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Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

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Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#81

Post by tokenadult »

The Maryland law is different from the law in other states. The article text reads, "A dozen states require all parties to consent before a recording is made if there is a 'reasonable expectation of privacy."" First of all, it's very dubious that a state law enforcement officer would consider himself to have an expectation of privacy while interacting with citizens in public places. Fortunately, most states have a more reasonable body of law (like mine) and allow any party to an interaction to record the interaction without permission of the other parties (which is also the rule of federal law on taping interstate telephone conversations, absent a more restrictive rule of state law). It's outrageous that members of the public can be prosecuted for recording the public activities of law enforcement officers. It is also unusual for such a prosecution to be possible.

After edit: Another HN thread a while back recommended the book Arrest-Proof Yourself: An Ex-Cop Reveals How Easy It Is for Anyone to Get Arrested, How Even a Single Arrest Could Ruin Your Life, and What to Do If the Police Get in Your Face

http://www.amazon.com/Arrest-Proof-Yourself-Ex-Cop-Reveals-A...

which I greatly enjoyed reading and which my son is reading this week. There is a lot of good information there about how and why to stay out of trouble with the police.

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#82

Post by tokenadult »

patio11 wrote: post #13
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #2

I wish I had ten upvotes for this. Or a hundred. I love devil's advocate, so I'll say this just as a way of keeping things in perspective: not a lot of folks would want people videotaping everything they did at work and putting it on YouTube (along with criticisms) I know it would drive me nuts. Society as a whole is going to have to go through some major contortions as people get their heads wrapped around the idea…

I think we all, given a few minutes of reflection, would be glad that we're not judged on a 30 second edited video highlights reel of the worst decisions we've ever made. Particularly not one which stripped the context out of the video. That said, I'm much less concerned about videotaping cops on the street and more concerned with VPI -- videotaped police interrogations. Unlike videotaping cops on the street, they'd…

Videotaping police interrogations is routine in my state, just as private citizens recording their own activities and interactions with other people (with or without the consent of the other parties in the interaction) is routine. The practice of routinely videotaping police interrogations in my jurisdiction seems to help considerably with the administration of criminal justice.

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#83

Post by pg »

apu wrote: post #80
pg wrote: post #58

The ACLU should make these cases a priority. I'd join again if they did.

Why'd you leave the ACLU?

The most recent time, because they sent me a deluge of junkmail. They seemed to have morphed into a marketing organization that also did some legal work. Maybe the problem was that I gave them more than the normal amount of money; maybe the more you give them the more mail they send you.

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#84

Post by apu »

pg wrote: post #83
apu wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why'd you leave the ACLU?

The most recent time, because they sent me a deluge of junkmail. They seemed to have morphed into a marketing organization that also did some legal work. Maybe the problem was that I gave them more than the normal amount of money; maybe the more you give them the more mail they send you.

Actually this is a huge problem that regularly deters me (and my parents) from donating more. 95% of organizations view a single donation as an all-access pass to send junk mail, emails, and in many cases even phone calls with "updates" and requests for more money.

Sometimes I want to be able to say to organizations: "I would love to support your cause, but not if it means I have to deal with all your crap afterwards!"

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#85

Post by bkrausz »

Dove wrote: post #67
michael_h wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you have to have anything related to your work release reviewed for the rest of your life I'm not sure that this is true.

I don't know about that, but you do see notices all the time that say things like, "Use of this or any other DoD interest computing system constitutes consent to monitoring at all times. . . information placed in this system is not subject to any expectation of privacy." It just comes with the territory. Some jobs are more private, some are more public. Bank tellers, customer service reps, talk show hosts, members of…

That's true of any job: if it's their hardware they can do what they want with it. Tons of jobs have similar monitoring policies.

