Very cool, if true

Wow. Am I misunderstanding this situation? It seems fairly trivial for the police to get involved.

I've known people get punched and the police didn't bother to even come and get a statement.

From:

Not trivial at all; it's a form of identity theft and should be stamped on, hard.

From:

Whose identity did they steal? "Graeme"'s? You don't know that isn't their name, and it's so vague that you can't argue there is any identity theft at all. If someone claimed to be me (Robert Hulme) and provided additional information (such as my address / social security number) then that would be identity theft.

This situation is more like me going up to someone and saying "Hi I'm Bob". It's not theft. It's probably not incorrect either as there is no requirement in law in the UK that a person is legally identified by a single name.

It sounds like they were lying to some extent. Is that illegal? I think it depends, not all lying is illegal.

From:

I'm not claiming they're stealing "Graeme"'s identity.

They're stealing Ed's and/or Andrew's identities, and earning them a false reputation amongst local cab firms and Chinese food outlets. Identity theft followed by ordering good and services fraudulently, with the intention of causing harrassment and defamation. Tell me that's not incorrect, not illegal, and there's a debate to be had.

From:

So you want them to be "stamped on, hard" for ordering fast food to someone else's house? Fair enough. IMO that's unreasonably harsh. Something like that is probably slightly worse than 'cheeky', I wouldn't be talking about it in terms of identity theft.

Given that the call might have terrorised Andrew should we also consider them to be terrorists?

From:

I have a strong distaste for actions which unfairly damage reputation, and where laws exist to help protect reputation which is damaged unfairly I'm not averse to advocating their use. Other people don't necessarily share this opinion, naturally.

I suspect my contempt for the current trend for elbowing everything conceivable into a pigeonhole labelled "terrorism" is something we both share.

From:

I expect we agree far more than we disagree.

I would be annoyed if this happened to me, but I'm not sure how far I'd go in terms of using police time / prosecuting someone.

From:

I have very little intention of prosecuting anyone, unless the police say "It'd be dead easy and we think you should." - in which case I'd be doing it to put off other people who might do it in the future.

I was pretty much doing it because the police might be able to shut down the mobile they were calling from.

From:

My family have received numerous threatening phone calls in the past, the police just told them to change their number.

From:

Did they know who the calls were coming from, or have a number it was coming from?

From:

I'm afraid I can't remember. It shouldn't make much difference though because the phone operator would know.

From:

It's also a case of letting the police know what's going on -- to help them see if there's a pattern of this behaviour, and so on. It's difficult to keep a control on crime, to fight it, and have some idea of how much of it there is, if no-one tells you that it's happening.

From:

That's quite true.

From:

pisica.livejournal.com

Definitely agree. The shop I work at has occasionally been the subject of Annoyances By Youth (not lately, touch wood!), and although the police in one case did actually catch the little beggar who shoplifted, in most cases I'd report something not expecting a result, but to get that incident onto their books. At the very least it becomes a statistic for their performance indicators.

And if (touch wood again that it doesn't!) this happens again to Andrew, there's a history there rather than 'well this happened before but I never bothered to mention it'.

From:

dapperscavenger.livejournal.com

I wish we were a little bit more "unreasonably harsh" with our punishments in this country. Might actually make people think of the consequences before doing something stupid like this.

From:

Hang 'em.

From:

blackmanxy.livejournal.com

Meh. Deterrence has never worked well. If public executions didn't deter crime back in the day, then anything we implement today isn't going to do it. That unassailable belief that "I won't get caught" overrides fear of all but the most unreasonable punishments.

Much better to keep the punishments fair and just, but give people the sense that they won't get away with any mischief.

From:

dapperscavenger.livejournal.com

I don't believe our current system has punishments that are ether fair or just. They are far too lenient.

Deterrence works when it is enough of a deterrent. Can't put just one slug pellet in the garden and expect it to keep the slugs away.

From:

Unfortunately most evidence shows that deterrence doesn't work, no matter how much of a deterrent it is. You can get as extreme as deportation, corporal punishment, etc. and it still doesn't deter people, because nobody believes they'll actually get caught.

From:

dapperscavenger.livejournal.com

I've been thinking on this and I have to say I have a hard time believing that is true. Of course, I know you don't just go around making stuff up so I do believe you, naturally.

Its just that, if deterrents didn't work why aren't we all going around breaking our arms and legs just to get a few days off work?

This got me to thinking, anyway, but a deterrent is not the same as a punishment, exactly. Then I started wondering, what are we trying to achieve with our punishments in this country? Are we trying to deter criminals, punish criminals, or protect joe public? I have to say, we're not doing a teribly good job at any of the above.

From:

No, we're not.

Let me turn it around slightly - do _you_ avoid killing people because you're worried about being punished? Or because you don't actually want to or need to? Have you avoided robbing a bank because you'd be punished for it, or because it's just plain wrong?

From:

I was getting taxis arriving at 1am. When one arrived I was going to write it off as idiots having a laugh. When the fifth arrived at 1am, I was rather beyond that point. I knew the phone number where this had all started, but there was nothing I could do about it. The police, on the other hand, could shut their mobile connection down, meaning I could possibly get some sleep. Phoning them therefore seemed the smartest thing to do.

I wasn't so worried about identity theft/fraud, although I was aware that I might have problems ordering chinese/calling a taxi next time. I was more worried about harrassment and what they'd do _next_.

From:

Could the police do that? I assume to do that the police would have to get the phone records for the number (which I imagine requires paper work and at least a few weeks of waiting for the operator to respond), contact the taxi company and hope they logged the call information (and ideally recorded the call). Then I assume they'd have to construct a case and take the person to court.

I can see that it's annoying, and even perhaps worrying. I sympathise. I'm just surprised that the police got involved at all, and I'd be very very very surprised if getting them involved actually achieves anything (given my prior experiences of the police not taking action when things are stolen, places are *being burgled*, or when people are assaulted).

I'm looking forward to the next post saying what the police ended up doing. I would like to believe that they will do something that will have a positive outcome, but I'm not holding my breath.

From:

Nope - if they have reason to suspect a phone has been stolen (which is usually the case when it's being used abusively) then they can contact the phone people's abuse centre, who will then try to verify that the phone is in the hands of its owner, and if not they will disconnect it.

In the case of assaults and burglaries, there's rarely much clue as to who actually did it, so the police are fairly powerless. In this case I have a phone number which will hopefully point in the right direction.

From:

In the case of the assault I'm thinking of someone came out of a pub and started punching someone else. There were many witnesses. The police said they'd send someone out to take a statement but they didn't bother to come (even after repeatedly asking them to).

From:

0olong.livejournal.com

It's fair to say that the degree to which police give a shit varies greatly throughout the UK, in my experience...

From:

I'm not sure I blame the police. I suspect they're under resourced.

From:

0olong.livejournal.com

Fair point. 'Give a shit' is probably not the most equitable way of putting it...

From:

pisica.livejournal.com

Jeez, that sucks. Hope someone finds this microcephalic dweeb and steps on his head. (And his phone.)

From:

pisica.livejournal.com

But still, getting five taxis to your place on a Friday night is pretty darn good.... /flippant

From:

I live just off the main road from Portobello to Edinburgh. It's great for getting taxis, because they're always coming past on their way back into town.

From:

thishardenedarm.livejournal.com

wow, thats quite disturbing...I get freaked enough if I think theres some possible security chink in my computer, but having someone hack into your life...yeah, creepy, not-nice.

How'd the rozzers respond?

From:

Not here yet - but they just said "Sometime after 10" and it's possible they're busy somewhere...

From:

octopoid-horror.livejournal.com

While the situation obviously is bad and hopefully will be resolved, I wouldn't have given out their phone number.

You know at least a few people who -do- this sort of thing to people they don't like or when they think it's funny, and if someone takes it on themselves to do it right back on your behalf, it'll just get worse.

From:

Good point. Bit late now, I suppose. And hopefully nobody will be that stupid.

From:

poisonduk.livejournal.com

Others may be judgmental but I think you did right involving the police. This could be the start of a nasty vindictive campaign. Last year when my colleague tried to run me off the road I was told to report anything no matter how small just in case things escalated and there was a need to prosecute.
Ed is such a likable person I find it strange that someone would pick on him.
Horrid thouqht but what about the folk downstairs?

From: