26 January 2008

Lawlessness in Lanyon Valley

| riotrossco
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2:22am this morning (Friday 26th January 2008), a golf ball enters my dining room window, showering the dining, kitchen and family area with glass, a quick call to 000 has me believing the police are on their way to alleviate not only my fears but that of the 4 children in the house ranging from 8 years to 19.

Forward 18 minutes (2:41am) and a car is dispatched to check the local area, forward 34 minutes (3:15am) the car arrives at the area and does not see any persons of interest wondering the streets.

Now around 4:00am I call the police (hence the details above) and am told my initial call was booked as a disturbance. Now this incident did disturb me and my family but it was far from that. What if the perpetrators had continued their barrage on my property or other properties? I was given the above details and a job number by a young constable, he also re-entered the call as “Property Damage”

During this time, my second eldest (18 years) and his friend who is staying over (19 years) went on their own search for the perpetrators and happened to find them at the local Woolworths service station. My boys overheard their conversation where the perpetrators laughed about it “The Ball” going through a bedroom window. These people thought they were hitting the bedroom window where my 8 and 13 year old sleep, and were happy about the damage they caused.

We have obtained a partial number plate and description of the vehicle; alas the police said there was nothing they could do, very ineffective.

Tonight I don’t think I’ll sleep as I am concerned the perpetrators will return, tonight I’ll be ready to take the law into my own hands, I know a call to the police who are meant to Protect and Serve will be a waste of time and effort as it seams Lanyon Valley is a neglected part of Canberra in the eyes of the law.

Any law abiding citizen of the Lanyon Valley would surely agree that police presence here is lackluster.

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Now for the double post.

I heard of a crazy old woman who hassles the kids from Dickson College as they catch the bus from near her house – in return they play pranks on her and have done for years.

Riotrossco – Are you the Lanyon Valley crazy old woman?

Madman – you need to go and have a closer look at the patrol zones of your local plods – head down to Tuggers station and they will tell you which copper is directly responsible to your suburb. Then complain accordingly to them.

They told me so on the add.

Thank you all for your comments… Now some of my own..

A call to triple 0 was made as an impulse, I was very happily sound asleep and to suddenly be woken by screams of shock from my family took me into auto mode… hence believing the worst had happened.

This is not the first time this has happened. Some 8 months ago, a VB bottle came hurteling through my kitchen window at about the same time, again showering the family, dining and kitchen area with glass (and to the individual who made comment about such areas being small to cover that area, go and pitch a hard object through one of your windows and examine the shatter effect for yourself (get a clue))

I would like to thank all who have made sensible, unbiased and usefull comment to this thread.

I have installed safety measures to my property to deminish the possability of further damage, this I hope will give my family a sense of peace and protection, as I know surely the ACT police under the controll of Canberra’s biggest looser (stanhopeless), will not be offering me, nor many other families across the ACT, any peace and protection for a long time to come.

Does anyone know if cop shops are directly provided by the ACT Government, or are they provided by the AFP under the output-based contract to supply policing?

The problem has been allowed to fester for years.
So build a cop shop. It ‘might’ change.

But you do have to accept that Lanyon Valley does not have a neighbouring police station other then Tuggeranong….

If you lived in Kambah you would wither get a tuggeranong or a woden patrol. If you lived in Bruce, you’d either get a Civic or Belconnen patrol.

But unfortunatly there is no police station below the suburb, therefore yes… the response times are very slow, I agree.

Lanyon’s crime rate is rising very fast.

Like the bus stop at the shops… the glass has been broken on that 9 times now!

OK, “a golf ball enters my dining room window, showering the dining, kitchen and family area with glass”

Gee. Either the golf ball was the size of a gigantic award winning super-duper melon, or you have one mighty small “dining, kitchen and family” area in your house.

Triple O ???? Pfft. Heaven forbid you ever become involved in a real emergency. Who you gonna call then … the glass repair dude?

Good point Mael, never really thought about that, but its true to say that perceived danger is usually surplus to “actual” danger – but if a citizen feels the need to dial 000 then the respective authority has a responsibility to attend and alleviate such percieved or real danger.

In saying so AFP are like nurses in that they have plenty of infrastructure, they just do not have the workforce to occupy it to its full capacity.

Hang on a little on the perspective here.

