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sweet UER decals:
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 .sarge.
  
Location: Born in Virginia, Hearts in Washington, live in North Dakota.
Gender: Male
Dammit why didnt I bring my camera
 |  | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 80 on 8/17/2011 8:33 PM >
|  | | | Glad to hear you both are ok now. Welcome back!
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YoelT
    
Location: Viet Nam
Gender: Male
| |  | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 81 on 8/20/2011 5:19 AM >
| | | | I wish I would have chimed up in this thread earlier, but I have only been on UER minimally most of this year due to the dredges of school.
Soon as I heard about this situation I was really sickened that such a thing could even happen in this country, in my city. But really this is the most frequent country for things like this to go on that are not a totalitarian state. Most of this was just a bad situation but the choice of the SWAT to release the dog is unimaginable. As someone said earlier, releasing the dog is the same as if he would have fired his gun into the surrendering explorers back. It is really disturbing that we live in a society where that can happen without repercussion. History and psychological studies have shown that normal people will do horrible things when they are in an environment where it is acceptable and they will not be punished (ie, the holocaust). I have heard the accounts from both of the victims and this SWAT team member could not have in any way felt threatened buy the situation. What pisses me off the most is that I don't find it unlikely at all that he released the dog for his own enjoyment or to "teach him a lesson" for inconveniencing him that day. Since the only witnesses were the were the other SWAT team members who were equally mentally off, he could get away with anything. Cops will always stick up for their buddies even if they shot Mother Teresa in the face. While the victim is suffering for quite some time after this, the SWAT guy goes home and eats dinner with his family with probably no remorse what so ever. Dirty cops are no different from any other group of thugs or criminals, they just happen to have the biggest guns and the most money so can get away with anything.
Birmingham is a very corrupt city, our previous mayor left office to go to prison. Even though his crimes were apparent to everyone in the city, it took quite a long time for that to happen. Don't let this be a bad rap for Birmingham though. I mean yeah, it is a bad rap, yes it is one of the most dangerous cities in America, and yes has some severe shortcomings in many areas. Its a really crappy city when you look at some aspects of it. On the other hand, it is a really great city. There is so much abandoned stuff in the downtown area alone that I won't have a chance to explore it all anytime soon. Its really like a mini-detroit of the south, only with some cops who don't have enough to do (the homicide rate isn't that big of a deal, it's just black on black violence anyway). I live happily downtown in a neighborhood many people in the suburbs might consider "scary". I have done more urban exploring in Birmingham than any other city and I have only had minor run-in's with the police here. I have heard other stories about bad events happening at schools, nothing like what happened to DJ Craig, but enough to keep me from all but one. If I had realized you guys were going to a school that day I would have passed that info on.
It really sucks about what happened at the follow up court date. I guess that is a lesson learned for all of us to get anything a court promises in writing if possible. It guess that is the city's and county's financial troubles coming out. Milk everyone for what they are worth, so they can pay for the SWAT teams to not fight real crime.
I think I will go over to the school and when that woman comes out, take some HDR pictures of her and her house. What a worthless wench, but what else do you have to do all day when you don't have a job and live off welfare? I'd look out my window and call cops on people not bothering me too. Not.
This is terrible that all this happened, and sucks that the court screwed you over in the end, but I am glad that it is finally finished for you.
www.yoeltaom.as |
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Eschaton
Location: Western NC
Gender: Male
Entry: Eschaton (es-kuh-tawn) noun | end of time, climax of history | Etymology: Greek for 'last'
| | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 82 on 8/23/2011 4:35 PM >
| | | | Apparently I just barely avoided almost the exact same situation that you've been through, Craig. Abandoned school, spotted entering, police and K9 units dispatched.
We surrendered and played the photographer card, just wanted to let them know that we weren't causing trouble, but got slapped with a citation anyway. We supposedly exited the building just as the K9 unit entered, and all the cops were joking about how lucky we were, how they were all disappointed that "Frenzy" didn't get to see any action, how we would have been carted off to the hospital, and all that shit. I know cops like to make jokes like that to scare the people they're apprehending, but seeing how the Birmingham cops treated you, now I'm not so sure about the cops in my city.
