What do you think about sites like Mugshots.com who post pictures of people not yet convicted...

[L0oniX]

of any crime? Is this an invasion of privacy? Is it libelous? Does posting these pictures imply guilt? What if you didn't do anything wrong but were arrested and had your mug shot posted all over the internet ...and then had charges against you dropped? IMO when someones picture for any reason is in the public domain is is free to usew so long as you don't profit from it. What do you think?

[Dawson Leery]

1. pigs.com, I mean online police magazines such as police one and officer.com

think it's hilarious! Charlatan and Constitutional Rapist Joe Arpaio too thinks it's hilarious. He even has a vote section where anyone can vote on who has the "ugliest" "mug".

These sites should not be allowed as the people in question have been but accused, not convicted.

[L0oniX]

3. Isn't the info public domain since they are taken by law enforcement and posted on gov websites?

I don't think it's right to have these pictures in the public domain since they are not post conviction pictures. What if the charges are dropped for lack of evidence? As I understand it, the police can arrest you and hold you for up to 48 hours just for suspicion. You would get a mug shot and it would be posted in the public domain. A potential employer or date could look up that picture ...and you know what that could do to you. It's being punished for something you did not do.

[izquierdista]

2. They are probably illegal in many countries

[bemildred]

4. I'm all for it, we need to stop running away from this shit, treating it as some sort of taboo.

It's like rape, it should all be hashed out in public, accuser and accused both get their say in public. A free people cannot hide every time some cop throws his weight around.

[L0oniX]

6. Guilty first and maybe ask questions later? No trial but you are guilty by implication of a picture?

[bemildred]

8. Cops lie, we need to stop acting as though an accusation is a conviction.

Innocent until proven guilty requires that one not act guilty because one is accused. Why should we hide because some cop says so?

[Obamanaut]

25. People lie. That is why one can hear, at nearly every court in the

country, people saying "not guilty" when the judge asks how they plead.

There is no such thing as 'innocent until proven guilty'. There is a presumption, but a person who robs a convenience store is guilty despite stating "not guilty". That person then has the benefit of a trial, but was in fact guilty as soon as he said to the clerk "Give me your money."

Then in prison, he will make claims of "I had a bad lawyer", or "There were untrue facts in my case."

[bemildred]

29. And cops, one and all, are people.

Legal guilt is not the same as actually having done it, true, so what? Innocent people are convicted of crimes they did not do, people who knowingly commit crimes get away with it, the criminal legal process works poorly. But, the criminal legal process still needs to be carried out in the full light of day and public scrutiny. Secrecy breeds corruption.

[SmileyRose]

5. Fraud website.

There's a picture under Douglas county GA that is actually the employee badge picture for one of the court employees that I personally know.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

11. If that's true, the employee is in for a big wad of moolah.

Sue the fuckers.

[sharesunited]

7. Definitely need some federal guidelines. Certain jurisdications come down for fully public.

Others keep it under wraps for law enforcement and incarceration services only.

Clearly needs some uniformity from sea to shining sea.

And if anyone says, leave to the states. To hell with that. Crush them.

[L0oniX]

10. To me it's about the same thing as the "do not fly list". You are guilty ...of something ...

without a trial, hearing or a legal review of any sort.

[sharesunited]

14. Hang on now. Anyone who tries to open an airplane door in mid flight can be on a no fly list.

Happy to take two corroborating airline attendants' word for it.

[sabrina 1]

9. I think they should not be allowed. But we live in a

'guilty unless proven innocent' with zero respect for the rule of law, let alone individual rights.

I wonder if people can sue after they have been exonerated? That would make them be more careful I suppose.

[Nye Bevan]

13. Sue on what grounds? It's true that they were arrested, and that they were photographed.

As long as the police don't claim that this implies that they were guilty, I don't see that there is anything to sue over. Unless of course it was a false arrest, in which case the police can be sued regardless of whether there was a mugshot.

[L0oniX]

15. Would you bother to employ someone whos picture is posted on Mugshots.com?

Would you hold off on a judgement until the potential employee could prove his or her innocence or would you drop them from consideration and go on to the next potential employee?

[sabrina 1]

19. So long as you can demonstrate damages, you can sue.

Having your image all over TV portraying you as a criminal is pretty damaging. And that's what people remember. How many people remember that much later on you were exonerated?


Giuliani is responsible for this archaic, vindictive practice. A sociopathic authoritarian, it's no surprise that he would enjoy humiliating people, even knowing them to be innocent. It's sad that a man like Giuliani should be emulated and that people's natural revulsion of many of his practices while power, are now dismissed because we got used to what was once widely condemned here in the US, when we were, apparently, a better country. It's no surprise that other countries look at these practices with revulsion. They have not been desensitized the way Americans have.

