Topic:
Video surveillance is becoming more and more ubiquitous in both public and private spaces. Police departments, in response to various high profile incidents involving the use of deadly force against citizens, have begun deploying body cameras on officers. Both the Salt Lake City Police Department and the West Valley Police Department use body cams mounted on glasses worn by officers. Such use raises a host of privacy issues.
Blog Post:
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? “Who will watch the watchmen?”
Police body cameras are slowly becoming more and more ubiquitous with law enforcement procedure, and the way law enforcement personnel interact with the public. A common assumption regarding the use of body cameras is that they will help to either dissuade “bad cops” from abusing their power or using excessive force, or that they will help us hold those who do abuse their power responsible for that abuse. Proponents also hope that police body camera footage, like footage from dash cams, can be used to clear up mistakes in memory or determine the truth of differing claims when the facts of a case are disputed. Interactions between police and the public have a history of being volatile or negative leading to vastly different accounts of events. Cameras could potentially provide the clarity we’ve lacked for so long.
Manufactures and law enforcement are looking at many potential camera designs to accomplish these goals. From the chest-mounted cameras to small cameras mounted to the side of headgear, the models are widely variable and contain many different components. According to the Atlantic, this technology can be expensive, costing a police department between a few hundred and a few thousand dollars a set. But is the potential cost worth it to increase transparency and accountability? The opinions are mixed.
Potential Problems with Body Cameras
Alongside the cost of the cameras themselves, departments must think about secondary costs associated with the collection of that much footage. Law enforcement faces questions about when to record, what to store, and for how long to store it. Will that data be public? How will it be accessed? Can it be protected? To keep the cameras rolling the entire time an officer is on duty would amass vast amounts of film data that would need to be stored. Allowing an officer to turn the camera on and off could potentially erase its watchdog effects. And still more argue that body cameras don’t make police behave better at all. Last October the New York Times reported on a study done in the Washington D.C. police department that showed no significant difference in the use of force or number of civilian complaints between officers who had cameras and those who did not. A reasonable argument can be made that these cameras serve little more than to record what can be our most vulnerable moments which could become public record at taxpayer expense.
Current Laws and Policies Regarding Police Body Cameras (Utah)
Utah does have several laws in place regarding the use of police body cameras. H.B 300 is one (of several) such law(s) that made its way through the state legislature in 2016 determining basic guidelines for the use of body cameras. The Salt Lake City police department had 295 body cameras in use at the end of 2014, one for each officer who would be deployed in the field. Depending on the crime, camera footage is usually stored between one and three years, and access to any footage is processed through a Government Records Access Management Act (GRAMA) request and can be denied. Each unit cost the city $3,368.
My Opinion
I personally tend to agree with the general implementation of police-worn body cameras. While an increase in government surveillance is not generally something I find myself agreeing with, I am a member of the majority of Americans who believe that at the very least, body cameras will help to increase transparency in police-public interactions. I do however think the use of this technology needs strong regulation, including limits on the length of time footage can be stored as well as who has access to the footage. With proper supervision, I believe body cameras can make our communities at the very least, more honest.
I also believe that body cameras can be overall beneficial. However, I think for them to be implemented there need to be strict guidelines in place, especially when it comes to access of footage. I believe that only in relevant cases and investigations should the footage become public, when it can actually aid in providing clarification. Another potential benefit to body cameras is the protection they could provide to officers. It's a lot harder for someone to make a false claim against an officer when the entire situation was captured on tape.
ReplyDeleteThe false claims is something that's so important and I believe was missed in the post. Protection of the officers is a huge perk of body cams. I didn't think of the access when I read this post but It being public I believe is okay. I mean there are shows out there like Live P.D. or Cops that already show this footage. I think its more important to see how police officers handle situations to help end the biases against them.
DeleteI believe that the body camera is a very beneficial technology not only for protecting the public, but also the officer not just legally, but physically. If an officer has a gun pulled on him during a routine stopping of a pedestrian and he uses his taser in defense it looks better if we see the footage of the gun being pulled than if we just heard about a police officer tasing a civilian. The police have gotten a bad wrap for being overly aggressive recently, but the body camera could be the difference to help us tell bad cops from good cops in bad positions. As far as policy goes I believe that every encounter a police officer has on duty should be recorded (Every time they pull someone over or stop people on the street or respond to a call). They should start the recording before they contact the suspect so that the whole conversation can be seen. These videos should only be kept if something out of the ordinary happens. If they just pull someone over for speeding and give them a ticket and that's it there is no reason to keep the footage. All videos collected should also be protected well because you don't want someone to hack in and alter a video so that it looks worse than it actually was due to lack of context or content. I believe that overall this will make the police force more transparent and safer for the officers. At the end of the day it is these men that are protecting the public so they should be trusted to do their job correctly and this will help the people trust the police again.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the use of police body cameras. I also agree with Cole's sentiment taht "these videos should only be kept if something out of the ordinary happens", which would allow for continuous use and body cams which could not be turned on/off by the user. By removing the option to turn on/off the cameras, the police no longer have the temptation or the ability for flagrant and gross abuse of the technology (as in this case, https://splinternews.com/grand-jury-indicts-baltimore-cop-caught-appearing-to-pl-1822406730). I also don't know that the use of body cameras particularly effects the behavior of the police. One of the videos we watched as part of our reading (http://www.ted.com/talks/alessandro_acquisti_why_privacy_matters) mentioned how it only took 15 seconds for students to overcome the inhibitory effect of knowing students and faculty would read their response to questions about cheating, rather than just students. In the same fashion, I feel that police body cameras have an initial effect on behavior but eventually the idea of constant surveillance and scrutinization becomes the new norm, and the behavior police body cameras attempt to control and prevent will still exist and still occur.
