Police Using YouTube To Tell Their Own Stories

stevegee58 writes "Posting videos to YouTube allegedly showing police misconduct has become commonplace these days. Now police themselves are posting their own videos to refute misconduct claims. 'After a dozen Occupy Minnesota protesters were arrested at a downtown demonstration, the group quickly took to the Internet, posting video that activists said showed police treating them roughly and never warning them to leave. But Minneapolis police knew warnings had been given. And they had their own video to prove it. So they posted the footage on YouTube, an example of how law enforcement agencies nationwide are embracing online video to cast doubt on false claims and offer their own perspective to the public.'"

Comments

In contrast

[TubeSteak]

Police Unions are resistant to reviews of dash cam footage
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/community-news/dallas/headlines/20120422-officers-complaints-prompt-dallas-police-to-suspend-units-reviews-of-squad-car-video.ece
http://www.q13fox.com/news/kcpq-police-union-opposes-random-reviews-of-officers-dash-cam-videos-20120105,0,451142.story

/And don't get me started on retention policies for dash cam footage.
//Without any specific laws in place, most police departments more or less do what they want.

Blue Code of Silence

[saibot834]

This is fine, they should present their own point of view. The evidence suggests however, that police brutality exists and that often there is no persecution of the perpetrators – sometimes they even drop investigations against police and instead charge the victims with resisting arrest.

There is a Blue Code of Silence in the police that will protect a violent minority of policemen. In Germany there was a famous case of police brutality at a demonstration "freedom not fear", where the CCC released a video of the incident. First of all the policemen had to be identified, which was only possible because it was a HD video, since despite Amnesty's calls for a identification tags for policemen, there is none. When the accused police officers were questioned, they were provably lying, because the CCC had another unpublished video disproving the statements by the police. They were later convicted, but only had to pay a few thousand bucks.

Re:Pepper-spraying sitting protesters

[the eric conspiracy]

It's not legal to use pepper spray on peaceful protesters in the United States.

http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2011/11/16/211132/23

Re:Pepper-spraying sitting protesters

[Hatta]

Yes, democracy is completely dead in the US.