So, I kind of mocked this story yesterday, but today an interesting twist has emerged which puts the story in an entirely different light. This week, CNet reported a story about how Apple is working with the San Francisco Police Department to retrieve a lost iPhone 5 prototype. The police and Apple apparently traced the phone to someone’s house, and showed up on his doorstep, threatening him and his family. The only problem – the SFPD has no record of any house search or of the case in general – raising the question whether Apple employees falsely impersonated the SFPD, which happens to be a serious crime in California. Update: While I was busy sleeping, the story changed a little bit, but it’s still far too shady. After conferring with Apple, the SFPD now states four police officers were involved, and that only the two Apple employees entered Calderon’s house. However, Calderon had no idea these two were private non-police people, since he claims they did not identify themselves as Apple employees. Had he known, he would not have let them search his house. So, update or no, Apple employees still impersonated police officers, and issued threats to intimidate Calderon into letting them search his house – without a warrant. I don’t understand how people can just accept this sort of behaviour. Don’t you have rights in the US? Update II: Perfect summary.
After CNet’s story broke, the SF Weekly contacted Sergio Calder~A^3n to talk over what the heck happened that day. He details how six officials, four men and two women, claiming to be of the San Francisco Police Department showed up on his doorstep, claiming they traced the GPS signal of the lost iPhone 5 prototype to his house. The six officials asked if Calder~A^3n had been at the bar where the prototype was lost, and indeed, Calder~A^3n had been there.
The officials then asked if everyone in Calder~A^3n’s house was staying in the US legally, and that the family could get into trouble. Even though Calder~A^3n and his entire family are legal citizens of the United States, he got nervous and allowed the six officials to search his house, car, and his computer. They found nothing.
They then offered Calder~A^3n $300 if he returned the phone. “They made it seem like they were on the phone with the owner of the phone, and they said, ‘The person’s not pressing charges, they just want it back, and they’ll give you $300,'” he told SF Weekly.
As the officials left, one of them, ‘Tony’, gave him a phone number he could call if he had further information about the phone. SF Weekly decided to call this number, and it was answered by Anthony Colon, who confirmed he was an employee of Apple. His LinkedIn site, which has since been taken down (SF Weekly has screenshots of the profile), confirms that Colon is ‘senior investigator’ at Apple. He is a former San Jose Police sergeant.
The problem with all this is that the San Francisco Police Department has nothing on record about the search, or even about any case in general. This raises the question if Apple employees falsely impersonated police officers, while also threatening an innocent family. Both of these are serious crimes, said SFPD spokesman Lt. Troy Dangerfield.
“This is something that’s going to need to be investigated now. If this guy is saying that the people said they were SFPD, that’s a big deal,” he said, “There’s something amiss here. If we searched someone’s house, there would be a police report.”
This could turn out to be real bad for Apple. If Apple employees indeed falsely impersonated police officers and threatened an innocent family, these employees could be in serious trouble – let alone the damage it would do to Apple’s image. Of course, there’s always the possibility of something being wrong in the bureaucratic chain of the SFPD, but even if there was no paper trail, at least someone would know about it.
I honestly do not think this is some sort of official policy at Apple, but policy or no, there could apparently be a climate within the company where something like this is possible. This case suddenly turned into something very interesting.
If this is true, someone at Apple obviously needs to be canned.
Why are Apple employees leaving their so called secretive IPhone “prototypes” in bars? To see if they will work in a bar? Are they testing the drink apps?
Why are Apple employees moonlighting as “police officers?” Are they pulling people over on the road to verify their IPhones hasn’t been “jailbroken?” If they need to serve a search warrant on someones home to look for a missing IPhone, do they remember to remove the Apple logo letterhead from the documentation?
Boy….
Android has them rattled…..
It’s not true. The SFPD did come to the house.
How does this have anything to do with Android? Apple was like this before Android and it will be like this after Android.
Wow, that’s scary if they really did go to the house and are now denying it!
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/09/lost_iphone_5_apple.php
—
UPDATE, 11:42 A.M.: Lt. Troy Dangerfield of the SFPD called to clarify his above statements: The police will only investigate if Calder~A^3n chooses to speak with them directly and share information about the people who came to his house. (So far, the SFPD has not spoken to Calder~A^3n, but only learned of his story through SF Weekly.) “If the person is reporting that people misrepresented themselves as San Francisco police officers, that’s something we will need to investigate,” Dangerfield says. “We take people representing themselves as police officers very seriously.”
—
Do you think it’s because of the offer of $300 for the return of the phone?
(Same source as above)
—
“They made it seem like they were on the phone with the owner of the phone, and they said, ‘The person’s not pressing charges, they just want it back, and they’ll give you $300,'” he recalled.
As the visitors left, one of them — a man named “Tony” — gave Calder~A^3n his phone number and asked him to call if he had further information about the lost phone. Calder~A^3n shared the man’s phone number with SF Weekly.
The phone was answered by Anthony Colon, who confirmed to us he is an employee of Apple but declined to comment further. According to a public profile on the website LinkedIn, Colon, a former San Jose Police sergeant, is employed as a “senior investigator” at Apple.
Dangerfield said police plan to look into Calder~A^3n’s allegations.
“There’s something amiss here. If we searched someone’s house, there would be a police report,” Dangerfield said.
Apple’s media-relations department did not return calls for comment.
Since the SFPD disavowed any knowledge of the search for the phone, some tech reporters have speculated that the story of the lost phone was a hoax or publicity stunt engineered by Apple. CNET based its report on a single anonymous source “familiar with the investigation.”
