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From: TERRY@spcvxb.bitnet (Terry Kennedy, Operations Mgr)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: The LAW vs. Telephone Access Devices
Message-ID: <10879@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 15 Aug 90 02:53:19 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 570, Message 9 of 10


In article <10844@accuvax.nwu.edu>, annala%neuro.usc.edu@usc.edu (A J
Annala) writes:

> The police claim is that such devices are telephone
> access devices which should not be in the hands of the public.  I am
> curious about whether any other technical people have been challenged
> by the police and what answer has satisfied them to go away without
> hassle.

  Well, it *should* depend on where you are/what you're doing with
them.  If you're up on a pole in a parking lot in the middle of the
night, they should be more suspicious than if you're working in an
office in the middle of the night.

  It is always helpful to have the name and number of the person who
authorized your doing the work handy. I was installing for a customer
who had the misfortune to move his office during the great NJ phone
strike. Since he couldn't get any service orders through, and I
informed him of the probable backlog once the strike was over, we
decided to run our own poles and cable since it was all on his
property.

  I had a few inquisitive looks from the local police when I was up on
the poles, since there was a *lot* of vandalism in the area (things
like a pedastal terminal being pulled out of the ground by a pickup
truck). In fact, one of the customer's building feeds (500 pr) was
cut, and a *very* over-worked manager showed up to splice it. I wound
up splicing it while the manager got a well-deserved rest, since I was
about 4x faster.

  So, it depends on the situation. Even a simple screwdriver could be
considered burglar's tools in the right situation - but if you indeed
have business in the area, it shouldn't be a problem.

 
        Terry Kennedy           Operations Manager, Academic Computing
                                (& part-time freelance installer)
        terry@spcvxa.bitnet     St. Peter's College, US
        terry@spcvxa.spc.edu    (201) 915-9381