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#86

Post by dedward »

CodeMage wrote: post #28
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #2

I wish I had ten upvotes for this. Or a hundred. I love devil's advocate, so I'll say this just as a way of keeping things in perspective: not a lot of folks would want people videotaping everything they did at work and putting it on YouTube (along with criticisms) I know it would drive me nuts. Society as a whole is going to have to go through some major contortions as people get their heads wrapped around the idea…

Society as a whole is going to have to go through some major contortions as people get their heads wrapped around the idea that everything -- and I mean everything -- is going to be digitized and recorded. That is precisely one of the things that give me the shivers about the society today. I understand Mr. Graber's motivation. I also agree wholeheartedly that the "reasonable expectation of privacy" rule has to be ap…

It's not paranoia... it's justified. The problem is - there is no clear solution. Technology is going to advance.... and it's a fact of life that there are going to, one way or the other, be cheap, high-res, always-on recording devices all over the place, public and private, for some reason or other. I'm not talking conspiracy theory or anything here..... just that the technology is only going get cheaper and cheaper, and the world more and more networked - so we need to make some decisions as a society as to how we're gong to deal with that on all kinds of fronts - personal privacy being one.

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#87

Post by Groxx »

eru wrote: post #79
johngalt wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem we have here is that new technologies generally reach an equilibrium at some point. The fallacy is to assume that present technology trends always continue. In the 50s they thought the future would be nuclear everything. In the 30s they thought the future would be flying everything. At the turn of the century they thought the future would be electric everything. During the industrial revolution they thoug…

Actually, electric everything has arrived.

I'm still waiting for my car to plug into the wall :\

At least they're on their way towards actual production. Again.

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#88

Post by eru »

Groxx wrote: post #87
eru wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, electric everything has arrived.

I'm still waiting for my car to plug into the wall :\ At least they're on their way towards actual production. Again.

Yes, our cars are still seldom moved by electricity. But there are still lots and lots of electric gadget in a modern car.

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#89

Post by hga »

MartinCron wrote: post #77
stcredzero wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish all cars came with black boxes and 360-degree video coverage so that we could voluntarily supply this information. People lie when they get into a fender bender. (Note: if you live in a neighborhood where people key cars, either stop parking like a douche or you need to move to a better neighborhood. If people feel free to vandalize in a place, they'll also do other crime.) I'd pay $300 for a device I could ju…

Wiretapping laws only apply to places and scenarios where one could have a reasonable assumption of privacy. As long as you're not driving through my bedroom, you're all right with me.

Not true in Illinois, where they explicitly made it illegal to tape cops. Although in all fairness the state laws on wiretapping are designed to protect the guilty (e.g. only the Feds can secretly legally wiretap anyone in the state).

Re: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police

#90

Post by dpatru »

CodeMage wrote: post #28
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #2

I wish I had ten upvotes for this. Or a hundred. I love devil's advocate, so I'll say this just as a way of keeping things in perspective: not a lot of folks would want people videotaping everything they did at work and putting it on YouTube (along with criticisms) I know it would drive me nuts. Society as a whole is going to have to go through some major contortions as people get their heads wrapped around the idea…

Society as a whole is going to have to go through some major contortions as people get their heads wrapped around the idea that everything -- and I mean everything -- is going to be digitized and recorded. That is precisely one of the things that give me the shivers about the society today. I understand Mr. Graber's motivation. I also agree wholeheartedly that the "reasonable expectation of privacy" rule has to be ap…

> I also agree wholeheartedly that the "reasonable expectation of privacy" rule has to be applied consistently, i.e. if a police officer can videotape me over the course of his or her work, then I should be allowed to videotape that officer.

The rules for recording police should not be symmetrical. Anyone should be allowed to record police, but the police should not be allowed to record without good cause.

Recording police serves the same function as the press, the right to bear arms, and the right to due process and a jury trial: it keeps the government under the control of the people. The police recording the public serves the opposite end, it enables the police (government) to control the people.

An analogous situation is recording legislative hearings. We expect to be able to watch our politicians pass laws in the legislature. We want to keep an eye on them. But we don't allow the government to install cameras in our workplaces.

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