Forcing America's Weaponized Police to Wear Cameras

[xchrom]

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/08/americas-weaponized-police-force-could-benefit-from-one-more-weapon-cameras/376063/

?naaxg6

Police officers armed like stormtroopers rained tear gas on Ferguson, Missouri, fired rubber bullets into crowds, and arrested journalists charging their cell phones in a McDonald's last night. As my colleague James Fallows pointed out, the transformation of America's police officers into high-tech warriors has a long history. Armored trucks "intended for an overseas battlefield," M-16 rifles and grenade launchers have become everyday tech in local police departments across the country.

Although military technology has arguably given law enforcement an unreasonable amount of power, there is another piece of technology that could help restrain the militarization of America's police in the future: a camera.

Ferguson police reportedly ordered civilians to turn off cameras and recording devices on Wednesday. But what would have last night looked like if the police had to wear their own devices?

In 2012, Rialto, a small city in California's San Bernardino County, outfitted its police officers with small Body Cams to be worn at all times and record all working hours. The $900 cameras weighed 108 grams and were small enough to fit on each officer's collar or sunglasses. They recorded full-color video for up to 12 hours, which was automatically uploaded at the end of each shift, where it could be held and analyzed in a central database.

[Flyboy_451]

1. As I stated in another thread, I fully support this!!

I generally avoid threads regarding LE here on DU, because it almost invariably results in nothing pleasant being said and tempers flaring.

Our department started requiring us to wear audio recorders about three years ago, and switched to both audio and video about a year and a half ago. Not only did it reduce the number of complaints that were directed at our department, it revealed a huge number of complaints to be maliciously false. Accusations ranging from unprofessional behavior to abuse and evidence planting.

Both thepolice and community are guilty of false claims and this seems to have been a great benefit for both parties. It was interesting to watch the change in behavior on both sides of the line. In 18 years on duty, I have served as a patrol officer, Emergency Response team member, and my current position in traffic enforcement. This has been the single biggest "Win-Win" that I have been witness to in my career.

I think we should require the same thing of all of our elected officials. Full time video and audio recordings of all official business. No more closed door meetings and back room deals. Root out corruption on all levels!

JW.

[littlemissmartypants]

3. Agreed. nt

[Dale Neiburg]

4. Cameras, definitely!

Until she died last year, my wife was an auxiliary officer in our local PD (almost exactly the size of Ferguson's -- 56 officers, while I think Ferguson has 53). They've also gone the camera-specs route, and find it keeps all parties on good behavior. Neither police abuse nor false accusations can be hidden. (Abuse fortunately wasn't much of a problem before -- there's been one excessive force claim in 15 years, and that was settled by mediation.)

[littlemissmartypants]

2. Uncle Joe, look!

Someone agreed.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

5. Can we start municipal referendums around the country

to stop our police from using specific items for crowd/riot control, like tear gas, rubber bullets, tanks, submachine guns, etc?

[intaglio]

6. Big problem - cameras "break"

From the Albuquerque Journal

Manufacturer can’t say why officer’s lapel camera didn’t record
Albuquerque Police Department officer Jeremy Dear’s lapel video turned on and off numerous times the morning he shot and killed 19-year-old Mary Hawkes, according to a report released by Taser International Inc., which makes the cameras.

But it’s unclear why. The report states that investigators don’t know if Dear powered it off or if the cable disconnected. None of the shooting was recorded, according to the report, despite the fact that the camera was turned on at some points.

Jeremy Dear shot and killed Hawkes in the early morning of April 21. Police said she was a suspected car thief and that she pulled a gun on officers after a short pursuit near Zuni and Wyoming. APD received criticism for the lack of video evidence, and Dear has a history of not recording his encounters with the public, according to his personnel file.

emphasis mine

The excuse given by Deputy Chief William Roseman of Albuquerque PD is that the cables are designed to break. This completely ignores the point that the cable did not break but rather, somehow, disconnected and reconnected.

[justiceischeap]

7. This is the problem with cameras

they break or don't work correctly or can be disconnected. If we seriously want to have police wear body cams at all times, then they must be cameras that cannot be tampered with by the officer. I don't know how the dash cams work, meaning, can officers power them on and off at will, but if they can't then body cams need to work like that. Of course, even if a camera exists or is created that an officer can't manually turn off, there's always the excuse, it broke in the scuffle.

I'm sure this goes a long way toward making us all feel better but I suspect the bad cops will find a way around the use of these recording their "best" moments. Plus, do we really as a nation, who often decry big brother watching us, want more surveillance--why not install more pole cameras like in the UK then?

[Lee-Lee]

10. Dash cams when I was working were turned on automatically when your blue lights went on,

and the tapes were locked with only supervisors having keys. They re-recorded over a tape if it wasn't pulled so unless it was something where they pulled the tape that shift it was gone. We had just started getting ones that had a buffer that saved 90 seconds prior to lights coming on when I left LE, so when you turned on your lights the tape started 90 seconds before the lights went on. I understand now with DVR technology they are continuous, and some include telemetry about vehicle speed, braking and the rest as well and I am sure access is restricted.

Making reliable cameras for body wear right now is mostly a battery issue- you can't make ones that will last a whole 12 hour shift that are self-contained, so that requires a battery pack on your belt with a cable. With cables they have to be a break-away design so that a opponent in a fight cant grab it and use it to manipulate you, but that means they can and will come loose.

So body cams are not going to be a perfect solution until technology exists that can provide a self-contained unit with adequate battery power for a shift, or even half a shift if they give an adequate (30+ minutes) warning to change battery.

For perspective a Go-Pro camera has a 2-2.5 hour battery life, and is really a bit big for use with LE, so the technology has a ways to go. Maybe in 5 years you could have a self-contained, tamper proof camera- gets issued at beginning of shift, turned in and recharged at end of shift, data is preserved for XX days to see if needed. Have it built into safety glasses for dual purpose use.

[intaglio]

8. Another problem - sometimes, entirely by chance of course, the wrong recording is saved

From the Daily Beast

The Day Ferguson Cops Were Caught in a Bloody Lie

/snip

Indisputable evidence of what transpired in the cell might have been provided by a surveillance camera, but it turned out that the VHS video was recorded at 32 times normal speed.

“It was like a blur,” Schottel told The Daily Beast on Wednesday. “You couldn’t see anything.”

The blur proved to be from 12 hours after the incident anyway. The cops had saved the wrong footage after Schottel asked them to preserve it.

Thanks to justiceischeap for the OP where I found this Link to Thread

[rhett o rick]

9. While I agree this is a good idea, it avoids the main problem.

How do we get the police to do what we think is important? They militarized w/o out asking. I don't see them following our "suggestions".

[marmar]

11. K/R

[pipi_k]

12. As much as I will often

not automatically assume the cops were wrong whenever something tragic happens, I do fully support this idea of mandatory cameras, either on their persons, in their vehicles, or both.

Video evidence is preferable to one sided "news" stories.

[riqster]

13. Cameras are not perfect. But they are a very good tool.

IF they are used in a secure manner that the cops cannot easily tamper with or defeat. The descriptions of controls as presented by the LE professional here are good examples of best practices.

I should note that such security is also necessary to protect the privacy of law-abiding citizens whose images would be captured on such video devices during an officer's shift.