Counter-argument: a single, anonymous tip is insufficient to justify a military-style response.
Hoax! I completely fell for it.
Look at the other articles on that site.
Argh! My outrage response was so primed, the premise of the story so belivable, and then the snores posting cut me off mid- snark. A good argument for reading the comments before posting, I think. I will try to only get worked up about real stories in the future.
Sorry, this turned out to be an entirely believable hoax. Which says something about where we are.
I think that qualifies it as art.
Mathew Weigman received a 135 month sentence for, among other things, SWATing people. However, he pled to
one count of conspiracy to retaliate against a witness, victim or informant and one count of conspiracy to commit access device fraud.
Retaliation against a witness is quite serious, though and I’m not sure that doing the same against an unknown person could attract serious jail time.
Hm; have SWATings been handled in the courts? I’m curious as to what the charges would be. Technically it seems an indirect form of assault.
/edit: die antwoord is yes; charges are for faking the call (false bomb/violence reports).
Makes sense.
From that Snopes page:
[quote]National Report publisher Allen Montgomery has also stated to the legitimate press that in no way should anyone construe the National Report as real news:
“It is our opinion that if a person is too lazy to check for multiple references [or at least one other source] … and they spread misinformation around as fact, then they are to blame for their own stupidity, not us,” he said.[/quote]
Food for thought.
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