If I was awoken from a dead sleep – as is likely to happen circa 2am in the morning, by all kinds of noise, broken windows and shit flying everywhere, I’d strongly consider an auto-reaction of 000 JUST IN CASE.

OK, a golfball through the window is a minor event, but for all you know at that time it could be a home invasion, or even a car through an inconvenient part of your house – you really don’t know cause you were asleep.

Then you do a recce and find out it was a golf ball through a window, and report this, including probably, a pretty reasonable description of the offenders. You really don’t deserve a fob off from the coppers, ideally if they were going to do nothing about it, they wouldn’t let that little snippet out to the victims.

I do think it is poor policing to leave a member of the public feeling they are unprotected by the law, I’m sure I’m not alone in this thought.

It’s not really about the golfball, it’s the sense of security that should be afforded to all citizens by the provision and practice of law. In this case, I feel they have been let down.

A ball throught the window? My god, wtf’s got into kids these days – no respect at all. I blame it on video games and violence on tv. I don’t blame you for wanting to take the law into your own hands, in fact you should smash their heads in with baseball hats. In fact, any kids wandering the street after midnight should be locked up, they’re obviously looking for trouble(sarcasm meter >11). Get some perspective, man.

Apologies for bad spelling and grammar in previous comment…

What if the offenders were at the front door with a screw driver attemping to wrench the door open, were busted by housemate, front door was jamed from them dodgying up the lock then 2 housemates giving chase. Getting a number plate from the car that was previously parked out the font with the 3 crims trying to invade our house. I’m not trying to be a cop here or tell them how to do there job, I made a suggestion to get fingerprints as they were clearly obvious on our front door. I think being able to offer information to the police is better than nothing. They don’t seem interested either way. I was very interested to know if they caught these guys because an attempted home invasion is pretty bloody scary.

Ah the home CSI show – the offender touched my woolen jumper, there is bound to be fingerprints and DNA on it.

What do you think fingerprinting the front door is going to prove – that the person came to your front door – thats about it – easily explained in the ACT courts by – I was looking for my friend and got the wrong house. Description – not good enough by the time the fingerprints come back.

What are you left with – nada, nothing, nichts and dumbarse cops.

Mr Rat – you sitting outside your house in your driveway is probably a good deterant, especially if you are working on your golf swing that night – bit paranoid if you ask me though. Go down the local cop shop and ask them how many cars on the road they have each night, then work out – (hours in the night minus attendance to cats in trees jobs divided by number of streets in Tuggeranong = time each car have to drive down your street)

If you don’t like this whinge at your local MP for more Police.

One of the worst drivers I’ve encountered on country roads was the cops, at dusk.
Tailgating on a windy potholed road, refusing to overtake. Causing serious concern given they were so close that their headlights were often barely visible behind us. To do what? Try and push us to speed over the wrong section of road, even though we were 10-20ks under? Or maybe they were waiting for a sudden 60k zone we didn’t see cause we were more concerned about the idiot behind us?

When we got to a T junction and they eventually passed we were peeved to find out that the idiot was a cop car. There to protect us right? Prevent road fatalities, of course! Or run people off the road in a bored attempt to raise a bit of revenue…

“Some say we shouldn’t blame the police themselves, it’s the system’s fault. Some of the police ARE total dumbarses though – the ones who came and investigated my burglary sure were”.
popgoescanberra — 28 January, 2008 @ 10:53 pm

Agreed!

We had to suggest they get forensics to fingerprint our front door after an attempted home invasion. They were happy to leave with just one witness statement. We gave them a full plate (probably stolen though), desriptions and a whole door covered in fingerprints, so lets hope they caught them.

Deadmandrinking2:13 pm 29 Jan 08

NSW = Hopeless.

Proving again two of the laws of nature.
1. Jetski owner = moron
2. NSW = hopeless public services

Deadmandrinking11:55 am 29 Jan 08

Skid…yes, oh my god yes. My mother and I were heading back from Batemans Bay at the end of the long weekend when, first, she was tailgated by this f-king arsehole in a commodore with a Jet-ski trailer on the back. He overtook, but later caught up with his mates in similar vehicles, all with Jet-ski’s, on the side of the road somewhere just before the Clyde (birdies and observations of masturbatory habits were exchanged as we drove past).