—
Why do you think they had a retired cop with them who says that he works for Apple? Should we get Patrick Jane and the CBI to investigate this since it overlaps the jurisdictions of Cupertino, SF and San Jose? I’ll bet he’ll crack this case and we can all watch it on iTunes for only $0.99! Wouldn’t that be great!!
I see that there is new news now:
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/09/iphone_5_apple_police.p…
And I also see that they didn’t update the earlier article, which might have saved me from being such an ass if they had.
Or not … <(^B)<
But I’d at least like to think I wouldn’t have been such an ass if corrected coverage had been linked to the original article.
I think you work for apple. I think you are the employ that lost his phone and I think your the one who Falsely Represented themselves as a Police Officers. That or your just an Apple fan boy. Probably that later.
Not making any excuses for Apple, but the guy shouldn’t be letting anybody search his place unless they have a proper search warrant. Not even if they were real cops.
If apple have indeed impersonated the Police dept, then they’d have already forged clothing, badges, cars, radio equitment etc so I’d expect them to have also forged documents relating to arrest warrents, search warrents, illegal migrants etc all ready to pull out of the bag if need be…
Social engineering, the easiest hack to pull off.
See that sounds more like an Israeli Mossad or FSB team. If a team of Apple investigators could pull off fake uniforms, car, authentic looking badges and papers then we really would be in a Shadowrun world. Even the Mafia would have a hard time getting that much stuff together. It’s not as easy as they make it look in the movies.
Plus this lead investigator guy obviously isn’t that bright giving out his real phone number, then admits he’s an Apple employee. This man is going to jail.
Edited 2011-09-03 00:12 UTC
Investigators just wear normal clothing and drive unmarked vehicles.
While Calderon shouldn’t have let the faux-officers in his house so willingly (does that mean people out there are so trusting of police?) the employees’ tactics far overshadow that.
I completely agree. That’s why I said I wasn’t making any excuses for Apple. The guy should file civil suits against the police and Apple for harassment.
To lose and possibly be forced to pay the defendants legal bills?
If he has a half decent lawyer, he doesn’t lose. Cops on his lawn with no search warrant and not there in any official capacity but to back up corporate private investigators, and Apple employees making racial remarks, comments about immigration status. No way, both of these entities would settle out of court.
That’s a shame though since it indirectly makes this ok behavior. I’ve always thought of this whole “settle out of court” business to be questionable and a net negative for justice.
It kind of depends how you look at it. There is the Gerald Ford principle to consider, ie. when he pardoned Nixon, he was criticized by everyone for it, because everybody wanted an overt admission of guilt, but they were never going to get it. Later in an interview with Woodward or somebody, he said the reason he did it was that Nixon, by accepting the pardon, was admitting guilt, though Richard himself probably didn’t even consider that, just thought it was a get out of jail free card.
And it could be treated the same on a smaller scale in a civil suit.
Edited 2011-09-05 05:40 UTC
I see your point but for much of the time it feels like legalized hush money.
Agreed, he should not have let them in, but they implied a deportation if he didn’t comply.
Cops can play very dirty games. And if you don’t know your rights, you’ll do almost anything to get them away from you.
Hell, even if you know your rights, you may let them do something they have no right to do.
One time I was at a strip bar and I walked out to my car to get another pack of smokes. The cops, driving through the parking lot at the time, stopped me and asked to search my car. My first thought was, “WTF, FU!”, but I knew if that was my response or even if it was a polite, “no, Sir”, I knew that I would be sitting there all night until they found a reason to search me.
So I gave in, let them search it, and got back to looking at titties.
Have I contributed to the “police state”? Yeah.
So I understand how one can be intimidated into doing something like this. It is also exactly why they said what they said to him: to intimidate him into letting them search his house. This happens all the time and the only reason we’re hearing about it, is because it has to do with an iPhone.
Welcome to the new world!
***
We help geeks get the girl of their dreams at http://www.eyesofodessa.com
Heh I understand. Personally I think it depends on which cops you’re talking about. I’ve had my car searched in Chicago for probable cause once, and even though there was nothing to find, Chicago cops are the LAST ones you want to argue with. Worse than LAPD really. But I think is a sad statement about San Francisco which is supposedly the progressive city that cares about its citizens, everybody’s about peace and love, city of tolerance all that, and it’s the same ole same ole there. Intimidate a guy because he’s a minority and everything…
Fact after fact, i finally came to a verdict: Apple high management went nuts.
That’s the sole explanation for their recent behavior. Not even Microsoft a decade ago dared that. Not even SCO… not even MPAA!
This story is not true.
The MPAA sues random innocent people – in their quest to snare the guilty – who can’t afford legal representation and are forced to give them money. It’s legal extortion.
Microsoft forced companies to not carry competing operating system and software. This illegal behavior shaped the computer industry for two decades and still continues to impact it.
Apple makes shiny phones. If you don’t like Apple don’t buy Apple but please don’t start foaming at the mouth without justification.
No one has a problem with Apple making shiny phones. What people do have a problem with is Apple abusing legal system to stop others from making shiny phones and Apple corrupting police to illegally break into people’s house.
It sounds like one of the investigators was a cop a year before he was hired as an investigator for Apple. My guess is that he was over zealous and very convincing.
I am guessing that Steve’s reality distortion field resigned too ; )
Indeed. Seems like the guy read too many Mike Hammer novels or something while he was a cop and decided to try it out for real in the private sector.
This must of been the “cop car”…..
https://www.facebook.com/tonycolonjr#!/profile.php?id=10000154933179…
The US isn’t officially run by corporate interests but it’s close enough.
Actually, according to SCOTUS, companies are people too so it’s only a matter of time before the US is officially run by companies.
