I don't know what is the appropriate response. I have never in my life had to face the question of what to do with a person who keeps taping fish to ATMs.
I don't know what is the appropriate response. I have never in my life had to face the question of what to do with a person who keeps taping fish to ATMs.
I mean it just doesn't feel like an arrest, criminal record, etc. is it. If we can start restorative justice with anyone, can't it be the fish tapers? I feel like no one can really object to them...
I mean it just doesn't feel like an arrest, criminal record, etc. is it.
If we can start restorative justice with anyone, can't it be the fish tapers? I feel like no one can really object to them as a starting point.
How would that work, or really differ from what they are doing? It seems to me like an arrest and trial are kind of necessary since we can’t just dole out restorative justice without first...
How would that work, or really differ from what they are doing?
It seems to me like an arrest and trial are kind of necessary since we can’t just dole out restorative justice without first confirming that this kid is in fact the perpetrator. This will almost certainly be resolved by community service and/or a small fine and a misdemeanour charge.
I think there's a world where you don't have to arrest (even in summons form) or use the court system for it. I do feel like a knock it off conversation could have been helpful - it tends to work...
I think there's a world where you don't have to arrest (even in summons form) or use the court system for it. I do feel like a knock it off conversation could have been helpful - it tends to work with most college students.
I'm abolitionist adjacent, in part because figuring out the details is hard. But if we added up the cost of the justice system's interactions with this kid I have a hard time believing it doesn't cost more than removing fish and tape from ATMs.
This gets to that underlying idea of whether there's actually a deterrent effect, or if that deterrent effect could have been gotten from a conversation. When our system is much more set up for...
This gets to that underlying idea of whether there's actually a deterrent effect, or if that deterrent effect could have been gotten from a conversation. When our system is much more set up for punishment, rather than for effective deterrence or rehabilitation. I think that it's hard to do the math overall but I don't think it would work out over time. Future fish tapers probably would also cost more to address in this manner than literally doing nothing. Whether doing nothing is the wisest action vs a lower-cost option would be up for debate.
I personally think that this is a good example of when alternatives to the police/justice system would be beneficial. Again, this is the sort of conversation that non-police university staff have with students all the time - even outside of a formal conduct process. College is a more controlled environment, but I see systems that work and could be extrapolated to the "real world" so to speak.
I don't see why not. It's property damage. It's no different than someone who urinates on property. It's not OK to tape fish to things you don't own, and it shouldn't be.
I don't see why not. It's property damage. It's no different than someone who urinates on property. It's not OK to tape fish to things you don't own, and it shouldn't be.
"Property damage" from scraping the tape residue off of things? C'mon. That's BS. Really, it's a violation of the animal cruelty statutes. That kid was asphyxiating fish for social media clout....
"Property damage" from scraping the tape residue off of things? C'mon. That's BS.
Really, it's a violation of the animal cruelty statutes. That kid was asphyxiating fish for social media clout. Throw the book at him.
And getting the fishy odor off of things? I don't see it as any different than egging things. I think everyone would say that it's illegal, if infantile, to egg other people's property. It's not...
And getting the fishy odor off of things? I don't see it as any different than egging things. I think everyone would say that it's illegal, if infantile, to egg other people's property. It's not necessarily difficult to clean up, but you shouldn't have to clean it up. And yes, it could be animal cruelty, although I couldn't find a description if the fish were taped while alive or not.
It's not like he should be executed or something, but community service and a fine as a deterrence is more than appropriate.
Extra egregious is that the perpetrator did it in multiple countries, especially Tokyo. He's part of the social media generation embarrassing the US there.
So wiping them down with some disinfectant? Given how insane, discriminatory, and punitive the US Justice and penal system are, I think involving criminal charges of any sort in this situation is...
And getting the fishy odor off of things
So wiping them down with some disinfectant?
Given how insane, discriminatory, and punitive the US Justice and penal system are, I think involving criminal charges of any sort in this situation is serious overkill. This is something that easily could have been handled civilly by the banks, in small claims court, and that likely would have been just as effective a punishment and deterrent without potentially ruining the kid's life over a relatively harmless prank.