They came back just as we were along the thin stretch of road towards Braidwood. Double-lines, a queue of returning holiday makers that resembled something you’d see in Sydney; all three morons decide it’s okay to speedily overtake for far longer than anybody should be on the right-hand side of the road, then suddenly squeeze in different positions with literally centimetres between the cars in front of and behind them and I’m thanking God for my mum’s braking ability. We thought ‘f-k it, might as well report these bastards for dangerous driving once we get into braidwood – for everyone sakes before someone gets killed.’

The Jet-skiing trio of cretins had stopped at the Cafe in Braidwood, so we drove further on to the cop-shop. It was unattended, but there was this automatic-button thingie that put you directly in touch with the call-centre, so we used that. We told them what had happened, gave our names and descriptions – then they hung up, no ‘Okay, we’ve got that down’ or ‘we’ll deal with it’. F-k knows what they did, but they obviously didn’t seem interested in seriously nutcase drivers who were putting more than a few holidaymakers at risk. We did see a cop car headed in the cafe’s direction, but didn’t see what happened – basically a toss-up between talking to the morons and merely being on patrol. The call-centre operator was rude and that was definatley not the way anyone representing the NSW police should be treating the public.

ACT Policing on 131 444 is less likely to get you dismissed as a nuisance caller.

There used to be a number for the ACT Policing Radio Room direct, which I can no longer remember.
(02) 6256 7777 is the ACT Policing switch, who can also put you in touch with anybody you like.

000 is onlyfor immediate danger and offender still in area, or serious major incident.
Hint: If the ladies on the other end of the line hang up on you (or do not try to talk you out of hanging up), its not important enough to be using 000.

Stainless Steel Rat10:33 am 29 Jan 08

Special G, A fair point that I do conceed, but I have stayed up until three am more than ten times sitting in my driveway and have still seen neither… As I indicate above, I understand in the scheme of things this is pretty minor and doesn’t justify a full scale alert, but some visible presence might actually deter whoever it is.

There seems a remarkable propensity to write off ‘minor’ crimes as not being worth pursuing. I bet the kids sleeping in the bedroom who’s window was smashed don’t fell that way!

If you can catch the little bastards who did this, you’d be better off having a ‘polite chat’ with them so they know not to do it again. It’s not like the cops can/will/would do anything.

Oh and that was in Gordon.

As I said several years ago now, when a little shit tried to steal one of my cars (smashed the window where infant car seat was) and cut up both cars with a blade off a pair of scissors (leaving DNA evidence), nothing was done. He could have stabbed my husband as he had brandished it at him when hubby came out to see what the noise was.

Hubby heard the smash and went out, the kid lied to him and as he was calling police, the kid ran off.

Three houses down, he and his mates pushed a car into a garage (damaging foundation).

Police turn up – grab kid off streets (due to hubby’s description) “Is this the kid?” they ask him. “Yes” says hubby.

They let him go.

It takes another 40 mins to find him (July 3am) as we all stand outside surveying the damage.

18 months later, kid and his mates gets off. They (nor their parents) have to pay to repair our cars or neighbours car and house.

So our insurance rates went up.

I have found that dealing with these barstards yourself is the best course of action. These little pricks need to be given an attitide adjustment more often. Why didn’t your son and his friend sort them out when they saw them?

I have taken care smart arses such as these on three different occasions and has always proved far more effective than when the police get involved.

Not much different to them from throwing a golf ball through a window of a home, or a car or a bus.

Homes you can repair but if you get hit whilst driving it can kill.

um, so that’d be a difference then, gooterz? d’uh… ’emergency’ implies ‘imminent danger’, which applies to drivers/passengers of swiftly moving vehicles, greatly increasing the effective mass of the missile.

Mr Rat, you probably noticed the Police patrolling down your street the same way you noticed the kids blowing up your letter box and egging your car.

popgoescanberra10:53 pm 28 Jan 08

Some say we shouldn’t blame the police themselves, it’s the system’s fault. Some of the police ARE total dumbarses though – the ones who came and investigated my burglary sure were.

Stainless Steel Rat10:30 pm 28 Jan 08

oh, I’m in Isabella Plains by the way. (Yep, about four minutes drive from the police station….)

