Weekly Daily Brickbats Archive 2008 September 8-31

In 2003, Great Britain gave local officials greater power to place people under surveillance and trace their telephone calls and emails. The government said the new powers were necessary to fight terrorism. But the Telegraph has found that most local councils have mostly used their authority to investigate allegations of crimes such as noisy children, selling cigarettes and alcohol to minors, selling pizza without a license, and noisy dogs.

Students at Minnesota's Prior Lake High School will no longer be able to wear hats or hooded shirts during the school day. School officials say the ban will make sure that security cameras can always capture the faces of the students.

Joseph A. Shepard Sr. sat in a St. Louis jail for two years on drug charges, apparently forgotten by the court, prosecutors, and even his own attorney. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports Shepard was held in his cell 23 hours a day. Now that they know he's there, prosecutors are going to press on with the case. But they say he'll get credit for the time he has served if he's convicted.