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Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

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Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#31

Post by Broken_Hippo »

kbenson wrote: post #5

Half good, half bad: House Bill 972 does make such video accessible to people who can be seen or heard in it, along with their personal representatives ― but they must file a request to obtain the footage. If the request is denied, the petitioners must go before the state’s superior court. Requests can be denied to protect a person’s safety or reputation, or if the recording is part of an active investigation. Curren…

I see two things with the reputation bit, both positive and negative:

If you release someone being arrested, and afterwards it is a case of mistaken identity or one is found not guilty, it can affect reputation. Arrest records are public, and even when it winds up being mistaken identity or a not guilty verdict, it impacts lives and jobs. Some folks would base their judgement on how you acted or where you were in that video.

In addition to things such as domestic violence (perhaps we should blur out faces of the victims, for example, and not show their naked bodies to the public).

On the other hand, some of these could damage the Officer's reputation, and I wonder if they could be denied for that reason.

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#32

Post by Broken_Hippo »

michaelbuddy wrote: post #9
wheaties wrote: post #2

Phew, for a second there I thought we might have some transparency in our government. Glad to know that in the wake of historic video footage of public abuses, this is being taken away. Our leaders have listened and what they heard horrifies them! So now they don't have to listen, unless you come with a court order, that is.

If dash and body cam footage was available easily, you're not gonna like what you see. And people will then be up in arms because they are being harassed for their own bad behavior on camera given to public. I personally want body cam footage to be seen because I know it will cause that backlash and it will show the public how terrible their neighbors are and they'll understand why the police are so necessary (and ne…

Part of the issue, however, is that police aren't civil to the public in the first place.

We expect folks in call centers to take all sorts of abuse. Folks working at the local pharmacy are supposed to keep a smiling face and professional demeanor, even if folks are yelling obscenities and insults in their direction. Folks tell retail workers that if they can't do that, or if they can't handle that, or don't like it, they need to find another job.

I don't see why we shouldn't expect that from police in most situations. I understand the need to be firm at times with some folks, but it isn't something that needs to be done at a traffic stop. Even if the person being pulled over is grouchy. Works both ways.

And yes, some folks will be harassed for their behavior, but I think it'll be a minimum.

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#34

Post by basseq »

This is tough. I see the intent and logic in this bill. At its core, this is a win for citizen privacy and data protection. It protects the integrity of criminal investigations, and limits public outrage without context. (E.g., a 30-second clip of a cop tackling someone presented as police brutality, omitting the previous 30 seconds of the individual resisting arrest or being a hazard to the health of himself or others.)

The downside, of course, is transparency at a time when public trust in police and proper oversight is at an all-time low. And the "oversight" piece of this is critical. We simply don't believe answers like, "Our internal investigation shows that the officer acted correctly."

So I do think this is the right move, but this needs to be coupled with real reform in independent police oversight and investigation.

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#35

Post by TeMPOraL »

jMyles wrote: post #29
guelo wrote: post #21

The millions being spent on police cameras only serve as a gift to Tazer and the other paramilitary industrial complex companies. True reform will only come from the continued release of uncensored citizen video. The right to record must be protected at all cost.

> The right to record It's hard to contort the First Amendment in such a way not to protect this. I agree that this is one of the core rights of information age society.

Wait, wait. So it's a right to record, but if I go out and start recording stuff I get called out as privacy violator? So which way is it?

(I'm pro-recording here btw.)

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#36

Post by jMyles »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #35
jMyles wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The right to record It's hard to contort the First Amendment in such a way not to protect this. I agree that this is one of the core rights of information age society.

Wait, wait. So it's a right to record, but if I go out and start recording stuff I get called out as privacy violator? So which way is it? (I'm pro-recording here btw.)

The former, and strictly so. This version of "privacy" can't survive in a free society I don't think.

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#37

Post by dragonwriter »

sp332 wrote: post #24
jrs235 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if it isn't going to be used against but could be exculpatory?

Of course, it's illegal for them to withhold any exculpatory evidence.

If its not public, you have minimal chance of discovering it if it isn't provided, so while it is illegal for them to withhold it, you'll never know it existed and was withheld unless someone who does know of it -- almost certainly the police themselves, or the person shown in it (quite possibly, the real criminal, who would be revealing their own identity by coming forward) -- actively reveals it. So, illegal or not, it makes it much easier for them to get away with concealing exculpatory evidence.

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#38

Post by hx87 »

jMyles wrote: post #36
TeMPOraL wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, wait. So it's a right to record, but if I go out and start recording stuff I get called out as privacy violator? So which way is it? (I'm pro-recording here btw.)

The former, and strictly so. This version of "privacy" can't survive in a free society I don't think.

That's why I think the European concept of "right to be forgotten" is deeply flawed. I understand that they're trying to protect people from being negatively judged using outdated information, but the problem lies in the judgement, not the information. A better alternative would be "right to be not given a damn about".

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#39

Post by hx87 »

abstractbeliefs wrote: post #22
koolba wrote: post #14

On it's surface making the footage not immediately public isn't a bad idea. The classic example would be a swat team showing up at the wrong house, busting down the door, and having video footage of John Q Citizen in his birthday suit. As long as there is a process for getting access to the footage that's impartial, that's fine. What's really needed though is a way to escrow the footage. This is a solved problem in t…

Not even de facto, if they genuinely broke the law, they are de jure criminals!

Exactly. They're just de facto protected by overly police-friendly prosecutors and juries.

Re: Police Camera Footage Will No Longer Be Made Public in North Carolina

#40

Post by shove »

I'm an NC native. The governor and most of the NC legislature are an embarrassment to our great state.

The history is complex, but basically, the Democrats controlled NC state politics for decades (weird, I know) and lost both the governorship and the legislature in the wake of backlash from Obama carrying NC in his first term. Big-money Republicans poured money into the state to ensure that a) Obama didn't carry NC in 2008 and b) Republicans would control the state during the key years following the US census, during time which they would gerrymander the ever living fuck out of our districts. Expect to hear lots of stories about our state's laws getting slammed by SCOTUS. There are several cases already in flight.

Don't try to make sense of it all -- it's about power and pandering and the worst most regressive parts of "conservatism".

Police are employed by the public. That footage, taken by public employees, in (mostly) public spaces, ought to belong to the public. I'm very concerned about privacy, the police / surveillance state, but I'd rather strap cameras to all officers than continue to allow them to literally get away with murder.

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