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04/06/2015 09:31:34 PM · #1 |
| Colorado Bill Would Punish Officers Who Interfere with Photographers |
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04/06/2015 10:27:10 PM · #2 |
| Maybe the Legislature has finally started smoking the good stuff ... ;-) |
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04/07/2015 04:23:47 AM · #3 |
I work as a citizen in law enforcement, in Colorado.
Transparency is good. The problem is the public safety and safety of officers. With people increasingly attempting to record incidents on their cellphone, they are increasingly entering a dangerous area for incidents in progress. It's the same process that happens when I was assuming I'd capture pictures of some idiot with a cellphone getting gored to death by a moose while I sat back with my telephoto trying to photograph the moose. Mob mentality, and the idiocy of large numbers of people, is hard to grapple with when your goal is transparency. The principle is good, but it reminds me of an episode of Black Mirror. Safequarding the public against itself is the true difficulty here. |
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04/07/2015 08:48:23 AM · #4 |
This should be country wide.
My wife's cousin is a cop out west and he welcomes being recorded.
He says when everyone knows they are being recorded they usually behave.
He said he has used recordings of his arrests that were taken by the public to prove there wasn't any foul play on his part.
He also says any cop that doesn't like being recorded is most likely a cop that doesn't like to play by the rules. |
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04/07/2015 09:25:14 AM · #5 |
Originally posted by spiritualspatula:
. Safequarding the public against itself is the true difficulty here. |
Never something that should be attempted, nor is it a laudable goal. |
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04/07/2015 10:24:30 PM · #6 |
It's just as easy, if not easier, for an officer to ask people to move back to a specified safe distance as it is to grab their camera and bludgeon them with it.
Originally posted by spiritualspatula:
I work as a citizen in law enforcement, in Colorado.
Transparency is good. The problem is the public safety and safety of officers. With people increasingly attempting to record incidents on their cellphone, they are increasingly entering a dangerous area for incidents in progress. It's the same process that happens when I was assuming I'd capture pictures of some idiot with a cellphone getting gored to death by a moose while I sat back with my telephoto trying to photograph the moose. Mob mentality, and the idiocy of large numbers of people, is hard to grapple with when your goal is transparency. The principle is good, but it reminds me of an episode of Black Mirror. Safequarding the public against itself is the true difficulty here. |
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04/08/2015 02:25:57 AM · #7 |
Originally posted by Cory:
Originally posted by spiritualspatula:
. Safequarding the public against itself is the true difficulty here. |
Never something that should be attempted, nor is it a laudable goal. |
The difficulty arises when you have a dangerous scene and some idiot decides they should approach it. Are you implying an officer should also allow Captain Tourist to approach a burning tanker in the interest of them documenting it? There are people that stop in the middle of 75mph interstate highways to take pictures (seriously). Should that just be overlooked? Besides which, criminals are a part of the public. The very creation of police, and law, is to protect the public from itself. There are segments of the public who seek to harm the majority, criminals are part of the public- burglars, murderers, rapists, wifebeaters, they are all part of the public. So if you don't think police should attempt to pursue that, I'm frankly not sure what you expect them to do.
In regard to Spork-
The majority of the law is fine, it's good. But under the current wording, both of your circumstances are equally illegal. Telling somebody to back up to the specified distance is clearly "intentionally interfering." I'm not advocating the camera snatch and grab bs that has been prevalent in numerous areas, the deletion of images etc.
 nygold also raises good points, and I agree with everything he said. But it's also important to understand why many police agencies bristle at public recordings, as they are typically incomplete (only capturing once the incident has escalated), lack proper audio from the interaction, and filmed by an often biased source. As photographers, it should be readily apparent to us that it's easy to portray something drastically different from the actual scenario. To this end, bodycams are a great solution, but unfortunately very costly. Unfortunately, law is horribly behind technology at this point, and is largely unprepared for the sudden proliferation of technology, which has resulted in lots of gray areas. Add to that post-9/11 paranoia and you've got yourself a great mess. |
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04/08/2015 07:40:53 PM · #8 |
Of course, had a citizen NOT recorded the incident between Officer Michael Slager and Walter Scott, the officer would have probably gotten away with murder.
The good cops should welcome their activities being monitoredâ€Â¦the other ones not so much.
Sorry, I don't buy the excuses from the police. They can afford Tasers, armored vehicles, high powered firearms, tear gas, SWAT teams, mobile response centers and all the other cool toys but the gear to monitor the activities of their officers is too expensive. I call bullshit.
Message edited by author 2015-04-08 19:45:48. |
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04/10/2015 06:00:17 AM · #9 |
Originally posted by Spork99:
Of course, had a citizen NOT recorded the incident between Officer Michael Slager and Walter Scott, the officer would have probably gotten away with murder.
The good cops should welcome their activities being monitoredâ€Â¦the other ones not so much.
Sorry, I don't buy the excuses from the police. They can afford Tasers, armored vehicles, high powered firearms, tear gas, SWAT teams, mobile response centers and all the other cool toys but the gear to monitor the activities of their officers is too expensive. I call bullshit.
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No disagreement with you relative to the plethora of military equipment you mentioned, but you have to remember that this is yet another "added" police expense that the taxpayers will have to digest.
If all we were taking about was the cost of the camera, then yes this is not a major issue of financial consideration... but it isn't.
One also has to factor in things like storage, IT issues, privacy laws, access to information requests and the list goes on. That is where the real costs will come in and it will be costly.
What would you suggest... getting rid of some of the equipment they currently have perhaps.
Just curious.
Ray |
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04/16/2015 03:46:19 AM · #10 |
Originally posted by RayEthier:
Originally posted by Spork99:
Of course, had a citizen NOT recorded the incident between Officer Michael Slager and Walter Scott, the officer would have probably gotten away with murder.
The good cops should welcome their activities being monitoredâ€Â¦the other ones not so much.
Sorry, I don't buy the excuses from the police. They can afford Tasers, armored vehicles, high powered firearms, tear gas, SWAT teams, mobile response centers and all the other cool toys but the gear to monitor the activities of their officers is too expensive. I call bullshit.
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No disagreement with you relative to the plethora of military equipment you mentioned, but you have to remember that this is yet another "added" police expense that the taxpayers will have to digest.
If all we were taking about was the cost of the camera, then yes this is not a major issue of financial consideration... but it isn't.
One also has to factor in things like storage, IT issues, privacy laws, access to information requests and the list goes on. That is where the real costs will come in and it will be costly.
What would you suggest... getting rid of some of the equipment they currently have perhaps.
Just curious.
Ray |
More with less. Crunch the numbers. Make it work, it'll be simple. We'll cut several patrol officers to afford it. Also, we want a decrease in criminal occurrence rates. |
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04/16/2015 08:39:12 AM · #11 |
Originally posted by spiritualspatula:
What would you suggest... getting rid of some of the equipment they currently have perhaps.
Just curious.
Ray |
More with less. Crunch the numbers. Make it work, it'll be simple. We'll cut several patrol officers to afford it. Also, we want a decrease in criminal occurrence rates. [/quote]
I can absolutely guarantee that if you cut in-line personnel you will definitely see a reduction of criminal occurence rates... well at least as it relates to reported stats.
Ray |
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