Stainless Steel Rat10:29 pm 28 Jan 08

I’ve now gone through four letter boxes, had my car egged three times (the paint has been damaged from this) and three days after Christmas a bottle was smashed on my windscreen. That shattered the windscreen and left me $245 poorer. I undersatnd the police can’t be everywhere, but I’ve reported 8 acts of vandalism that have happened in my street. I understand that reporting it the next morning means they can’t fly out here in a car and find someone. I thank them for adding this report to their database and passing it on to the people that look into crime patterns to see if it can help find criminals. I also understand that being a cop is a hard and mainly thankless job. But after all of the above in about two years, I’m still yet to see one cop car drive down my street. I know the eggs and the mailbox are petty kid stuff, and not easy to solve short of video footage and an id…. but I can see a pattern here. They are continuing to vandalise becasue nobody is doing a dam thing to stop them. Well, $900 later I have moved the fence and gates on my property and now have off street parking for our second car……

Vote for Mike Crowther in the next local election.

Gotta love those riots reported by the CT – 100 people fighting in the street is generally two blokes having a bit of a cuddle and 10 people standing around filming it on their mobile phones.

Thumper,

Thank you, that was beautiful. I should have seen that.

Lawlessness in Lanyon, mob mayhem in Manuka, cabbie chaos in Civic … where will it end? Anarchy in Amaroo?

Special G,

So @40 police per 100K, that makes us understaffed by about 140 Police.

I would suggest that 140 additional police would make an enormous diference to the whole crime/public order equation.

So why are we so shortchanged, oh great god Sonic?

Yet another call for more police on W”IN news tonight.

Manuka resturants are getting broken windows every Saturday night from brawling nightclubbers. Up to 100 rioted last weekend, to which 6 police responded.

Jon Stanhope then said more police is not the answer – people need to take a good look at their behaviour – as it is criminal.

So I thought when criminals were about it was time for the police – I must be old fashioned!!

What a load of crap some people spout on this site. Tooks
summed it up well.

As for those who are asking the ACT has about 250 police per 100k people – National average is about 290 police per 100k people.

Lets have a look at the phone call on this one:
Hello ‘000’ What is the nature of your call?
Someone put a golfball through my window.
Are they still there?
No
Did you see them?
No
We’ll send someone over?
Car responds and looks around for anyone weilding golfclubs – doesn’t see anyone.
Kids see bad guys – get description – white Holden Commodore and partial plate – Y _____.
Ya useful info – try again next time.

frozen pork was shot through a bedroom window with a big pipe gun

was this some sort of religious hate crime? or revenge by someone who dislikes the “lamb on Australia day” ads?

“The police should have investigated this……..it’s an offence to have a replica pistol or rifle…….possession of a pipe gun with the power to blast a frozen piece of meat through a window must surely be illegal.”

While I agree with this, 1. its much harder to rob a bank with a three metre long PVC tube with ammunition from the deli then it is the use a replica pistol, & 2. police don’t spend too much time investigating replica pistols or rifles either if its just kids mucking around. Unless they think they are investigating a real M16… which in of course the whole point of banning replicas.

LOL! Since when does a golf ball through a window require a quickfire 000 call? You must be hell paranoid.

Similar story inthe Canberra Times today – except frozen pork was shot through a bedroom window with a big pipe gun, shattering glass through the bedroom,and covering the occupants, and also putting glass through two more rooms.

Police were not interested, describing it as Australia Day high jinks…

You shoulda said you lived in a doughnut shop. then they’d be there pronto!

Deadmandrinking5:21 pm 27 Jan 08

I think that whilst the poster’s sons did the right thing in theory, it could have also turned out very bad. If the news is anything to go by, little juvies are more keen to carry knives now. It’s just not worth it anymore. We need more police, desperately.

Yeah, but I bet it’s “circumstantial”.

Like catching perps on property, getting the licence plates of their cars parked outside, spotting them AND their kids who are near the cars acting as cockatoos (lookouts).
All “circumstantial”. Riiight. Seems like it’s all too much like hard work, don’t it?

So the people who care (ie the property owners) have to just look after it themselves.

The poster’s boy and a friend heard a conversation to which a group of youths ‘allegedly’ admitted to hitting said golf ball through the window of the poster’s house.

