# Purported Video of "Evacuation" During Boston Bombing Search **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 23, 2013, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495 "2013-04-23T14:50:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/101 "2013-05-05T18:54:22Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > The lock down extended in at least a 30 mile radius around Boston. I know for a fact that all rail service was suspended all the way out to Worcester, which is like 40 miles from Watertown. I live in Somerville, and we were out and about, driving and shopping. We received UPS deliveries. There were no restrictions on our movement other than the T was shut down. I’m not sure what you think “Lock Down” means, but not having commuter rail it isn’t. > [@](#): > > Martial law was effectively declared in Boston. While it’s true the tanks and heavily armed “police” were pretty much just in that part of the city, people elsewhere could not move about freely. Yes, the movement of large numbers of people was restricted. No, it wasn’t martial law by any stretch of the imagination. ---
**Author:** ![split\_p\_j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@split\_p\_j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/split_p_j)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/102 "2013-05-05T19:01:45Z")
> [@Tee](#): > > I think it’s funny that anti-statists think their rights are violated when public transportation is shut down. I’m not talking about public transit, but really, what difference does it make. The fact is freight rail was also shut down. All freight operations on the main CSX line out of Boston had to be staged out of Worcester. Not to mention the fact that you could not even hop in your private car and take the Mass Pike towards Boston since it too was shut down. Isn’t that the whole point? I mean the soldiers are fighting for our freedom right? What happened in Boston was the opposite of freedom. ---
**Author:** ![split\_p\_j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@split\_p\_j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/split_p_j)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/103 "2013-05-05T19:10:05Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > I live in Somerville, and we were out and about, driving and shopping. We received UPS deliveries. There were no restrictions on our movement other than the T was shut down. I’m not sure what you think “Lock Down” means, but not having commuter rail it isn’t. > > Yes, the movement of large numbers of people was restricted. No, it wasn’t martial law by any stretch of the imagination. I’m not from the area, but I was out there on that day. Just because the lock down did not personally affect you does not mean it didn’t happen. Try getting out of or into The Hub from one of the outer suburbs and then try to tell me it’s was not de-facto martial law. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/104 "2013-05-05T19:19:29Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Isn’t that the whole point? I mean the soldiers are fighting for our freedom right? What happened in Boston was the opposite of freedom. I personally consider my freedom to not have my legs blown off by a terrorist more significant than my freedom to go joyriding during a manhunt. ---
**Author:** ![split\_p\_j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@split\_p\_j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/split_p_j)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/105 "2013-05-05T19:35:12Z")
I’m not sure how to respond to this statement. So anything goes as long as it let’s you feel you are safe? You can use a loaded term like joyride, but, let’s put it in perspective. 3 people died and I think maybe 28 lost a limb in a metro area of over 5 million people. As a result of that, it was decided that you could not travel freely as far as 30 miles away. You are saying I should give up my freedom just so you can feel safe? ---
**Author:** ![Tee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@Tee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tee)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/106 "2013-05-05T19:44:13Z")
I’m from the North Shore area and I don’t think you could keep a corner bar clear of people if the people weren’t agreeable to it. To me it looked a lot like the population going along with the idea of depriving a murderous twit of an easy escape and/or additional victims, and I was kinda proud of them. The Amtrak Downeaster service was stopped and held not far from where I am. I was sorry for those people, that’s a little rough, but any track jumper can cause that on any given day - blame goes to the jumper. Likewise, blame the bomb-throwing twit they captured for messing up your day. ---
**Author:** ![split\_p\_j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@split\_p\_j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/split_p_j)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/107 "2013-05-05T20:00:35Z")
> [@Tee](#): > > I’m from the North Shore area and I don’t think you could keep a corner bar clear of people if the people weren’t agreeable to it. I’m sure people in Watertown thought the same, until the tanks were actually on their streets and “police” were pointing guns in their faces while telling them not to look out the window and searching their houses. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/108 "2013-05-05T20:15:57Z")
