>Okay so, if you go to the police with the video, do you mean your own
>local police? If you know where the video came from (as in Bunny's
>case), do you just go straight to those police?

Usually you start with someone you know in any law enforcement
position. While they may not be able to look into it themselves,
they should have someone they can talk to. When I said local, I was
referring to the ones in your area. Having dealt with several issues
cross state lines, things tend to go smoother if you talk to your
guys first. In this example, don't say "They live in another state"
say "They might live here" or "They look familiar".

>Okay. Then, if that does not work, you say to try Fish and Game ...
>I'm sure in a place like Jersey, that would really be helpful. But I
>think in most states ferrets are hands off to them, and I think they
>won't handle abuse cases (at least here).

I've seen the Fish and Game dept take a few abuse cases, and being
already connected to animals, they would be more likely to know who
to point you too. You could also talk to your state Senator or house
Representative, they would likely have a good point-of-contact (POC)
for this kind of stuff.

>So, okay, if you do go through the police, is the Fish and Game really
>the best next choice, or would some animal group be? If so who? The
>ASPCA (the national one, or do you go to your local one, or is it best
>to go to the closest one in the same state as the video was made?) ...
>someone else?

I have not dealt with many animal groups. The ASPCA or local chapter
would not be bad choices I think. Basically the point is to find
someone who cares and has the authority to request a warrant. AFAIK,
any local police can request information from YouTube.com . After
finding the proof, everything can be handed to the authorities where
the abuse took place and then they'll have to make an official inquiry
into it... but without the information and proof that it happened in
their area, they can easily say "Not my jurisdiction" if they don't
want to do the foot work.

After we find someone that's willing to work with us, we can establish
a standard policy with what to do. Do NOT post their information to the
list unless they specifically say it's ok. You risk loosing the POC if
they get flooded with requests.

>[Mod's Note]

He's right, here's a little more detail on how ip tracking works:

Jill = Video maker
ISP = Jill's Internet provider
John = law enforcement

IP address are assigned to different ISPs. They own them, so to speak.
So that IP address will always come from that ISP. Jill makes a video
and uploads it to YouTube. YouTube's servers log the IP address the
video comes from. John sends an official police inquery to YouTube
about the video and the details of the poster. John now has Jill's IP
address and several times when Jill logged into YouTube. This is the
easy part.

John then finds out which ISP owns the IP address. He then has to send
an official inquiry to the ISP who owns the IP address with IP address
and the times Jill logged into YouTube. If the ISP is cooperative and
well organized, they will look in their logs to see which account was
assigned to the IP address John provided them. This should turn up
Jill's billing account, which will have all her address details. If
they are not cooperative then John has to get a warrant, and if they
are not well organized then you may get the wrong account or no
account at all (more and recent log-in times help with this).

Then John checks to see if he has jurisdiction where the address is, if
not, he'll turn over the information to the authorities that do have
jurisdiction.

Again, I'd like to point out there is a big difference between trying
to save an animal and trying to punish a person. People can quickly
spot the difference between the two. No matter how much you think the
person deserves punishment, the only people who can hand that out with
out backlash are the police. If something happens through unofficial
channels, and the media catches the slightest hint of it (which they
WILL if the punished person has anyone intelligent around them), then
your going to find ALL ferret owners under some bad press for "Trying
to ruin this poor girls life". People stalking underage girls over the
internet and trying to ruin their lives makes for a MUCH better news
story than some underaged drinker who "harmlessly" got her pet drunk.
Until she kills something, most people won't see anything wrong with
her actions. The media doesn't care, they're just worried about their
profits. PLEASE do not try and punish this person. Justice will
eventually find her, one way or another.

[Posted in FML 5934]