Ars Gratia Adventuris |
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caro____0
Location: Greensboro, NC
Gender: Female
| |  | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 83 on 8/28/2011 8:58 PM >
| | | | there's no need to explain the hatred i felt when reading about the cop letting the dog go for your friend. arrrgh.
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MrSivalls
This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
I'll be a-surfin' in yer blood on Saturday night
| | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 84 on 8/30/2011 9:51 PM >
| | | | Posted by DJ Craig
Thanks for all the support!
Does anyone here happen to know legally what difference it made when my friend got hurt? It seems that the moment he was injured, I went from being under custodial arrest to actual arrest. The cops seemed to genuinely want to just let us go, but claimed they couldn't because he had been hurt.
There was, by the way, a separation between the SWAT team and the cops outside that actually questioned us and took us to jail. The SWAT team's only job was to go in and get us out. The cops outside were much friendlier...although they still fucked us over with the whole "declining medical treatment" thing.
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If both of you had surrendered before the cops called in SWAT, they may well have let you off with a warning. Searches put them in danger and waste time.
Take away all the drama and realize what you netted for your efforts.
Your security measures were inadequate.
How unfortunate for you. |
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Aleksandar
Location: United States
Gender: Male
your darkest shadow, my oldest friend; the world's become ashes, this is the end.
| | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 85 on 8/30/2011 11:31 PM >
| | | | Craig, that sounds unpleasant. i'm sorry you had to experience it.
I don't say this to question your story, but to make a few points of clarification for other explorers who may be wondering about police procedure and the deployment of a K-9 unit. (simply saying "we hate police" or "police should be hunted down" is childish and outright stupid).
first, when a patrol unit is dispatched to respond to a report of a suspected crime, they generally have very little information to go on and are trained to be prepared for all scenarios including the worst case. in this case, they would not know if they were dealing with explorers, drug dealers, arsonists, murderers, gang activity, etc. clearly the responding patrol unit did not feel sufficiently able to safely apprehend you, had no idea of what you were up to, and called in a unit specially trained to deal with locating and apprehending individuals inside a large dark building with lots of hiding places. there is no malice in this -- they simply have a job to do, and want to do it safely. its not like they WANT to have to go into a big dark building. the idea rightfully scares them.
SWAT's job in this case was to safely find you and apprehend you and extract you. They were concerned primarily for their safety and equally so for your safety and the safety of anyone in the building. The use of an enforcement dog occurs when there is the potential for officers to be physically harmed -- and from their perspective, they would have to assume this was the case. The dogs are highly trained, and generally have 3 enforcement modes: "find and bark", which is locating you and exposing you; "bark and hold", which is keeping you in position by intimidation; and "bite and hold", which is keeping you in position through a physical bite. Their training is almost always scenario specific -- fleeing suspects, combative suspects, hiding suspects. NOT prone suspects or cuffed suspects. An officer would not release their dog, nor would the dog reliably respond, outside these scenarios. a police dog that would bite a prone or cuffed suspect would likely be retired or sent back into training -- this is a highly undesirable behavior in a police dog. if the officer was feeling malicious he'd certainly have not loosed his dog while your friend was cuffed, and would have done it prior to apprehending him. For all these reasons i find your friends version of events highly suspect. i'm not saying he wasn't bitten -- i'm just saying he was probably bitten while hiding, while fleeing, or while resisting.
Were your friend as injured as you suggest here, he would have been taken to the emergency room under police guard prior to booking. there was no reason not to take him, and every reason for officers to err on the side of caution. not only were the responding officers trained to make this judgement, but so were the booking and jail officers. that this did not occur simply means your friend was not seriously injured. the judgement of the nurse confirms this. too, police dogs are not trained for combat -- and their bites are trained to be firm, restraining, and not savage.
anyways, i say all this only to keep people from developing incorrect notions about police, and about what they can expect if they are apprehended while UEing. the absolute wrong lesson to take away from this is the mistaken notion that police are your enemy, and that you should adopt a combative posture or attitude when dealing with them.