I am not sure I’d like to live in Google town though. The wifi would be free and it would be super fast but the toilets would all be beta models and would ‘crash’ 50% of the time.
And Apple town would be like a Nazi Germany. Everything works perfectly. Everything is smooth. All the “unwanted” elements removed.
Whoops, I think you just lost the argument.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law
Both because I hate the god damn company and their disgusting, self-righteous, locked-down ways, and I’d like to stop hearing about the assholes for a change…
I honestly couldn’t give a rat’s ass less about Apple, though I wish them the worst, and hope that one day they’re not in the news so f***ing much… of course, that would require them to stop being douchebags, and what are the chances of that ever happening?
Yeah, I know this post is going to be modded to hell and back. But that doesn’t change the fact that as far as I’m concerned, hell is exactly where Apple can go for all I care.
Edited 2011-09-02 23:22 UTC
No, it would just require people like Thom to stop turning sites like OSAlert into their own personal, political blogs, and stop posting articles that have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with tech. Obviously, this is a case for the authorities to deal with, and only showed up here because it involves Apple.
Very true. I just don’t get what his fascination with Apple is. I think we all get it by now (except for the many clueless Apple fans out there), they’re the equivalent of Microsoft just a decade (or less) ago when it comes to disgusting business (and legal) practices. Does anyone really care any more? Just boycott their damn products! Easy for me to do, considering I never bought a single Apple product in my life and therefore never had the chance to be locked into it or their furious OS update release cycle ($$$).
Hopefully Steve Jobs’ successor runs the business into the ground. I’ve been waiting for him to quit and the company to eventually start its inevitable downward fall.
Edited 2011-09-02 23:36 UTC
It’s not really a fascination with Apple, but he’s more of a ‘corporate watchdog’, if you will. Meaning, he feels like it is his responsibility to report to the rest of us every time he discovers that a tech company is behaving badly. You know, like maybe how your little sister would run and tattle on you when you were younger, if she caught you looking at dirty magazines.
Not that there’s not a need for this kind of thing, but for people like me who hate politics, it’s goddamn annoying to see this bullshit on technology blogs, instead of political blogs, where it belongs.
Edited 2011-09-03 08:55 UTC
True, true… once again, good point. It just sucks that the place of this bullshit has to be OSAlert.com.
Please bear in mind that the huge corporations all have an enormous weight on the politics, whether you like to hear it or not.
And for your own concern, remember that buying a product from a company is pratically empowering that company to put pressure where it pleases to make its business revenue higher. So buying is like voting in a sense.
So, no.. I don’t consider this kind of news as out of place on a tech news site.
No, I have the feeling Apple is worse than Microsoft.
But many people already expected that.
NO SHIT, SHERLOCK.
Are you one of those people that think that tech is isolated from the rest of the world? Politics do have an effect on tech. Law does affect tech. And since tech is everywhere today, a lot of things have an affect on tech…
Sure, a lot of things have an effect on tech, but a lot of the crap that gets posted here and elsewhere (like this very article) has nothing whatsoever to do with tech.
Ok, to be fair this article may have a VERY lose association with the iPhone 5 prototype, for which absolutely no information was given. The only reason Thom posted it is to offer up a rant about a possible illegal search of somebody’s home that took place.
Was the rant justified on this site? Well, if this had been Toyota losing a new car prototype and two of their employees did a (possible) illegal search in somebody’s garage, would it belong on a car enthusiast website, especially when no new information on the model (which everybody knew was coming out soon anyway) was learned from the story?
It sure as hell belongs on a tech site when the world’s largest technology company does something illegal.
If you don’t like news like this, THEN DON’T READ IT. Considering all the comments you put into this already, me thinks you are more interested in this than you care to admit.
In complete agreement.
Note: I may not agree all the time with Thom, but for anyone to violate someone’s homeplace under false pretense and accusation is wrong.
Someone needs to go back and see why this was the case in American history. And reread the Fourth Amendment again and again and again.
Certain Democrats, Republicans, and judges as well need to understand this, that regardless of terrorism, war, corporate interests, and other matters that protecting the rights of the citizens comes before all else.
You may want to reread the 4th amendment yourself. According to this story that’s from some other blog, the person consented to a search. He’s not protected by the 4th amendment since he consented. lol The coppers can make up all sort of nonsense to try to get you to consent.
I agree. These kind of news are important and relevant to the technology world.
And I really don’t understand these members of your creepy fan club. Apparently they hate your “corporate watchdog” articles with a passion, yet they choose to read them every time (the headlines make it pretty clear what the articles are about). Because judging by their comments, it’s obvious they read them. Why would any sane person voluntarily do something they diskile so much? Well, normal people take medicine that tastes like shit, but only because its’ good for them. So, either these guys deep inside believe these articles are good, or they simply are fixated on you. I’d say it’s the latter.
Edit: typos.
Edited 2011-09-03 16:35 UTC
I skimmed thru the article summary and saw the blurb about the iPhone prototype – THAT is what interested me.
It would be easier to only report on the technology, if the technology companies only did technology.
I have no idea what they are doing now, it has nothing to do with technology.
I don’t care what apple does! I like my SanitryPad. I mean iPad.
Another facepalm moment… brought to you by Apple.
It’s been confirmed that the SFPD were the ones who came to this persons house with Apple security staff.
Apple employees did not impersonate the SFPD.
Maybe you could provide some credible sources for that information then.
Google News is your friend.
The OMG WTF aspect of this story is that apparently the SFPD guys (of whom there were 3-4) were just ‘assisting’ on this and the Apple security guys were in charge.
