7 replies to this topic

[knittychick]

I heard this story on NPR today on Talk of the Nation: http://www.npr.org/b...6/july-8th-show has the complete transcript. I find it mind boggling that somebody could be arrested for recording a public official on duty in a public place for invading the officer’s right to privacy. Providing that you are not blowing an under cover cop's identification or interfering with their action in any way why would it be illegal and what expectation of privacy could there be?

The Rules And Your Rights For Recording Arrests - July 8, 2010

The Los Angeles police beating of Rodney King resonated, in part, because it was caught on video. Now, most modern cell phones have video cameras. Many police departments struggle to draw the line between citizens' and journalists' rights to film arrests, and their officers' rights to privacy.

Copyright © 2010 National Public Radio®. For personal, noncommercial use only.

Neal Conan, host: Just about everybody who has a cell phone has a video camera in their pocket. And almost 20 years after the Rodney King video, friends, accomplices and passers-by scarcely hesitate to record interactions with the police. You can find these videos on YouTube. There are blogs and websites solely devoted to these amateur recordings, and in some places, the police are trying to put a stop to it.

In Boston, a man was arrested for illegal electronic surveillance when he recorded audio of police officers making a drug arrest. In Baltimore, several people face felony charges for recording their own arrests. And, of course, the cops have video cameras, too, sometimes mounted on the dashboards of their cruisers, maybe someday soon, cap-cams on police headgear.

At best, the laws on this are fuzzy, and states are only now just trying to catch up.
We begin with Radley Balko, a senior editor with Reason magazine, where he writes about the criminal justice system, and he joins us from a studio in Nashville.

Mr. RADLEY BALKO (Senior Editor, Reason): Thanks for having me on.

CONAN: So if I see something curious on the corner involving a police officer and a citizen, and I take out my cell phone and start recording, am I okay?

Mr. BALKO: It really depends on where you are, and even within that, it depends on the particular police officer that you're recording. In three states right now, they are actively arresting people for recording on-duty police officers: Illinois, Maryland and Massachusetts. In the other states, and even those states, the law isn't settled. Basically, they're arresting on an interpretation of wiretapping laws that..

CONAN: Yeah, I was going to say, are these new laws passed to cover this specifically or interpretations of old laws?

Mr. BALKO: Yeah, these are well, in most cases, they're interpretations of old laws. But actually, in Illinois, the Illinois Supreme Court threw out a conviction of a guy who was arrested and was recording police officers from the back of a police cruiser. And in response to that, the Illinois Legislature actually specifically amended the state's wiretapping law to make it illegal to record police officers on duty without their consent. Actually, it applies to anyone without their consent. They took out an expectation of privacy provision that was in the old law.

But in other states, you know, it's sort of wide open right now. You know, if a police officer wants to arrest you for videotaping him, he can he doesn't need wiretapping laws. He can look at, you know, obstructing a police officer, or if he asks you to turn it off, and you don't, for some sort of, you know, disobeying a lawful order.

So the law is really behind on the technology on this, and a lot of this stuff isn't settled.

CONAN: The Maryland, you mentioned, is one of the places where it seems to be at least an interpretation of state law that it's illegal. There has been a celebrated case involving a student at the University of Maryland.

Mr. BALKO: Yeah, that's right. In Maryland in February, a University of Maryland student was pretty savagely beaten by some police officers after a University of Maryland basketball game, and it was caught on numerous cell phone cameras and posted to YouTube. And the videos that were documented and posted actually contradicted the police report. And in fact, there was a security camera, a police-operated security camera that was pointed in an area that would have covered the beating, and mysteriously, that camera stopped functioning during the period that the beating occurred.

But after this happened, we started seeing these arrests in Maryland. People were starting to be arrested for recording police officers, and Maryland prosecutors and police were using this old wiretapping statute.

And, I mean, interestingly in Maryland, the Maryland law actually does have an expectation of privacy provision. So basically, if you record someone without their consent, you've broken the law unless that person had no reasonable expectation of privacy with respect to that conversation.

CONAN: But this is a public official in the course of their duty on a public street.

Mr. BALKO: Absolutely. And in one case, this was a police officer who actually had his gun out and was pointing his gun at a person that he had pulled over. And it's really absurd. I mean, the way that Maryland law enforcement officials have interpreted this law, when a police officer pulls you over, he has an expectation of privacy with respect to what transpires during the interaction. You, the citizen, don't, obviously, you know, the old Miranda warning, anything you say can and will be used against you. And it's really fundamentally at odds, I think, with some of the sort of core concepts of what we associate with a free society.

See link for the rest of the transcript...

[SunshineServices]

Land of the Free, Home Of The Brave.

It's bullsh**, another example of our eroding-by-the-minutes rights.

Can't wait to see what we lose next.

[Oldschooler81]

Land of the Free, Home Of The Brave.

It's bullsh**, another example of our eroding-by-the-minutes rights.

Can't wait to see what we lose next.

I totally agree with you. I'm kinda too tired to write a long response right now, but like the OP knittychick said, as long as it's not being abused (like an undercover cop's investigation) I don't see what the problem is. I'm not suggesting every cop will commit police brutality or otherwise get out of line, but the fact that SOME do is reason enough. If they can be proven acting in a way they shouldn't, the public deserves to know. Sure anything can be abused or have people that go too far with it, but that's the price we pay for living in a free society. Better that than the other way around.

[Howdy]

This one came about recently.

http://www.autoblog....g-gun-with-hel/

[Bill Z]

Land of the Free, Home Of The Brave.

It's bullsh**, another example of our eroding-by-the-minutes rights.

Can't wait to see what we lose next.

That sums up my sentiments pretty well.

[supermom]

I guess "cops" shows are gonna be banned from those states?

Funny it used to be the perpetrators were considered "innocent until proven guilty in a court of law...

Now--our lawsuit driven economy has the cops as being too afraid to do their jobs for fear of reprisal, of what a camera is not showing just off the edges of its scope.


Was the cop in WA guilty of cruelty when he punched the teenager in the face?
Was the Oakland cop guilty of racial rage when he shot a teen he had in a head lock on the ground? Was the Massachusetts cop guilty of rage when he threw that kid threw a department store window?

What the hell?

Maybe, just maybe.....this is a way of the labor unions to push through legislation to protect officers jobs when what the real issue is excessive penalties $$ on cities for cops using excessive force?

Look at that whole thing going on with that girl that was found after 18 years missing. what was her name? Dugard? Very, very sad situation. No one argues that. Very, very sad that she was maltreated. But $20 million fricking dollars? And the state is nearly bankrupt? Are they outta their effing minds?

I say 2 million for her and 1 million for each of the kids.

Put the other 16 million into Victim witness programs (money is being cut from them) or into Parole agencies so more cops can be on the streets going after the bad guys who don't check in.....or into training and hiring specialty cops for tracking down guys like this.

Prioities are all effed up.

[Oldschooler81]

^ I agree Supermom.

I'm not saying everything the police do needs to be recorded, and maybe some people go too far... but there definitely are cops who abuse their power or at least cross the line more than they should. The Rodney King case obviously is a perfect example. I think if someone in a position of authority violates the rules they should be punished even harsher than someone else, because if you can't trust them, who CAN you trust?

P.S. It's downright scary to hear 1991 rounded up as "almost 20 years ago". Logically I know it is, but still unsettling.