Study: Police Body-Cams Reduce Unacceptable Use of Force

An anonymous reader writes: Incidents like the Michael Brown case have recently put police body-worn cameras into the public consciousness, but they're not a new idea to criminology experts. In fact, researchers at Cambridge began a study in 2012 using law enforcement in Rialto, California as a test bed. Their results are now in: "The experiment showed that evidence capture is just one output of body-worn video, and the technology is perhaps most effective at actually preventing escalation during police-public interactions: whether that's abusive behavior towards police or unnecessary use-of-force by police." The simple knowledge that both parties are being watched puts a damper on violence. "During the 12-month Rialto experiment, use-of-force by officers wearing cameras fell by 59% and reports against officers dropped by 87% against the previous year's figures." This was enough for the city of Rialto to decide it wants to move forward with body-worn cameras; hopefully the study will encourage other police departments as well.

Comments

Re: Obviously

[Noah Haders]

it was proven that the cop's testimony was full of lies and half truths. why did MB approach the vehicle? if he is 6'3" and 300lbs how could he be leaning into the car? why the cop pull out his gun? why did the officer shoot a man who was unarmed ane 150' away? if the officer felt unsafe why didn't he step on his accelerator pedal and go down the road a hundred yards beffore continuing to engage? if a boy had just stolen a cigarillo, why would he aggressively engage the police? a lot of things dont fit.

Re:No s**t Sherlock

[NatasRevol]

Exactly what happened last night in Berkeley, MO.

Cop 'accidentally' didn't have body camera on. Shot another black kid dead. Claims he pulled a gun.

In spite of 3 other cameras just feet away from the incident, the cops released a blurry video from far away. I wonder why that is?

Odds they get away with it again? 110%.

Re:No s**t Sherlock

[pastafazou]

Your comment is horseshit. Commenting about choking you to death is obviously alluding to the Garner case. Garner was resisting arrest. The police are authorized to apply force to enforce the laws. Resisting arrest allows the police to use force as necessary to apprehend the suspect. Did the police officer draw his gun and shoot Garner? No, he applied a choke hold in order to subdue and cuff him. Unfortunately, Garner died as a result of this altercation. However, the intent of the officer was not to kill him. It's unfortunate that Garner died, but had he not resisted, he'd be alive today.

Re:If only the cop had a camera in Ferguson...

[BitZtream]

... you are an idiot.

You're going to see the cops as being bad and wrong and evil even as they save your life.

Its mind numbing that you don't understand why that turned out the way it did.

And for reference, normal health people don't die from a chokehold thats released as soon as the person loses conscious, fat ass had a heart attack due to his own health issues.