Crime Baiting
 

Something that has really been bothering me about my countries "justice system", is Baiting. Baiting is when police officers set up situations for crimes to be committed for the purpose of getting people to commit them and then charging them with the crimes fully. It is one step below entrapment.


For example, Officers in New York do this all the time, they leave a wallet on a chair in a train subway, and have like 3 hundred dollar bills sticking out of it. If someone grabs this wallet, and does not take it to lost and found, they are arrested as soon as they leave the train station. They create impossible situations that would rarely ever normally exist, and in the end, they criminalize someone who did something almost anyone, including these officers themselves most likely, if they found themselves in the same situation would have done, and people here get arrested for it all the time.


I am not trying to say that the people who take these wallets are good, or justified, just that they react the same way anyone who just found a hundred dollar bill on the ground would react. They take it. Because of this they are heavily criminalized.

Five minutes ago, I watched an episode of cops, where they left this bike out to see if someone would take it. It looked like a normal bicycle, but it was actually worth 300 dollars, and because of this someone who took it would be charged with a felony, meaning that their life as a regular citizen of the US is over and they will forever be labeled as a criminal, for the rest of their life.


Well, that said, my opinion on this subject is pretty obvious, what is your opinion? Do you think things like this benefit society? Are they just? Are they warranted?

IMHO, what is the point of taking something that is not yours? I myself have found wallets but I just turn them in since I would expect the same thing of someone who took my wallet. There is no point to look in the wallet for money because it was not mine to begin with. I don't like the fact that the police keep playing these type of social games but honestly, if you see something that is not yours such as a wallet with money sticking out of it or a bike, then why take it? If you do take it and some kind of consequence happens such as you are arrested and such well..was kinda your own fault wasn't it?

Whether it is your fault or not is not really relevant here. The question is, were the police who set the situation up, for the sake of tricking people into falling into their trap, justified? That bike was not left there by someone who was in a hurry, and ended up getting there bike stolen, it was placed their by an officer for the sole purpose of throwing someone in jail and ruining their lives. This is fact. How you can see justice in something like this, is beyond me.

basing yourself off an episode of COPS is, quite frankly, retarded (as are just about any person on that show ever).

also, the whole point of a sting operation is to deter a certain type of crime that's been happening with regularity but that the perpetrators have continually eluded arrest. basically, if they used a bait bike it's most likely because there had been a bunch of bikes being stolen in that area over a short period of time and this was the easiest way to catch the most likely culprit (let me guess, university neighborhood)

it's not like they sit in their cars eating donuts all day flipping through a rollodex of possible ways to shaft random innocents.

more often than not the bait is an obvious illegal activity, like prostitution, bootlegging, or drug dealing. at which point, i don't feel any remorse or sympathy for anyone who gets caught that way.

the police aren't out to get you unless there's a reason for you to be gotten.

They didn't really trick anyone though...noone forced these people to take anything, they took it of their own free will and therefore ruined their own lives. It doesn't matter if an officer placed it there or a passerby really. As the above poster stated, items were most likely placed there due to it being a sting operation in that area and it wasn't done randomly.

Situations occur all the time when people loose personal belongings on trains and buses and people who find the lost article give it to the buses driver or some other transit worker. My sister lost her wallet and a few weeks later a police officer traced down where she lived (because she moved) and returned the wallet. My friend who is a plumber was do some work for a widow and found almost $10,000 in cash in a bag hidden behind a radiator, and gave the money to her. She never knew her husband hid the money, he could of easily walk out with it, but he didn't - he said it was a matter of conscience. Even though the odds of finding something valuable is decreases as the value goes up it not such impossible occurrence, people are still honest and trun things in - regardless of value. See people turn lost items in all the time, so it's not impossible for that guy who found the wallet on the subway train to turn it in, it is just a matter of conscience. Who knows if commuters were complaining about having items stolen, and police baited him because they were trying to catch a pick-pocketer.

No, not just about anybody. Only selfish people.

Not really. If I found a hundred dollar bill (after getting over the amazement of how it got over the pond) there'd be no way of tracing it back to the owner short of having literally seen the person who dropped it whilst they drop it. A wallet is recognisable and will usually have cards and some other form of identification within it so that it's actually useful if you hand it in to lost property.

You don't get it do you? The person taking the bike has no care who left it where and why. They see a bike that they know isn't theirs and they take it either to use themselves of sell on. If it had been left by a normal civvie, the thief had happened to be caught on CCTV and they were still arrested for it you'd have no problem with it but the mentality behind the criminal action is exactly the same and 100% equally repeatable. The only difference between the two situations is that in the instance of a police sting it's a controlled environment that can guarantee an arrest without anyone except the criminal being put out. Which means one less thief on the streets to go on and steal something from somebody whose only mistake was absent mindedness.

Not your property, don't take it/hand it into lost property depending on situation. It's really that simple. Do not take it for personal use. Societies values on the matter are really quite clear.

1) Isn't justified, in my opinion. It's just a wallet. Only one out of every ten poeple would return the wallet to the lost and found, and even then, it's a major possiblity that the person that over sees the lost and found will take the money out of it anyways. And I can bet my next pay check that the cops would do the same thing. Regardless of what they tell ya, they aren't angels. I would know. My baby bro is a state trooper. XD
2) The bike situation is entirely justified. It's something that could have been left there by mistake, or on purpose, because the person would be running an errond.

You can't compare situations that aren't the same, and treat them the same.