Patterico's Pontifications

4/10/2013

Ryan Seacrest SWATted

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:33 pm



CNN:

Ryan Seacrest became the latest celebrity targeted by a “swatter” when a hoax 911 call reported armed men were shooting their way into the “American Idol” host’s home Wednesday.

When police arrived at Seacrest’s Beverly Hills home at about 2:40 p.m., they found Seacrest there, but no group of armed men, a Beverly Hills police spokesman said.

After speaking with Seacrest and his security team, the officers left.

The article indicates that some local police agencies have begun responding more cautiously to calls that sound suspicious. This growing awareness seems like a good thing — but then, we don’t want a situation where a real emergency that sounds like a SWATting is not responded to quickly.

The now traditional roll call of the SWATted: Ryan Seacrest; Russell Brand; Selena Gomez; Justin Timberlake; Rihanna; Sean Combs; Chris Brown; Tom Cruise; Paris Hilton; Clint Eastwood; Brian Krebs; the Jenners and Kardashians; Justin Bieber; Miley Cyrus; Ashton Kutcher; Simon Cowell; Aaron Walker; Erick Erickson; Mike Stack; and me.

15 Responses to “Ryan Seacrest SWATted”

  1. How long before cops develop ways to catch these people?

    For what it’s worth? The folks at the Dallas FBI seem to have a real track record of success in this area. I suggest y’all contact them for help.

    Don’t be too proud. The important thing is catching the bad guys, not pride.

    Right?

    Patterico (9c670f)

  2. Oh, sure …

    SPQR (768505)

  3. Of course, with Los Angeles County Sheriff, one has to be happy when they keep their SWAT team inside LA county lines … eh?

    SPQR (768505)

  4. I can not believe the technology does not exist to see the number and location of the prank or malicious caller.

    Michael Harris (d71d72)

  5. Patterico #1: The important thing seems to be making sure no celebrities get hurt. Catching the perpetrators is further down the list, if it’s even on the list.

    DRJ (a83b8b)

  6. ok this one has both kardashian AND simon cowell connections and Ashton and Ryan are more than just hi pals they have a deep superficial bond

    happyfeet (8ce051)

  7. What’s going to happen when the situation is real and SWAT is late to the scene?

    Stashiu3 (ac9e9e)

  8. all this Swatting going on!!! Maybe those who do this, should have SEVERE consequences??
    My brother was SWAT at Columbine. It wasn’t funny.
    Nor Kimberlin crap.

    Gus (694db4)

  9. California detectives were asked for a statement.
    Inspector Clouseau responded “Chocholote makes me thirsty”.
    Ho Hum.

    mg (31009b)

  10. God help us here if the SWATters start saying there’s a meth lab in an expensive home. Cops will come from nearby counties just to get in on the forfeiture.

    Kevin M (bf8ad7)

  11. The New York Times has a front page story on SWATting:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/11/us/hollywood-swatting-hoax-strains-both-police-and-stars.html?pagewanted=all

    This is actually a single column on the far left of the page beneath the fold. I didn’t spot it until I turned to page 3. It’s the main story on page 3.

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  12. The New York Times explain the technical situation this way:

    Police officials said that typically, pranksters placed a 911 call through a computer, often by hacking into someone else’s account or using a system for people with hearing disabilities, to disguise their locations. They report a crime in progress at a celebrity’s address, usually involving people armed with guns or bombs, which prompts the police to respond Code 3, with lights and sirens.

    The authorities said they had become more sophisticated in tracking down prank calls. “A lot of people think that if they’re on a confidential server, it won’t give away their address,” Mr. Smith said. “But if you put a search warrant in front of an Internet company, they can give you pretty much whatever information the judge tells them to.”

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  13. Simon,

    I always figured that was the case (that maybe 911 is set up so that they can’t tell at the time that the call does not actually originate from the claimed location), but if the investigators were to even subpoena the involved service providers that accurate information could be obtained. At that point it’s a matter of how much interest police and prosecutors actually have in closing such cases or would they rather just forget about it and move on to something else.

    Of course there’s also the issue that these people may well be using more than one cutout layer, and figuring that out would be a lot harder. It’s easy to determine that there was no gun battle at Ryan Seacrest’s house and that the call had to come from somewhere else. It’s a lot harder to determine whether Mr. Y at the place the provider says the fake call came from was actually the responsible party or not.

    Soronel Haetir (02427a)

  14. Somebody needs to change the way 911 works, and the telephone system in general.

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  15. On Good Morning America news crawler this morning (4/12) – “LAPD to stop providing information about celebrity swatting cases to discourage publicity seekers.”

    Not sure seeking publicity is a result since they can’t seem to figure out who’s doing it, but ok.

    Em (0af170)


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