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LA County Prison gets Heat Ray for Prisoner control.
Taramoor
StorytellerRegistered User regular
StorytellerRegistered User regular
I can't see any way in which this could possibly be abused, go wrong, or backfire.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_jail_ray_gun
So, yeah, let's take a device that causes intense pain but leaves no physical evidence and put it in the hands of prison guard who can't even see the people they're shooting with it.
Better idea, let's give one to Sheriff Joe and see what he can do with it.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_jail_ray_gun
LA authorities plan to use heat-beam ray in jail
By THOMAS WATKINS, Associated Press Writer Thomas Watkins, Associated Press Writer – Fri Aug 27, 12:50 am ET
LOS ANGELES – A device designed to control unruly inmates by blasting them with a beam of intense energy that causes a burning sensation is drawing heat from civil rights groups who fear it could cause serious injury and is "tantamount to torture."
The mechanism, known as an "Assault Intervention Device," is a stripped-down version of a military gadget that sends highly focused beams of energy at people and makes them feel as though they are burning. The Los Angeles County sheriff's department plans to install the device by Labor Day, making it the first time in the world the technology has been deployed in such a capacity.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California criticized Sheriff Lee Baca's decision in a letter sent Thursday, saying that the technology amounts to a ray gun at a county jail. The 4-feet-tall weapon, which looks like a cross between a robot and a satellite radar, will be mounted on the ceiling and can swivel.
It is remotely controlled by an operator in a separate room who lines up targets with a joystick.
The ACLU said the weapon was "tantamount to torture," noting that early military versions resulted in five airmen suffering lasting burns. It requested a meeting with Baca, who declined the invitation.
The sheriff unveiled the device last week and said it would be installed in the dorm of a jail in north Los Angeles County. It is far less powerful than the military version and has various safeguards in place, including a three-second limit to each beam of heat.
The natural response when blasted — to leap out the way — would be helpful in bringing difficult inmates under control and quelling riots, the sheriff said.
But the sheriff was creating a dangerous environment with "a weapon that can cause serious injury that is being put into a place where there is a long history of abuse of prisoners," ACLU attorney Peter Eliasberg said. "That is a toxic combination."
Cmdr. Bob Osborne, who oversees technology for the sheriff's department, said the concerns were unfounded. He said he stood in front of the beam more than 50 times and that it never caused any sort of lasting damage.
"The neat thing with this device is you experience pain but you are not injured by it," Osborne said. "It doesn't injure your skin, the beam doesn't have the power to do that."
He said the device would be a more humane way of dealing with jail disturbances. Unlike hitting inmates with batons or deploying tear gas, a shot from the beam has no aftereffects, he said.
The device was made specifically for the sheriff's department by Raytheon Missile Systems. Sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said its $750,000 cost was paid for by a Department of Justice technology grant.
After a six-month trial, the sheriff will determine if the device is effective and if it should be deployed in other jails.
"When this pilot program is done, the realistic hope is it will accomplish not only what the sheriff's department wants but what the ACLU wants, which is to save lives harmlessly," Whitmore said.
A Raytheon spokesman on Thursday referred questions to the sheriff's department, but provided a fact sheet describing how the device only penetrates skin to a depth 1/64 of an inch. The military's version of the device can shoot a beam more than 800 feet but the sheriff's department model has a maximum range of 85 feet.
Angelica Arias, an attorney with the county's Office of Independent Review, which monitors the sheriff's department, said only deputies with special training would be able to use the device and a video would be automatically recorded each time it is operated.
"Based on the level of scrutiny the department has put on itself and its training, it doesn't appear there would be too much wiggle room for misuse," Arias said.
So, yeah, let's take a device that causes intense pain but leaves no physical evidence and put it in the hands of prison guard who can't even see the people they're shooting with it.
Better idea, let's give one to Sheriff Joe and see what he can do with it.
Taramoor on
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On the other hand, I guess police officers need some kind of disciplinary tool or device, right? I guess? A device that is unable to cause permanent physical injury (short of causing the person to leap into a spike or something) is simultaneously frightening and oddly comforting. No physical evidence of its use (aside from a recording) is a bit unnerving, but the physical evidence in this case is bodily harm, isn't it?
