# Police surveliance and Supreme Court rulings.



## Jim Engel (Nov 14, 2007)

The Rodney King case was a tipping point in police/public relations, and modern technology means that many if not most people carry an increasingly effective video recorder in their portable phone. Police administrations and individuals have sought legal restriction on recording police activity, and police actions to deter or halt recording have made the news.

The Supreme court has let stand a lower court decision in Illinois striking down restrictions on civilian recording of police activity. This and upcoming Supreme Court decisions concerning constitutional restrictions on unreasonable searches and the deployment of drug dogs, particularly seem destined to fundamentally effect canine deployment.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...g-of-police-20121126,0,686331.story?track=rss

Future legal changes may also effect police dog use.

If we eventually legalize and control most drugs as we do alcohol, what will the the impact on the economic viability of police dog programs?


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## Lisa Brazeau (May 6, 2010)

To me, part of ensuring good police work is accountability. It raises a red flag for me that police don't want to be filmed by the community. It suggests there's something to hide.

Is there a circumstance where recording the police actions (aside from being 'in the way') is detrimental to the community?

As far as economy, it will affect those businesses who deal in drug detection dogs as drug policy progresses. I don't think it will mean that dogs will no longer be used in police work, though.


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## Dave Colborn (Mar 25, 2009)

Lisa Brazeau said:


> To me, part of ensuring good police work is accountability. It raises a red flag for me that police don't want to be filmed by the community. It suggests there's something to hide.
> 
> Is there a circumstance where recording the police actions (aside from being 'in the way') is detrimental to the community?
> 
> As far as economy, it will affect those businesses who deal in drug detection dogs as drug policy progresses. I don't think it will mean that dogs will no longer be used in police work, though.


 
We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm." – Winston Churchill 


Go cops. Stay home videographers...Unless you are getting a high speed pursuit for COPS or something... To me someone with a camera tends to enable the shitheads. Pumps them up, and makes them loose the little sense they have. Because what a society needs to function, is the understanding that people will punch you in the mouth if you are stupid. In the street. In real time. Keeps everyone honest.

Videos of cops teach bad guys SOPs. Standard Operating Procedures. A video can get a cop killed. So yes, that is my final answer. it is detrimental to the cop and the community...COPS glorifies the bad guys for them as much as it does for the cops arresting them. Different value system than ours. Why wouldn't they want to do something more stupid to get more air time.


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## Brett Bowen (May 2, 2011)

Lisa Brazeau said:


> Is there a circumstance where recording the police actions (aside from being 'in the way') is detrimental to the community?


In most circumstances I have no problems with being recorded. In fact, I record myself, , sometimes by more than one device, all the time, I don't care. History has shown, at least in my department, that those recordings have saved officers far more often than they hurt officers. 

Is there a circumstance? Yes there is, when we start talking about tactics and procedures. Those things can get officers hurt and killed. In a certain sense it's like (pick your favorite football team) and giving the rival team your playbook. So yes it is detrimental to the community as your officers get put at risk. 

Where I am at, no law against recording us, but it does scare me. Not for me personally, but for the officer who contacts a subject who watched that video and learned something.

Other part is the video doesn't always convey the totality of the circumstances. Example, there was a video a few years ago of an officer fighting (fists flying, weapons being used, etc) with a subject in the back seat of the patrol car handcuffed. The video looks like this officer is beating this handcuffed guy in the back of the car. what the video doesn't show is the guy had opened the car door on one of these very tall overpasses and was trying to jump out. The officer was fighting him back into the car to keep him from jumping. 

Yes we have bad eggs, but they get found and discarded. Some take longer than others unfortunately.


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## rick smith (Dec 31, 2010)

i see nothing clear cut on either side of the coin; tuff subject

a few years back only LE had the ability to use covert video surveillance; now everyone can film anything, anywhere, anytime :twisted:
- how much a video can be used effectively by either side prob depends more on the lawyers than the user, but it's a fact of life
- nevertheless, laying on laws about who can do what with whatever is legal to carry kinda goes against the "transparency" our leaders and press keep harping on whenever they get the chance; regardless of whether it is ethical or not :evil:

- hard to have your cake and eat it too .... but if you quit believing the system will sort it out, it's prob time to move to a country where it doesn't matter and see how "good" and fair it is over there ](*,)

- in the meantime don't lose sight of reality, and don't forget that even if you live in the freedom loving USA, if you bitch too much and things get outa hand, martial law WILL be declared in a heartbeat and you'll all get locked down tighter than a drum ...don't ask me why i know that  ... ..... prob won't be no arab spring //lol//

purely (USA) politics and probably doesn't belong here, even if dogs are mentioned


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## Dave Colborn (Mar 25, 2009)

- hard to have your cake and eat it too .... but if you quit believing the system will sort it out, it's prob time to move to a country where it doesn't matter and see how "good" and fair it is over there ](*,)


+1

I'd like to see a fund for flights to deport willing people to never return to the US of A. Let people go that don't have a desire to try and affect change, but just complain and add more to the problems we already have nad need to fix.

That system that sorts it out is a good one, made up of good people. Could it be better to weed out the bad eggs sooner.


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## Paul Anthony Wootton (Nov 21, 2012)

It is an unfortunate fact that a video can be made without the full content being filmed of an incident and a false impression being made.
Paul


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Paul Anthony Wootton said:


> It is an unfortunate fact that a video can be made without the full content being filmed of an incident and a false impression being made.
> Paul



To me, this lack of context is (or can be) a huge factor.


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

in IL it is only illegal to videotape if the sound is being recorded...nothing about video itself I think, but then again, who records without sound??? lol.

all I can say is the couple of bad incidents I had with police, if I was taping it, I might have gotten beaten and lost my camera...LOL..those couple guys were pretty freakin scary...

all in all my experiences with the police, they have been nothing but professional, bar a couple...one guy threatened to shoot a 6 month old puppy though and banned me from a public park for life on his own, cause I asked for clarity on the law concerning playing tug with a dog onleash in a park...I do kinda wish I secretly recorded that one...guy was a loose cannon for sure....major hothead...same guy kicked a friend of mine in his fake leg and broke it, city got sued...some officers should not be left patrolling public parks,if they would fit better on the gang unit...another detective told me he was going to come back and kill my dogs in the crates when I refused a search without a warrant one time, never came back..he was bluffing...but it still scared me some...which was the point I guess, but how would that tape sound if played back? not too good...

I am very pro-cop...but I think most of the police tactics can be well studied from watching cable TV..there have to be at least 25 tv shows that show all kinds of police tactics...so I am not so sure how much a guy taping his police interaction is really going to reveal....


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## kerry engels (Nov 7, 2010)

Joby Becker said:


> in IL it is only illegal to videotape if the sound is being recorded...nothing about video itself I think, but then again, who records without sound??? lol.
> 
> all I can say is the couple of bad incidents I had with police, if I was taping it, I might have gotten beaten and lost my camera...LOL..those couple guys were pretty freakin scary...
> 
> ...


 
I have had some experiences with"public" officials that electronic equipment and the current laws saved my butt. It's not what you know but what you can prove....


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## Jim Engel (Nov 14, 2007)

*Note for Mr. Becker.*



Joby Becker said:


> in IL it is only illegal to videotape if the sound is being recorded...nothing about video itself I think, but then again, who records without sound??? lol.
> 
> ....


Joby, this has just be struck down as unconstitutional, it was this that was at issue.


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## Craig Snyder (May 7, 2012)

Most cops are good decent people. And most shouldn't have anything to worry about. The recordings that are out of context are the ones that are a problem. Cause the folks using them edit them to their favor and conveniently "lose" the original. 

That's why all cops should have their own recorders which many do now.

It might be generalizing but I think the smaller the department, the more likely you'll find the idiot cops that just like to mess you up and have their power trip. Not to say a large department can't have them, there is always one or two. But usually it seems the bigger departments have better screening, training and professionalism. 

Bottom line for the most part is respect the uniform and you'll rarely have a problem.

Craig


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Craig Snyder said:


> Most cops are good decent people. .... The recordings that are out of context are the ones that are a problem. Cause the folks using them edit them to their favor and conveniently "lose" the original. ....


Yes, this was what I meant too.


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## David Frost (Mar 29, 2006)

Brett said: "In most circumstances I have no problems with being recorded. In fact, I record myself, , sometimes by more than one device, all the time, I don't care. History has shown, at least in my department, that those recordings have saved officers far more often than they hurt officers."

That's been my experience too. It's policy that you will have video. It is automatically activated. The in car, all digital now, goes back a prescribed amount of time even before the video is activated. People forget we have video as well. It's understandable we are held to a higher standard. It's also newsworthy because of the rarity. 700,000 law enforcement officers having hundreds of thousands of citizen contacts daily, that never come to light. Doing the job isn't newsworthy.

DFrost


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## Christopher Smith (Jun 20, 2008)

David Frost said:


> Brett said: "In most circumstances I have no problems with being recorded. In fact, I record myself, , sometimes by more than one device, all the time, I don't care. History has shown, at least in my department, that those recordings have saved officers far more often than they hurt officers."
> 
> That's been my experience too. It's policy that you will have video. It is automatically activated. The in car, all digital now, goes back a prescribed amount of time even before the video is activated. People forget we have video as well. It's understandable we are held to a higher standard. It's also newsworthy because of the rarity. 700,000 law enforcement officers having hundreds of thousands of citizen contacts daily, that never come to light. Doing the job isn't newsworthy.
> 
> DFrost


Excellent perspective Dave and Brett. 

Brett, the history of your department is the same as most others that have moved to recording.