The SFPD has already changed their story once so it’s likely this tale has a bit of a ways to go.
That’s what they’re saying here:
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/09/iphone_5_apple_police.p…
Though it’s just made shadier by the fact that now they’re saying only Apple employees went in the house despite being with police detectives, and still no mention of a real search warrant.
Apparently he let them into his house so they were able to enter without a warrant.
However, it’s just weird that the SFPD would send 3-4 detectives to help a company search for a $500 device.
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Really it’s the guy’s fault for simply not telling them “no”. But still these Apple employees and the cops handled this improperly. If Apple thinks somebody has stolen property, they’re supposed to report it to the police and let them handle an investigation just like the rest of us would have to do. I’m pretty sure you’re not going to just let me shake down your place just because I get the notion you stole my phone.
The cops shouldn’t have been there at all unless they were on an official investigation. This is shadier than usual business by Apple, but the guy allowed himself to be taken advantage of, despite not even having the phone.
Actually it’s not uncommon for the police to intervene in this manner.
One of the people that works for me had their house broken into and some laptops stolen. The buyer of the stolen laptop contacted them looking for the password. When they told her the laptop was stolen she offered to sell it back to them. They contacted the police and the police came with them to meet the seller and recover the laptop (and also arrest the seller for trafficking in stolen property).
So having the Police assist you in recovering stolen property is not the weird. Having the police facilitate the search of a suspects house by corporate employees is what’s weird about this.
That’s what I was wondering about: the police should have clearly indicated that the Apple employees were not police forces and that the person in the story could have just said “no” when asked for permission to enter.
While the Apple employees didn’t do anything wrong in terms of the law they too still crossed the amoral boundary when they didn’t tell the person in the story that they’re just working for Apple and have no law enforcement capabilities.
Apple won’t get anything bad out of this except for a little bit of bad PR for a while, it doesn’t seem they did anything illegal, however I don’t know if the police officers can be sanctioned in any way over not informing the person of his rights.
But consent may be invalidated if it was made under duress or coercion.
I’m speaking from my experience as a law enforcement employee (but not an officer) AND on the assumption that the SFWeekly article and blog posts are accurate:
Yes, they should have. The police are in the wrong by misrepresenting the entire group as SFPD. Even if they didn’t say “we’re all cops” they should have been clear from the start that they were merely assisting citizens in what my agency calls a “stand-by”. Basically the officers should only have been there to keep the peace if things got ugly between one group of citizens asking another citizen for their property back.
Also, Mr. Calderon could have refused entry to any of them including the real officers, as they had no warrant and in fact no report had been filed yet (according to the department’s own statements). He seemed to be aware of his rights based on statements made to the news media, but was afraid to because of the intimidation tactics of the fake cops.
I think they did break the law, with the help of the real cops, by misrepresenting themselves as badged, mandated officers of SFPD. The intimidation in order to gain entry might also be enough for them to be charged; I’m not familiar with California law but most states have similar laws regarding threats and intimidation under color of law, whether the color of law is legitimate or implied strongly enough to trick the victim into waiving their rights.
Apple most certainly broke the law if everything Mr. Calderon and the SFPD sergeant said is true. Whether or not Apple gets a slap on the wrist or serious criminal charges, they certainly did set themselves up for a nasty lawsuit based on a gross infringement of Mr. Calderon’s fourth amendment (security from illegal search and seizure) and fourteenth amendment (due process under the law) rights. Ditto for SFPD, who in the very least appear to have four very stupid cops in their employ. It’s possible the agency may even be complicit in this scheme, given their reluctance to even admit it happened.
I really hope this blows up in Apple’s face and becomes a major shitstorm for them. The way they have been acting lately, they seem to think the law (local or European) doesn’t apply to them. I’m sick to death of the company; I think they just surpassed Sony on my Evil Empire list.
——-
As an aside, I seriously wonder if Jobs left purely for health reasons. Perhaps he didn’t like the way his company seems to be run by lawyers and crooked investigators now, and either left in disgust or was pushed out.
If it was the police officers who represented themselves as SFPD the Apple employees could just be quiet and let the man think they’re also officers. In that way they wouldn’t actually have said they are officers, they would only be guilty of not saying who they are, and could possibly get scott-free in court. That’s what I meant with my previous comment.
The officers would have been clearly in the wrong according to Finnish laws, but I really don’t know about the local laws and how strict people are. But if any of the news items about police officers doing something wrong in the US in general are any indication they’ll at most be suspended for a month.
By acting under the color of law to deprive a homeowner’s fourth amendment rights, the Apple Employees, and Apple by extension of the doctrine of respondeat superior for vicarious liability, could have breached 42 USC 1983, a civil liability in tort. Thus, the homeowner could nab Apple for punitive damages. IANAL.
>> but the guy allowed himself to be taken advantage of, despite not even having the phone.
So, by your logic, if I suddenly punch you in the face it would be *your* fault for leaving it in the wrong place… amazing…
If it was in a boxing ring, then… yeah
It does sound like the individual didn’t know his own constitutional rights – which is really a shame.
He surely does know his rights. Probably he also knows that letting them search a phone he doesn’t even have might be better than playing ‘Johnny the Tough Guy’ and having them come back with a warrant and a grudge.
WTH kind of analogy is that? It’s more like if I think you stole my phone, and I ask your permission to search your house and your car, you gonna let me in? There’s no difference here. The cops weren’t coming in anyway because they weren’t there in an official capacity and these Apple people had no authority. Let them get a warrant, and in the meanwhile, you’re calling a lawyer over to make sure everything is legal. Those Apple employees have NO business in his house or car, regardless. You don’t have to be a tough guy to call BS when you see it. These are Apple security people, not the Mob. You tell them to leave, and if they don’t want to, you can have those cops that are just standing around anyway arrest them. If they won’t, then you call the police yourself.
