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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.'"
Then they should stop confiscating the cell phones and cameras of protesters if they have nothing to worry about.
The difference is, the only real attention the media will give will be to the police, and this AP article illustrates this perfectly.
For the Chicago G8 protests, the police filmed every man woman and child who entered the protest area and had dozens of officers filming the entire protest.
A few minutes after the protest ended they attacked everyone who didn't leave. They never showed tape of that.
The police want laws to say they can't be filmed but they want to film everyone. They want maximum transparency of the population and none for themselves.
There's two sides to every story, and frankly, the occupiers usually come off as smug hipsters with a victim mentality - demonstrated through their actions and creative editing. But maybe it's just me.
If we can film them in public places then they can do the same: liberty is a two way street. Let the information flow and justice prevail.
i guess police are people, too...
... that must be held to a higher standard.
I find it hard to be on the side of the police these days. I live in Montréal, and I've seen and read about a lot of police abuse. They always have an excuse, a reason or some lie. I would be more inclined to believe them if they would show us what they are doing against inappropriate conduct by their own officers, or if they would publicly acknowledge any wrongdoing when it happens. When they constantly protect the ass of their officers, they lose credibility. When the press is constantly attacked by the police while trying to capture what is happening, they lose credibility. When they hide their badge number so we can't report them, we know they are up to no good. When they kettle a group of people, and then tell them to disperse while not letting them, well they probably think we're stupid about believing that they gave the people a way out. And when they detain and arrest people for no valid reason, or to issue them a traffic ticket because people were protesting peacefully, well they should consider themselves lucky we're not acting like the miners in Spain and all we do is put a video of their wrongdoing on the net.
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.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
What?
So cops come to your house in response to a call and film it, for whatever reason. Turns out you didn't do anything but someone said it was a domestic abuse case. You want that film if you answering the door at 2am public? Even though you didn't do anything wrong? Isn't that an invasion of privacy?
I agree the police side should delete the film, if it was kept, but making it public ... not so much.
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.
What's this, social activists edit their posted videos to hide the truth? Shocking!
police officers should have to wear personal recorders that stream their actions to the police station. This video should be available to the public on request.
In case of a legal dispute, the police should be forced to release their video, as to provide the clearest possible picture of the case. They should not only release them when it suits them. Unfortunately, presumably incriminating police videos often end up "missing", with little or no consequences for the policemen.
Errr....
And so you think spraying large amounts of pepper spray into people's face because they are protesting is ok then?
riiiigghhhtt....
Is democracy completely dead in your country or what?
They were warned and they made a choice - and the narrative quickly went from "police brutality" to "protester choice".
The narrative remained "non-violent protesters, undeterred by threat of violence from police, ultimately met with violence by police".
Yes, because a warning that a police officer is about to use a chemical agent on peaceful protestors certainly removes all hints of brutality, and dismisses our outrage at seeing a policemen casually strolling around spraying a chemical agent at peaceful protestors.
They were warned and they made a choice - and the narrative quickly went from "police brutality" to "protester choice".
Just because they were given fair warning doesn't make it even close to a proper use of force. The police could have arrested everyone for trespassing or illegally blocking a walkway (if that's illegal). Any protester who didn't simply allow himself to be arrested could then be charged with resisting arrest. Only if the protesters fought back would the use of force be reasonable.
How far does "they were warned" let an officer go? Get out of my way or I'll hit you with a club? Get out of my way or I'll shoot you with a gun?
It should, AND losing any video should be a crime in itself. Severity of the punishment should be the same as that for the crime for which the video is needed as evidence.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
They were warned and they made a choice - and the narrative quickly went from "police brutality" to "protester choice"."
False choice. Do what we say, are you will be in immense pain.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
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
No..not available on request. That can turn someone from having a really bad day, to destroying them. Ye,s they need to be available, but you should need to go through the courts to get them.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Ten the un-edited video came out, and it showed the police office walking up to each protester, telling them that if they didn't move they would be pepper-sprayed, and to a person they all sat ad waited for the officer to do what he said he would do.
Yes, he said he would violently repress their right to peaceably assemble, and then he did. Who could find fault with that?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Yes, democracy is completely dead in the US.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
From just his comment it sounds like they were sitting in the middle of a street blocking the crosswalk, which is not only illegal it's also dangerous (especially in NYC.) Most of the OWS people I've seen who are the "victims" of police brutality put themselves into situations where they know they will be forcibly removed just so they can claim brutality. They're not protesting they're being douchebags enticing violence so they have something to point to and say "Look we're victims!" And yes pepper spray is probably the best option considering the second option is beating them with a nightstick till they unlock their arms so you can physically move them one at a time.
Unless of course you have a much more effective method to use in that sort of situation that doesn't put the officer in harms way...
How far does "they were warned" let an officer go? Get out of my way or I'll hit you with a club? Get out of my way or I'll shoot you with a gun?
Well, "stop making me feel threatened regardless of how reasonable that perception of threat might be or I will shoot you with a gun" is fair play in some states.
I think this is an entirely reasonable response. Instead of trying to shutdown speech the police are offering another side of the story. Good.
Of course some of the broader implications are pretty interesting. An individual can basically edit a video to show the part where the police are beating the crap out of him and ignore the earlier part where he's spitting and throwing rocks. The police, on the other hand, don't get the luxury of using video simply as a PR mouthpiece. If this sort of response to protesters becomes commonplace it will be interesting to see what happens the first time an edited video comes out from the police. More interesting will be the cases where people start requesting these videos as evidence against the police at their trials.
From just his comment it sounds like they were sitting in the middle of a street blocking the crosswalk, which is not only illegal it's also dangerous. . .
