Once again, cops try to make up their own laws. I’d sue them personally as well as Amtrak:
Well, the verdict was guilty of resisting arrest,not illegal photography…Penn Station may have a policy against it but the police can’t enforce policy, only state and local laws and ordinances, so they charged him with other offenses…
Amtrak apparently has regulations against taking pix of specific equipment/ properties etc—I suspect that a BIG SCREWUP occurred around the PR people who put this contest on and the legal beagles----which only goes to show—make double sure that where you’re pointing the camera isn’t going to land you in legal hoohahs…[:-^]
Amtrak can have all the “regulations” it wants, but there is NO law that prohibits taking photos of trains or railroad equipment, which means you cannot be arrested for doing so, and is why it appears this particular instance is legally actionable.
Point your camera wherever you want. It is your legal right to do so.
For reasons unknown, I can’t access the article. However, if as a previous poster stated, the subject was found guilty of resisting arrest, that means that the arrest and the actions of the officers involved was lawful and valid. You can’t be found guilty of resisting arrest if the arrest is unlawful.
If you ever feel you are being unlawfully arrested, for the love of pete, don’t resist. If you fight, all thats going to happen is you’re going to go to jail sore. Better to go willingly and let the lawyers sort it out.
I cannot access the full story either. Also isn’t Penn Station private property? i have never been there and am guessing that most of it is not accessible to photo without being inside on amtrak or transit authority property?
Here’s the contest notice from the Amtrak website.
And here’s a page of results from a Google search on the topic.
Left hand not talking to right hand…
S.N.A.F.U.
Here we go, AGAIN.[B)]
Couple questions:
How can they charge him with resisting arrest if there were no grounds for arrest in the first place?
The Amtrak page says the contest ended last summer. Why is this coming up now?
Mountains out of mole hills.
Well I guess the legal beagles at AMTRAK didn’t bother to do the job they should’ve in clarifying a simple point----was he actually standing on ‘private’ property(which actually is somewhat possible—I guess—malls are in fact ‘private’ property although they comprise a public area) and the other could be did he in fact commit an offence—namely resisting arrest? Even if there is a question on the property issue then his conduct wasn’t necessary—he did not need to resist arrest then----it would/could have been thrown out of court-----
The photographer at one point—from what the current scribbler was told—apparently even volunteered to erase the ‘offending’ picture----if this be true then it is a truly odd story----
Not quite: http://www.krages.com/phoright.htm
OK----looking at a forum on RailPictures.net I got some interesting issues----First) the issue of photography as such around the site-----according to the regs the ONLY thing was not to take pix from within /on/at/or any place assoc. with a work environment—ie; YARDS/FENCED IN AREAS/ TOWERS/etc----he was on a PASSENGER PLATFORM—hence nowhere close to those other areas----apparently when he left he was headed up a flight of stairs(no mention of which stairs but…) They ultimately wanted him to delete the pix but then —odd things happened
The police in this case are mentioned as AMTRAK police–
There were no regulations against photographs mentioned however; wording may be so vague as to scupper any sensible actions without going through some weird legal gymnastics
This was involving someone just recently----although there was a previous incident in Washington DC that occured in the summer of 2007 at Union Sta.(?) there—and again; same issue----the issue being who is going to take responsibility and actually make all sides in this hoohaw come their senses and agree on what the interpretation needs to be?
Until then—get anything from AMTRAK re; photography in PRINT/ with a signature-----
Note that the contest ended months ago…maybe next year.
Ed
Under the common law, you have the right to use reasonable force to resist an illegal arrest. See, United States v. Moore, 332 F. Supp. 919 (E.D. Va. 1971), Commonwealth v. Brown, 27 Va. App. 111 (1998) (Virginia’s criminal code essentially follows common law and Virginia courts allow the common law defenses (at least in theory - in actual practice NO WAY (can you tell I used to be an Assistant Public Defender in Virginia and that I had a person convicted for “resisting arrest” following what was undoubtably an unlawful arrest (and despite that every non-police witness said that my client did not do what the police claimed)). However, you do so at your own peril - because the standards for arrest are different than the standards for a conviction, a police officer merely needs good faith to believe that a law is being broken to arrest someone (conviction requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt that a crime had taken place).
I do not know whether New York retains the common law right to resist an unlawful arrest (but judging by it being very difficult to prove even in a state where the statute specifically permits the common law defense of resisting an unlawful arrest it would seem to be almost impossible to prove).
BTW, my favorite “obstruction of justice” case from Virginia - Wilson v. Kittoe, 229 F Supp 2d 520 (W.D. Va. 2002), affd 337 F.3d 392 (4th Cir. 2003) - holding that it was not obstruction of justice for an attorney to advise his neighbor’s son of his rights as he was being arrested. It also recognizes that under Virginia, people have the right to peacefully protest the police (again, do so at your own peril)
As The Clash said "you have the right to free sp
The guy is trolling. The contest was ended several months ago. The pictures on his web site are badly amateur and have lots of post-processing done to them. I don’t understand the problem he had with the handcuffs. Finally this sort of person doesn’t get handcuffed for not resisting arrest.
He’s a troublemaker trying to get attention.
The comments from visitors to his site are really illuminating, even if his badly blurred, poorly framed photographs are not.
Here is Amtrak’s photography policy which might have a bearing on this case.
Amateur photography, including video, by passengers and the general public is permitted on board trains and from locations legally accessible to the public.
On-board photography is permitted only when - in the opinion of the Conductor — it does not interfere with passengers or crew.
Photography from station platforms is permitted only for persons authorized to be on the platform, which at many stations requires holding tickets for a train the passenger is preparing to board or has alighted from. In the latter cases, any photography (including video) on station platforms must be limited to hand-held cameras and must not require more than one minute to set up and complete.
Any other photography on trains or in stations - including news and commercial photography - requires advanced permission from Amtrak management.
While photography of and on trains is legal, in some circumstances photographers may be questioned by law enforcement or security personnel about their activity if it is deemed “suspicious” or if the activity is determined to be disruptive in any way.
The
Ah, but the key word of that italicized stuff is REQUIRED. A handheld camera does not require more than 1 minute to set up/remove. That part is likely for a number of safety reasons, and he did not run afoul of that AFAIK. He was using a handheld, right? Also, I read a bit about people thinking his photos suck. Even if they do, that has no matter on this. He may think they’re great, and that’s all that matters, except for contests. And if they’re not good enough for those, then he simply won’t win. It’s another case of bad cops.
I saw some of that site ‘troll’ apparently put together----bad pix----but if anyone took photos those overpriced goons might still have operated in the same way.
As for the regs----it still would’ve been up to the security people to ----- and here’s the problem-----INTERPRET—whether his/her actions warrant ‘suspicion’-----I can see where we are having these issues because the regs themselves are written in such a way that certain ‘paranoiacs’ within security police can justify imaginary issues where all the ‘poor’ photographer did was take a picture for crying out loud
Contest or no—and I see there are a lot of cases like his going on all over----this needs to be addressed-----innocent activities should not be suddenly ‘Suspect’ just because some lunatic criminal does take a pix for some stupid purpose. Why should you jump through hoops just so that you can take a pic?[soapbox]