Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
propublica.org
Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
1–10 of 240 posts
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#2Immediate Reaction: Um, yes? Only the naive, self-deluding, and techno-utopians would have expected otherwise. Vs. an experienced teller from a well-run 1950's podunk bank could tell you that no security technology is worth crap if the managers don't actually care, or are crooked themselves.
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#3Seems like this is the thesis:
> As policymakers rushed to equip the police with cameras, they often failed to grapple with a fundamental question: Who would control the footage? Instead, they defaulted to leaving police departments, including New York’s, with the power to decide what is recorded, who can see it and when. In turn, departments across the country have routinely delayed releasing footage, released only partial or redacted video or refused to release it at all.
The impetus to avoid transparency is the strongest indication I can observe that the state will be deprecated in favor of the internet in the coming centuries.
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#4Immediate Reaction: Um, yes? Only the naive, self-deluding, and techno-utopians would have expected otherwise. Vs. an experienced teller from a well-run 1950's podunk bank could tell you that no security technology is worth crap if the managers don't actually care, or are crooked themselves.
> Immediate Reaction: Um, yes? Only the naive, self-deluding, and techno-utopians would have expected otherwise. Vs. an experienced teller from a well-run 1950's podunk bank could tell you that no security technology is worth crap if the managers don't actually care, or are crooked themselves.
If one isn't trained as (or thinking as) a scientist, then I think it's easy to miss the importance of documenting expected results. One shouldn't believe a conclusion, even an expected and obvious conclusion, without data supporting it. This makes gathering data to support expected results a valuable process, and one that should be recognized.
(For example, in this particular context, if one wants to argue against police claims that body-cams offer sufficient accountability, being able to argue from specific cases where the accountability has been subverted is much more likely to be useful than arguing from a general feeling that they won't be used properly.)
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#5A police officer in performance of his duties should have zero expectation of privacy, and has a legal obligation to fill out an accurate duty log, which is such that it may be used as evidence in court.
Body camera footage should be viewed as an extension of that, and when missing or unavailable, that absence should be viewed in the same light as a failure to properly document something in a duty log --- it is a dereliction of duty and of their obligation to be accountable to the public which they ostensibly serve.
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#6Without adversarial third party oversight police will continue to abuse the public.
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#7Seems like this is the thesis: > As policymakers rushed to equip the police with cameras, they often failed to grapple with a fundamental question: Who would control the footage? Instead, they defaulted to leaving police departments, including New York’s, with the power to decide what is recorded, who can see it and when. In turn, departments across the country have routinely delayed releasing footage, released only…
Is the Internet going to pave roads? How?
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#8A police officer in performance of his duties should have zero expectation of privacy, and has a legal obligation to fill out an accurate duty log, which is such that it may be used as evidence in court. Body camera footage should be viewed as an extension of that, and when missing or unavailable, that absence should be viewed in the same light as a failure to properly document something in a duty log --- it is a der…
This is another example of "an untested backup doesn't exist", as well.
Regardless of whether some of the time, a police department is full of bad apples and concealing or destroying body-cam footage, if you treat your body cams as a backup -- and only look at it when something goes wrong -- you're going to discover that your body cams weren't working all along and no one noticed.
And then you're going to look hella guilty of hiding evidence, even if it was just bad IT policies & procedures.
If you have body cameras, you need a process where you frequently, randomly pull the footage from random officers, and check whether it was turned on, recording properly, filed correctly, whether the camera quality is uselessly grainy, etc etc etc.
Otherwise, just like you don't have backups if you aren't testing your restore process, you'll find out you don't have body camera footage even when it would clear you of blame.
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#9I want elected officials to wear body cameras too
Re: Police have undermined the promise of body cameras
#10Seems like this is the thesis: > As policymakers rushed to equip the police with cameras, they often failed to grapple with a fundamental question: Who would control the footage? Instead, they defaulted to leaving police departments, including New York’s, with the power to decide what is recorded, who can see it and when. In turn, departments across the country have routinely delayed releasing footage, released only…
"Will be"... by whom? People won't do it, the state sure isn't.