Photograph the Police, Get Arrested

Servo writes "Last month a man was arrested in New Hampshire after presenting evidence of a police officer being verbally abusive that he had captured on his home security camera system. Now just recently in Philadelphia a 21 year old student was arrested on his property after he took a photo of the police who were in the process of arresting a drug dealer down the street." From the article: "Cruz said that when he heard a commotion, he walked out of his back door with his cell phone to see what was happening. He said that when he saw the street lined with police cars, he decided to take a picture of the scene. 'I opened (the phone) and took a shot,' Cruz said. Moments later, Cruz said he got the shock of his life when an officer came to his back yard gate."

Comments

crucial differences

[joe 155]

I'm not sure the extent to which I have sympathy with the guy taking a picture in the street, you could say that the police have a right to privacy and that especially if they are arresting a drug dealer then they might fear that some future reprisal could come about against them because of the picture. I would think this should really depend on how the interaction between the guy and the police went. In this case the police sould have just asked him to delete it and then sent him on his way - I don't like the way they seem to threaten him - so long as it didn't appear that the police were doing anything illegal (if they were he should have the right to keep it as evidence against the police).

The other case is far more black and white for me, the police were breaking the law, they had no reasonable expectation of privacy (because they were on private property where it clearly stated that audio and video recording was taking place) and arresting the guy is completely wrong. It is situations like this that make people not trust the police and it is one which the police have caused themselves.