livedarklions

This is disgusting behavior from people who just wanted an excuse to beat someone with a baseball bat.
I'm appalled anyone would defend this.

Happy Feet

How do you derive that from this case?

The couple did not live in fear, they intentionally created a situation so that they could assault someone and recorded themselves doing it so they could share with others on social media.

Again, instead of reacting emotionally, look at the intent of this particular case. It appears to have been to set a trap to hurt people - not protect property. They used their property as bait.

Pratt

According to national crime statistics, Fresno's rates of robbery and burglary are about twice and 11/2 times the national averages, respectively.
Perhaps the police are fairly unresponsive to property crime

CliffordK

My guess is they were "victimized" in the past, and chose to take revenge on thei previous thieves by attacking proxies.

Nonetheless, not everyone in the USA lives in a neighborhood where leaving an expensive bike on the front porch, and it will be gone... within hours.

Happy Feet

I had a bicycle stolen from my front entryway about two years ago. I was very mad and, in the heat of the moment, might have grabbed the thief if I caught them and roughed them up a bit before the cops came. That's a lot different than two people far removed from the emotion of the moment setting up a trap and laying in wait so they can beat someone with a baseball bat. When you understand that difference you see this has very little to do with the theft of a bicycle (only of interest to us because this is a bicycle forum) and more to do with their violent psychopathy.

burnthesheep

Vigilante justice creates a world you wouldn’t want to live in of it’s allowed and glorified.

Just think about the wild murderous times of the Old Testament.

kaos joe

I wonder if these folks had reason to believe they were being repeatedly victimized by the same criminals, and determined to put a stop to it.

CAT7RDR

This looks like a case of Dumb and Dumber with a criminal twist.

bruce19

I don't know if this actually meets the legal standard but it might be called "entrapment."

CliffordK

What about those videos posted on youtube where a person simply has a rather long "security rope" tied to their bike?


I suppose they should have a note on the downtube indicating that "personal protective gear is recommended when riding the bike".

daoswald

You may hate our court system, but it is at least striving to not provide arbitrary, vigilante justice. Most of us will go our entire lives without being charged with a serious crime. But this is, in part, because our justice system strives to eliminate injustice, and to protect the rights of the accused. If those altruistic goals did not exist, there would be more justice dolled out, but there would also be a lot more injustice. As we start down the slippery slope of vigilante justice we do so by reducing the rights of the accused. And when that happens we move the needle toward accusations being sufficient to warrant a penalty. And at that point we could find ourselves in a situation where many of us *have* been accused of a serious crime, and maybe even paid a penalty for it, without having actually committed one. Vigilante justice feels good in the moment, but in the longrun puts us all at risk of finding ourselves at the business end of the stick because someone had an axe to grind.

There is a balance to be had between a fair, impartial justice system that often acquits someone who is actually guilty of a thing and a more strict justice system with lower threshold for conviction, that too often convicts the innocent. I hate that we are at the mercy of those who gamble they won't get caught, or won't get convicted. But I prefer that to being at the mercy of those who have a grudge, who feel wronged, or who are just having a bad day.

Happy Feet

In this case, even though it is fake, if they really set about creating the situation knowing the result and someone was injured they would be at fault. Again, it all goes back to intent. Can you prove by the video that the person intended someone to take the bike and fall off, reasonably surmising they may be injured as a result. I would argue yes. The intent was not to secure the bike at all but rather to injure the person taking it or at least make them fall off it (which we could reasonably surmise could cause harm).

What you seem to have a problem with is thinking one persons bad intent (stealing) somehow validates or mitigates another persons bad intent (causing harm). They are two bad things, but one is a property crime and the other is a personal injury. The problem is that the injuries are unpredictable. What if the bat wielders caused a 15 year old thief a TBI that incapacitated them for life? What if the bmx thief fell off and broke their neck and became a quadriplegic... are those punishments commensurate to the crime of stealing a bike and does the common man have the right to determine and mete out that sentence? Remembering this is not spur of the moment reaction but premeditated action on their part.

CliffordK

Are the rope videos fake? I've seen others in the past.

What if the person yells "Stop, that's my bike"... and the thief keeps riding away? They should have some responsibility for their own fate when they reach the end of the rope.

308jerry

The common man? Compared to the chosen ones that can shoot you for stealing a pack of cigarettes and or refusing to bow down for a friendly strip search.?

Metieval

In the name of accuracy and honest debating , let me fix your quote for you.

Rajflyboy

Why didn’t the cops set up a sting? And then the judges put these thieves away in the slammer for a while? Why didn’t this happen?

only way the crap will stop is if “US” citizens do the hard work (unfortunately)

you peeps need to quit victimizing the criminals in this country

livedarklions

Nothing particularly honest about that. I suspect someone who would choose to beat someone with a baseball bat really didn't care very much about why. Like I said, I think the thievery was just how they rationalized their extreme sadism.

Metieval

so they only beat bike thieves, but you'd rather use the term "someone" rather than 'bike thieves' why?

Do you know what a Venn diagram is, and how to correctly and appropriately label one?

livedarklions

Are you intentionally missing the point? Beating someone with a baseball bat is such sociopathic behavior that I don't think the people who engage in it really care about what the person stole or did, they just like beating people.

You don't have to agree with that, but you don't get to rewrite it.

Metieval

I didn't miss the point, you willfully, and purposefully and dishonestly enlarged your victim circle. to include anybody, not just thieves.

which is no better than the vigilantism you are speaking out against.

at least I know a vigilantist isn't going to beat me up, but someone that intentionally skews the truth will probably lie to my face.

Happy Feet

Not really. If taken at face value, the whole premise of the bike skit is that the would be thief does not know about the booby trap until it is sprung - the punchline is that they fall off the bike. Just like the couple in the OP, they've made a video showing how they set the bait, over and over, and wait for the expected result demonstrating they knew exactly what would happen.

Try thinking of the incident as two separate crimes. The couple is being prosecuted for what they intended to do - create a scenario so they could assault people with bats. That is why there is a Conspiracy charge - because they planned it ahead of time.

Whether the bike thief is prosecuted is a completely different case.

And your point is?

Is it that those sort of things happen in a society that believes disproportionately violent punishment should be meted out for minor offenses before a trial by those other than appointed by the courts?
If so, I agree. Having police that act like that is a logical conclusion for a society that thinks its citizens should act like that.

Homebrew01

Closed. Not cycling related.
Those wanting to discuss politics, take it elsewhere.