Police Trunk Cameras: Height three Pros and Cons

A North Charleston, Southward Carolina, police officeholder wears a body camera in Mar. 2016.
Source: Ryan Johnson, "St. Paddy's Day in Northward Charleston – 2016," Creative Commons, Mar. 12, 2016

  • Overview
  • Pro/Con Arguments
  • Discussion Questions
  • Accept Action

Police force trunk cameras (also chosen body-worn cameras) are small cameras worn on a constabulary enforcement officeholder's chest or head to record interactions betwixt the officer and the public. The cameras have a microphone to capture audio and internal information storage to save video footage for later review. [37] [41]

Co-ordinate to the Bureau of Justice Assist, "[t]he video and audio recordings from BWCs [body-worn cameras] can be used by law enforcement to demonstrate transparency to their communities; to document statements, observations, behaviors, and other prove; and to deter unprofessional, illegal, and inappropriate behaviors by both constabulary enforcement and the public." [41] Constabulary body cameras are in employ around the world from Australia and Uruguay to the Britain and South Africa. [19] [32] [35] [36]

After the law shooting expiry of Michael Brown on Aug. 9, 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri, President Barack Obama requested $263 million to fund body camera programs and police preparation on Dec. ane, 2014. [38] [46] As a event the Department of Justice (DOJ)  implemented the Torso-Worn Photographic camera Policy and Implementation Program (BWC-PIP). Between fiscal year (FY) 2015 and FY 2019, the BWC-PIP has given over 493 awards worth over a collective $70 million to law enforcement agencies in 47 states, DC, Puerto Rico, and the The states Virgin Islands. Agencies in Maine, Montana, and North Dakota have not been awarded federal body camera funding. [xl] [42] [43] [44]

As of Oct. 29, 2018, the most recently available data, 36 states and DC had specific legislation about the use of police body cameras. At that time, another four states had pending torso camera legislation. [45]

On June 7, 2021, US Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, JD, directed the ATF, DEA, FBI and US Marshals "to develop and submit for review" body-worn camera policies in which agents wear cameras during "(ane) a pre-planned attempt to serve an arrest warrant or other pre-planned arrest, including the apprehension of fugitives sought on country and local warrants; or (2) the execution of a search or seizure warrant or lodge." [63]

Should Police Officers Vesture Trunk Cameras?

Pro 1

Law body cameras better police accountability and lower reports of law misconduct.

Law body cameras provide visual and audio evidence that tin can independently verify events. In Texas, a police officer was fired, charged with murder, and sentenced to a $ten,000 fine and fifteen years in prison house after body-worn photographic camera footage contradicted his initial statement in the Apr. 2017 shooting of an unarmed youth. [12] [48]

In Baltimore, Maryland, an officer was convicted of fabricating show and misconduct in office subsequently existence caught by torso-worn cameras planting fake drug testify.[14] [49]

A RAND study constitute that utilise of force past police officers dropped if the officers wearing cameras kept the cameras recording for the officers' whole shift. [471] In Miami-Dade Canton, Florida, researchers found a 19% reduction in law officers using physical force against citizen resistance, and ceremonious cases against the police section for use of force dropped 74%. [l]

In Phoenix, Arizona, complaints confronting officers wearing cameras decreased 23%, while complaints against officers not wearing cameras increased 10.six%. [thirteen]

The cameras too protect police force officers against false accusations of misconduct. In San Diego, California, the use of trunk cameras provided the necessary prove to exonerate police officers falsely accused of misconduct. The number of severe misconduct allegations deemed false increased 2.four% with body camera footage, and the number of officers exonerated for less severe allegations related to conduct, courtesy, procedure, and service increased half-dozen.v%. [eleven]

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Pro ii

Police body cameras are a powerful tool in domestic violence cases.

When an officeholder wearing a camera arrives at a domestic violence scene, the camera is able to record the immediate aftermath of the attack, including injuries the victim has suffered, also every bit victim statements that may be more honest than subsequently statements once victims remember emotional and financial ties to their abusers. [51] Victims may also experience more secure in their testimony with video bear witness backing up their statements. [52]

Elliott Knetsch, JD, Prosecutor for the City of Burnsville, Minnesota, whose police department uses torso-worn cameras, stated, "When the cops are chosen and come up through the door, the victim is very happy and relieved to see them. They feel safe. They tell the officer what happened. That statement given right at that moment is more probable to be the truth than what comes out fifty-fifty half an hour afterwards, when the implications of what has happened showtime to set in." [51]

In the six months since body cameras were deployed in Burnsville, police force recorded video for nigh every domestic violence case, something former Principal Deputy of the Dakota County Attorney's Office, Phil Prokopowicz, JD, found useful. He stated that photographic camera footage "can be influential in resolving the case in terms of negotiations. The defendant gets to see the human action and know what will be displayed in front end of the jury. The documenting of those first moments is very critical to those types of cases, as well equally any admissions that may occur as officers are entering." [51]

Officers in the U.k. and Queensland, Australia echoed this benefit, stating some abusers plead guilty because they knew in that location was video footage bear witness confronting them.[52] [53]

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Pro 3

Police body cameras are a good police reform tool and have strong support from members of the public.