They were sitting across a paved foot path that crossed a larger grassy area on a college campus. Just see for yourself how scary and threatening these protesters were: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AdDLhPwpp4
I seem to recall a show called Cops that would disprove your claims.
Oh you poor nieve fool... dealt with many police officers in your day?
You'd realise, they aren't all that smart and not pillars of the community, rather a bunch of trained meatheads that spent a few months at some camp to teach them a set of black and white processes. I think I saw recently a study on low level cases and their percentage rate of success / failure in the court system. The figures looked something like this.
60% of not guilty pleas are dismissed before a summary hearing or trail is even mentioned.
Out of that remaining 40%, 3 in 4 cases are dropped due to lack of evidence or a guilty plea.
Also never forget under criminal law the defence always gets the benefit of the doubt.
Granted Police have their place for serious crime though its only the really good cops that work on such cases. For the most of it many of them are stuck behind a desk filling out paperwork (badly) ticking whatever governmental boxes they need to get out of the office as quickly as possible. They are grossly underpaid and sit at the bottom of the public servant pecking order with no incentive of doing their job properly or better than say a postal worker or garbage man.
so a demonstrator is allowed to present their side of a story to the court of public opinion, and the police can only present their side of the story to an actual court?
one or the other: both police and demonstrators can engage the court of public opinion, or both police and demonstrators must keep their footage for an actual court of law. you choose
i don't understand this point of view that only demonstrators can engage the public. the police are not alien beings, they are our neighbors, tasked with a job we want them to do, keep the law and order. if they abuse someone, we want to see the video and we want to have them judged. if someone LIES about them abusing someone, we want to see that video too and the liar to be judged. as a citizen, i want to hear both sides. you will not tell me i can't hear or see the policeman's side of the story, just as much as you or the government can't tell me i can't hear the demonstrator's side of the story. transparency is the only way justice can work, and that truth works BOTH ways. shrouding one side, or the other, is when abuses get perpetrated, whether by police, or demonstrator
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
every single demonstrator should have a camera. every single cop should have a camera. now you have a proper adversarial situation. when something goes bad, whether the fault of demonstrator or cop, now we will clearly know
the more cameras, on either side, the better. who cares if someone loses something? the incriminatory evidence should be available from the side that wants to present the abuse that was perpetrated
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Statistics and misguided hate do not make all police fit your image of an officer. I know, in fact, many extremely smart police officers. Many of them, even those who aren't that smart, are very kind and easygoing people. The fact is, their job requires them to have a very definitive good/bad policy on virtually everything they encounter, and often leads them to deal with very abusive/belligerent/annoying people.
Let's consider that the time you most encounter police is when there is some sort of serious problem occurring. A traffic accident, robbery, assault, whatever. They are tense situations, where you have to understand the cops can't crack jokes and act like your buddy - they have a very specific job to do. Consider, also, that you can't fathom the amount of people who harass them, annoying people they need to deal with a-la bums, drunks, etc. Their job really does suck quite often, they don't get paid that much, and they are there to help you when you need it.
That said, I think it is fantastic that the police are embracing video as those trying to hold them accountable have. Video is a great tool, and for a person charged with upholding peace and establishing the truth of crimes, it is crazy they haven't been using this in every aspect of their jobs already.
I just hope they respect the boundaries on video surveillance placed on them by the law. None of that "Whoops, my camera happened to look in your second story window without a warrant".
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
but as long as you have this "us" versus "them"
You mean the exact mentality the police ADMIT they have?
they are accountable to us, they are accountable to YOU
No, this is a lie. They are accountable to their supervisors, and to accountability boards that are staffed by ex-police, and to Internal Affairs, who are also police.
NOWHERE in that process can a citizen bring accountability. Qualified Immunity prevents lawsuits except in the most egregious, and rare, circumstances. If IA and the accountability boards don't hold a cop responsible, you're out of luck.
You can't elect them out, you can't vote them out, so this "they are accountable to you" tripe is just blatantly false.
not the entirety of the police force
The entirety of the force colludes in protecting the bad apples. And you make excuses for them because they "kiss their kids at night" or some other "think of the CHILDREN" sappy bullshit.
stop talking about them like they invasive inscrutable species out to hurt you for no reason
I will when they stop living up to the description.
http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/18722525/2012/06/06/prince-georges-county-police-officers-under-criminal-investigation?obref=obinsite
FTFA "WALDORF, Md. -Two Prince George's County police officers are under criminal investigation in Charles County for allegedly handcuffing, detaining and assaulting a teenager in order to teach him a lesson."
Now, that's two cops plus every other cop who covered for them. You forget, they have a responsiblity to uphold the law, so every single officer who knew about that incident and didn't turn those cops in is legally culpable. But you ignore that in your rush to paint a portrait even more distorted than the one you're crying about.
maybe you'll actually get something accomplished about their behavior
No, the current "Fuck the Police" attitude has done more to bring attention to these issues than the copsucking you're suggesting ever did. That, and ubiquitous cameras. However, I don't fault you, collaborators always suggest collaboration, it's easier than resistance and you collaborators tend toward laziness and cowardice.
I appreciate your opinion, but as you can see, you really have absolutely no idea what the fuck you're talking about. Frankly, you take a startlingly similar line to cops themselves, and I have to wonder if you have a bit of Stockholm Syndrome.
You're a citizen. It's your DUTY to resist tyranny. Not sit by and defend it because it kisses it's kids forehead at night.
It was apparently not legal to wiretap without a warrant in the US also.
How is that working out for you?
If a video is selectively edited to portray a cop as a racist when he's not (like was done to Zimmerman's 911 tape by a network affiliate) then go ahead and sue for defamation.
That's absurd. Police officers are public servants and are held to a higher standard than private citizens.