Misdemeanor grades exist for a reason. Petty vandalism without prior offenses seems likely to solicit fines, maybe probation if there were other factors. Animal cruelty charges could be another...
Misdemeanor grades exist for a reason. Petty vandalism without prior offenses seems likely to solicit fines, maybe probation if there were other factors. Animal cruelty charges could be another matter.
As someone who grew up fishing, getting the fish smell off of things can be a challenge. I used to rub my hands together with used coffee grounds to help with the smell. I don't know how much the plastics would have absorbed the smell.
Misdemeanors can still completely ruin lives thanks to three strikes laws, systemic racial bias in the justice system (e.g. Trial as an adult rates among minorities), "Troubled teen" program abuse...
So how do you suppose the banks pursue a civil remedy against an anonymous vandal? Edit: I suppose the banks could find a John Doe lawsuit and get the court to subpoena IP addresses of logins from...
So how do you suppose the banks pursue a civil remedy against an anonymous vandal?
Edit: I suppose the banks could find a John Doe lawsuit and get the court to subpoena IP addresses of logins from Instagram, then subpoena the ISPs. However I would expect them to request that their legal fees be awarded as damages, potentially saddling the kids with six figure debt and garnished wages. A misdemeanor summons and fine to cover direct cleanup damages is likely the least damaging to the kid.
Most minor misdemeanors will result in a summons and a fine. I know the article says arrest, but this story came out on the 18th with no update since. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that it was really a summons, since we haven't seen a follow up article about the minor being released, charges, etc.
Also, three strikes laws are for felonies. Misdemeanors can be raised to felonies in some states based on prior offenses but I don't know that that is the case in Utah, and doubt it would apply here.
Obviously I don't want this kids life ruined. A fine seems plenty. And while the abuses in our system are deplorable, there is no civil recourse available against an unknown party, and the state can more easily compel data from social media companies to identify the person.
Misdemeanor especially for a minor is not going to affect the kid. There are also many ways the prosecutors can set up community service to get charges dismissed leaving no record of anything.
Misdemeanor especially for a minor is not going to affect the kid. There are also many ways the prosecutors can set up community service to get charges dismissed leaving no record of anything.
Dude's arrested. Maybe that's a little too harsh already. It doesn't make a lot of sense for a fish taper to go to criminal court and outrage is not an argument. Being a silly imbecile should...
Dude's in prison arrested. Maybe that's a little too harsh already. It doesn't make a lot of sense for a fish taper to go to criminal court and outrage is not an argument. Being a silly imbecile should evoke liability not culpability. He or his parents should pay in money, not in time. Even more so for a minor. We can't criticize police states while selective siding with them when the accused is unlikeable. The US is way too casual with imprisonment. That's absurd.
It looks like the story first came out on January 18th, and charges and the identity are still unknown. It is common for minor crimes to give a summons to appear in court instead of an arrest....
It looks like the story first came out on January 18th, and charges and the identity are still unknown. It is common for minor crimes to give a summons to appear in court instead of an arrest. While I know the articles say "arrest" I wouldn't be surprised to find that it was actually a summons. For a juvenile to be arrested, and not see more detailed reports within two weeks would seem odd.
So I'll reserve judgement until all the details are out. I hope it was just a summons and ultimately a fine, and I wouldn't be surprised to see the news get the wording wrong.
Maybe that's my mistake because in my country usually when someone's arrested they stay in jail for varying amounts of time. Correcting, not prison, jail. They still shouldn't have been arrested...
Maybe that's my mistake because in my country usually when someone's arrested they stay in jail for varying amounts of time. Correcting, not prison, jail. They still shouldn't have been arrested and I would make the same argument either way. In my country the requirements to arrest someone are quite high and I believe that should be the case.
Were the ATM's actually damaged? Or did they just need to have some tape residue and fish juice wiped off? I don't think the act should go unpunished, but arresting him seems like an...
Were the ATM's actually damaged? Or did they just need to have some tape residue and fish juice wiped off?