Rudolph Giuliani

As a federal prosecutor, Giuliani was credited with bringing the "perp walk", parading of suspects in front of the previously alerted media, into common use as a prosecutorial tool.<22> After Giuliani "patented the perp walk", the tool was used by increasing numbers of prosecutors nationwide.<23>

Giuliani's critics claim he arranged public arrests of people, then dropped charges for lack of evidence on high-profile cases rather than going to trial. In a few cases, his public arrests of alleged white-collar criminals at their workplaces with charges later dropped or lessened, sparked controversy, and damaged the reputations of the alleged "perps".<24> He claimed that veteran stock trader Richard Wigton, of Kidder, Peabody & Co. was guilty of insider trading; in February 1987 he had officers handcuff Wigton and march him through the company's trading floor, with Wigton in tears. Giuliani had his agents arrest Tim Tabor, a young arbitrageur and former colleague of Wigton, so late that he had to stay overnight in jail before posting bond. "We're not going to go to trial. We're just the tip of the iceberg", but no further charges were forthcoming and the investigation did not end until Giuliani's successor was in place.

How sad that the vicious and vengeful tactics of a sick man like Giuliani have become standard practices. It shows how little by little a nation can be primed to sink further and further into totalitarianism without even realizing it. And if ever there was a candidate to become a totalitarian leader, it is Giuliani. He would make people yearn for the good old days of Bush/Cheney if he ever got that kind of power.

[Nye Bevan]

20. So mugshots should not be circulated until guilt has been established?

Like this, for example?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9248306&mesg_id=9250417

[sabrina 1]

21. He WAS convicted.

When he pulled that stunt, on the reporter, he was on probation.

So what's your point?

[proud2BlibKansan]

12. Off topic but you know that little bug in your sig line?

I had a real one in my monitor at work last week. LOL It was a hoot. Stayed there for two days.

[Nye Bevan]

16. I thought that was a feature, not a bug.

Oh wait... the bug *is* the feature.

[provis99]

17. fine

as long as we can put a picture of every cop in this country on a website too, undercover or not. After all, if they aren't guilty of anything, what would they be afraid of?

[former9thward]

18. Newspapers and the TV networks publish pictures everyday

of people arrested. Why would websites be any different? It is called the first amendment.

[LooseWilly]

22. You can get mugshots of anyone arrested from your Sheriff's Dept.

The public relations official will e-mail a mugshot of anyone arrested and processed upon request... that's precisely how all news sources get their mugshots, and I presume the Sheriffs will do the same for citizens who don't bother to claim to be with a news organization.

Try going to your local courthouse, pick a random name from the cases to be dealt with, maybe get fancy and find the court records clerk and ask for a case #, then lookup the contact number for the Sheriff's Department... call, and ask for a mugshot for the name you randomly picked. You'll be transferred to the PR official, who will-I'd be willing to bet-then proceed to send you the mugshot you asked for.

It's really not so terribly nefarious. It's Public Information who is being arrested, after all.

[sabrina 1]

23. Rec'd for being thoughtful enough to ask the question.

[L0oniX]

33. Thank you.

[RandomThoughts]

24. When I was smeared years ago.

And I was never arrested for anything, since I had not done anything wrong, and they could not arrest me within how the legal system works.


What they did do was to use a photo of someone 60 miles away that was a convicted bad person, made a bad copy of it, and put flyers of that person, on hand flyers, on the doors of people in the neighborhood I lived in.

Guess who the guy looked like.

They also called bosses, and told the bartenders at the bars I went to lies about me. They said it was to 'break me' by removing anything I had.

Note I had not done anything wrong, and they were pissed becuase I was, and still am, laughing at them for thinking they can lie and break laws for there ego or for control outside of law.

They also will be held to account for false accusations, if that is thought just, although I do petition for mercy and forgiveness for them, that is not my decision.

Many of them are already dead, but the source of their arrogance against the basic concepts of a society having justice with compassion, was part of a much bigger fault.


I like music, and still am the same person I have always been, although it took much help to make it through those wrongs done.


Sara Bareilles, Ingrid Michaelson - Winter Song
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkOKCWDJ4iA

Part of that help came from love in so many stories and songs they could not see, so much of the posting I do is also a form of thanks.
:loveya:


And I have not needed to heal for years, although I believe there are many that still can be healed, as done before the unjust attack was attempted. So it is not about me, but about showing what some do, and that should not be part of a just and compassionate society.

I am however due beer and travel money.

And someone will be sending the beer and travel money that is due.

[XanaDUer]

26. Obscene

the virtual equivalent of stocks in the square, although I believe even that was post-conviction.

[XanaDUer]

27. There's even a sub-folder on mugshots.com called "Beatups"?

:puke:

[L0oniX]

35. Jeeze. n/t

[blindpig]

28. Despicable.

There is a paper sold around here, 'Jailbirds', which publishers mugshots and arrest data of people busted locally. This can easily result in the loss of a job before one is even convicted, as though ya don't have enough trouble already.

[Iggo]

30. Don't like 'em. Don't look at 'em. Don't have a high opinion of those who do. (n/t

[lunatica]

31. If it's OK to publish the mugshots what's not OK about makine a profit?

Do you think the rags don't pay for photos like those? Hey! Capitalism is sacred. The chase of the almighty dollar is as American as apple pie.

:sarcasm:

[jberryhill]

32. What do you think about countries which have secret arrests?

[L0oniX]

34. Like the USA?