Was I the only one that actually read the post correctly? (out of the last few posters)

According to the original poster, police did turn up
and look for them. Yes, this/these little prick/s deserve to be caught and I can understand riotrossco’s frustration, but in this case:

– The victim didn’t see the offender/s or the vehicle in his street (unless I’m missing something, so the fact that his son went to the servo later and saw a car he believes was involved means very little.
– Even if he did get a full rego, what do police do? Knock on the door and the owner of the car denies any involvement. Without further proof, there’s nothing that can be done.

– Population of Tuggeranong, about 90,000. Police cars (tugg station) patrolling per shift, probably 2-4. Not nearly enough police per head to effectively police the area.

They should try and catch the little freaks.. Not much different to them from throwing a golf ball through a window of a home, or a car or a bus.

Homes you can repair but if you get hit whilst driving it can kill.
Back in November/decemeber there was a few of these if ppl remember

You called triple 0 (which is reserved for EMERGENCIES)for a property damage which most likely was a random attack and happens dozens of times a week, then your son goes down and gets a partial numberplate and description of the vehicle you reckon is involved.

Then there’s some hearsay evidence about a golf ball going through a window. What exactly would you have Police do to investigate this major crime?

Yep, Mr Waffle, I think you’ve got it.
Dumbed-down “crime” for our non-existant police.

After they failed us for the last time (hello, we have crime. licence plates. visual id. CCTV oh that’s STILL circumstantial, is it?) well, OK.

own measures were implemented. Legal? Hell no.

After one experience of same, guess what? they’ve gone.
Sigh.
Our taxes at work. yet again.

Come on guys, give the police a break- they’re out stopping the REAL criminals, the ones going 85 in an 80 zone!

Seems like the perfect case for Special Constable Matthew and his garbage detection camera squad.

Is that Brendan Smyth a moderator for RiotACT?

el ......VNBerlinaV812:39 am 27 Jan 08

His comment and the other ‘suss’ article have now been pulled.

Ingeegoodbee12:35 am 27 Jan 08

I’m with you el… it’s a tad suss.

el ......VNBerlinaV812:28 am 27 Jan 08

Would the real johnboy please stand up?

(Small j)

I think the police pretty much do all they can with the numbers they have, they’ve been grossly understaffed for many years with stanhopeless’ useless funding to “boost” police numbers, which really just replace the officers leaving not boost actual numbers.

unless someone/something is direct danger response times will normally drag, i’m surprised they actually responded within 30 minutes to this. i’ve reported thefts/criminal damage in progress and violence to have them rock up 4 hours later or the next day, and they’re a patrol from the other side of the city.

I don’t even think the police remember what a police patrol of a suburb or area is anymore, Canberra is very much a city of reactive policing, their numbers are so small compared to population that all they can do is react after the fact.

Agreed with the comment a call to 131 444 would be more appropriate for one golf ball too 🙂

Ingeegoodbee12:15 am 27 Jan 08

Just another example of wasted taxes I’m afraid. If you’d rung in with the opportunity for the police chief to flip flop on national security or maybe had some suggestions for the current top cop on how he might manage to “top” the departure of his predecessor then they might have been interested.

From other threads hear it seems that a car theft is some sort of major crime worthy of an all out police jolly on wheels but an assault on your house is racked up as just another whinging motherfu@ker complaining about being woken up in the wee hours.

The average law abiding citizen wouldn’t worry so much if they weren’t paying taxes and didn’t have to be insulted by the conga line of whining co@ksuckers who queue up to blow sunshine up the ar$e of our keystone coppers with how frigging wonderful their thin blue line really is.

Cloak & Dagger stuff. Well maybe that’s going a bit too far.

I’m sure that a lot of the people in the ACT Police force are not doing much wrong. Or are they? How can you tell? Nothing is ever perfect. Does accountability matter? Should we have 100% operational secrecy of Police and invest as a community in hearsay?

I’m not suggesting that there should be more Police, but maybe they should be accountable to the community. If not, perhaps we should invest in our own local security squad, just like Homer Simpson’s “Spring-Shield”. The RiotACT would have many possible recruits.

Once more to clarify. I am NOT for more Police, as much as I am for ACCOUNTABILITY.