I don't think the act should go unpunished, but arresting him seems like an over-reaction. Fine the kid, and hope his parents give him a stern talking to. But putting him through an arrest seems asinine given the small scale of the crime. In terms of severity I would rank this below speeding, because speeding actually endangers people.
I just want to remind people how many felony crimes are solved by the police See Here They actually spent the time to solve this "Case." I get it, the fish smell might linger, the cleanup might...
I just want to remind people how many felony crimes are solved by the police
They actually spent the time to solve this "Case." I get it, the fish smell might linger, the cleanup might cost money, but look at how effective Police are at solving crimes and tell me that they should waste their time on this "Criminal" in lieu of the actual heinous crimes not being solved. Boy, I just couldn't care less about this.
That's what I was thinking. There are cases where people have had cars and bikes, computers and phones stolen, and had electronic tracking. Airtags, phone home software, and so on. Exact...
That's what I was thinking.
There are cases where people have had cars and bikes, computers and phones stolen, and had electronic tracking. Airtags, phone home software, and so on. Exact coordinates, mapping. A freaking dot on the map that says "here is where I am, come get me."
Cases where the cops just shrugged, or got outright irritated at the citizen for bothering them with it. All they'd have to do is go to the coordinates, in uniform, throw their weight around and ask "is this your car/bike/phone/computer? Looks like one that was reported stolen, tracked to this location. Got papers?" But that's too hard. That's not worthy of their time.
Who wants to bet there were zero stolen cars, zero actual property crimes on the desks of that police department while they had people track down a kid who ... tapes dead fish to a few things. Which isn't even to mention domestic violence, reports from citizens who've been threatened by someone with violence, and so on that are going without police attention.
And the moment some citizen gets "out of line", gets annoyed with the department, doesn't offer up proper respectful obeisance to the high and mighty officers of this crack unit that tracks down fish tapers, the beating and killing will commence.
I did note, in the article, it mentioned a fish got taped to a police cruiser. One might think it was the banks pitching a fit about their ATMs, but I'd bet it was the cops being pissed their car got disrespected. Not damaged. Disrespected.
It's a joke. Cops whine about "everyone hates us." Gee, I wonder why.
It seems a bit different given the persistence of it. Some teenagers go out and tape a fish (God did I just write that?) to something in public for a laugh once, twice, maybe three times? Boys...
It seems a bit different given the persistence of it. Some teenagers go out and tape a fish (God did I just write that?) to something in public for a laugh once, twice, maybe three times? Boys will be boys. Over a dozen times? At what point does the nuisance of it make it a priority? And as much as police shouldn't operate based on outside influence, at what point does the inability to stop serial petty vandalism become a black eye in the community? Especially with local news coverage keeping it alive in the public mind.
So I don't disagree that police involvement seems a bit much, and I hope they were simply given a misdemeanor summons. But I can't fault the police for doing some follow up after over a dozen issues. If they pulled in Scotland Yard for a single incident that would seem excessive and vindictive.
This is an example where the criminal justice system, even the juvenile justice system, is probably not the appropriate response.
I mean. Come on.
I don't know what is the appropriate response. I have never in my life had to face the question of what to do with a person who keeps taping fish to ATMs.
I mean it just doesn't feel like an arrest, criminal record, etc. is it.
If we can start restorative justice with anyone, can't it be the fish tapers? I feel like no one can really object to them as a starting point.
How would that work, or really differ from what they are doing?
It seems to me like an arrest and trial are kind of necessary since we can’t just dole out restorative justice without first confirming that this kid is in fact the perpetrator. This will almost certainly be resolved by community service and/or a small fine and a misdemeanour charge.
I think there's a world where you don't have to arrest (even in summons form) or use the court system for it. I do feel like a knock it off conversation could have been helpful - it tends to work with most college students.
I'm abolitionist adjacent, in part because figuring out the details is hard. But if we added up the cost of the justice system's interactions with this kid I have a hard time believing it doesn't cost more than removing fish and tape from ATMs.
Although in this case it might be cheaper, it might be cheaper overall to prevent future fish tapers.
