Terrorist or freedom fighter?

[Timber020]

But aimed specifically at traffic enforcement schemes like speed cameras. A second bomb exploded today in the offices of a firm that handles speed cameras and the ticketing of drivers caught by the devices. Two men were injured. Yesterday a small bomb exploded in the offices of a firm that collects "congestion fees" in London. One woman was hurt in that incident.

Two people were injured today in another letter bomb attack - this time targeting a speed camera headquarters.

It comes just 24 hours after an explosion in the post room of congestion charge firm Capita.

Police are trying to establish any links between the attacks. Detectives fear a motorist is attacking firms that run traffic penalty schemes. The devices seem to be designed to injure but not kill victims.

Today's explosion happened at 9am at the offices of Vantis, in Wokingham, Berkshire - a company involved in speed cameras. Two male workers suffered blast injuries. Neither was seriously hurt but both were said to be "traumatised". …..

…..Campaigner Captain Gatso, the director of group Motorists Against Detection, said today: "We are not responsible for these attacks and do not condone causing injury to anyone. However, there is a war against motorists and it seems this is an act of retaliation." Police revealed that yesterday's bomb, which exploded in Victoria Street in central London, was contained in a Jiffy bag padded envelope.


Hey what would we name a NZ superhero who destroys speedcamera's, something better than captain Gatso I hope

[James Deuce]

A step too far I'd say.

[Steam]

Terrorist if he attacks people opening the fucking mail for gods sakes, they are probably paid minimum wage.

Freedom fighter if they attack the speed cameras. Nobody would get upset at that, we'd all cheer him on!

Hope they catch the bastard and send him to jail for a long long time. Letterbombs! Nah.

[The Pastor]

or if he hacked the mainframe and shut down all the spedcamers etc......


What about burning downt he HQ at night? If no one got hurt would it change things?

[Timber020]

Bugger, I pasted the wrong article, the one I thought I had copied was more about captain gatso- here it is


Saboteurs take out 700 speed cameras


They are Mad - or Motorists Against Detection - and are dedicated to destroying the tools that help to keep roads safe

Stephen Khan
Sunday September 7, 2003
The Observer


They are the black knights of the road; balaclava-wearing highway hitmen out to burn, bomb, decapitate and dismember. But drivers need not fear, for it is speed cameras that this growing band of rebels are after.
Up and down the country, the tools used to keep roads safe are being ripped down, blown up and even shot apart as part of a campaign orchestrated by a gang of web-surfing outlaws. They threaten to become the most popular gang of criminals since Robin Hood and his Merry Men stalked the countryside.


More than 700 cameras across the nation have already been taken out and insiders warn that operations are about to be stepped up. Communicating through internet chat rooms, the activists move under cover of darkness, targeting devices they claim have taken a particularly heavy toll on drivers' licences and wallets.
From the south coast to the Highlands no camera is safe. Known as Gatsometers, or Gatsos, they are being destroyed at a rate that has alarmed police forces. Particularly destructive cells are operating in north London, Essex and Wales - where they rage against machines deployed by renowned anti-speeding police chief Richard Brunstrom.

Last week Brunstrom, who is also head of the technology committee of the Association of Chief Police Officers, raised the possibility of introducing impairment meters to test the reaction times of elderly motorists, but the violent backlash against his camera crusade is growing.

With each unit costing £24,000 to replace, a huge bill is being run up. But the rebels are unrepentant, claiming the cost is more than met by speeding drivers' fines. Speed cameras, they argue, are not about keeping roads safe, but about raising revenue. The charred remains of their victims are often adorned with stickers or graffiti which declare cameras to be stealth tax inspectors.

Recent months have seen new operations in Norfolk and central Scotland. A representative of the shadowy Motorists Against Detection (Mad) has claimed responsi bility and said hundreds of members were ready to risk thousands of pounds in fines and up to six months in jail.

The secretive figure who would give his name only as Captain Gatso warned that the campaign was being stepped up.

'We are moving into a new phase which will see increased operations across the country,' he said. 'This is a struggle against an unjust form of taxation. The cameras have nothing to do with road safety and everything to do with raising revenue.

'Our operatives are responsible people. Many are professionals with families who lead normal lives. Yet they feel aggrieved and will not just sit back and accept this. Direct action is our only form of defence.

'These cameras are there to make money. The people attacking them are not boy racers or speeders. They are ordinary drivers who use cars to go about their business every day. They are trying to defend their livelihoods.'

Welsh IT consultant John Lockett runs a website used by speed camera saboteurs. He denied encouraging attacks and said direct action was 'perhaps going a bit far', but he echoed Captain Gatso's anger.

'I don't endorse this action, but I don't condemn it either. I've just set up a site that lets people known where cameras are. Everyone has a right to know that. What they then go and do is up to them.

'You shouldn't be caught for speeding if you have got to overtake a bus, let through an ambulance or swerve to avoid a kid. I think it's wrong. To place a trap behind a tree, on a very fast corner or down a hill is unfair.'

He claimed to know a three-strong cell operating in South Wales. It had, he said, attacked one Gatso with ham mers so many times that the police had given up and taken it away.

Websites such as Lockett's allow users to alert each other to new cameras and attacks that have eliminated existing ones.

They promote radar speed trap detectors and warn of the menace of what they call the Talivan - mobile police speed detection units. Other sites used by the rebels proudly display images of burned-out and felled Gatsos.

Even the camera widely touted as Britain's most successful has been unable to escape their wrath. On the southbound carriageway of the M11 at Woodford, Essex, tyre tacks were found leading away from the toppled device which had been nabbing 2,000 motorists a day. Police believe a lorry driver deliberately reversed into it.

