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LAPD Orders Body Cams That Will Start Recording When Police Use Tasers
HughPickens.com writes: Lily Hay Newman reports that the LAPD has ordered 3,000 Tasers which, when discharged, will automatically activate cameras on officers' uniforms, creating visual records of incidents at a time of mounting concern about excessive force by U.S. law enforcement officers. The new digital Taser X26P weapons record the date, time, and duration of firing, and whether Taser wires actually strike suspects and how long the thousands of volts of electricity pulse through them. "This technology gives a much better picture of what happens in the field," says Steve Tuttle.
The idea of using a Taser discharge as a criterion for activating body cams is promising, especially as more and more police departments adopt body cams and struggle to establish guidelines for when they should be on or off. Police leadership — i.e., chiefs and upper management — is far more supportive of the technology and tends to view body-worn cameras as a tool for increasing accountability and reducing civil liability. On the other hand, the patrol officer culture is concerned that the technology will be an unfair intrusion into their routine activities — for instance, it might invite over-managing minor policy violations. "In addition to these new Taser deployments, we plan to issue a body-worn camera and a Taser device to every officer," says Police Chief Charlie Beck. "It is our goal to make these important tools available to every front line officer over the next few years."
The idea of using a Taser discharge as a criterion for activating body cams is promising, especially as more and more police departments adopt body cams and struggle to establish guidelines for when they should be on or off. Police leadership — i.e., chiefs and upper management — is far more supportive of the technology and tends to view body-worn cameras as a tool for increasing accountability and reducing civil liability. On the other hand, the patrol officer culture is concerned that the technology will be an unfair intrusion into their routine activities — for instance, it might invite over-managing minor policy violations. "In addition to these new Taser deployments, we plan to issue a body-worn camera and a Taser device to every officer," says Police Chief Charlie Beck. "It is our goal to make these important tools available to every front line officer over the next few years."
How about as soon as the holster for the taser (or gun) is unsnapped?
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That's right but I wonder to what extent the argument of self defense is still being dragged in. I recall that in the beginning tasers were being presented as an alternative to guns. That was not a credible argument and I would like to see statistics about whether guns have been used less since introduction of tasers. I think that tasers have just become a new way to force people to are no credible danger but who are just not obeying orders . Or not fast enough.
Sure it is - the police routinely wear all kinds of other equipment, packing 6 phone batteries around their belt will not exactly be hard.
Well, how about starting them as soon as a weapon gets unholstered. Gun or taser doesn't matter. OK, the event that made the cop unholster the weapon isn't recorded but everything from that moment is. If the opposing party decides to back off then there would hardly be any need to shoot them anyway.
it might invite over-managing minor policy violations.
Have you heard of the broken windows theory? It may not be appropriate when applied to citizens, who are supposed to be presumed to be the masters of government, not its servants. However, when a person is acting in a public service position that has extraordinary authority and hence extraordinary responsibility, broken windows is far more appropriate.
LEOs are supposed to get in trouble for minor policy violations, and major policy violations should be virtually unheard of. Were we not on the wrong side of that balance, we would not have to implement solutions like this. The few bad cops did this to you. They are the worst enemy of good cops. Go put those mutts in jail, make that the new normal; then we'll talk about easing up on the surveillance.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
It's a generally unpopular thing to say in these discussions, but American cops are by world standards incredibly badly trained, equipped, and managed. I know UK cops who have done exchange programs and the like and they are dumbfounded by how bad things are.
[FUCK BETA]
Tasering is a routine activity now?
If you read the summary you'll note that concern was with regards to when these cameras should be on vs. when they should be off. Should they be on while the officer is sitting in his patrol car doing paperwork, bitching to his partner about the litany of mundane things (both work related and personal) that co-workers across all professions bitch to one another about? I have friends and family in law enforcement and I'm generally supportive of body cams, but they're going to fundamentally change the nature of policing and not always for the better. Do you think you're going to get the polite "Please slow down." admonishment when you get pulled over by an officer wearing a body cam? Think your pot smoking kid gets the joint taken from him, ground into the dirt, and an admonishment to shape up his act? Not likely. It's going to be letter of the law by the book policing, with all the pros and cons that go along with that. On balance it's for the best but let's not pretend there won't be drawbacks to it or that there aren't legitimate concerns about the best way to implement such technology.
although it is better than discharging live rounds at unarmed kids of course.
Unarmed has nothing to do with whether or not someone is a threat that warrants the use of deadly force. There are a litany of informative articles that you can read on the subject if you're so inclined. Start by Googling "disparity of force" and "ability, opportunity, and jeopardy." Those are the standards taught to law enforcement (and armed civilians, incidentally) in all 50 States. If you're alluding to what happened in Missouri, I read the Grand Jury transcripts in their entirety, and if the Officer's testimony is to be believed his actions were completely justified. The Grand Jury apparently thought they were and the Feds haven't bothered to bring charges against him.
I wonder what will happen to the "Hands up, don't shoot!" movement when we see another such incident happen with a body cam wearing officer who turns out to be completely justified in his actions? Will we still see the parade of childhood pictures of some 280 pound thug? Attention seeking asshats (*cough* Sharpton *cough*) jumping in for their share of the headline? Riots in the streets? I'm guessing that all of those things will happen, because these things have never been about justice, but are rather precipitated by a handful of assholes taking advantage of legitimate longstanding grievances in disadvantaged communities. It fits a narrative so let's run with it, never mind what the actual facts are on the ground.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.