feedburner
Enter your Email Address Here:

Delivered by FeedBurner

feedburner count

Chicago Mails Ticket Based On Facebook Post

Posted by Unknown Labels: , , , , , , ,

Will County

, Chicago –Understanding the social network is speaking to the world. One thinks of free speech, the ability to share knowledge, or the ability to rant. What happens when the police use your social network post in order to give you a citation, even if it’s misinterpreted? A Will County resident found that her Facebook post cost her a citation in her physical mailbox from the local police.
The verbiage she used was misinterpreted, but the action of the police should cause alarm.


False citation
The Facebook conversation regarded a local dog park, where commenters were complaining that their pets were getting sick. Dogs were catching the “Kennel Cough” in the Will County Dog Park. The park is located west of Chicago‘s Cook county. The Facebook page having the conversation was created by private users of Will County, not connected with the park nor the Chicago police department.
In a response to the conversation, the resident expressed her relief at not exposing her dog to the threat of being sick. She also poorly commented the following post.
“I was feeling bad that I haven’t bought a pass and been bringing Ginger there, but I’m pretty glad I haven’t.”
That post was interpreted as a violation of park rules by Chicago park police, who mailed her a ticket in the mail for bringing her dog to the park without purchasing a license.
Chicago police and Facebook “roaming”
A Patch reporter reached out to the woman and she meant to “say that she hadn’t gotten a license and had not been using the park and was glad she hadn’t, because she would have exposed her dog to the illness that was going around.”
The police confirmed sending her the ticket.
“We did issue a citation to a woman based on her Facebook post. The only reason we were monitoring the group is because of the complaints of kennel cough. When we saw her post about visiting the dog park without buying a permit, it was our responsibility to respond.”  Police spokeswoman
Why wasn’t a simple question to the woman via the Facebook page used?  Clarification could have been found, and Chicago police would not appear to be roaming the net in order to send tickets in the mail.
Should the police even be allowed to send tickets to residents based on social media posting? Police found her correct physical address, so obviously they snooped further than the Facebook timeline.
Users were alarmed to learn the county officials were using their Facebook page as a platform to hand out citations.



0 comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)