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This ain’t no block party.
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Lego has asked a California police department to stop adding digital toy heads of suspects’ faces, which it has been doing to comply with a woke state law protecting offenders’ rights, the New York Post reported.
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Murrieta cops went viral for posting funny images of suspects’ faces replaced by Lego heads after the state Legislature passed a bill prohibiting the release of mugshots and booking photos of those accused of non-violent crimes.
But Lego isn’t laughing. The toy company wants the agency to stop using the likenesses.
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“The Lego Group reached out to us and respectfully asked us to refrain from using their intellectual property in our social-media content, which of course we understand and will comply with,” police spokesperson Lt. Jeremy Durrant told Fox News Digital, per the Post.
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“We are currently exploring other methods to continue publishing our content in a way that is engaging and interesting to our followers.”
The department’s Instagram page showed the digitally superimposed blocks with various facial expressions.
One appeared to show two suspects handcuffed in the back of a patrol car — with the Lego face on one angrily looking at the other, whose toy head is crying.
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“The Murrieta Police Department prides itself in its transparency with the community, but also honors everyone’s rights & protections as afforded by law; even suspects,” the police agency said on social media last week.
“In order to share what is happening in Murrieta, we chose to cover the faces of suspects to protect their identity while still aligning with the new law.”
In 2021, the California legislature passed Assembly Bill 1475, prohibiting local law enforcement agencies from publishing images of suspects charged with non-violent crimes.
Last year, the state also passed AB 994, requiring mugs of any suspects to be removed from social media within 14 days unless there are special circumstances, according to the L.A. Times.
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