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March 2017
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Jury Acquits Restaurant Owner Of Obstruction Charges For Tweeting Out Photo Of Teens Involved In Police Alcohol Sting

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Obstructing government operations seems like a serious offense, but it tends to be one of those catch-all charges used by law enforcement to generate arrests for non-criminal activities like showing less respect than officers feel they deserve or someone getting all constitutional in response to searches and/or seizures. In Nebraska, law enforcement uses it to handle "being made."Nebraska state police attempted to perform a compliance check at local restaurant Salt last August. In this case, "compliance check" is just a dressed-up word for "sting." Cops sent in two teenagers to attempt to purchase alcohol. The sting failed.

Two troopers in plain clothes drove the teens in an unmarked vehicle to the businesses and stayed nearby in case things went awry, testified Christopher Kober, a State Patrol investigator.The teens sat at Salt 88’s bar and ordered two Bud Lights, Alberico testified. The bartender asked for identification and the teens, trained on what to do, presented their real driver’s licenses. The bartender refused service and the teens left, Alberico testified.
John Horavatinovich, the owner of Salt, wasn't too impressed by the failed sting. He tweeted out a photo of the teens, along with a warning to other restaurant/bar owners.
Assistant City Prosecutor Makayla Maclin said in her opening statement Monday that on Aug.13, Horvatinovich tweeted photos showing the faces of two teens with the comment: “Omaha restaurant peeps: These two are trying to ruin your night w/sting operations in town.”
The state police decided to shut down its sting operation since its two underage informants were no longer all that "confidential." Instead of rounding up another set of compliant teens to perform compliance checks, the cops arrested Horavatinovich for obstruction of justice.The arresting officer justified this with a mostly-nonsensical statement about safety -- as though restaurant owners were every bit as vengeful and violent as mob bosses and drug cartel heads.
“I have never had my CIs’ identity compromised before,” Trooper Alberico testified. “I felt that it was a safety issue for them. I care about my CIs, and it’s my job to protect them.”
The police certainly seemed secure in the rightness of their actions, despite everything about the arrest looking like nothing more than petty revenge for having their operation blown. And the local prosecutors office was the most compliant entity in this failed compliance sting, as it followed through with a jury trial, rather than drop the ridiculous charge.The jury found in favor of the restaurant owner, which means the next time an ID sting is uncovered, restaurant owners are more than welcome to let each other know which teens are acting as narc-of-the-day for the local PD.Honestly, the problem here lies entirely with state law enforcement and its response to Horavatinovich's actions. As Fault Lines' Josh Kendrick points out, the public shouldn't be forced to stay silent when law enforcement screws up.
While police are welcome to investigate crime, that doesn’t mean we now live in a police state. If your amateur hour undercover investigation targeting law-abiding business owners gets discovered, why does the public have to cover for your ineptitude? Why can’t those business owners get together and help each other? Maybe remind each other to double-check identification and watch out for teens drinking at the bar?
Just like warning drivers about speed traps, warning other business owners about law enforcement stings raises awareness and actually results in more compliance, rather than less. Those warned about speed traps slow down. Those warned about law enforcement sting operations pay more attention to those they're serving alcohol to. The only party that "loses" is the one that thinks the general public is nothing more than a revenue stream that can be tapped into at its convenience -- where arrests and fines are preferred to actual lawful behavior.

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posted at: 12:00am on 01-Mar-2017
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Indoor Football Team Lets Fans Pretty Much Run Everything From A Phone App

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We've talked a great deal about businesses connecting with their fans as a way to keep their interest in a product. The whole formula of CwF+RtB relies first and foremost on giving customers an emotional interest in seeing a particular business or product succeed. This generally involves treating the buying public well, engaging with customers in an open and honest way, making sure the product is great, and building advocates out of mere consumers.But then one day the owner of an indoor American football team comes along and decides that basically the entire team should be run in a crowdsourced manner by the fans via a mobile application.

The Screaming Eagles claim to be the first fan-run professional football team in the United States. Using a free mobile app, anyone can vote on nearly all aspects of the new team's identity and function, including calling offensive and special-teams plays. The experiment did not begin swimmingly. On the Screaming Eagles’ first possession, voters decided on a pass play on third-and-10 from their own 5-yard line. Reed fumbled in the end zone, and Nebraska recovered for a touchdown. Five plays later, on fourth-and-15 from their own 1-yard line, the vote called for a field goal. (The field is 50 yards long.) The kick was blocked and recovered by Nebraska for another score.
But the influence of the fans was felt long before they managed to collectively poop the bed on the field. The fans were responsible for the uniforms the team wore in the game, the name of the team and its cheerleader squad, and even the choice of the music to which the team warmed up. And, like all good ideas that have ever existed, the owner of the team decided to do all of this because he played video games.
Sohrob Farudi, the chief executive of Project Fanchise, the team’s ownership group, said there was no eureka moment behind his decision to start such a fan-driven team; it was something he had considered for a number of years.“I was always on my couch, playing Madden, making calls and wondering why I was spending money on beer and tickets to games,” said Farudi, who sold his cellphone resale and recycling company, Flipswap, in 2011. “Being so close to tech and mobile, I wondered, Why can’t a fan be involved?”
And now they are, in more ways than with any other team in the history of professional sports. There have been some rocky beginnings to all of this, including some fans' attempt to have the Utah-based team named The Stormin' Mormons. Still, Farudi appears committed to the concept, and even his coach and players are getting on board.
McCarthy, whose résumé includes head coach and coordinator positions on four other I.F.L. teams, said he has warmed to a system that, to outsiders, may look as if he is relinquishing control of his coaching duties.“At the end of the day, it’s still my plays,” he said. “I set up our system, so it’s got my plays in it and what we’ve been working on.”
Nobody would suggest that this level of fan involvement will translate to the larger, more popular sports leagues and franchises. But aspects of it certainly can. And the Indoor Football League is obviously desperate for eyeballs, so it's quite interesting to see them try to attract fans by giving them a crazy amount of ownership over the product they'll be watching on the field. It seems obvious that allowing fans to have this kind of crowdsourced involvement in the team can only help to keep them engaged by giving them an emotional investment in the product. That's pretty clearly CwF-type thinking, with the curiousity of how the fans' gameplan might turn out to be a rather creative RtB. There are even benefits for different levels of fan involvement and purchasing.
Christian Williams, 29, of Melbourne, Australia, spent $450 during the team’s crowdfunding round to be named one of 10 co-founders of the franchise. He said in a phone interview Thursday that he had analyzed scouting reports and held conversations with the front office via Skype and email.“I like the fact that I have been involved in the process all the way,” he said.
Again, not a model for everyone, but it's a cool concept for fan engagement. I imagine that engagement would only multiply if the team manages to start winning some games with the fans at the helm.

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posted at: 12:00am on 01-Mar-2017
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