Freedom breeds war; and Peace, slavery. So it shall be forevermore: Men who love freedom buy it with their lives, and lovers of peace with their freedom. |
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DJ Craig
  
Moderator
Location: Johnson City, TN
Gender: Male
Break the Silence
| | | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 86 on 8/31/2011 7:07 AM >
| | | | Posted by Aleksandar
Craig, that sounds unpleasant. i'm sorry you had to experience it.
I don't say this to question your story, but to make a few points of clarification for other explorers who may be wondering about police procedure and the deployment of a K-9 unit. (simply saying "we hate police" or "police should be hunted down" is childish and outright stupid).
...
anyways, i say all this only to keep people from developing incorrect notions about police, and about what they can expect if they are apprehended while UEing. the absolute wrong lesson to take away from this is the mistaken notion that police are your enemy, and that you should adopt a combative posture or attitude when dealing with them. |
I can appreciate this perspective. It's hard to separate myself emotionally from this, and I certainly don't think there is any way to justify what was done to us, but at the same time I can see what you're saying. I've had MANY experiences with cops in my life. All of us have had a cop find us trespassing, ask us to leave, and then have a friendly conversation with us about the history of the building. We just generally don't go ramble about it on Main when that happens. This was a freak occurrence. And, although I don't feel it is an excuse or justification at all, I do know that there IS another side to this story.
I trust my friend 100%. Indeed I wasn't actually in the room when that happened, but I can certainly say that they were RIDICULOUSLY brutal and violent when they arrested me, in spite of me cooperating completely, and the entire time, the dog was barking in my face, struggling against the officer holding his leash, and VERY clearly wanted to fuck me up, even though I was laying down and cooperating.
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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MrSivalls
This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
I'll be a-surfin' in yer blood on Saturday night
| | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 87 on 9/4/2011 4:52 PM >
| | | | SOP to send SWAT to deal with know drug hot spots when activity is spotted. That's probably what you inadvertently walked into.
Hyped up SWAT members aren't pleasant to deal with.
Your security measures were inadequate.
How unfortunate for you. |
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DJ Craig
Moderator
Location: Johnson City, TN
Gender: Male
Break the Silence
| | | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 88 on 10/17/2011 9:28 AM >
| | | | Basically the EXACT some shit has just recently happened AGAIN to someone else:
http://www.uer.ca/...d=1&threadid=95882
Notably INCLUDING their car getting broken into!
Aaaaand the location is in the DB now... (there is a warning on the DB entry)
http://www.uer.ca/....asp?storyid=11516
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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superphoenix
Location: New York City
Gender: Male
There's a madness to my methods
| | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 89 on 10/20/2011 2:29 AM >
| | | | Amazingly well written. I had to rush to the bathroom halfway into it, so I can only imagine how frightened you felt!
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YoelT
Location: Viet Nam
Gender: Male
| | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 90 on 11/22/2011 6:25 PM >
| | | | | Posted by MrSivalls If both of you had surrendered before the cops called in SWAT, they may well have let you off with a warning. |
The police made no effort to make their presence known before calling in SWAT.
Posted by Aleksandar
a police dog that would bite a prone or cuffed suspect would likely be retired or sent back into training -- this is a highly undesirable behavior in a police dog. if the officer was feeling malicious he'd certainly have not loosed his dog while your friend was cuffed, and would have done it prior to apprehending him. For all these reasons i find your friends version of events highly suspect. i'm not saying he wasn't bitten -- i'm just saying he was probably bitten while hiding, while fleeing, or while resisting.
