Slashdot Mirror
Police Allegedly Arrest UK News Photographer For Standing In A Field (wordpress.com)
Long-time Slashdot reader Andy Smith, a Scotland-based news photographer, writes: I'm a press photographer. Slashdot has previously covered how the police used underhanded tactics to seize some of my work photos. But that was far from the end of the story. Several months of harassment culminated in me being arrested for standing in a field, something protected by law here in Scotland. I was given a police caution, which is a formal alternative to prosecution, but the police then cancelled the caution and prosecuted me anyway. Ironically, I was meant to be joining the police this month as a volunteer, but that has now been delayed by at least six months.
Earlier Andy had filmed the same police sergeant warning him not to photograph a minor traffic accident -- which had "seemed to anger him."
Earlier Andy had filmed the same police sergeant warning him not to photograph a minor traffic accident -- which had "seemed to anger him."
This didn't happen in England - it happened in Scotland, where it's explicitly written into law that it's completely legal to walk on someone else's land as long as you don't cause damage.
... or cause danger, or intrude on privacy. I.e. you won't have access to someone's back yard where they might reasonably expect privacy, or to a pasture with dangerous animals, but a field is fair game. If planted, footpaths must be provided to cross or skirt them, so you don't impede on the public right of way.
It's also a crime to prevent people from access without a good reason (and ownership is explicitly not a good reason). I.e. the policeman here is the one who should be prosecuted.