According to the article, a video will be recorded every time it is used. Also, the beam can only be used for a maximum of three seconds per shot. I am skeptical but not ready to write it off as a bad idea just yet.
I mean I'm finding it hard to think of disciplinary technology that is misuse-proof.
My main concern is that the device was originally conceived and designed as a tool for peaceably dispersing large crowds of people. If they're putting it in a prison dorm it is being set up as a punishment tool to be fired at people who can't get away.
And time limits (like the ones on tasers) and video cameras (like the ones on dashboards) have been known to malfunction to an almost unprecedented degree when in the hands of police officers. It's the damnedest thing.
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But I think they're going to run into the same problem that we are increasingly seeing with abuse of tasers, which is that the dude in the other room with the joystick in hand is going to gradually become complacent with the alleged safety of his weapon. Three seconds will turn to six seconds will turn to "whatever the operator deems necessary," and it's all fun and games until someone's eyeball pops, the vitreous humor all dripping down from the hideously sagging crumpled thing in the empty eye socket. That's actually my best hope for this, is that it will end with a really gross failure that turns into a ridiculous media circus, and nip in the bud the likely plans to put this device into service as a hippie-extinguisher.
Someone being hit in the eye was my first thought, too.
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
The human body is an interesting thing, and I have zero problem believing it's possible to cause pain without the potential for actual injury.
Of course, I too am not willing to take it on faith that this thing fits the bill.
Anything that can be used to disperse a crowd can be used to pacify it as well. Obviously we're getting into the classic debate over whether "pain compliance" is a valid technique, but I really don't see how you can pacify an unruly mob of prisoners any other way. You've got either straight physical force (beating), tasers, gas, guns (beanbag or otherwise), magic heat ray, or asking pretty please nicely.
One of these will be ineffective. Guess which. All of the rest cause pain.
I'd be willing to bet that continued exposure moves what feels like burning to actual burning.
Much like tazers are way safer than other methods until the various jackasses get a hold of them and just keep shocking someone.
Cookies?
EDIT: There are, of course, the obvious improvements to our prison system to make any such disturbances less common. But disturbances would still happen, and you still need a way to get them under control, so the entire principle behind this device still stands.
Eliminate crime.
I'll get right on the internet petition.
As far as a device for prison control, it seems like being a giant robot ray gun hardwired to the ceiling may help rein in abuse a little? Maybe? I'd be more worried if it was a hand-gun that could be taken into a back room somewhere and used in secret. It's at least possible that its existence could be a net positive.
Then again, it's possible that the existence of tasers could be a net positive, and yet I'm relatively unconvinced of that.
How do they deal with it right now?
I don't think the argument is that we shouldn't hurt prisoners during a hypothetical riot, but that invisible burn rays from the sky cross the line of what is acceptable, in the same way that waterboarding isn't acceptable in interrogation, but other forms of physicality are.
Although I am sure the need for fire turrets wouldn't be so urgent if we could stop putting so many people into jail.
God, I fucking hate Lee Baca.
There doesn't seem to be any way this isn't going to be abused, but it could certainly be worse. And, well, I can see the argument for such an installation. I'm not comfortable with it, but still.
Good for the environment.
See my other post. Pepper spray, CS gas, rubber bullets, beanbag guns...maybe Tasers? And good ol' fashioned ass-whuppin, too. All of which cause pain (often nearly unbearable pain) and most of which carry greater potential for injury. Oh, and most of which continue to hurt after you stop applying them...an important point.
So using CS gas, pepper spray, physical beating, or Tasers are valid during an interrogation? I'm pretty sure every last one of them can be considered torture, just like waterboarding.
Again, any other method of breaking up unruly and (potentially or currently) violent inmates is going to have a significant risk of injury, cause intense pain, or both. This probably has the least risk of injury and causes the least lasting pain of any of them.
The only real question is how it's used (or rather when). If we're talking about breaking up brawls, riots, or other general disturbances in which physical force is already warranted? Great. Good idea, go forth. If we're talking about using it because an inmate got "lippy?" No good, just like when Tasers get overused out in "the world."