.o0 ( *sigh* )

el ......VNBerlinaV811:25 pm 26 Jan 08

Unfortunately it’s not exclusive to Lanyon. Kids are constantly trying to (and occasionally succeeding) in stealing cars in Weston Creek, in particular my area. Basically the police can only get to you so quickly, and by the time they do the shitbags have left the scene, hence, there really *isn’t* much they can do.

Quick! Call the police to protect you from rogue golf balls!!

Dont hate the player – hate the game.

Police have their hands tied as much as Nurses Iwould say.

Sure they can make more police stations – but withouty staff to attend them it snot worth a pinch of shit eh ?

Tonight I don’t think I’ll sleep as I am concerned the perpetrators will return, tonight I’ll be ready to take the law into my own hands, I know a call to the police who are meant to Protect and Serve will be a waste of time and effort as it seams Lanyon Valley is a neglected part of Canberra in the eyes of the law.

This was barely a premeditated attack – I doubt they will be back – not worth you staying up for.

I have had ctrade tools stolen from, my car on several occasions (being a chef you tend to get attached to your tools, taking them home so no one from work steals them.. and get them stolen anyway – have had several cars broken into and windows broken… Basically I ring the cops now only for insurance purposes, its not like they intend to fuck you over by their non attendance, just that ther is not enough cops because the working conditions and pay are shit…

I’ve never known the police to be interested in the things we expect them to be in the ACT. They probably have more important things to do, and we just don’t realise it. as for investigating crimes, even when you’ve got descriptions, number plates of the perps etc, they have much more important things to do.

And people wonder why people take things into their own hands.

From my own experience, the police don’t do much at all… sadly it seems to be much more effective to catch them yourselves and deal with it appropriately…

Perhaps your son and friend should have returned the favour by smashing the golf ball back through their car window?

From talking to some police, and ex-police, it seems the trouble is the paper work that is taking patrols off the street. These guys work a 12hr shift, and are meant to write reports on every incident before their shift is over. Doesn’t leave much time to ‘police’ the community.

Next time ring 131 444 as it wasn’t an emergency. If someone got hurt or if the boys are attacking the house (more than 1 ball) then ring 000.

Sadly this happens to everyone in Canberra all the time.

I think there has to be imminent danger of serious injury for ACT police to turn up promptly.

New York has 10 times the police per head of population than we do. I don’t know how many other Australian cities have.

I do think we should have more. A few more police on the roads might deter some stupid behaviour and then they’d be available to actually attend disturbances and robberies etc.

This is misuse of the 000 service. Call the police directly instead in future.

ask to be their caddy, then suggest the one iron. no-one can hit a one iron.

(i’ve often wondered ‘the streets…?’) [sorry, had to do that…]

and barney is right – how many patrol units do you imagine are on hand on that shift in your area to deal with everything that goes on? and what else was happening? see? he’s right, you can’t answer – so if you wanna complain like this, try the area commander and get a real answer first… where’s proud local when you need him?

that said, also tell the local area commander about the response to your lads’ obtaining what seems to be useful information…

I’m sure the root of the majority of complaints regarding Police (in)action can be sheeted home to ACT Police numbers.

We seem to be constantly reassured that our Police numbers are adequate, and in keeping with Australian averages.

I don’t believe we are being told the truth. So many calls to Police are fobbed off as below seriousness to attract Police attention, in what appears to be a dearth of resources.

How does the ACT compare in Police numbers/population in comparison with other Australian/Overseas numbers? If we are being treated less than adequately, what do our political masters propose to do about it?

One assumes it will cost more money. One also has to query how transparent the provision of local Police by AFP in comparison to what the ACT Govt pays for this service. I have little faith that we are not being ripped off.

I also have little faith that Sonic and Co have the clout to rectify any shortchanging by the AFP.

As disturbing as this incident was, anti-social behaviour and a lack of policing is hardly exclusive to Lanyon.
A golf ball through the window is hardly Assault on Precinct 13!
How scared could your older boys have been if they went out at 2.30am looking for the perpetrators?
Sounds like an abuse of 000 to me.

There is no way of telling what Police are doing. Response times could be anything they feel like. Maybe they were busy, but maybe they weren’t. How could you ever tell. You cant. That’s one thing that concerns me.

How old were they? the perps?

smart move claiming you are going to take the law into your own hands on a public forum. i can’t see that coming back to haunt you.

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