May 19, 2003
Police Gargoyles

One of my early motivations for this site came from someone who probably would not care for my taste in personal reporting. Who I am referring to is a police officer who after detaining me for absolutely no reason, incorrectly assertained that I was intoxicated by a narcotic substance, methamphetamines. In addition to these violations of my civil liberties, he also said threateningly to his partner while I was handcuffed and waiting to be taken to the station,

"Get the baggies and syringes from the glove compartment to put in his pockets".

Now I ask you, do you think this man would have acted the same way if either I had my own recording device obvious to him, or in reverse, he was required to wear a recording device?

Video cameras are not a threat to any police officer if the records are publically available. I spoke to the first LAPD police officer regarding my incident and the need forpo.jpg police officers to be accountable for their actions. In the way that he spoke about crime and punishment, it was obvious he had altrustic intentions for being a police officer. While he was not against having video cameras in his patrol car, it's likely that most police officers are afraid of being accountable. A report from abcnews.com found "more than half of the city's marked patrol cars" had their video cameras disabled by police officers, an insight that was only discovered due to the fact that the units they bought weren't programmed to record continuously. In City Councilwoman Sheila Cockrel's words, "Gee, why would you even buy them if they weren't?", but also added that she was "..very interested in tearing down the blue curtain of secrecy that is such a detriment to our police and to our city."

Police measures to 'supervise' police have worked well dispite the backlash of secerecy that detroit and other places have. In fact, many police like the ability to prosecute people with the recorded 'evidence', and the next logical step would be a POV (point of view) camera with a hard drive on their belt. Dispite the cost concerns, it would have the potential to weed abusers of the badge as well as affect our society in different ways.

Tom, I'm pretty sure CAHV is a joke site. Also did a little cleaning up of spelling and such. Grammar and word choice's still a bit florid, but I didn't want to rewrite you. Might want to stick the later links and such into the extended entry part by the way. And oh yeah, why no trackback support?

**Links**

DVRs for Cop Cars:
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/05/15/1520205&mode=thread&tid=136&tid=137&tid=187

Cameras in Cop Cars:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2002/07/19/copcameras.htm

Cops Against Home Video:
http://www.cahv.org/mission.htm
"Should you encounter an instance of police action, the best thing is always to turn off your camera and leave the premises immediately!"

Who’s Watching?
Detroit Cops Could Turn Off Cameras Meant to Monitor Them:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/detroitcops010122.html
'"One of our fundamental problems in Detroit is that there is no central place where records are kept of police misconduct," she said. "If that information is not collected and kept somewhere, it's a problem."..."I am very interested in tearing down the blue curtain of secrecy that is such a detriment to our police and to our city."'

Video Cameras in Police Cars Benefit Citizens:
http://www.statenews.com/editionssummer99/071299/op_col2.html
'Local anarchist groups have been making vehement criticisms of alleged local police brutality. But honest anarchists call for the development of a self-policing moral system to decrease the need for cops and courts. They should welcome the tapes. I think vocal and energetic anarchists should volunteer to go over the tapes.

Once possible court action is completed, there’s no reason not to release the tapes. Perhaps the “protection of the innocent” may be an issue. But from whom do the innocent need protection? In my experience, the innocent are usually most wronged by the police and courts, who already possess the tapes. '

Auto Black Box Data Being Used in Courts:
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/05/16/2210211&mode=thread&tid=158&tid=99&tid=123

Posted by nym at May 19, 2003 10:23 AM
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