A friend of mine is in trouble :(

Paul11 · 10 Dec 2012 at 21:57

if he is innocent, then he shouldn't have anything to worry about

Delvis · 10 Dec 2012 at 21:57

Dang. Not good.

I had an email the other day about someone trying to reset one of my sony accounts, not touched that for nearly 6 years or so

Rroff · 10 Dec 2012 at 21:58

By keeping the account open tho if the person doesn't know the police are investigating they continue to give the police evidence to work from and continue to incriminate themselves giving the police a firmer conviction... it may be they've taken your friend into custody to remove him from the equation while the account is still active...

Or they could just be doing a shoddy job.

unwashed potato! · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:07

what would happen if they found music on his hard drive? a lots of them? would they on their own investigate how he got them without being told to by a big music company? i can imagine many users on here would be screwed if the cops just randomly seized their computers

Malevolence · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:10

Mammalian said:
what would happen if they found music on his hard drive? a lots of them? would they on their own investigate how he got them without being told to by a big music company? i can imagine many users on here would be screwed if the cops just randomly seized their computers

It's OK officer, I was lucky enough to rip my CD collection to my HDD before the burglary.

[TW]Fox · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:10

Mammalian said:
what would happen if they found music on his hard drive?

Nothing, because the police investigate criminal matters and the posession of mp3's is not a criminal matter? :confused:

Slam62 · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:14

Mammalian said:
what would happen if they found music on his hard drive? a lots of them? would they on their own investigate how he got them without being told to by a big music company? i can imagine many users on here would be screwed if the cops just randomly seized their computers

Hung drawn and quartered at tyburn

gambitt · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:15

Paul11 said:
if he is innocent, then he shouldn't have anything to worry about

HA
.....

HAHAHAHAHAAAA!!

Rexxar · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:17

You should not be getting involved, let the criminal justice system do it's thing and allow the forensic scientists time to analyse his devices.

If he is innocent, this will become apparent.

unwashed potato! · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:19

[TW]Fox;23339601 said:
Nothing, because the police investigate criminal matters and the posession of mp3's is not a criminal matter?

ok change it for many many movies. i know possession of the file isn't illegal, but would they, assuming they think the files have been illegally download, be able to pass the info on to anyone who then may deal with it?

silvercut · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:21

The truth will come out one way or another. Miscarriages of justice are rare and if he is wrongly charged he can sue the police for causing embarrassment.

gambitt · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:29

Mammalian said:
ok change it for many many movies. i know possession of the file isn't illegal, but would they, assuming they think the files have been illegally download, be able to pass the info on to anyone who then may deal with it?

No and I speak from experience.

silvercut said:
The truth will come out one way or another. Miscarriages of justice are rare and if he is wrongly charged he can sue the police for causing embarrassment.

You wouldn't believe how easy it is for them to "twist" what would otherwise be a miscarriage of justice into a scenario that best suits them, especially in low profile cases.

diamount · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:30

silvercut said:
The truth will come out one way or another. Miscarriages of justice are rare and if he is wrongly charged he can sue the police for causing embarrassment.

Is it now? Tell that to the people being arrested for derogatory facebook comments. But yeah, don't make me laugh - if it's a low profile case as the poster above me mentioned then they'll take the shortest way out possible so they don't have to deal with the paperwork.

Pestilence · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:33

"It wasn't me! It was the baby's armed man!"

Surveyor · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:33

silvercut said:
Miscarriages of justice are rare and if he is wrongly charged he can sue the police for causing embarrassment.

Even if it turns out he's innocent he can't successfully sue for being arrested, charged and prosecuted unless those things were done maliciously.

Being embarrassed doesn't give him a legal cause of action.

Illusion · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:35

1. It's kind of his own fault for leaving his account(s) active.

2. If he is innocent they (Facebook) will easily be able to show what IP addresses the account in question was accessed from, and if these are traced back to somebody who isn't your friend there should be no problem.

diamount · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:39

Illusion said:
1. It's kind of his own fault for leaving his account(s) active.

2. If he is innocent they (Facebook) will easily be able to show what IP addresses the account in question was accessed from, and if these are traced back to somebody who isn't your friend there should be no problem.

The OP already said his 'friend' doesn't have internet so how can they cross-reference IP's if there is only one? I guess they can query Microsoft what the IP was with the creation date but that was probably a long time ago and people change ISP's often.

Bengaboy · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:43

SexyGreyFox · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:43

wannabedamned said:
He's due back in the police station on the 21st December, to find out if he's being charged.

Where's Magick to tell him why he won't be?

Rroff · 10 Dec 2012 at 22:47

Mammalian said:
ok change it for many many movies. i know possession of the file isn't illegal, but would they, assuming they think the files have been illegally download, be able to pass the info on to anyone who then may deal with it?

As Fox said its not a criminal matter - unless the copyright holder brings action against the individual the police will do nothing and it would be a huge waste of police time and effort for them to go through every file on someones HDD and try and work out who the copyright holder is and if they should inform them just incase the file isn't a legally held copy.