And no update from hoax issuer Tom?
In fairness to Thom on this everyone jumped on this story because, you know, it’s Apple.
Not me. I’d jump on a story like this anytime a corporation is throwing it’s weight around like this. Bad enough they control Congress, but they want take it to the streets too? The corporations haven’t completely bought and paid for this country yet.
lol Well, it is, what, 3AM in the Netherlands right now on a Friday night? No doubt, the bars are closing about now, and people filing over to whatever restaurants are still open.
1) It’s not a hoax.
2) I actually need sleep to stay pretty.
how many of the posters here and elsewhere who has no problem with what happened. They’re not even question what happened. “He let them in, No harm done” etc. That’s seriously fscked up. If you have no issue with the police, on or off duty, escorting someone to your home, ID’ing themselves and just letting that person rummage around you might as well move to North Korea.
…those saying “the guy should have said ‘no’ and shut the door in their faces”… I^A'd love to see how many of them DO really have the b*lls to do it, let alone being a Latino with a family to look out for…
Look away now if facts offend
Turns out this story was not true – see
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/09/iphone_5_apple_police.p…
Uhm, see the update. The story IS true.
No one, with a brain, would ever buy apple stuff.
start counting the brainless . . . . . . .
No one with a brain would talk to the cops without a lawyer present or give consent to the cops to search their house.
Apple notice board
Dear employee
From now on end Apple prototypes is prohibited from entering establishments where alcoholic beverages is sold.
Thank you
Apple notice board;-)
Please be aware to be in proper uniform of a police officer when conducting illegal searches and seizures of American citizens homes for missing or jailbroken Apple products. (Other countries do not apply).
I don’t understand, if the Police where there, then they obviously allowed the Apple employee’s to enter the house to help with the search.
If anyone is at fault here, it’s the police department for allowing the Apple employee’s in. Maybe the police asked the employee’s to help find the prototype, perhaps the prototype looks very much like and iPhone 4 or even 3GS etc…
I think again WE are all jumping up and down trying to be anti Apple without all the facts. Once ALL the facts are in, then maybe we should comment on such things…
If it turns out Apple is in the wrong, then they should reap the consequences. Isn’t there a innocent until proven guilty in the US?
Honestly, even though I love Apple stuff (mainly), I am not trying to back what Apple may or may not have done, just saying, lets wait until the jury is in… I am sure most of us here would hate to be misinterpreted by the press, I am sure most of us here have knowledge on how easily facts are thrown away to make a great story…
If it turns out Apple is in the wrong, then they should reap the consequences. Isn’t there a innocent until proven guilty in the US?
That is correct, however, say that in the circumstance of the person who had their home violated without a warrant. by the government.
Was he guilty of a crime? No. Was he manipulated by law enforcement and Apple employees to gain access to the house? Yes.
So in his circumstance, he was guilty before innocent. Did he have the phone? No.
The cops don’t need a warrant when someone consents to the search. The cops can try to manipulate you and lie to you.
Even if this story is true, nothing illegal even occurred.
In Chicago, police corruption stems from the Mob. In San Francisco, it comes from Silicon Valley.
Let’s put things into perspective…we’re talking about a cell phone here. Not the secret plans for a deadly weapon of mass destruction. This is just one more reason of many that I won’t purchase or use Apple products.
The law in this country has been set up to keep the weak and the poor … weak and poor. God knows corporations and the rich have spent enough money on “campaign contributions” (formerly known as bribes) to make it so.
If there is an investigation, it will be a whitewash of Apple and the SF police. No matter the outcome, it won’t hurt Apple, they can throw their employees to the dogs and replace them in hours.
“What goes around comes around.” Which is true, I know from my own life. Hurts like hell, too. As many have pointed out, the best way to make it come around is to not buy Apple products or patronize Apple services and encourage others to follow that lead. That’s about the only effective way to make Apple pay.
A large local company goes to the cops and say ‘we think an important prototype of one of most important products has been stolen and is in this house’. The local cops go to house along with a couple of reps from the company and the cops lean on the guy living at the house, no doubt using their years of cop experience of exactly how to lean on someone, to convince them to allow a search. The guy agrees. Having got the owners permission to search the cops ask the company reps to look around and see if they can see the missing item, an item which the cops presumably might well have trouble identifying on their own.
Frankly I can’t see anything there to get excited about. Sure cops should in theory always work exactly within the rules and go out of their way to tell suspects their full rights and not try to talk anybody our of exercising their rights but you know and I know that cops don’t work like this and if they did then a lot more bad people would get away with a lot more bad stuff. Cops get adept at bending the rules. That’s just the way the world is.
The only reason this is a news item is because the company’s name is Apple and a small but very vocal group of people are very Apple phobic and get very, very excited when Apple is mentioned especially if it is the context of some possible misdeed by the company.
Pathetic.
For god’s sake grow up.
I’m hoping one of these days the cops show up on your doorstep threatening your family, and then have people tell you it’s okay for the police to do so.
Holy crap, you Apple cultists scare the living fcuk out of me. You people are sick.
Looks lets leave the dramatic show of indignation for the kids shall we. We both know cops spend their whole day bending rules and manipulating people, that’s how they get their job done, this involves amongst other things mild deception, deception by omission, invoking threats, talking up the bad consequences of not cooperating, pressurising people through force of personality and through numbers. It goes on day and day out. If it didn’t the cops couldn’t get their job done. Sad but true. It’s also true that if this incident involved a stolen hi-fi, or stolen handbag, nobody would blink an eye. The only reason you splutter about this is because you are Apple phobic and this story pushes all your buttons. Grow up.
