Dean Brown of Racine, Wisconsin, has unwittingly made the case for encryption in GPS units. He was pulled over by police while driving with freshly harvested marijuana in his car and arrested, according to the Racine Report. But that was just the start of his troubles:
Deputies found a GPS unit around Brown’s neck with coordinates to areas throughout Racine County, the complaint said. On Saturday, Metro Drug agents plugged coordinates saved in Brown’s GPS unit into Google Earth…
… and they found all his grow sites. And now he faces 59 years in prison! For marijuana!
hahaha awesome! Where’s the kml file then?
This is more a case for obeying the laws of one’s area.
“And now he faces 59 years in prison! For marijuana!”
For *illegal* marijuana.
I personally don’t have a problem with legalizing marijuana. But at the moment the majority doesn’t agree (democracy, you’ll recall) and it’s illegal here. The guy knew it, and went ahead anyway. His free choice, he’s responsible and has to accept the consequences.
A little update on this case. The search of the gps unit was found in county court to be unusable, as the info was obtained illegally- no warrant and no consent. Racine county dropped all the charges, the state picked up the case until they realized ther was none. As of last week, the case was dismissed and mr. Brown is a free man. How’s that for 56 years! What garbage! The most he was ever realistically facing was 3 years. Gotta love a happy ending.