In San Diego, police arrested a man who was miles away from a crime because they got a hit on a license plate reader for car similar to the one they were looking for. It shows the dangers of misuse of automated license plate readers, but also more broadly how police can get fixated on a suspect because of one bit of digital evidence. In South Bend, police thought a suspect was using his Facebook account at a home. But the only person in the house was a teenager playing video games. He came out and truthfully said no one else was in the house. His mother and sister got home and said the same thing. Police called into the home and no one came out. Despite no other evidence connecting the suspect to the house, they lobbed gas grenades through all the windows and let off a flashbang in the front entrance. The police refused to pay for all the damage they did searching an empty house. Penny McCarthy was arrested by a US Marshals team in her front yard in Arizona. She was called by a name she had never heard and the team refused to go into her home and check her ID. We still don't know what evidence that Penny was connected with the wanted woman was, but it must have been slim because they'd never even lived in the same state. A digital lead is just a lead. Police have to do additional work before they leap to arresting someone and prosecutors have to be more careful to not charge people based on thin evidence.

Yesterday, @IJ helped save a garden in Illinois.

This is crazy! A village in Illinois is ordering a botanist to tear up the garden she has been working on for years, saying it's "high grass or weeds." Laura Schaefer has 7 days to do it or the village will send people onto her property to destroy the garden--then bill her!

Hopefully Millstadt will come to its senses quickly. I'll post updates as we get them. END (for now)