Maybe, just maybe, that’s because the police wouldn’t come to the rescue for ordinary citizens as they are doing for Apple. Just a guess though.
I sputter about this because it involves Apple? NO SHIT, SHERLOCK. Maybe that’s because, you know, THIS IS A TECH WEBSITE?
You apparently have no issues with living in a state where the police will trample all over your constitutional rights just to protect a company which, may I remind you, has pretty much offshored hundreds of thousands of American jobs to the Far East. You find that okay, and as such, you are part of the reason why America is in such a dire state right now.
Luckily, most of the reactions to this issue on the web have been very negative and condemning of both the police and Apple, which at least means there are a lot of Americans out there who do have two braincells to rub together and realise that this is entirely unacceptable.
Maybe, just maybe, that’s because the police wouldn’t come to the rescue for ordinary citizens as they are doing for Apple. Just a guess though. Of course not. If you are big, important, famous, well connected and law abiding you will get better service from the police services just like you will get better service from all other services. That’s just the way the world is. A huge local employer says a critically important prototype of a product worth billions in the market place may have been stolen and the cops respond with vigour – duh what did you expect them to do. This is the real world.
Here you go again ‘no issues with living in a state where the police will trample all over your constitutional rights ‘ Trampled all over constitutional rights? I say again grow up. Cops do this sort of stuff everyday in every country, nothing exceptional occurred here.
The real telling bit of your tirade is this gem “to protect a company which, may I remind you, has pretty much offshored hundreds of thousands of American jobs to the Far East. You find that okay, and as such, you are part of the reason why America is in such a dire state right now’
This is exactly what I mean, you have a big bone to pick with Apple so this unremarkable little incident is blow up in your mind to some sort of pivotal human rights abuse. It’s ridiculous.
I have a bone to pick with any company that does this sort of crazy shit. I’ve written countless similar stories about Microsoft, for instance, or Oracle, and Google, too.
YOU are the one with the Apple fixation, since YOU only see the Apple stories on this site. You have barely EVER made a non-Apple comment. So, who’s the one fixated on Apple here? Me, who has posted more than 10000 stories (excl. comments!), of which 99% are NOT about Apple – or you, who has never posted a comment NOT about Apple?
Sorry, but I think you might require a few glances in the mirror.
You are a troll and losing respect as a news site daily.
The police assist victims retrieve stolen cars, laptops, phones all the time. University police helped me retrieve a stolen laptop just six months ago after I tracked it down and asked what to do. And we approached it the same way, confronting the person so they could return my “lost” property without having to file charges.
Really is that why there has been no OSAlert story about the utter incompetence shown by the Dutch certificate provider Diginotar and the corrupt Dutch officials that tried to cover up the extent of the damage and which has affected every operating system with a browser to issue patches? That story has no news value compared to some propaganda swipe at Apple? If you really want to use the “this is appropriate because Apple is a tech company” line you really need to grow some self-awareness.
Also, name calling in caps makes you seem like a bigger douche than hopefully you are irl. Beginning to doubt that too.
A) The police did nothing but stand outside.
B) This guy apparently chose to let private citizens who accused him of theft into his house in order I suppose to prove his innocence.
C) If Apple employees pretended to be police, they are guilty of a serious crime. I have not seen any complaint made by this individual, have you? He was probably too busy trying to sell his story to engadget or gizmodo so they can take advantage of the foaming at the mouth fanboism of people like you to make a few bucks before people move on to the next bullshit story.
Please state which constitutional right was “trampled”. Also, would you have rather Apple didn’t call the police and instead raided the house with a gang in the middle of the night? Personally, I’m glad the police were there and not the opposite. By the way, do you ever let anything as simple as the facts stand in the way of your absurd grandstanding?
Yes it sure is a good thing that people who have no attention spans, apparently can’t read, and have zero common sense or understanding of the law agree with you. Yay, for PR spin masquerading as critical thought! Maybe you could emigrate to the US and run for political office in the Tea Party.
Fourth Amendment to U.S. Constitution:
“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
But maybe there was no iPh5 lost and it was all just a publicity stunt, with Apple figuring no one would care about a Latino. Probably go over big with the Limbaugh crowd.
Umm, not sure if you are trolling or are just as ignorant as Holwerda’s two brain cells he “rubs together.”
The protection against unreasonable/unwarranted search and seizure protects you from agents of the state not the actions of your fellow citizens.
The Constitution has pretty much nothing to say on the matter of Citizen Bob stealing Joe Citizen’s phone. Evidence unlawfully obtained from any defendant by a private person is generally admissible. So if Apple people had found the prototype they could have handed it over to the police and it would be used as evidence.
However, almost universally in the US, citizens lack the authority to conduct searches and seizures of the property of other citizens. Depending on the jurisdiction and circumstances that would be trespassing, b&e, assault, and larceny. None of which applies in this instance given the so far undisputed facts.
Have they given up on teaching even basic civics in American high schools? Probably have replaced it with a class to read Facebook’s privacy policy and terms of use. Or maybe they just watch a few episodes of Law & Order and call it good.
Civics was a required course in the 50s and 60s which I studied in grade school and junior high or high school (I’m over 60) and I did well, thanks. Is it OK for corporate goons abetted by agents of the state (the SF Police) pretend to be agents of the state and coerce U.S. citizens into “freely” allowing searches of their homes? Sounds like a corporatist/fascist wet dream to me. Something tells me that that is not what the framers of the U.S. Constitution had in mind. Your mileage may vary.
