News and notes from Reston (tm).

Thursday, June 23, 2011

This Fortnight in Crime: Reston House Party Yields 15 Arrests, Racial Grafitti, and the Feds Raid a Server Farm

5117DXK60FL._SL500_AA300_.jpegWhat is it with kids today? If they're not getting chased by police helicopters and K-9 units while fleeing a house party in South North Reston, they're spray painting racial slurs on the signs of a local business. Why can't they do something constructive, like maybe post to a "web log" or something?

First up: the house party:


Police responded to citizen complaints regarding a large party where teens were allegedly consuming alcohol in the 1100 block of Northwind Drive in the Reston Police District on Monday June, 20 around 11 p.m
Upon officers’ arrival, numerous teens fled through the neighborhood. Police detained many of them, investigated, and charged 15 teens with alcohol-related offenses including drunk in public, illegal/underage possession of alcohol and violation of open container laws.
Then there's what police are calling a "bias crime":
Employees at a business in the 11600 block of Sunrise Valley Drive discovered racial slurs and derogatory comments spray painted on their business sign, driveway and retaining barrier around 6:30 a.m. on Tuesday, June 7. The employees saw a teenage boy and girl running from the scene. The area was searched but the suspects were not located. The male suspect was described as white, 16 to 18 years old. He was about 5 feet 6 inches tall and 140 pounds. The female suspect was described as white, 15 to 17 years old. She was about 5 feet 6 inches tall and 125 pounds.
As if that wasn't enough excitement, the FBI raided a Reston data center on Tuesday, knocking several popular "web logs" offline. (Fortunately, we don't have to worry, as this "web log" has never been popular.)
The F.B.I. seized Web servers in a raid on a data center early Tuesday, causing several Web sites, including those run by the New York publisher Curbed Network, to go offline.

The raid happened at 1:15 a.m. at a hosting facility in Reston, Va., used by DigitalOne, which is based in Switzerland, the company said. The F.B.I. did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the raid.

In an e-mail to one of its clients on Tuesday afternoon, DigitalOne’s chief executive, Sergej Ostroumow, said: “This problem is caused by the F.B.I., not our company. In the night F.B.I. has taken 3 enclosures with equipment plugged into them, possibly including your server — we cannot check it.”

Mr. Ostroumow said that the F.B.I. was only interested in one of the company’s clients but had taken servers used by “tens of clients.”
It's been widely suspected that the raid was connected with action taken against a group of hackers that have attacked government websites in recent weeks. Or maybe someone's not a fan of twee urban housing blogs.

Things in our friendly neighbor to our west continue to be weird -- and a little too friendly.

A man in a car was struck with a gun while driving through Northgate Square several weeks ago.
A man was struck with a gun as he was driving in the 1400 block of Northgate Square around 11:25 p.m. on Thursday, May 26. A group of people on mopeds approached him; one man asked a question then struck him with the weapon. The suspect was described as Hispanic, between 17 and 20 years old, with short, black hair and a light complexion. He was about 5 feet 8 inches tall and 160 pounds, wearing a dark blue polo-style shirt and khaki pants. The victim was taken to the hospital with non life-threatening injuries.
Finally, a box of donuts was stolen from a business on Baron Cameron Drive, there are no words, etc., etc., the end.

5 comments:

  1. Ah, when I saw the latest police report on stolen donuts, I said to my husband, "Restonian will pick up on this and say, 'There are no words.'"

    You did not disappoint.

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  2. Ever since that DRB meeting when the topic of Texas Donuts came up, I have been waiting for this sort of criminal backlash.

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  3. "fleeing a house party in South Reston" -

    Northwind Dr.? Isn't that North Reston?

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  4. Agree with Anon 4:27 -- it is indeed, NORTH Reston. And kids who live in that area are zoned to go to HERNDON HS ... not the much maligned one in Reston.

    Those of us in the South Side ghetto need to defend our bragging rights.

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  5. Sigh. One of these days we'll learn how to read a map right-side up.

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