An Essex police officer said: 'Perhaps if the person who did this could see some of the effects of speeding that we see in hospitals and mortuaries they would think differently about what they have done.'

Northamptonshire police offered a £2,000 reward for help in finding people who used a bomb to take out a Gatso on the A605 at Thrapston. The blast sent shards of metal flying more than 50 feet.

A spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers said: 'Attacking these cameras is an offence. If perpetrators are caught they will be arrested and dealt with.'

A counter-attack against the saboteurs is being launched by Susan Beck of the All Safety Camera Partnership, a publicly-funded body that works with the police to decide where Gatsos should be placed.

[Deviant Esq]

Some people know hacking... some people know explosives. I suppose he just picked what he's good at. A step too far? Yeah I reckon so. He should have at least given them a chance to forgive him all his speeding fines before detonating the bomb....

Edit: Motorists Against Detection? Now that's a good article. I'd agree with most of what the saboteurs are doing - most speeding cameras over here - and there are an awful lot - just take from people's wallets rather than improve any road toll. Maybe the measures they're taking are a bit extreme, you wouldn't find me doing anything like that, but they're echoing the frustration of over fined motorists everywhere.

Wokingham's not far from where my Uncle lives - when we stayed with him in December we were taking the train into London nearly every day. I can still hear the automated announcer saying "This train is for London Waterloo, and the next station is Wokingham," In an electronic sounding but still English accented voice. LOL. South West Trains was a good service, just farking expensive.

[scracha]

Why target the cameras?

I miss Gatso's and other fixed cameras. They don't do you for wheelying or filtering. They're easy peezy to spot (having luminous yellow stripes and all), often front facing and a good excuse for the UK government to have less filth on the road. You can generally ride at sensible (read as about 135Kph) speeds in the UK and on the rare occasions a couple of dibbles spot you they generally won't give a monkeys as they're usually not "traffic" cops.

Here the there's less rozzers allocated to catching the real bad people and more allocated to "traffic". The local ones seem to spend many hours hiding in the shadows a few houses along from me to catch old ladies speeding on the long downhill bit of road nearby. Why it takes 2 well-trained cops in very fast cars (5.8 litres?) to do this is a bit beyond me. Come to think of it...why aren't the "non" traffic dibbles over here running about in efficient little petrol hatchbacks or diesels?

If the government honestly gave a $hit about road deaths they would get serious about drink driving and put barriers around the telegraph poles littering the side of our roads.

[Steam]

Saboteurs take out 700 speed cameras

Now that's a bit of fun eh, definitely freedom fighters, not like the nutjob letterbomber.

[Lou Girardin]

Attacking workers is cowardly, attacking cameras is a public duty.
I'm struggling to oppose attacking the pollie scum who enact these measures.

[SixPackBack]

'Gatsoism' is a wonderful thing, something kiwi's should/will pursue.

I noticed yesterday in the Herald the pigs had given out 200 tickets for speeding around schools, an officer was quoted as saying "we want the motorists to travel under the speed limit WTF? Joe public is left scratching his/her head meanwhile wondering why the pigs do not simply lower the limit around schools.

It is that total lack of logic [applied widely in traffic enforcement and roading]
that makes many of us think think fuck the pigs, government and transit they havent got a clue.

I'm off to burn a speed camera

[terbang]

UK - Captain Gatso Declares War on Speed Cameras

The mysterious leader of Motorists Against Detection (MAD), an anti-speed camera group, has declared a "zero-tolerance" policy for photo enforcement in light of statistics that show the devices have caused an increase in accidents. Captain Gatso, a Tony Blair mask-wearing family man in his 40s asserted his group would begin stepping up attacks.


"This will be civil disobedience on a grand scale," he told the Sunday Express newspaper. "We are planning to target any and all cameras until the government sees sense and re-thinks its road safety policy. Before we had speed cameras we had the safest roads in Europe. Since their introduction this is no longer true."


The group, which claims two hundred members, has been responsible for the destruction of between 600 and 1000 speed cameras since 2000. Newly developed technologies allow for camera destruction within a matter of seconds.

"Most of the organizing group are just ordinary blokes with families who are sick of us heading towards a police state," Captain Gatso said. "There will be a zero tolerance policy towards all cameras. We need to focus attention on what the cameras are about."

You gotta hand it to the poms for their sense of humour.. Checkout here for a good laugh.

[Deviant Esq]

There's another thread in Rant and Rave along the same lines, with the whole article posted in it. Check it out: Click here.

Maybe a mod could merge the two threads? Edit: Ah, well done, that mod.

[Swoop]

Letterbombs? A bit far.

Destruction of tax cameras, perfectly OK by me. They are never in "accident black spots" anyway, so don't try and trot out the "they are for safety" bullshit.

Unfortunately the apathetic kiwi will roll over and continue being shafted by politicians.

[placidfemme]

Well I think the letter bombs are overkill (excuse the pun). Recklessly endangering lives is plain stupid and if caught they deserve everything thrown at them and then some.

As for destroying the speed cameras... good fucking job!!!!!!! Metal Tax Men is all they are... revenue gathering to fund shit that our taxes are funding already... Blow them up, run over them, smash them with hammers... whatever... all good in my book

[Guitana]

Just goes to show if you push Joe average to hard sooner or later he'll push back!! Go captain Gatso kill all revenue gathering scum then you can start on the bureaucrats and government lowlifes!!!
Why stop there apply to the Al Qaeda for a training grant and branch out!!!