Phone purchases by foreigners 'suspicious'

Phone purchases by foreigners 'suspicious'

www.thetelegraph.com

ALTON — Police are on the lookout for any more instances of foreign men trying to buy numerous prepaid wireless telephones at dollar stores, as happened twice Saturday in Alton.

The Alton Police Department subsequently reported the “suspicious” incidents to the Statewide Terrorism Information Center (STIC), based in Springfield.

“It certainly was a reason for concern when men of foreign descent demand to buy all of their phones,” said Deputy Chief Jody O’Guinn of the Alton Police Department.

O’Guinn said if store clerks encounter such instances, they should not get actively involved in trying to detain the men.

“The best thing they can do is to be good witnesses,” O’Guinn said, and to call police.

While some foreigners might be buying the cheap cell phones for illegal or dangerous purposes, a law enforcement source said most of the time, the people are involved in a “re-marketing ploy.” They send the phones to Third World countries, where a colleague resells them at a huge mark-up.

(visit the link for the full news article)

What do you think - suspicious enough to alert the Statewide Terrorism Information Centers, just a scam to buy and re-sell the phones (or is that alone suspicious enough to alert STIC), or an over-reaction by local yokels who can't even tell if the accents were Middle-Eastern or "Russian"?

www.thetelegraph.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Oops, forgot to include another news source, here:

www.altondailynews.com...

www.liveleak.com...

Nuff said?

This is just more silliness from the fear mongers. Something must be brewing though, they haven't tried to get us all panicked about people buying cell phones for a while..

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I don’t think it’s suspicious, when I have gone overseas on a holiday – for a month or 2 I usually buy a local pre-paid phone or Sim Card, it’s usually cheaper than using roaming from my home network.

These police need to travel more.

Mikey

ALERT, ALERT: Someone has just bought 10 tins of baked beans. He must be a terrorist, otherwise why would he need so many tins of beans. lol

Originally posted by andy1033
ALERT, ALERT: Someone has just bought 10 tins of baked beans. He must be a terrorist, otherwise why would he need so many tins of beans. lol

With 10 tins of beans that’s going to be some “explosion”, just have your masks on!

Mikey


[edit on 13/2/2008 by Mikey84]

What reasons would you need to buy dozens of telephones? Terrorism? Some criminal activities perhaps? Do people usually buy that many?

Before we all shoot off at the mouth like we know it all, maybe just stop for a moment and think.

If I were in a store and a couple of middle eastern looking guys came in and demanded to buy all the prepaid cell phones, would I be just a little alarmed.

Anyone here that says no is lying!

No matter who we are we are all affected by bias even if it's just a little bit. I for one will always be cautious and alert in these situations. Furthermore I try to be as unbiased as possible while taking all factors into consideration. It doesn't hurt to report something and have it checked out.

I see Arabic people walking around my neighborhood all the time but I don't think much of it. However, if I saw them in a store buying 20 pp cells it's going to raise my eyebrows a little.

Let me tell you guys about the Alton police ,,har har

I used to work in that area across the river there is a small hobby shop
off of broadway there and I was in there checking out some model rockets
and asked out of curiosity if they still had the estes rockets with the cameras ( I like model rockets what can i say) he says no we don't carry them anymore, a short time later while still browsing a cop comes in and says is that the guy and pointed directly at yours truly, I said yes can I help you he said yes the shop owner says that you were asking about the camera rockets I said yes I was he says can I ask why now at this point we were both kinda looking like we were gonna laugh
he says I am sorry but we have to ask and we told the owner to call us if anyone suspicious asked about these and he apparently thought you were suspicious so I said ask what you need well where do you work , I told where do you live I told him and what was my reason for asking about the rocket, and I told him (like I said I like model rockets) he was like that is cool..

So the deal is there is a refinery nearby and they are on the lookout for terrorists ha that was hilarious so your tax dollars are hard at work in Alton Illinois let me tell you..

while the real terrorists are planning an attack these guys will be busting boy scouts for model rockets.

Respectfully
GEO

[edit on 2/13/2008 by geocom]

reply to post by Mikey84


You know what i meant by that, he is stocking up, the government must watch those who stock up in food, as well.

all this fearmongering and paranoia is only going to make it harder for the true dangerous people to be discovered.if you suspect everyone its only makes it harder to suspect the right people,get it?.

i like to strut around the park,yet due to my dislike for fashion,my impressive sideburns,self cut hair(good but a bit messy) and pale skin people think im dangerous and stay clear of me,dragging themselves and thier children away cos i look a bit "rough".it annoys me to no ends,ive never hurt anyone in my life and never would!.

surely you would be more suspiscious of he who is smartly dressed,the true scoundrel comes in a disguise!.in this case a true terrorist would buy his phone off a criminal down a back lane not a bloody shop with cctv,dear god!!

what a joke,the people in charge dont have a clue,they can only be causing fear on purpose and are actually hampering the fight against the terrorists!

reply to post by G_Ponderovo


A Topic of interest to all......How about the State that these towns are in...???

reply to post by welivefortheson


They are afraid of you because they are cowards.....The manner in which some body dresses can facilitate a disguise.....The guys buying these phones do not care.....They are not afraid of death....The sooner we realize that the better off we are all going to be...If the local sheriff moves quickly and locates the service provider these phones can be disabled and then all we have to do is wait for the nice men who bought them to come back for their refund......

reply to post by geocom


WHERE IS ALTON ?????

Originally posted by theodorej
reply to post by geocom

 

WHERE IS ALTON ?????

Western Illinois - on the Mississippi River, a little far north of St. Louis to be considered a "suburb", but only just. There are fairly large refineries in that area (because of the barge traffic).

The terrorist threat is being played up big right now. They have an illegal spying bill to pass.

Here's another:


news.yahoo.com...;_ylt=AmMl6ygcBNDuXLQXhr9uq9is0NUE

When people are sufficiently terrorized by all the threats, they'll encourage their elected officials to ram through that illegal spying act tout suit!