Hi Pet forum people. I just heard this woman relay her story on a radio station. Make my blood boil that we are sold a bill of goods only to find out that we can't use it. Apparently Verizon is not the only one to follow this policy - it is the law. I don't have a phone with GPS but now I know it would be useless if my car were stolen with a pet inside!
Woman aims to cut red-tape delays in tracing cellphones
After her SUV, phone and dog were stolen, Mary Michael tried to get Verizon to track the phone. The utility said it couldnt without a warrant. Michael, whose dog died, is taking aim at that regulation.
By David Kelly
September 03, 2008 in print edition B-3
It was 16 years ago and Mary Michael was going through hard times. She had three children, and her first marriage was collapsing.
ThatÂs when she met a winsome ball of fur at a Mission Viejo pet store, a little dog that seemed to smile and proved impossible to resist. She took her home and named her Rebel after Rod StewartÂs "Rebel Heart."
The wolf-malamute mix proved a boon companion, comforting Michael in times of trouble and protecting her from harm even as the dog slowly became a cripple.
Then on Aug. 16, Michael and her husband, Craig, visited Riverside National Cemetery. They parked their Ford Excursion and left Rebel inside with the air conditioner running. Moments later, they saw a woman jump into the SUV and speed off, followed by another vehicle. The Excursion was found the next day parked on a Moreno Valley street. Rebel was inside, beside an empty bowl of water. She had died of heat exhaustion. Three suspects were arrested.
A distraught Michael said Rebel would be alive today if Verizon had traced the cellphone she had left inside the car. "They could have saved RebelÂs life," she said Tuesday during a news conference outside Riverside County Superior Court. "ItÂs my phone. It has GPS capability. We should be able to use it."
Michael, who is originally from London and lives in Hemet, has started a campaign to make such tracking easier. Many wireless companies now require warrants before tracing phones, but Michael argues that obtaining a warrant takes too long when a life hangs in the balance.
Verizon spokesman Ken Muche said state and federal privacy laws make it impossible to trace a phone without a court order. He said criminals and stalkers had impersonated customers in the past to try to find cellphone users. "We work with law enforcement and will respond to requests from the court like subpoenas and warrants," Muche said. "We have a policy in place so our customer service people are not in a position of having to determine a personÂs identity."
Had Verizon traced the phone, it could have pinpointed the location to as close as 50 to 100 yards, he said.
That was cold comfort to Michael. "If this had been done, Rebel would not have had to suffer, and we would not be going through the pain of losing her in this terrible way," she said. "I canÂt bear to think of what she went through during those last hours. I canÂt go there, itÂs too horrible."
Her husband wondered how tracing the phone could have been a problem in their case.
"There is no invasion of privacy because they are tracking our phone," he said.
Investigators arrested Gabriela Briones, 31, of Corona on suspicion of vehicle theft, forgery and animal cruelty. She told authorities she didnÂt know the dog was in the car. Michael said that was impossible because Rebel was barely a foot behind her in the back seat and would have been barking. Rhett Hermanson, 18, of Corona, was arrested after authorities said he tried to pass checks taken from the Excursion. Michael Deharo, 27, also of Corona, was charged with helping steal the vehicle.
Immediately after witnessing the theft, the Michaels rushed into a Verizon store in Moreno Valley and tried unsuccessfully to persuade employees to track the phone. Then they called Verizon and were told about the warrant policy. A warrant, they argued in vain, would take hours to get, and by that time the phone would be dead.
As a last resort, Mary MichaelÂs son sent text messages to the phone begging for the dogÂs release. "We know that Rebel lived throughout the night and could have been saved," Michael said. A passerby saw the dog alive in the car the next day and called police. But by the time the call was made and police arrived, she had died.
Michael made a scrapbook of RebelÂs life, from her youth as a fuzzy, bear cub-like pup to her last years, when she suffered from hip dysplasia. RebelÂs hip, she said, had degenerated to the point she had difficulty walking. Michael spent two years at home taking care of Rebel as she became increasingly immobilized.
"She was my life," Michael said. "I remember times when I was feeling sorry for myself and lying on the bed, and Rebel would come and drop a piece of bread for me to eat."
She took the dog everywhere. When Rebel was young, Michael swaddled her in blankets and pushed her around the grocery store in a shopping cart. "She didnÂt deserve this," Michael said, kissing a photo of her dog. "I want my Rebel back. No one can replace her."
david.kelly@latimes.com
runsnwalken
cynthia_gw
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