Summary
Two former Missouri police officers, Julian Alcala and David McKnight, were charged in separate federal cases for illegally searching women’s phones during traffic stops to obtain explicit images.
Alcala, formerly with Florissant police, faces 20 counts of deprivation of rights for allegedly taking nude photos and videos from phones and deleting evidence.
McKnight, an ex-Missouri State Highway Patrol trooper, faces nine similar counts.
At least 29 women’s phones were allegedly searched.
Both men resigned after investigations began. The FBI urges victims to report misconduct by officers. The cases are unconnected.
Do cops just routinely grab victim’s phones at traffic stops and demand they be unlocked so they can sit in their car and scroll through the photos? How the hell is this legal? Why ?
This really pisses me off.
For the thick brained: “victim” in this context is the person pulled over.
From the article:
According to the federal indictment, Alcala would take women’s phones during traffic stops to confirm their insurance coverage or vehicle registration. But he searched their phones for nude images and took photos on his own personal phone, the indictment said.
(Doesn’t make it ok, but the cops weren’t just walking up to the window and demanding to search their phones)
Its things like this that make me glad for Androids app-locking feature.
Lock it on your insurance card. They would need your passcode to leave the insurance app.
For those who are unaware or curious, iOS can do this with your Guided Access settings. You can set it up to be unable to leave the app it’s currently in when you start Guided Access.
Thank you! I was trying to Google it as I was sure Apple has something comparable
Do cops just routinely grab victim’s phones at traffic stops and demand they be unlocked so they can sit in their car and scroll through the photos? How the hell is this legal? Why ?
No, that’s not normal or legal. Which is why these guys are getting charged with deprivation of rights.
That’s an incredible vague charge, I hope they get convincted.
Disgusting typical cop shit,
Sure, they resigned. Does it end there? They should be jailed for years.
Now I’m just curious about the stats. What percentage of women have nudies on their phones? I would have guessed you would need to search quite a lot of phones to get 29 with nudies on them, but I’m starting to think I’m wrong about that presumption.
I’d be willing to bet it’s most women in their 20s and 30s. Although to be fair, it said 29 phones were searched, not 29 phones had nudes on them.
Probably every woman above 18 has some nudes of themselves on their phone
Are you a woman? Not asking for any accusatory reasons or anything, I’m just curious about why you’d say that - if you’re a girl with lots of friends with nude photos, a guy who’s received a lot of photos, just a guy assuming, etc. Again, not asking to attack, even if you’re just assuming. I don’t have any nudes on mine, and I’ve had talks about this with a few friends and they were all “helllll NO” to the idea as well.
Edit: Though I do have some wicked sexy pictures of my bare legs. They are covered with horrible lumps called erythema nodosum, though, so probably no one would be looking for that lol
Probably not
Desperate and pathetic. Have these guys never heard of the internet?
I’m guessing it’s a power thing. They have “trophies” to get off too
Yeah, that seems like the best explanation. In that case, I’d like to add “reprehensible” to my other insults.
Also this should go on their permanent record. So they are never allowed to be in any position of authority anywhere again.
That would be nice, but in America, I’m not sure there’s anything like a permanent record for cops.
There’s a permanent record for everybody that went to school in America. I remember it was drilled into us at a young age, that this or that could end up on our permanent record.
And if there isn’t one for cops and other positions of authority there should be one. Make it a phone app.
They probably feel like it’s “personalized”, like it’s “for them”, which is an absolutely disgusting and horrifying thought.
The power of it probably does something for them as well.
Does this fall under protecting or serving?