Since we’re in civics mode, as I recall it, the Boston Tea-Party affair had to do with the “sweetheart” relationship between the British Crown and the British East India Company. It was the B.E.I.C’s tea that was sent to a watery grave in Boston harbor. Destruction of sacred corporate property. How horrible!! Which led to still more repressive laws… which eventually led to the American Revolution. Don’t they teach anything about the British East India Company in American History anymore?
It’s more than a little interesting that the SF police seem to be having trouble coming up with a consistent story… And what has the Sacred Apple had to say? Nothing. Nothing at all. Apple’s silence on the incident is deafening.
Where’s the warrant? Where’s the paperwork for the reported stolen phone? On what grounds did they think that person had the phone? Why is the local police action as enforcers for a corporation? Why was it necessary to intimidate and threaten the person?
There’s just so many things wrong here it’s amazing people are defending it. Stop defending this kind of behavior just because it’s Apple.
Yea, right. That’s why. Not because there was a misconduct of justice. Right.
This is not an action movie where the good cops get away with this shit because it’s cool and because they’re chasing a bad guy (you know, a real bad guy, not someone who didn’t steal a phone). It’s real life. Grow up.
The cops aren’t obligated to tell anyone their rights unless they’re detaining them. So far, in this article, the coppers didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just that many in the comments section are ignorant on basic American law.
buttcoffee,
“So far, in this article, the coppers didn’t do anything wrong.”
I sincerely hope that you meant that they didn’t do anything *legally wrong* instead of *morally wrong*.
The cops shouldn’t have been there at all. If they didn’t have a search warrant, and weren’t prepared to conduct the search themselves, there’s no reason for them to be there. Unless of course they’re doing a little moonlighting on behalf of an old friend which we can either chalk up as abuse of power or flat out corruption if there was something in it for them.
What on earth are you talking about? What planet do you live on?
Thousands of times every day in every liberal democracy (all with high standards of human rights) cops go with people who have accused someone of stealing or damaging their stuff and knock on their doors and try to get to the bottom of what has been going on.
It’s one of the most basic and useful things cops do. What else do you think cops should do? They are there to make sure no arguments get out of hand, to see whether a crime has been committed or not and they try to get stuff resolved without being too formal or legalistic about it (they hate paper work like we all do).
As I said before this is just a big puff ball of excitement for those who want something to knock Apple with. It’s childish and pandering to it with an article just makes OS News look bad.
…and yet, it seems only the Apple fanatics such as yourself who defend this kind of behaviour.
Odd.
I note you don’t actually respond to the points I made but resort instead to trashy ad hominem tactics.
Odd.
While I admire your loyalty to Apple, I hope they’re paying you for all this mindless PR you provide for them. I said it before and I’ll say it again. If Apple wants to report a crime and let the police investigate, that’s within their rights. This however was just bully tactics, and not okay, no matter what corporation or entity does it. Just because the cops often abuse their power doesn’t mean people should just take it laying down. Wake the fsck up already. You can stop kissing Jobs’ arse any time now. He doesn’t care anyway, as long as you keep giving him your money.
As I said thousands of times every day people tell the cops someone has stolen, misappropriated or damaged their property and thousands of times a day the cops go with the complainant to visit the alleged perpetrator to try to resolve whether the complaint has any substance and to try to sort out what has happened. Don’t you guys get out at all – or at least watch any one of the dozens of cop reality shows? In this case the missing property was a prototype that whilst having a lot of value (as a prototype) would have been quite hard for the cops to recognise so it’s even more understandable that they took some technical help along. Jesus what a storm in a tea cup. What next – Apple employee double parks shock horror!
You didn’t even read the article, did you? You just fail to grasp the point completely, so desperate are you to vindicate Apple. The cops stayed OUTSIDE, didn’t take part in the search, and thus were unavailable while these corporate P.I.s were making racial remarks regarding immigration status to an individual simply because he’s a minority.
So one last time for posterity. No official criminal investigation means the cops shouldn’t have been there at all. A couple of pushy corporate gumshoes requesting their presences is not enough reason. And even thought the man unwisely allowed the search, that does not justify him becoming the victim of racial discrimination. And finally, the guy didn’t even have the GODDAMN PHONE at all. So all of this was for nothing. Is this really so hard for you to understand, or are you just pretending? RTFA again:
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/09/iphone_5_apple_police.p…
And pay attention to the details for christsake.
Umm, the police deal with 1000s of incidents that involve no criminal complaint, genius. Most incidents never involve criminal charges.
Do the rest of us a favor please. Call 911. Tell the police that you know your neighbor has stolen your tv and that you are going over to his house to demand you get it back no matter what. Give the address.
I’ll wager you lots of money the police show up without any criminal complaint because their job is to protect the peace.
Also when the police show up, pretend you have a gun. Please. Thanks.
It has very little to do with vindicating Apple’s actions. That would be up to them. The original poster impugned the motives of police and (apparently the rule of law in the US, lol) I still fail to see and you have not and most likely never will offer what exactly it is the police did wrong if the accounts given so far remain accurate.
You fail at the internet, btw.
Even though I know better than to debate with iFans (most of whom are just plain idiots, including yourself), I found the last sentence to be so out on left field that I couldn’t help myself.
Number one of what the police did wrong in this case is to properly and accurately present themselves and identify Apple employees as such! They deliberately mislead the owner of the house (or occupant) just to enable their old comrade to gain access to premises.
As for your stupid statement about police proactively taking measures, are you on some drugs or what?? Without probable cause police can only knock and ask couple of questions … politely, I might add otherwise they can be found to be in dereliction of duty, and I would sue them out of the job. People have called 911 while they were shot at and police has failed to show up on time, let alone plain cloth detectives.
