SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — The addictive cellphone game “Pokemon Go” has led people to unlikely places to collect digital monsters – including the gates of a central California ranch that houses alcoholics and sex offenders. … But De Vaul, 72, told the Los Angeles Times that he was upset. “I have no idea what Pokemon is,” he said. “I have no idea who put the stop – if it was sabotage – because we don’t want kids showing up here.”
If children visit the property, some sex offenders living there might be placed at risk of being sent back to prison for violating conditions of their probation or parole, De Vaul said. Full Article
Related
http://abc7.com/news/pokemon-go-leads-players-to-california-home-for-sex-offenders/1426332/
While I am pretty sure this was an accident and random location put on the game, it won’t surprise me to see more on-purpose harassment of sex offenders and their addresses since incorporating it into apps and games is easy.
With how easily google and other sites can match your photo, it won’t be long before phones are used to scan all faces of people they walk by or approach a counter at a business and are automatically flagged as a sex offender.
Here in Texas, my wife has already been denied services for our children just because a sex offender lives at her home address.
I’m afraid no amount of “incrementalism” will stop the way the list gets used in the future. It will take a big case against the list itself.
If anyone ever believed that reality could not be ridiculous here’s proof. For all any player knows the augmented reality game might require them to enter a public bathroom not designated for their gender, kitchen at a restaurant, or another place the average person is usually not going to. It is not a stretch imagining some utterly strange locations for pokemom to be found; the white house front lawn, inside the Pentagon (maybe the the building itself, but a courtyard, a military base, outside jails, prisons, and detention centers, halfway houses, a warehouse, near strip clubs, bars, clubs, lounges, casinos, in the middle of nowhere, a town called nowhere, in a forest, jungle, in mountains, on hills, in or by rivers, lakes, seas, streams, oceans or other bodies of water, and on and on.
I can see it now, new HB 6969 amends 291.69 to “Prohibit anyone required to register under this section from residing or remaining present within 1000 feet of any digital Pokemon. Violation of this residency restriction shall be a felony punishable for up to 10 years in prison and a fine of $10,000. This requirement shall be retroactive and in full force upon signature by the Governor of this great state.”
Slapdash journalism. The Pokestops are locations that were submitted by users from the company’s prior game, Ingress. Apparently, one of the locations that was submitted was the gates of the sober living facility, where there happened to be sex offenders residing at the time. So what does the media do? Start cranking up the fear mongering machine.
It’s the same bullshit as the Halloween restrictions and SO’s. It’s never happened, but that doesn’t stop the media from stoking the fears and imaginations of its constituency.
This Pokemon Go sex offender hysteria is spreading across the country including here in Milwaukee
http://www.cbs58.com/story/32450697/they-could-lure-kids-registered-sex-offenders-living-near-poke-stops
Last weekend my son caught a ‘Paras’ Pokemon in my living room. He told me it’ll evolve into a ‘Parasect’. Should I call an exterminator? I guess the good news is that this didn’t compel me to sexually abuse him contrary to the frightening news stories I’ve been reading. I just don’t want to be run out of my house as it could be considered an “Attractive Nuisance”. I told my son “This infestation is just between us, don’t want no strange kids hanging around.”
The attractive nuisance doctrine applies to the law of torts, in the United States. It states that a landowner may be held liable for injuries to children trespassing on the land if the injury is caused by an object on the land that is likely to attract children.
Finally a safeguard has been built into Pokémon Go to protect children from Sex Offender monsters!
http://www.clickhole.com/article/gaming-safety-ftw-pokemon-pokemon-go-will-now-scre-4691
We knew it was coming. It looks like some New York senators are racing to get their legislation passed to “Save the children” from all the predators feasting on Pokemon Go players.
http://nypost.com/2016/07/29/pokemon-go-lures-children-near-homes-of-sex-offenders/