Were your friend as injured as you suggest here, he would have been taken to the emergency room under police guard prior to booking. there was no reason not to take him, and every reason for officers to err on the side of caution. not only were the responding officers trained to make this judgement, but so were the booking and jail officers. that this did not occur simply means your friend was not seriously injured. the judgement of the nurse confirms this. too, police dogs are not trained for combat -- and their bites are trained to be firm, restraining, and not savage. |
Thanks for this insight. This all sounds reasonable, but cops in this region are notorious for being anything but. Obviously, people do strange things when in extreme situations, but it is highly unlikely that the one who was bitten would have done anything other then immediately surrender when he encountered the SWAT team. The wound was indeed serious requiring medical attention.
Since a second nearly identical incident occurred to different people at this same site, I think this adds much credibility to the details of the original account in case anyone was in doubt. I don't hear about police violence on this level in other parts of Birmingham, so I am not sure if this is just the modus operandi of this particular precinct or what the deal is.
www.yoeltaom.as |
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KadeDepew
Location: Tulsa,Ok
Gender: Female
| | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 91 on 12/3/2011 8:35 PM >
| | | | Man that sucks.
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BecomeTheChange
Location: Birmingham, Alabama
Gender: Male
| | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 92 on 12/6/2011 7:42 AM >
| | | | So, I'm new to the Birmingham area. Before I moved here, I spent a year living in New Orleans. As you could imagine, that place is an urbex heaven due to Katrina. I managed to infiltrate hospitals, schools, amusement parks, and many other places. I usually found myself in BAD neighborhoods and I used my best judgement. I always did everything alone and I think this kept me very low key and active. There were some times where I had some scares and my heart was racing, but I have to tell you. For the short amount of time I've been in Birmingham, I've found myself in some parts of this city that I have felt terrified, much more so than any bad parts of New Orleans. I've had some horrible run ins with shady characters and the neighborhoods (probably just like the one this was in) scare the shit out of me. Now, after reading this, I'm even more discouraged.
Flickr - http://flickr.com/photos/justinpopp |
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YoelT
Location: Viet Nam
Gender: Male
| | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 93 on 12/13/2011 4:07 PM >
| | | | I have been in Birmingham for 3½ years now. It's a rough city, and I have had some close calls, but more often with police/security than with shady peeps. There is an untapped wealth of abandoned places that are in what I consider really bad areas, but I have never found these interesting enough to go to. Or at least the there are plenty of things to do out side these. Downtown is an example where it seems like almost every building is abandoned (I read that there are like 70 vacant buildings in the downtown district alone), and it is relatively safe since for the most part it is sparsely populated but you won't go long without seeing a police car drive by.
I'm interested in hearing about some of your run ins and what neighborhoods these were in.
www.yoeltaom.as |
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DJ Craig
Moderator
Location: Johnson City, TN
Gender: Male
Break the Silence
| | | | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 95 on 12/15/2011 4:07 AM >
| | | |
That's a crazy news story!
I've kinda lost interest in ghetto locations since this experience, and a few other bad experiences. Ghetto locations are worth checking out, but once you've seen a few, they're all mostly the same (with the exception of some large industrial locations) and they aren't worth the risks anymore after you've seen a few, imo. I've spent large amounts of time in the bad parts of Birmingham, Detroit, Gary, East St Louis, Chicago, Baltimore, Philly, etc. I'm just extremely done with that now...
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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golosco
Location: North East, USA
Gender: Male
| | Re: Why I've been gone for so long...
<Reply # 96 on 12/16/2011 8:01 PM >
| | | | this is a crazy story.. Emotional scars last a lot longer than bites on your leg.. but you seem very optimistic and have a good outlook on your life.. I know I haven't been here long enough to actually know you but the story is dramatic and touching.. life changing.. i hope you will be able to safely enjoi your passion like you have again.. MAD RESPECT from me, bud.
...oh yeah, FUCK the po-lice
[last edit 12/16/2011 8:02 PM by golosco - edited 1 times]
<*" Keep Tellin' Myself, Things'll Be Okay, While My Other Self Sayz FUCK LIFE DIE SLOWLY "*> |
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