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## Brett Bowen (May 2, 2011)

Christopher Smith said:


> Excellent perspective Dave and Brett.
> 
> Brett, the history of your department is the same as most others that have moved to recording.


We've had pocket audio recorders for many many years, so even if we are not near our car we're required by policy to get it recording. Think back to a big old brick with the mini cassette tapes. There were a few of those still floating around here when I started.

But the whole story how we got those was a parent came up to complain about how his daughter was treated during a stop. They bring the officer in with the parent sitting there and ask him about it. That officer (who's one of our LT's now) pulls out a recorder that he bought with his own money and finds the stop on the tape and plays it. The next week every officer had one issued to them. It's unique for us (and any law enforcement agency) because it wasn't a bad incident that prompted it. They realized that it saved an officer and saved the chiefs a lot of work and grief as the investigation into the complaint never really got started.


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## Thomas Barriano (Mar 27, 2006)

Brett,

Are you trying to tell us that a teenage girl lied to her Father and Daddy believed her and made a complaint? 
I would have loved to have seen the look on the girls face when your guy pulled out the recorder.


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## Brett Bowen (May 2, 2011)

Thomas Barriano said:


> Brett,
> 
> Are you trying to tell us that a teenage girl lied to her Father and Daddy believed her and made a complaint?
> I would have loved to have seen the look on the girls face when your guy pulled out the recorder.


The way the story has been told there was some uncomfortable silence and the officer was dismissed. If I could only have been a fly on the wall to hear the conversation after that.


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

Does anyone really think anyone will learn more about Police procedure by watching civilian taped interactions, than they would by watching any of the countless television shows that are about the police?

I have watched 1000's of hours of COPS, Police POV, Bait Car, Unleashed, Wildest Chases, The Squeeze, US Marhsalls, Locked UP, Alsaka State Troopers, Female Forces, The First 48, Forensic Files, The Investigators, Dallas SWAT, FBI Files, Detroit SWAT, Crime 360, Fugitive Task Force, and countless others...

To say that if someone films the cops is going to give away some trade secrets and SOPS seems pretty silly to me to be honest..when all of these shows pretty much lay out what the procedures are, from start to finish, and explain them fairly well in most cases...

I do agree that the tapes are often used out of context and even if procedures are followed, can rile some people up, but I just cant really get on board that someone filming the police with a cell phone is going to give any criminals an edge, when there are already 100+ tv shows that can be used for research, if they were looking to try to learn police procedures...


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## Brett Bowen (May 2, 2011)

Joby Becker said:


> Does anyone really think anyone will learn more about Police procedure by watching civilian taped interactions, than they would by watching any of the countless television shows that are about the police?
> 
> I have watched 1000's of hours of COPS, Police POV, Bait Car, Unleashed, Wildest Chases, The Squeeze, US Marhsalls, Locked UP, Alsaka State Troopers, Female Forces, The First 48, Forensic Files, The Investigators, Dallas SWAT, FBI Files, Detroit SWAT, Crime 360, Fugitive Task Force, and countless others...
> 
> ...


In my mind, those shows are edited and typically not everything is shown in it's entirety. It's the unedited cell phone that worries me. 

Also, you probably weren't watching those shows for the purpose of learning something for ill will.


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## Howard Knauf (May 10, 2008)

Brett Bowen said:


> In my mind, those shows are edited and typically not everything is shown in it's entirety. It's the unedited cell phone that worries me.
> 
> Also, you probably weren't watching those shows for the purpose of learning something for ill will.


True.

My biggest issue is being targeted and having "intelligence" gathered on me or any other singled out officer to see how we singularly would react to certain situations. In my department the officers regularly work a specific area. It's not hard to manufacture a complaint just to have the same officer respond time and again, then video the officer's reactions to certain situations that he is subjected to.

Our locals have no problem shooting guns or setting off mini explosions to draw us out of their drug corridor. They also regularly see how far they can go with rookie officers to find out if/how to bully the officer and what they can get away with in the future.

Do bad guys gather intelligence on cops? Absolutely! How often? Don't know. Do they use that info? I know for a fact that they do.


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

that makes sense to me Howard. did not think of that.

Brett, sure some editing is done sometimes, but in lots and lots of cases things are shown straight through...start to finish.

I always thought some of those police officers are pretty crazy to put themselves on camera like that, evfen have their families exposed on lots of those shows..


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## Brett Bowen (May 2, 2011)

Joby Becker said:


> I always thought some of those police officers are pretty crazy to put themselves on camera like that, evfen have their families exposed on lots of those shows..


I've asked several times if my wife would like to go ride out one night. I continually get told, "no, I'd rather not know what goes on first hand."


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

Brett Bowen said:


> I've asked several times if my wife would like to go ride out one night. I continually get told, "no, I'd rather not know what goes on first hand."


I meant have their wives and kids on camera in and out of the home . hope they are using fake names on the tv show...


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