Police torso worn cameras offer transparency and accountability to the public, which is an attempt to "mend that frayed relationship between the law and the customs," according to New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, JD. [56] [57] [58]

Video recorded from police body cameras tin can be used to train new and existing officers in how to perform during hard encounters with the public. The Miami Law Section has been using body cameras for training since 2012. Erstwhile Police Major Ian Moffitt, MS, stated, "we can tape a situation, a scenario in training, and then go dorsum and look at it and prove the educatee, the recruit, the officeholder what they did good, what they did bad, and [what they can] improve on." [17]

Amidst the Black Lives Thing protests after the expiry of George Floyd, a June 2020 Reuters/Ipsos poll found 92% of Americans wanted federal police officers to habiliment torso cams. [54] A July 2020 University of Maryland School of Public Policy survey found 90% back up for all police officers being required to article of clothing trunk cameras, including 85% of republicans, 86% of independents, and 94% of democrats. [55]

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Con one

Police trunk cameras are too expensive and unreliable for many police departments.

Equipping police departments with body cameras is extremely expensive as forces have to budget not only for the camera merely also for ancillary equipment (such every bit a car charger or mount), training, data storage facilities, extra staff to manage the video information, and maintenance costs. [26] Baltimore Constabulary entered a body-worn camera program in 2016 for $xi.3 1000000. As of June 25, 2020, the costs had tripled to $35.one million. [59]

Many law departments, particularly smaller departments with smaller budgets, have suspended body-worn camera programs citing rising costs of the cameras, maintenance of the programs, employees, and data storage. [27] [28] [29] [30] [60]

A trial in Edmonton, California, found that torso-worn cameras had an insufficient battery length for daily policing, peculiarly in common cold weather when battery life diminished more rapidly. [9]

A sheriff's office in Virginia stopped using trunk cameras due to the unreliability of their on-off buttons and poor integration with their Information technology systems that resulted in the organization inaccurately matching camera footage to the officer wearing the camera. [31] As the cameras, supporting equipment, and networks historic period, costs will only ascent to maintain or replace equipment.

In a perhaps extreme only cautionary example, in Oct, 2018 a Staten Island, New York, officeholder's body camera burst into flames while the officer was wearing the device. He was luckily not injured, but the department was forced to retrieve thousands of cameras. [61]

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Con two

Police body cameras invade the privacy of citizens, potentially exposing victims and subjecting citizens to facial recognition software.

Recording constabulary encounters with the public could atomic number 82 to the public exposure of private medical atmospheric condition such as mental affliction. Victims of crimes such as rape or domestic corruption may be further traumatized by recordings. Informants or witnesses may fear reprisal from criminals. People being arrested may fearfulness the damage of public exposure, such as being fired from a chore. [17] [xix] [34]

Onetime Spokane, Washington, Law Chief Frank Straub, PhD, notes that "every solar day we are exposing persons challenged by mental affliction, autism, developmental disabilities, addiction, etc. We are creating and making public recordings of their illness and potentially creating life-long consequences." [22]

Former Chief of Police force Ken Miller, MPA, of Greensboro, Due north Carolina, said that if citizens "remember that they are going to be recorded every time they talk to an officer, regardless of the context, it is going to damage openness and create barriers to important relationships." [23]

Ane such barrier is fear of retaliation. A United states of america Justice Department report notes that some "people volition be less likely to come forward to share information if they know their chat is going to be recorded, especially in high-crime neighborhoods where residents might be subject to retaliation if they are seen as cooperating with constabulary." [23]

Some other privacy fearfulness, according to the ACLU, is that police body cameras will exist worn as "roving surveillance devices that rails our faces, voices, and even the unique way we walk" that could exist used "to runway, allocate, and discriminate against people based on their nearly personal, innate features." [62]

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Con three

Law body cameras decrease the prophylactic of law officers and negatively affect their physical and mental health.

Assaults on law officers were 14% higher when trunk cameras were present. [18] Some people may respond negatively or violently to being filmed past police, especially those who may be under the influence of drugs or alcohol, or who are suffering from mental health problems.

University of Oklahoma Professor of Law Stephen East. Henderson, JD, stated that the apply of police body cameras may exist psychologically dissentious to officers because "nobody does well to be under constant surveillance." [21]

Pat Lynch, President of the Police Benevolent Association of the City of New York, stated officers "are already weighed downward with equipment like escape hoods [gas masks], Mace, flashlights, memo books, ASPs [batons], radio, handcuffs and the like. Boosted equipment becomes an encumbrance and a safety issue for those carrying it." [17]

Other potential wellness and prophylactic issues include caput and neck injuries, electric stupor or burns from faulty or damaged equipment, and the spread of contagious infectious diseases if the units are shared. [20]

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Discussion Questions

  1. Should police force officers wear body cameras? Why or why not?
  2. In what ways might body worn cameras improve policing? In what means might they complicate or impair policing? Explicate your answers.
  3. Should police departments consider other reforms in add-on or instead of body cameras? Which ones? Explain your answers

Take Activeness

1. Explore Bryce Peterson'south argument that law body cameras can increment community trust.

2. Consider the arguments on both sides with Pew Charitable Trusts.

3. Analyze why law torso cameras haven't stopped police involved shootings and other incidents at Wired.

4. Consider how you felt about the issue before reading this commodity. After reading the pros and cons on this topic, has your thinking changed? If and then, how? List two to three ways. If your thoughts take non changed, list two to three ways your better understanding of the "other side of the result" now helps you better debate your position.

5. Push button for the position and policies you lot support by writing US national senators and representatives.

Sources

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