It's a known fact that police in this country don't go for "disabling" shots (arms/legs/hands/etc) - they're trained to neutralize any perceived threat. Inciting a situation where you're causing an SWAT response and *then* escalating it to try and force an armed breach - that is purely malicious and straight up trying…

Oh, right, the old model where a bully gets to sit down and pretend to be sorry listening to the victim explain why their feelings were hurt. That doesn't work in real life.

If you think that the swatter wasn't trying to get someone killed, I'm a bit worried. The whole point of making the second call to try and get someone to run outside yelling "Someone has a gun" was to force the SWAT team to make a forced entry to neutralize a threat - so they'd go in looking for someone with something…

The whole point of making the second call to have someone run outside and yell "He's got a gun" was to force the SWAT team to force entry into the building and at that point they'd be on alert for *anyone* with anything in their hands (such as a bunch of people huddling around phones/radios). If you actually think the…

And it's not even like they "just" swatted them. When that didn't work in getting someone shot, they called the place and tried even harder to get someone shot.

...but life in prison is too much.

That's why step 1 is to stop referring to it as a "prank".

I think a federal task force and hotline is a pretty decent idea.

Please. There are worse things in life than being put in handcuffs for 20 minutes. Hell, some people do that in bed.

you're a fuckin moron

He's willing to prank someone in such a way as to order them to kill themselves by impersonating a fireman or other public worker. If this person is 12, they're already too far gone as it is.

Bullshit. Kidnappings used to happen all the time in america in the past. Then they made it a federal crime with mandatory jail and kidnappings stopped happening nearly as often. Your an idiot.

Yup, lets completely ignore the fact that it may have been a real situation with an armed suspect forcing people to pretend things are alright...that never happens...ever.

Fuck you. Minor video gamers are psychotic little monsters.

no punishment is too harsh for this. Whatever repercussions it takes to stop it including sending them away for good. Its the purest form of terrorism, i agree. Innocents should not have to worry about swat popping up for no reason.

I'd be happy to see my tax money go towards punishing madness like this. That's what government is SUPPOSED to be for- to protect the people.

Or you could stop being a nutbar, understand that it is their job to take threats seriously and in a real situation they would be the ones saving your ass.

So then they can't pay, drags on for years while they're on food stamps and welfare, and eventually end up in jail anyway. No, you're talking about basically an eventual debtor's prison. Instead, they should be jailed, and yes that will cost tax money, that's part of WHAT TAXES ARE THERE FOR.

Someone at the federal level should be assisting in tracing these little jackasses, every single time it happens. The only way this will stop is if it's 100 percent clear that you will always be caught, no exceptions.

There's a common thread in this sort of behavior, in which the perpetrator thinks they're fucking teflon and that nothing and no one can stop them. In almost all cases they change their tune once they've been caught and punished, begging and pleading for a second chance and claiming they learned their lesson.