ReplyDeleteI think the biggest thing missed in this post was the protection that the body cams bring. The body cams actually protect the officers from false claims like Garet was saying and that's so important. The officers have been getting a lot of hate lately especially from the black community. So its so important to be able to protect yourself from false claims when you try your best to stick your neck out for the people of this nation. Having the job of a policeman isn't easy and very under-appreciated. So its nice to have proof that you're doing your job right. Of course It can also go the other way like mentioned in the article. It also protects people from the abuse some cops give. So all-in-all body cams help protect literally everyone. It can also make for great shows like Cops or Live P.D.
ReplyDeleteI too am in favor of police body cameras, so long as there are strict regulations that determine when they should be on, how footage is stored if at all, who can access footage, and how long footage can be stored. Most importantly, I think there should be regulations on how the footage can be used, so it is only used to investigate specific crimes, and not used for general surveillance. I don't think body cameras are the complete solution to transparency and clarity in police/public relations, but I do think they have the potential to better these relations in certain cases.
ReplyDeleteI agree that police body cameras are beneficial overall. The best part about them is that they usually guarantee the truth. The footage from a body camera allows us to find out whether any allegations are true or false, which is beneficial to both the general public and the officers. One major problem with body cams is in regard to storage. Limitations to storage needs to be determined, such as who has access to the footage or how long the footage remains. Allowing anyone to sift through footage in order to find information about someone is a breach of privacy, so how should we determine who gets permission? We should also determine what is necessary to store. Footage while someone is on patrol may not seem important, but should it be kept anyways just in case it offers information regarding a crime? While there are many issues that need to be addressed regarding body cams, they should remain as a way to guarantee honesty.
ReplyDeleteBrady,
DeleteI'd like to point out that footage can also be misinterpreted, and truth is very subjective.
I think body cameras are beneficial, they hold both parties accountable for their actions. Some concerns that I had we’re retention for the footage and the usage. Who decides how long and what’s valuable? The blog post mentions that there are several types of cameras being used, one concern that I have is that the variety may distort was is being filmed. There are definite issues surrounding body cameras that need to be addressed, that is not a surprise. But as I asked before, who would decide and would it be a state decision that would implement these regulations or would it be a federal decision? Body cameras I believe do more good than harm in regards to privacy concerns.
ReplyDeleteI also think the implementation of body cameras is worth all of the challenges that come with it. As long as access to the records of surveillance is well regulated and policemen are not able to turn the cameras off when they choose, I think body cameras are positive. Even if the policemen act the same with or without the body cameras, as the New York Times found, it would still be beneficial for citizens as police would be better held accountable by one another and the people they serve.
ReplyDeleteI generally agree that police body cameras should generally be implemented. This post was very interesting because it posed a lot of questions and issues that I don't really have an answer for. When should these cameras be turned on? Who should have control over that? How would they actually prevent misconduct? Despite there being several issues, I don't think that any of the negatives that come with policemen and policewomen wearing body cameras will be their downfall. Overall, accountability and transparency for our police, especially when they are entrusted with so much power, is essential.
ReplyDeleteI agree that in general the implementation of police body cameras is beneficial to society. However, I also agree that regulations should exist concerning the use of these cameras. As suggested in the main post, a time limit on the storage of footage from these cameras seems like a good practice. I don't see any reason to keep the footage for extended periods unless something out of the ordinary is captured. Consideration should also be given to how the footage is stored and who has access, and for what reasons the footage can be accessed. In general though I would say the benefits outweigh the privacy concerns.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that the use of body cameras by police is beneficial for the general public as well as for the police officers. Body cameras can protect both the officers and the public from false claims and avoid situations where it is an officers word against that of the public. Body cameras if used constantly would record any arrests or stops that a police officer makes and could possibly capture footage of someone which that person would like to remain private. Therefore any footage that is captured should only be available on request and only to those with sufficient reason. As we learned with mug shots, not everyone who is arrested is guilty. Also, it is necessary to avoid making the footage public as to avoid it being uploaded to the internet such that someone would have to pay a fee to have it taken down, as currently happens with mug shots.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the implementation of body cameras would be overall positive. However, I believe that they can only be effective when kept on at all times (while on-duty, of course...). Without that requirement, police can just as easily plant evidence or simply turn off the camera when they foresee things getting bloody. I disagree that the footage should be made public, however, unless it is both relevant to an investigation and follows the wishes of the family (ie, if they catch someone's death on camera, the family should have a say in whether the footage should be made public). I also believe that, after a reasonable period of time, the footage should be pulled from the public eye. Of course, if someone else just uploads it to their Youtube channel, that's fine, but perhaps if the footage is available on a law enforcement website, it gets "retired" after the case is no longer relevant.
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