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The man who wasn't a terrorist
By adamg on Tue, 03/18/2008 - 9:24am
The Globe interviews one of the two guys a woman thought she overheard discussing bombs, drugs and Logan on the Red Line. Although T officials declare themselves happy with the outcome, which involved shutting down the Red Line at Park Street and detaining the two guys at Logan, he begs to differ:
... "The most disturbing thing about it was the apparent randomness of it," Watchorn, 50, said. He said he wonders how easy it would be to subject others to what he considers hoaxes and to disrupt the transit system, based on an unsubstantiated tip. ...
Oh, and he was heading to Logan to fly to Buffalo. Naturally, his detention meant he missed his plane. The story also notes how the nefarious travelers managed to evade a police manhunt until they got to Logan: The woman reported the two were wearing fatigues, but:
MacMillan said transit police could not find the men because they were not wearing fatigues.
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Comments
there should be
there should be accountability on the part of the person who reported it. I would sue her for libel, plus costs incurred subsequent to the missed trip
Disgusting
It's sad how we've bred the climate of fear and a complete lack of accountability for one's actions.
So much for the right to confront one's accuser in this country. Now all one needs to do is point an unreasonable finger at your fellow traveller and laugh while they get hauled off for questioning by the police.
That irrational, irresponsible, cowardly woman gets to slink back into her fearful life feeling smug that she's done the right thing, bravely faced the terrorists and as a result caused two victims to miss their flights. She's just the latest example of how Boston continues to live under a shroud of fear.
And of course the state police refuses to identify her. I'm sure she was hoping to be the next big score and if the men had "something" as bad as an outstanding parking ticket she'd be making the morning talk shows talking about how she bravely faced her fears and "did something" to show the "terrorists" how we're standing up for ourselves.
She may have a mental illness
Sounds to me like she was hallucinating camoflauge and hearing voices.
Then again, Dee Brown was taken to the ground by Wellesley cops when a panicked teller decided that "any black guy" in the parking lot of the bank MUST be "that black guy who robbed us last week".
Never mind that Dee Brown looked about as much like the bank robber as Obama looks like Chelsea Clinton!
And plain ridiculous
"'The landscape has definitely changed for mass transit in this country,' MacMillan said."
Yeah, it went from lousy to absolutely horrendous.
"He said police decide whether to pursue such tips based on the quality of the description and the type of allegation."
Really? So any lunatic out there with a vivid imagination and "good description skills" can wreak havoc in the public transit system.
The article states that the
The article states that the police couldn't find the men because they weren't wearing fatigues after all, but then states, "On the Silver Line, during a stop at Terminal B, state troopers boarded the bus. They pulled Watchorn and his friend off, then separated and searched them." So how did they identify them then? Did they just pull off any two guys traveling together?
I think this quote sums it up --
"The landscape has definitely changed for mass transit in this country," MacMillan said.
We must live in fear, the landscape has been forever changed.
The T loves scared passengers
Let's not forget that, according to the Globe's earlier report, "Pesaturo applauded the woman for alerting T workers and heeding the T’s calls that urge riders to speak up if they see or hear something suspicious."
Keep people scared with phony threats and they won't object to violations of their rights.
And as soon as something bad happens
the same people whining today about an 'overreaction' to last week's incident will complain that the police didn't do enough to protect the riders
no i won't
no i won't
An overreaction is still an overreaction
Maybe its understandable, but the MBTA needs to learn from this and learn how to better respond in the future. Patting itself on the back for essentially just preventing a harpsichord player from getting to Buffalo isn't an appropriate response.
Awesome Psychic Powers
Maybe they can use you to identify the real threats.
A mistaken assumption
Pointing out that an alleged security measure is both ineffective and disruptive isn't "whining"; but the term is applicable to predictions of an unspecified "something bad" which such actions will prevent in an unspecified way.
Every day on the T we hear Grabauskas declare that "Safety is our number one concern," and implying that reporting suspicious actions is the most important way of ensuring safety. Yet EVERY injury and death on the T has been due to causes other than terrorism. It may be because of a personal assault, and perhaps the police will have been sent off to investigate an alleged conversation about explosives. Will noting that they should have been ready to respond to the threats which predominate constitute "whining"?
Statistics don't lie
According to the crime stats on the Transit Police website, there hasn't been a homicide on the subway in over 3 years. And how many riders were on the subway during that time? 500 million or so? That tells me the current law enforcement techniques and procedures are working pretty darn well.
Deaths on the T
I think he's referring not to homicides, but to accidents -- mostly commuter trains hitting track workers or trespassers, but maybe also a bus or two hitting a pedestrian.
Statistics can be lies, though
People lie using statistics - or misunderstand them or intentially bias them during collection.
Recommended Reading: How To Lie With Statistics
There are three types of lies:
lies, damned lies, and statistics.
Your logic is flawed
There also weren't any elephant attacks in the last 3 years. Does that say that MBTA has an astounding elephant attack prevention program that's working splendidly? That there hasn't been a homicide doesn't tell us that they've actually prevented homicides.
I'd also note that homicide isn't a very good metric because there aren't a huge number of homicides in this city to start with. No homicides doesn't really tell us anything at all about effective policing because it offers little real context.
What's more, your data isn't even correct. The last 3 years is 2005-2007, and there were 2 homicides on MBTA property in 2005 and 1 in 2007. I don't know if you're trying to parse things out by limiting it to the "subway", but MBTA property is data that we can compare for the last ten years and here is that data...
1997: 0
1998: 2
1999: 0
2000: 1
2001: 1
2002: 1
2003: 3
2004: 2
2005: 2
2006: 0
2007: 1
Is homicide down? Well, in the last two years, yes, but the numbers are just too small to draw conclusions from at this point using only homicide as a measure.