Swatting

I read a lot of science fiction, and I like to think I'm familiar with many of its best-known writers. But it's hard to keep up, because we live in a new golden age of the genre, so I'm not embarrassed to say that some days I find out about a writer who has written more than 10 books without me knowing about them, even ones who have won major awards. 

There's a lot going on these days.

I bring this up because several months back I saw a thread by a science fiction writer I'd never heard of who has been subject to horrific swatting for years. If you don't know what swatting is, count yourself lucky. A short definition is when some jerk (or terrorist, depending on how strongly you want to label the action) calls the police and says a crime is happening at an address even though nothing is really happening there. Usually the fake crime is described as extreme domestic violence or hostage-taking, so the SWAT team shows up with guns drawn, ready to break the door down. 

How do you prove to the police that you're not in the midst of a domestic violence situation? And imagine that the person who's being swatted isn't a lily-white upper class person... how quickly does that compound the danger of the situation?

I don't remember the name of the writer who was being harassed in that case, but he and his family were victims of a vicious anti-fan for no sane reason, clearly. The writer had tried every obvious way to work with the local police to head off the swattings, but it wasn't working.

I thought of that ongoing travesty today when I heard that DOJ prosecutor Jack Smith's house was swatted on Christmas Day, after there was a report to police that he had shot his wife. 

And that D.C. Judge Tanya Chutkan's house was swatted just last night, with police and fire trucks showing up.

This is Trump's America.