This is all very simple really. An ex-cop called few of his buddies and asked for a favor, probably guaranteed that if it all turns up like he hoped they would get credits. The only smart thing those cops did was not enter the house themselves. Everything else was dumb. And yes, every time police is involved there has to be a report filled! No exceptions!
People who are actually working in law enforcement disagree with you.
http://www.osnews.com/permalink?488325
Would you be in here posting if this was Microsoft looking for their new Windows phone prototype, and we were all over their case about it?
what a dumbass. don’t let anyone in your house without seeing a badge. and a search warrant.
Officer Jobs: “Sir, step out of the car, please.”
“YOU WILL RESPECT MAH AUTHORI-TAH!”
What I like in particular about this article is how Apple could actually lose an iPhone 5 prototype. What is even more interesting is why the individual who supposedly found it, didn’t try and turn it into anyone. This whole affair sounds more like an attempt by Apple to boost public interest in their new product. If it is real, then Apple really needs to take a closer look at their whole security systems. Misplacing and loosing prototypes is ridiculous.
Yeah especially during the IFA, or right after the US launch of an Android Phone. Just glad I don’t live in the US, and that I get charged on unfair conversion rate when buying IT products.
The whole thing sounds like a very poorly thought out marketing stunt.
Apple has nice and good products. I can understand why people are carrying their money to the next Apple store to lower their equivalent of Thetan level. But Apple’s behavior is just plain unacceptable. How anyone can support this behavior is way beyond me. Is it just because they make pretty computers and cell phones?
You see an Apple thread here, and you think to yourself, “OMG! I gotta get in there and defend Apple otherwise it’s gonna be horrible. These people at OSAlert are sooooo mean!”
There’s another way this could go…. Apple could have contacted the DoJ directly and had the FBI crash down the doors with a proper search warrant, guns, and probably kill somebody. The family’s “copper based” assets would have been seized as evidence of criminal industrial spying, never to be returned. As Apple would have pulled out all those stops for nothing, the Feds would find “something” to put somebody in jail for… just for wasting Apple and the Feds time.
So instead of doing all that…. Apple choose to have the police “escort” them while “requesting” they look for the phone… because retrieving the property was the goal, not arresting anybody. I’ll venture when you compare stories that nobody from Apple’s team ACTUALLY SAID they were police officers.. and no POLICE officers searched entered the home without a warrant. I haven’t read any accounts to the contrary. Remember, Warrants only apply to CRIMINAL investigations… As Apple had not reported their device STOLEN the matter was not CRIMINAL but CIVIL and pretty much anything goes as this is just a dispute between private entities over a missing item.
The police did exactly what they are supposed to do… keep the peace. Sure Apple security employees “allowed their status to be misunderstood” but the courts have upheld that police can lie to citizens whenever they want, for whatever reason, many times. Police were there to make sure a physical altercation didn’t occur, not to enforce any warrants.
I’ve used a similar situation to get my kid’s bike back when kids stole it… the police isn’t “investigating” they are there to witness the peaceful request being made… and of course the intimidation of “lying to police” doesn’t hurt either as nobody wants police on their stoop.
In actuality this is how things should go down more often than not. Legitimately, filing a report of a “stolen” item before FORMALLY ASKING for it back is ABUSE of the legal system more that this was. What Apple did is how things should work, they presented evidence to the police, went with the police to “ask nicely”, and then moved on.
There was a time when they were called PEACE OFFICERS and not police. Peace Officers are there to follow the law, not enforce the law… to keep fights from happening in the first place.
My opinion is that for Apple to have picked that house out using GPS and phone logs, and somebody just happened to be at the same bar as the phone? There’s sticky fingers involved somewhere… maybe somebody’s friend that went home or lived next door. Now that Apple has made plenty of noise, if the phone turns up somebody is going to jail for sure. As a prototype the phone is worth whatever dollar value Apple wants to attach… easily into “grand theft felony” range. Gizmondo gets caught with the phone this time and it’s 10-15 in the slammer.
And yet, they found no phone, and the guy, a legal citizen, was subjected to racial remarks and threats while the cops did nothing. Glad you’re so casual about this. A drunk Apple employee loses a prototype at a bar, and because of it, a man is harassed and discriminated against by some p.i.s with visions of Humphrey Bogart in their heads.
Where di the info about the racial remarks come from?
Apple has enough money to hire pros like Haliburton and Blackwater to handle this stuff… the SFPD are amateurs.
$75Billion is a lot of money… more than enough to cover up some poor chump that nicked a phone in a bar ending up dropped off the Bay Bridge. I’m pointing out that Apple is big enough and rich enough they don’t HAVE to involve the police at all. Understand YOUR place in these matters as one little worm poking a giant glossy fruity beast. some little worm, nicked a phone that wasn’t his and just found out he poked a BIG SCARY… Besides, doesn’t everybody that’s had electronics nicked out from under their nose wish they’d end up at the bottom of the bay? it’s a “circle of life” kind of thing!
“it’s only illegal if you get caught” applies to Apple and their huge pile of cash as much as it applies to stealing their prototypes and posting them on the internet. What’s a missing thief or two anyway?
Compared to the dirty hands that Exxon-Mobile has in it’s history, Apple is a pussycat toy company for being at the top of the Wall Street hill without having to put a few bodies in the ground… or change dictators of small countries.
Blackwater? Ha! Ha! They make the Keystone Kops look professional by comparison. Blackwater recruit the dregs of the US military and give them a pair of mirrored sunglasses and a uniform.