Fish taping is a well known slippery slope towards walrus-bothering, and that never goes well.
This gets to that underlying idea of whether there's actually a deterrent effect, or if that deterrent effect could have been gotten from a conversation. When our system is much more set up for punishment, rather than for effective deterrence or rehabilitation. I think that it's hard to do the math overall but I don't think it would work out over time. Future fish tapers probably would also cost more to address in this manner than literally doing nothing. Whether doing nothing is the wisest action vs a lower-cost option would be up for debate.
I personally think that this is a good example of when alternatives to the police/justice system would be beneficial. Again, this is the sort of conversation that non-police university staff have with students all the time - even outside of a formal conduct process. College is a more controlled environment, but I see systems that work and could be extrapolated to the "real world" so to speak.
We need more robust law and public policy around what to do in the face of surreal crimes.
Fight fire with fire. Surreal punishments. Melt all his clocks.
Tape him to a very large fish and make him be stuck underwater
A court date and community service seems like more than enough to me.
I don't see why not. It's property damage. It's no different than someone who urinates on property. It's not OK to tape fish to things you don't own, and it shouldn't be.
"Property damage" from scraping the tape residue off of things? C'mon. That's BS.
Really, it's a violation of the animal cruelty statutes. That kid was asphyxiating fish for social media clout. Throw the book at him.
And getting the fishy odor off of things? I don't see it as any different than egging things. I think everyone would say that it's illegal, if infantile, to egg other people's property. It's not necessarily difficult to clean up, but you shouldn't have to clean it up. And yes, it could be animal cruelty, although I couldn't find a description if the fish were taped while alive or not.
It's not like he should be executed or something, but community service and a fine as a deterrence is more than appropriate.
Extra egregious is that the perpetrator did it in multiple countries, especially Tokyo. He's part of the social media generation embarrassing the US there.
So wiping them down with some disinfectant?
Given how insane, discriminatory, and punitive the US Justice and penal system are, I think involving criminal charges of any sort in this situation is serious overkill. This is something that easily could have been handled civilly by the banks, in small claims court, and that likely would have been just as effective a punishment and deterrent without potentially ruining the kid's life over a relatively harmless prank.
Misdemeanor grades exist for a reason. Petty vandalism without prior offenses seems likely to solicit fines, maybe probation if there were other factors. Animal cruelty charges could be another matter.
As someone who grew up fishing, getting the fish smell off of things can be a challenge. I used to rub my hands together with used coffee grounds to help with the smell. I don't know how much the plastics would have absorbed the smell.
Misdemeanors can still completely ruin lives thanks to three strikes laws, systemic racial bias in the justice system (e.g. Trial as an adult rates among minorities), "Troubled teen" program abuse cases, juvenile detention center abuse cases, abusive/traumatic "scared straight" programs, kids for cash kickbacks, etc. And for precisely that reason things like this should be kept entirely as a civil matter, IMO.
So how do you suppose the banks pursue a civil remedy against an anonymous vandal?
Edit: I suppose the banks could find a John Doe lawsuit and get the court to subpoena IP addresses of logins from Instagram, then subpoena the ISPs. However I would expect them to request that their legal fees be awarded as damages, potentially saddling the kids with six figure debt and garnished wages. A misdemeanor summons and fine to cover direct cleanup damages is likely the least damaging to the kid.
Most minor misdemeanors will result in a summons and a fine. I know the article says arrest, but this story came out on the 18th with no update since. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that it was really a summons, since we haven't seen a follow up article about the minor being released, charges, etc.
Also, three strikes laws are for felonies. Misdemeanors can be raised to felonies in some states based on prior offenses but I don't know that that is the case in Utah, and doubt it would apply here.
Obviously I don't want this kids life ruined. A fine seems plenty. And while the abuses in our system are deplorable, there is no civil recourse available against an unknown party, and the state can more easily compel data from social media companies to identify the person.
Misdemeanor especially for a minor is not going to affect the kid. There are also many ways the prosecutors can set up community service to get charges dismissed leaving no record of anything.
