WA Police are placing e-scooters outside shopping centres for people to steal, in a "proactive" operation that one human rights advocate says is inducing disadvantaged people to commit crime.
I loathe the fact that to go to my local shops I have to drive my fucking car because there is a high chance that some fuckwit will steal my bike or scooter if I lock it at the entrance.
Fuck people who steal bikes and scooters. All they are doing is grabbing on to people barely one rung up the societal ladder than they are and pulling them down.
Go steal from a large corporation instead if you want sympathy.
In Singas, some people don’t even bother locking their bikes. Others will just slip a chain with a combination lock through the back wheel. Almost none of them get filched. They’d be gone very quickly in Perth.
There are ways of doing this without entrapment. If they want to catch bike and scooter thieves they can stake out the bike racks. I suspect no sane person leaves their bike unlocked there so they have to contrive an artificial situation to entice someone to commit a crime. How is this valuable policing? Had the police not bought a scooter and left it unlocked no crime would’ve been committed.
I have no illusions that the young fellow in question is an upstanding citizen but how is public interest served here? One kid gets a fine and arguably may hesitate before doing the same thing again but the problem is not this one kid, it is systemic and were it not for this news article no-one would even know about it meaning it is useless even for deterrence.
It is a waste of everyone’s time, drags a kid who likely already has a shit life through the courts further alienating him, and did not even protect the property of a real person.
I do agree that it’s ethically dubious and in a perfect world you’d have enough police to monitor areas where this is likely to happen, but that’s not really the reality.
I don’t really agree that no crime would’ve been committed if the police hadn’t left a scooter there. Perhaps that’s true, but it’s more likely to me that delinquents are looking for opportunities all day.
I also don’t agree that we should avoid charging kids with this type of crime. If the court is producing bad outcomes then that is what should be addressed.
On balance, I think it’s the last, worst option. However, if police don’t have the resources to manage this problem then it would allow you to grab a few kids who are hanging out at the same shop every day stealing everyone’s stuff.
How is it immoral?
I loathe the fact that to go to my local shops I have to drive my fucking car because there is a high chance that some fuckwit will steal my bike or scooter if I lock it at the entrance.
Fuck people who steal bikes and scooters. All they are doing is grabbing on to people barely one rung up the societal ladder than they are and pulling them down.
Go steal from a large corporation instead if you want sympathy.
In Singas, some people don’t even bother locking their bikes. Others will just slip a chain with a combination lock through the back wheel. Almost none of them get filched. They’d be gone very quickly in Perth.
There are ways of doing this without entrapment. If they want to catch bike and scooter thieves they can stake out the bike racks. I suspect no sane person leaves their bike unlocked there so they have to contrive an artificial situation to entice someone to commit a crime. How is this valuable policing? Had the police not bought a scooter and left it unlocked no crime would’ve been committed.
I have no illusions that the young fellow in question is an upstanding citizen but how is public interest served here? One kid gets a fine and arguably may hesitate before doing the same thing again but the problem is not this one kid, it is systemic and were it not for this news article no-one would even know about it meaning it is useless even for deterrence.
It is a waste of everyone’s time, drags a kid who likely already has a shit life through the courts further alienating him, and did not even protect the property of a real person.
I don’t think it’s necessarily so pointless.
I do agree that it’s ethically dubious and in a perfect world you’d have enough police to monitor areas where this is likely to happen, but that’s not really the reality.
I don’t really agree that no crime would’ve been committed if the police hadn’t left a scooter there. Perhaps that’s true, but it’s more likely to me that delinquents are looking for opportunities all day.
I also don’t agree that we should avoid charging kids with this type of crime. If the court is producing bad outcomes then that is what should be addressed.
On balance, I think it’s the last, worst option. However, if police don’t have the resources to manage this problem then it would allow you to grab a few kids who are hanging out at the same shop every day stealing everyone’s stuff.