It turns out that there is a little game that some people connected to this great series of tubes like to play. It’s called “SWATing” and it involves calling law enforcement officers on the home of someone who irritated you on the Internet. On June 17, 16-year-old Jacob Neumann‘s home was surrounded by heavily armed police officers for banning a Minecraft player from the server he was administrating.
If you are being an ass in an online Minecraft server and someone kicks you, it’s obvious that you have only one option: Call the admin’s local police station and tell the dispatcher that a man murdered his daughter in cold blood. It only makes sense! A 16-year-old kid from Kingston, Washington was on his computer and, upon looking out his bedroom, saw a police officer holding an M16. The officers arrested Jacob Neumann’s father, Dave Neumann, after receiving a report that he shot his teenage daughter in the head. Dave Neumann does not even have a teenage daughter. Investigators are speculating that the report came from a Canadian gamer, putting the caller outside of the jurisdiction of state laws.
Law Enforcement personel are all trained to take every report seriously and respond accordingly; the police officers were just doing their job. Apparently, this was not the first time this prank has taken place. It has been used to target bloggers as well as random individuals. This prank places public safety officers and citizens in a very delicate situation. One false move from anyone could lead to catastrophe.
Wow. Just Wow. You better watch what you do on the Internet, folks. You may just end up handcuffed on the ground.
(King5 News via Kotaku)
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