Dude's
in prisonarrested. Maybe that's a little too harsh already. It doesn't make a lot of sense for a fish taper to go to criminal court and outrage is not an argument. Being a silly imbecile should evoke liability not culpability. He or his parents should pay in money, not in time. Even more so for a minor. We can't criticize police states while selective siding with them when the accused is unlikeable. The US is way too casual with imprisonment. That's absurd.It looks like the story first came out on January 18th, and charges and the identity are still unknown. It is common for minor crimes to give a summons to appear in court instead of an arrest. While I know the articles say "arrest" I wouldn't be surprised to find that it was actually a summons. For a juvenile to be arrested, and not see more detailed reports within two weeks would seem odd.
So I'll reserve judgement until all the details are out. I hope it was just a summons and ultimately a fine, and I wouldn't be surprised to see the news get the wording wrong.
We will see!
Nothing in the article says he's in prison, is there another source for that?
Maybe that's my mistake because in my country usually when someone's arrested they stay in jail for varying amounts of time. Correcting, not prison, jail. They still shouldn't have been arrested and I would make the same argument either way. In my country the requirements to arrest someone are quite high and I believe that should be the case.
Were the ATM's actually damaged? Or did they just need to have some tape residue and fish juice wiped off?
I don't think the act should go unpunished, but arresting him seems like an over-reaction. Fine the kid, and hope his parents give him a stern talking to. But putting him through an arrest seems asinine given the small scale of the crime. In terms of severity I would rank this below speeding, because speeding actually endangers people.
What a sentence to read
I think that vegetarians and vegans would see this as akin to nailing dead squirrels, rabbits, and cats to ATMs. It's creepy, and I would agree.
I just want to remind people how many felony crimes are solved by the police
See Here
They actually spent the time to solve this "Case." I get it, the fish smell might linger, the cleanup might cost money, but look at how effective Police are at solving crimes and tell me that they should waste their time on this "Criminal" in lieu of the actual heinous crimes not being solved. Boy, I just couldn't care less about this.
That's what I was thinking.
There are cases where people have had cars and bikes, computers and phones stolen, and had electronic tracking. Airtags, phone home software, and so on. Exact coordinates, mapping. A freaking dot on the map that says "here is where I am, come get me."
Cases where the cops just shrugged, or got outright irritated at the citizen for bothering them with it. All they'd have to do is go to the coordinates, in uniform, throw their weight around and ask "is this your car/bike/phone/computer? Looks like one that was reported stolen, tracked to this location. Got papers?" But that's too hard. That's not worthy of their time.
Who wants to bet there were zero stolen cars, zero actual property crimes on the desks of that police department while they had people track down a kid who ... tapes dead fish to a few things. Which isn't even to mention domestic violence, reports from citizens who've been threatened by someone with violence, and so on that are going without police attention.
And the moment some citizen gets "out of line", gets annoyed with the department, doesn't offer up proper respectful obeisance to the high and mighty officers of this crack unit that tracks down fish tapers, the beating and killing will commence.
I did note, in the article, it mentioned a fish got taped to a police cruiser. One might think it was the banks pitching a fit about their ATMs, but I'd bet it was the cops being pissed their car got disrespected. Not damaged. Disrespected.
It's a joke. Cops whine about "everyone hates us." Gee, I wonder why.
It seems a bit different given the persistence of it. Some teenagers go out and tape a fish (God did I just write that?) to something in public for a laugh once, twice, maybe three times? Boys will be boys. Over a dozen times? At what point does the nuisance of it make it a priority? And as much as police shouldn't operate based on outside influence, at what point does the inability to stop serial petty vandalism become a black eye in the community? Especially with local news coverage keeping it alive in the public mind.
So I don't disagree that police involvement seems a bit much, and I hope they were simply given a misdemeanor summons. But I can't fault the police for doing some follow up after over a dozen issues. If they pulled in Scotland Yard for a single incident that would seem excessive and vindictive.
And NONE of you have remarked, "Kids, that's not how phishing works"!
Because I am not a dad and don't have a pun license for a joke that bad /j