Geneva Avenue litterbugs arrested - for the loaded gun police say they had in their car
Boston Police report arresting men from Dedham and Mattapan on gun charges at Geneva Avenue and Bowdoin Street in Dorchester after gang-unit officers spotted one of them tossing something out of their car and then noticed the car seemed to have excessively tinted windows.
Police say the officers were on patrol around 3:25 p.m. yesterday when "their attention was drawn to a vehicle due to a passenger throwing an unknown item out of the window:"
The officers conducted a traffic stop for the violations and upon requesting the drivers registration, he became evasive and refused to comply with the officers request. The officers issued an exit order to the occupants of the vehicle due to their non-compliance and recovered a black semi-automatic firearm from the glove box during a frisk of the vehicle. The firearm was later determined to be a Citadel .45 caliber handgun with an obliterated serial number, loaded with 7 live rounds of ammunition.
Jahmone Hector-Smith, 22, of Dedham and Shukor Grady, 18, of Mattapan, were charged with illegal possession of a firearm, illegal possession of ammunition and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number, police say.
Innocent, etc.
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my theory as to partial reason why not more random enforcement
Because if the cops actually pulled drivers over for stop signs/speeding/red lights/other fuckery on a regular basis, there's a very nonzero chance they're going to encounter someone armed like this, and/or with an outstanding warrant etc, and that's the last thing you want if you're not expecting it. In this situation described in this post I'm assuming the littering gave the gang unit pretext to pull over a suspicious vehicle they otherwise might not have been able to legally go after.
Yes, the gang unit seems invested in traffic patrols
I didn't get a chance to write it up (only so many hours ...), but police say that the day before, the gang unit stopped somebody speeding down Blue Hill Avenue (and nearly slamming into somebody in a crosswalk) and wound up arresting him on gun charges.
"Reverse construction"
So much of this stuff could be the product of data, from the aforementioned BRIC and other sources.
People give up a lot of data voluntarily, and whether using it is a constitutional violation or not is an emerging and particularized issue. So the cops can't be sure whether a court will approve, or maybe just ignore the Fourth Amendment altogether.
But you've got the BRIC database, plate readers, Stingray, geofencing, and social media content and contacts analysis. and stuff we don't know about.