Of course, this method is unique compared to all of the aforementioned methods in that it leaves no injuries (thus would be harder to notice)...it's not like pepper spray, gas, and good ol' fashioined assbeating isn't already abused by officers in our prisons. So you rig it so that it records any uses, inspect it regularly, blah blah blah. You can mitigate the risk of abuse to the extent that it's not much more likely to be abused than any other form of force used in a prison environment.
Well yeah. But even in relatively well-maintained and normally-populated jails you're going to get disturbances, and they're going to need to get broken up. So again, what do we use? Cookies? Or beating their ass? What's better that this?
EDIT: I mean, the motherfuckers are already on time-out. Maybe spanking?
Those are actually very different situations. A prison riot is a situation in which people are, or will soon, be seriously injured. And breaking up the riot by conventional means already carries risks of injury to the inmates or guards.
An interrogation involves an already-restrained guy who is currently posing no threat to anyone in a situation where time is at far less of a premium. Barring hypothetical situations that rarely show up outside of Hollywood, of course.
There is no justifiable reason to create a policy of harming (or risking harm upon) a person during interrogation. There are justifiable reasons to have a policy of harming (or risking harm upon) people who are currently going berserk in a confined space.
Didn't the article say that some subjects experienced severe lasting burns?
edit: n/m, that was an early version of the more powerful military version
Yeah, I'd kinda hope this isn't something that would have to be explained.
I'm worried about operational creep, though. How long before these get mounted on police vehicles to use against protesters? And before someone says "better than tear gas" again I'll bet this will be used in conjunction with existing methods. The police haven't lost any of their other weapons when they were issued tasers and pepper spray. Hitting big crowds with this thing seems like it could be just as good at starting riots as stopping them.
So neat, being able to inflict pain without evidence. So neat.
Our jails are shit, but this isn't the answer.
Nitrous huh?
Maybe they could play some Pink Floyd too.
I've had the same thought too. I'm not sure why they aren't trying something along those lines.
Probably doesn't work too well outside.
That wouldn't do much against 200 rioting prisoners, would it? The initial reports claim that the prisoners just exploded.
We could start by making the prisons less shitty so this shit wouldn't happen.
If a riot starts in a prison and they just start blasting it seems that it either would create a situation of more widespread panic, or it would just disable SOME of the prisoners leaving them at the mercy of others who are perhaps more determined or more violent, since obviously you wouldn't want guards to run the risk of being caught in the line of fire.
If, however, it's not going to be used on riots, but on prisoners who are already within their cells and are simply be uncooperative... then it turns into something akin to tasing someone for not responding quickly enough or not showing proper respect.
Part of what I wasn't sure about was the area where it was installed. It says it was in one of the dormitories, which to me conjurs up an image of a huge block of individual cells, but I suppose it could also be just rows of beds like a hostel.
I just have trouble conjuring up a situation where this thing would not be ripe for abuse.
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The problem with both this and tear gas compared to this system is twofold-
-Dose. What's disabling to one person may not affect a second and could be toxic to a third.
-Linger time: once this thing is off, its off. Gas hangs around.
But yes. Pain ray that leaves no marks? In a prison, where no one is going to believe the inmates if they claim they're being abused? Yeah, this will not end well.
Or you could just grab them and shove them around. The goal isn't to brutalize the prisoners, it's to disperse them, and forcing them out of the communal area seems to be the most direct way to accomplish that goal, with riot shields to prevent counterattack and restraints being added liberally.
If you want to be all technological, you could just put rare earth metals in their shoes and keep electromagnets in the floors.
This may or may not be a viable alternative. Do you know what the average prisoner:guard ratio is in a prison? Riot shields aren't magical, and by the time you're considering the magic pain beam you're probably well past the "grab them and shove them around" stage. Because yes, they do that in prisons already. Things like CS gas and the like are for when that's no longer an option.
I have a feeling this is going to be one of those threads where a bunch of people pontificate about potentially life-threatening situations like they're no big deal, and as if they know what the fuck they're talking about.
EDIT: Though I'll admit that the only knowledge I have of prisons and prison riots is all second-hand.
I'm not exactly an expert on biology, but to my understanding, when dealing with the human bodym pain serves one major function: to tell you that you are being physically damaged.
But I love this idea, it move us one step closer to a distopyin future where implants that would give you psychic powers are a reality !!