> [@lawbuff](#): > > To quote selectively, although Edmond deals with checkpoint stops; > …The Fourth Amendment requires that searches and seizures be reasonable.\*\* A search or seizure is ordinarily unreasonable in the absence of individualized suspicion of wrongdoing. Chandler v. Miller, 520 U.S. 305, 308 (1997)\*\*. While such suspicion is not an “irreducible” component of reasonableness, Martinez-Fuerte, 428 U.S., at 561, we have recognized only limited circumstances in which the usual rule does not apply… > Since there was NO individualized suspicion to enter hundreds of homes, IF force was used or there was language by the police of the effect that compliance was mandatory or arrest was possible, then we have Constitutional issues. The entering was no doubt under a voluntary compliance, and although I am sure “some” thought they had to, that does not render the search per se UNconstitutional. > [INDIANAPOLIS V. EDMOND](http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/99-1030.ZO.html) > > Here is dicta to the effect of a “roadblock” to stop a terrorist, but this is not inclusive of a dragnet sweep of homes. > …For example, as the Court of Appeals noted, the Fourth Amendment would almost certainly permit an appropriately tailored roadblock set up to thwart an imminent terrorist attack or to catch a dangerous criminal who is likely to flee by way of a particular route. See 183 F.3d, at 662—663. The exigencies created by these scenarios are far removed from the circumstances under which authorities might simply stop cars as a matter of course to see if there just happens to be a felon leaving the jurisdiction… > > For the police to ORDER each occupant to submit to a search would be a Constitutional error. > > The suspect was a murder suspect, he had no atomic bomb capable of destroying a city as to even suggest “exigency” would permit a warrantless entry to any home to search. Seems to me that the 4th Amendment was tossed the minute warrantless wiretaps were allowed back in the previous administration. The logic from those who are now squalling about their 2nd Amendment rights and about cops going into private homes without a warrant was “if you’re not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to fear”. Why doesn’t the same (poor) logic apply to this situation? ---
**Author:** ![split\_p\_j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@split\_p\_j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/split_p_j)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/109 "2013-05-05T20:16:48Z")
Here we go. [Starting to build the case that everyone is a threat now.](http://news.yahoo.com/teenagers-social-media-terrorism-threat-level-hard-assess-131320139.html) ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/110 "2013-05-05T20:58:02Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > I’m sure people in Watertown thought the same, until the tanks were actually on their streets and “police” were pointing guns in their faces while telling them not to look out the window and searching their houses. How about we find some actual Bostonians complaining about the fact that the manhunt for a mass-murdering, cop-killing extremist whose continued flight from justice was a threat to the safety of the entire community was too much of an inconvenience to them? Seems to me that all the posters thus far who were actually _influenced_ by the manhunt understand and respect the reasons for it. ---
**Author:** ![Tee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@Tee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tee)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/111 "2013-05-05T21:26:08Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Here we go. [Starting to build the case that everyone is a threat now.](http://news.yahoo.com/teenagers-social-media-terrorism-threat-level-hard-assess-131320139.html) Good example of an aspiring suicide-by-cop. Bad example if you’re going for persecution by liberal bedwetters in Methuen. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/112 "2013-05-05T21:27:52Z")
It amuses me that an awful lot of people who thought it was just super to have the Patriot Act and warrantless wiretapping and completely unnecessary wars (that’s plural there) and all that crap in response to a much less imminent danger and for a much more indeterminate duration are now screaming bloody murder when a fairly mild travel restriction (which appears to have been mostly voluntary) is instituted (by LOCAL law enforcement, not even federal) for less than 24 hours in response to the flight of a suspected bomber who’s already killed four and injured more than 20 and was still at large. ---
**Author:** ![Deeg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/deeg/32/2955_2.png) [@Deeg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Deeg)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2013, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/113 "2013-05-05T22:00:31Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Try getting out of or into The Hub from one of the outer suburbs and then try to tell me it’s was not de-facto martial law. I live in a Southern section of Boston (Jamaica Plain) and people were out and about that day. You’re “30 mile radius” comment tells me you don’t know what you’re talking about. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495/114 "2013-05-06T00:44:05Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > I’m not from the area, but I was out there on that day. Just because the lock down did not personally affect you does not mean it didn’t happen. I was responding to the statement that even though the poster was 30 miles away from Boston they were on lockdown. No, they weren’t. Some public transportation was shut down but otherwise if you were outside the lockdown area you were free to move about all you liked. Inside the lockdown area people were still moving about. Stores were open, some people were traveling. I know folks who went to the airport and flew out of Boston, and flew back and drove home to Cambridge later in the day. It certainly affected lots of people. It wasn’t martial law. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purported-video-of-evacuation-during-boston-bombing-search/656495.md?page=5)