking about using living people at this point (rather than corpses, as in the movie), so that’s comforting.

Maybe they should hold off on that Robocop remake a little longer, so it doesn’t seem dated immediately.

But it’s not just criminals who can be bozos online. Those on the other side of the law can also find themselves in hot water over social media posts.

That’s why NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly was forced to issue a new, three-page internal order outlining new guidelines for cops and how they behave on the internet. The NY Daily News obtained a copy of the order, which bars police officers from “disclosing or alluding to their status as member of the department” on the internet.

Another thing that officers are no longer allowed to do: post photos of themselves in uniform, unless it’s a photo of an official event.

Officers in violation of the new rules may be subject to disciplinary actions – even termination.

According to the Daily News’ report, here are some of the recent events that led to the need for such a decree:

Capt. Jeffrey Schiff, commanding officer of the 76th Precinct in Brooklyn, recently left the department vulnerable to litigation by tweeting the names and mug shots of paroled convicts.

Last August, 17 cops were disciplined for posting racist and offensive comments on a Facebook page called “No More West Indian Day Detail.” About 150 comments were posted — some calling revelers “savages” and “animals.” Investigators found that about 20 of the people who posted matched the names of NYPD officers.

A recent story from Pennsylvania shows just how easy it is to be forced out of the police force due to a social media post. A Confluence police chief was forced to resign after a somewhat racy but ultimately innocuous photo emerged on Facebook. The photo featured the chief posing with a woman who was holding multiple firearms. The woman turned out to be his wife, but the damage was already done.

Everyone, including the police, has to be careful about what they post online. Once it’s public on Facebook or Twitter, it’s virtually impossible to take back.

[Photo via NYPD, Facebook]

But if you’re not going to pay up, please understand that your Facebook photos are public, and that investigators are most likely checking them in order to build a case against you.

This story comes from Milwaukee, where a 23-year-old man is facing three felony counts of failure to pay child support. And it isn’t looking too good for him after some specific Facebook photos emerged.

Christopher Robinson is facing up to 11 years in prison, and Facebook photos he posted showing him posing with cash and bottle of booze aren’t helping.

Although Deputy District Attorney in the case Kent Lovern won’t speak on pending cases, he did tell ABC News that Facebook is becoming a much more useful aid in these types of investigations.

“Facebook has become a repository for information that we may not…know about,” he says.

If the office gets a complaint on failure to pay child support, Facebook can then be tapped to help the investigation. Upon judge’s orders, the DA can have access to the Facebook profile and find any damning evidence – photos or otherwise.

“It is an investigative tool,” says Lovern. “It can be effective in assisting in the investigation and prosecution of certain criminal targets.”

So, when the DA finds photos of money and tons of things bought with money, it kind of ruins the story that the target doesn’t have to resources to pay.

Or, once again, let me be the first to suggest that you just pay the child support. Then you can make it rain all over Facebook with no worries.

This week, Valle was convicted on one count of kidnapping. The New York Times is reporting that a jury found Valle’s detailed plans to kidnap women proof enough of his intentions.

The case has shined a llght on some of the internet’s more deviant niches. In addition, it has raised questions about the line between online fantasy and reality, especially in regards to people with positions of authority in society.

One of Valle’s lawyers told the Times that Valle was prosecuted for thought crime, saying, “These are thoughts, very ugly thoughts, but we don’t prosecute people for their thoughts.” Valle’s lawyers have vowed to appeal the verdict.

The prosecution in the case, however, was able to demonstrate that Valle had used his access to police databases and resources as a police officer to track and research the women in his fantasies. Regardless of Valle’s real-life intentions toward the women, his misuse of police resources was a factor in the case, and the Times states that he has also been convicted of illegal access to a law enforcement database.

According to police, the shooting took place in the 1200 block of North Capitol Street at around 2:10 am. A surveillance camera was able to capture the event, which may have involved two different cars. The footage was released so that the public might be able to help identify the “vehicles of interest.” The D.C. police are offering a $10,000 reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of those responsible for the shooting.

The footage shows two very dark-colored cars drive by a large group of people outside of a D.C. apartment building. As the gunshots begin, people can be seen running in different directions and falling as they are shot. Though initial reports stated that one of the vehicles may have been a BMW, police have stated that neither of the cars in the video appear to be a BMW.

The Associated Press is reporting that 13 people were injured in the attack, with one of them critically wounded. None of the victims are expected to die, and the police are currently interviewing witnesses to determine a possible motive for the shooting.

(Image via Washington Metropolitan Police Department Facebook page)