Where are we in this whole thing?

Officers might also fail to turn them on. The more urgent or expected a situation is, the more likely this will happen. Such failures would be interpreted as implicit admission of guilt for a jury. That’s unfair. Especially so because abusive members of the police force will find ways around the system.

A scheme whereby the cameras work like cockpit voice recorders would be better in my opinion. They would just record continuously, overwriting previously recorded segments every 30 minutes until a serious incident occurs. Even then, the videos shouldn’t be viewed unless a judge presiding on a case decides it’s necessary. The existence of the tape alone should by itself keep witnesses honest. And when they honestly misremember things, finding out mid-trial is more useful as the jury will learn who has a tendency of stating the imagined as real.

I credit part of that being owed to the fact that in the Greater metro are all caps have dash-cams and body mics, its not wide spread knowledge but I helped a LEO buddy of mine adjust his one day when his body armor the mice and all the “batman” gear decided to work against him, hehe.

While I share Rags privacy concerns this is kind of a 2 way argument, the cameras protect you as well as the officer. Another point in favor of these devices, I am sure even one has run into a “bad cop” or one that really didn’t need to be a cop with these devices it is a lot easier for administrations to fight the inevitable FOP backlash from firing a cop who needed it, throw out the video and the FOP tends to crawl away pretty quickly.

I feel obliged to note that there are some states, including my home state of MA, in which it requires the explicit permission of ALL parties recorded to make a public recording legal.

Thus, routine on-body camera use by civilians (at least) would be prima facie unlawful, absent permission from every person recorded.

And, yes, people are actually criminally prosecuted in MA for this.

–Andrew, @LawSelfDefense

To my mind, that makes these cameras darned cheap. Frankly, hard to see any reason why lawful civilians wouldn’t be well-served by having their own version.

–Andrew, @LawSelfDefense

As for cameras I’m concerned that the media is more than willing to twist everything, including facts, into a racial bias against police. Shame on the media!

On top of that these same people were the ones that were complaining that at work it was discovered that the employer was keylogging, scanning their emails, recording sites they visit.

My beliefs are simple, police should record their actions. But the public should be give them some time to get used to the idea.

But information can also be used carelessly, and malignantly. There are some privacy concerns that will have to be addressed in the near future respecting these cameras, and the recordings themselves will have to be tested in courts to establish standards to assure their admission admission of evidence, and not a fiction.

Best,
Rabid