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Federal Appeals Court: You Have a Constitutional Right to Film Police Officers in Public (slate.com)
On Friday, a panel of judges for the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously ruled that the First Amendment protects individuals' right to film police officers performing their official duties. From a report: The 3rd Circuit now joins the 1st, 5th, 7th, 9th, and 11th Circuits in concluding that the Constitution guarantees a right to record. No federal appeals court has yet concluded that the First Amendment does not safeguard the right to film law enforcement officers conducting police activity in public. Friday's decision involved two instances in which the Philadelphia police retaliated against citizens attempting to film them. In the first incident, a legal observer named Amanda Geraci tried to film police arresting an anti-fracking protester when an officer pinned her against a pillar, preventing her from recording the arrest. In the second, a Temple University sophomore named Richard Fields tried to film police officers breaking up a house party when an officer asked him whether he "like[d] taking pictures of grown men" and demanded that he leave. When Fields refused, the officer arrested and detained him, confiscating his phone and looking through its photos and videos. The officer cited Fields for "Obstructing Highway and Other Public Passages," although the charges were dropped when the officer failed to appear at a court hearing. Geraci and Fields filed civil rights suits against the officers who interfered with their filming attempts.
The 3rd Circuit now joins the 1st, 5th, 7th, 9th, and 11th
Something different about the even-numbered ones?
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
ends on an officer's fist. Please remember: officers enjoy qualified immunity even when they are completely wrong about the law as long as they can make believe that they are clueless, and they are preselected for stupidity: a high IQ score disqualifies applicants from service.
that the police officer has the right to use deadly violence to defend himself, if he feels that his life is threatened by a camera. And the law is always on its own side, never yours.
Good lord, how many circuits are there? And when are they going to be combined into one integrated circuit that doesn't generate as much heat?
If you're not doing anything wrong you've got nothing to hide, right? This applies to them too.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
So if only their body cams would stop "malfunctioning" when there's an incident they could show their side of the story.
Now that body cams exist, we must stop taking cops' word for things. No evidence? No conviction. Period, the end. That's the only thing that's going to make the cops act responsibly vis-a-vis video evidence. Accepting a cop's word for anything has been conclusively shown to be harmful to justice.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
We get to be extra jumpy and fearful around a carrying but otherwise normal black guy, an officer doesn't. If he is, he's not fit for duty.
That is not the standard. The standard is that being jumpy and fearful is not a valid reason to shoot someone, whether you are a cop or not. Remember, although many states interfere with your constitutional rights (I'm looking at you, my home state of California) you have a constitutional right to keep and bear arms. And with that right comes the responsibility to not shoot people just because you find them to be scary.
Of course, in our society it remains permissible to shoot someone because they are black and you are scared, and that is shit
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
They are cheap enough for ANYONE to own one now. Even a Covert one! And just Like My Amex.... I Never leave home without it. If they want to beat people up, violate their own laws, and generally act like thugs... At the Very LEAST They will become Internet Infamous for it! :-)
The worst thing that will happen to them is that they will get a reprimand for wiping the memory on your body cam after they imprison you and take all of your stuff. This is why we need a law that says that if there's no evidence that an arrest was warranted, whether from body cam footage or another source more reputable than officer hearsay (which has conclusively been shown to be unreliable, and indeed, typically outright false) we should never grant a conviction. It should be "what, no body cam footage? case dismissed!"
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I think you need to look up what "slavery" actually is. Your flippant use of the word is an abhorrent insult to people past and present who are actually enslaved.
"Remember, it's not an officer's job to die in the line of duty"
Thats where you are wrong. Cop is one of the highest paying jobs for someone without a college degree and just like crab fishing or undersea welding they are being paid to take the risk.
They are supposed to risk their lives by holding on for a second before firing so that an innocent citizen does not get killed just because they were scared. Yes this is a risk but they are paid to take this risk. If you dont want to risk your life to prevent civilian deaths (including due to your own incorrect fire) you should not sign up to be a cop
Unfortunately nowadays we are hiring cowards as cops. Cowards get scared easily and shoot before asking questions.
**Life is too short to be serious**
Except that's not what happened for example in the Castile case. If we break down the chain of events that lead to him dying from the video footage it goes like this;
1. The officer asks for a license and insurance (1:01 in the video). Castile hands over a part of it (either ID or insurance), and the cop returns it to him (1:08) and starts going for the rest. My guess is that he's going for the insurance papers from the glove box.
2. Before this, probably because the documents he's about to get are close/near the gun he informs the officer he has a weapon (1:09) so as not to scare the cop if the weapon becomes visible when he's getting the stuff that was asked for. He says: "Sir, I do have to inform you I do have a firearm on me"
And here's where things go wrong
3. The cop acknowledges what Castile said, saying at first "Okay" (1:11) following it up with "Don't reach for it then". The cop has not ordered him to stop moving, or told him to stop going for his insurance papers or ID. He simply repeats 'Don't pull it out' (1:13). If you listen close you can hear Castile saying something after this, the audio is a bit bad but I thin it's: "I'm not a criminal" (1:14). It's also notable that Castile is stuttering, he's obviously nervous by having had what began as a peaceful exchange now turn immediately hostile even though he was trying to ensure the opposite by informing the officer about the gun. He apparently keeps going for his ID/insurance papers (again, something he was told to do and at this point has not been told to stop to do) at which point the officer yells a third time "Don't pull it out!" (1:15) and the immediately opens fire (1:16).
If you look at the timestamps, this goes from a point where Castile and the cop both think the situation is under control (the "okay' at the 1:11 mark) to deadly in 5 seconds. The officer does not give clear orders, if he wanted Castile to stop moving entirely he could've told him to freeze and then ask for the location of the weapon for example. Castile also should have told the officer where the weapon is, and I think he actually would have done so had the cop not immediately interrupted him by telling him the same thing 3 times in 4 seconds with increasing aggression. This is a clear case of a total failure in communication, and that's something that's entirely the fault of the officer.. Police are trained to handle these kind of situations and they're specifically trained to give clear commands and de-escalate, which is the exact opposite of what happened here. In this case instead of saying what he actually wants Castile to do (stop moving so he can know where the weapon is) he simply tells him what not to do, and Castile follows that order completely by not pulling the weapon out as he was told and still gets shot because he was unable to read the thoughts of the panicking police officer in the time span of 5 seconds that it took for the officer to escalate the entire situation
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead