Illegal to video record police officers.

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MJ12

The Freeman
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Who watches the watchmen?​

In response to a flood of Facebook and YouTube videos that depict police abuse, a new trend in law enforcement is gaining popularity. In at least three states, it is now illegal to record any on-duty police officer.

Even if the encounter involves you and may be necessary to your defense, and even if the recording is on a public street where no expectation of privacy exists.
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The legal justification for arresting the "shooter" rests on existing wiretapping or eavesdropping laws, with statutes against obstructing law enforcement sometimes cited. Illinois, Massachusetts, and Maryland are among the 12 states in which all parties must consent for a recording to be legal unless, as with TV news crews, it is obvious to all that recording is underway. Since the police do not consent, the camera-wielder can be arrested. Most all-party-consent states also include an exception for recording in public places where "no expectation of privacy exists" (Illinois does not) but in practice this exception is not being recognized.

Massachusetts attorney June Jensen represented Simon Glik who was arrested for such a recording. She explained, "[T]he statute has been misconstrued by Boston police. You could go to the Boston Common and snap pictures and record if you want." Legal scholar and professor Jonathan Turley agrees, "The police are basing this claim on a ridiculous reading of the two-party consent surveillance law - requiring all parties to consent to being taped. I have written in the area of surveillance law and can say that this is utter nonsense."

The courts, however, disagree. A few weeks ago, an Illinois judge rejected a motion to dismiss an eavesdropping charge against Christopher Drew, who recorded his own arrest for selling one-dollar artwork on the streets of Chicago. Although the misdemeanor charges of not having a peddler's license and peddling in a prohibited area were dropped, Drew is being prosecuted for illegal recording, a Class I felony punishable by 4 to 15 years in prison.
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http://gizmodo.com/5553765/are-cameras-the-new-guns

On March 5, 24-year-old Anthony John Graber III's motorcycle was pulled over for speeding. He is currently facing criminal charges for a video he recorded on his helmet-mounted camera during the traffic stop.

The case is disturbing because:

1) Graber was not arrested immediately. Ten days after the encounter, he posted some of he material to YouTube, and it embarrassed Trooper J. D. Uhler. The trooper, who was in plainclothes and an unmarked car, jumped out waving a gun and screaming. Only later did Uhler identify himself as a police officer. When the YouTube video was discovered the police got a warrant against Graber, searched his parents' house (where he presumably lives), seized equipment, and charged him with a violation of wiretapping law.
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Wut? Surely this is the kind of case that will go all the way to the supreme court, right?
 
Wait wait wait. It doesn't matter if you have consent or not, all you gotta do is blur the face so they can't see who it is, right? This is a stupid as shit.
 
hmm.....curious that this happens after all those videos of police brutality hav got so much fame
 
Maybe Danimal's totalitarian police state paranoia is justified...
 
lol its ok for us to be wire-tapped without consent or even knowledge, but **** OFF if you record a cop out on the streets doing illegal things.

I love America more and more each day.
 
>implying this will hold up
>implying anyone gives a shit about IL, MA, MD
 
How about they prosecute the ****ing out of control cops that these videos are showing! :flame:
 
Darkside55 said:
>implying anyone gives a shit about IL, MA, MD
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suck one, queer...

I don't see how this could possibly fly with the majority of people....this will be an interesting ride.
 
Applies in the UK too under the terrorism act.
 
This has been all the rage on reddit lately and I've agreed for a long time. I nearly had my camera confiscated years ago because some redneck did a burnout near me and the officer showed up after he left, assumed I was his buddy taking pictures of his sweet burnout, and threatened to confiscate my camera for evidence.

Of course I'd never met the guy before in my life, wasn't photographing his truck, and if I'd tried to argue with the cop he'd just take my camera (illegally) and if I tried to assert my rights then he'd really arrest me for resisting arrest.

The police are PUBLIC servants who work in PUBLIC there is absolutely, positively no expectation of privacy for these officers. I can't even express how pissed off these types of laws make me. It's basically them acknowledging to the public that they know they do illegal things but they just don't want everyone to be able to see it.
 
xcellerate said:
This has been all the rage on reddit lately and I've agreed for a long time. I nearly had my camera confiscated years ago because some redneck did a burnout near me and the officer showed up after he left, assumed I was his buddy taking pictures of his sweet burnout, and threatened to confiscate my camera for evidence.

Of course I'd never met the guy before in my life, wasn't photographing his truck, and if I'd tried to argue with the cop he'd just take my camera (illegally) and if I tried to assert my rights then he'd really arrest me for resisting arrest.

The police are PUBLIC servants who work in PUBLIC there is absolutely, positively no expectation of privacy for these officers. You can record them all you want so long as you aren't in their way.
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You could have gotten a nice little payout. Next time let them take your camera and arrest you. As long as you don't get assraped while waiting for bail you'll be fine.
 
No Limit said:
You could have gotten a nice little payout. Next time let them take your camera and arrest you. As long as you don't get assraped while waiting for bail you'll be fine.
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Over here, in the north of Ireland at least they take you camera off you 'under suspicion of gaining materials useful to terrorism'. Utter ludicrous, nothing makes me angrier than a policeman overstepping his bounds.
 
xcellerate said:
The police are PUBLIC servants who work in PUBLIC there is absolutely, positively no expectation of privacy for these officers. I can't even express how pissed off these types of laws make me. It's basically them acknowledging to the public that they know they do illegal things but they just don't want everyone to be able to see it.
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Well this, obviously. I totally agree.

The only rationalization - I guess they feel things are easily taken out of context. For example, civilian attacks officer, officer beats that ass. If this was caught on film, it could be clipped to just show some officer beating some dude up. Then this could be posted along with a one sided story defending the civilian as innocent, etc. and the story gains massive momentum. (hello internet). And the whole shit is a mess.

I'm still majorly opposed to it. They'll just have to deflect the criticism as usual. Cameras have caught a lot of cops abusing their power who don't deserve to be cops, but inmates instead.

Cops could be wearing those new camera devices at all times. (their side of the story).
 
most of the clips like that I've seen seem to have rational people commenting to them. Like the girl who got beat up in the mall I saw people asking, "what did the girl do?" because the clip does start half-way.

The stuff that gets me is like that NYC biker a year or two ago where the biker was trying to avoid the officer and the officer stepped OUT OF HIS WAY to knock the biker off his bike. Then he went on record saying the biker tried to run him over and he was just defending himself (before he knew the clip was on youtube).

If bringing the truth forward means committing a crime in itself, how do we have a fair system?
 
ZT said:
WHO READS THE OP?
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didnt-read-the-pamphlet.gif
 
If you follow the law you should be good to go anywhere. But yeah these new laws are bullshit. I wish I had a video of be being beat by a cop. It would have made many people angry
 
To be fair to the cops I agree with Virus that when they have a camera it gives their side of the story, but I also hear that quite a few of the cops in The USA are douchebags and will jump and people at any oppertunity.
 
How does a camera give only one person's side of the story? It's a ****ing recording device, how could it have bias?

inb4highbiastapes
 
The_Freeman said:
To be fair to the cops I agree with Virus that when they have a camera it gives their side of the story, but I also hear that quite a few of the cops in The USA are douchebags and will jump and people at any oppertunity.
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Duh, police should have helmet cameras and mics and be legally obligated to record continuously (as soon as that's technologically practical). This is a win-win situation for everyone: abuse is more difficult, and just prosecution easier.
 
How about everything is recorded everywhere at all times so NOTHING BAD CAN EVER GO UNNOTICED AND MORE IMPORTANTLY UNPUNISHED.
 
This is scary because it has deep, oppressive implications.
 
Vegeta897 said:
How about everything is recorded everywhere at all times so NOTHING BAD CAN EVER GO UNNOTICED AND MORE IMPORTANTLY UNPUNISHED.
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As far as the activities of a coercive state go, I agree.
 
I live in Chicago and am a freelance photographer. I guess I have to be careful now.
 
Maestro said:
Maybe Danimal's totalitarian police state paranoia is justified...
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Now I just need Jay-Z, Madonna, Gaga etc. to come out to the media and admit they're puppets for the Illuminati and I'll start pulling a "I told you so" Face at everyone.

Though of course there's nothing to be smug about, retrospectively.

I wish my friends had video-taped this cop who didn't get anything they were saying, when a raid was done on my friend's house (The neighbours thought he was some massive drug dealer because we'd rock up everyday to jam on guitars and shit LOL)

He found one of those little bags, that we call "Saddies" - And once he heard my friends say it, he was so determined to find out what they were.

"Why do you call them Saddies?! Is that code for something?!"
"I put jewellery in it, bro."
"Bullshit! What's a Saddie! Tell me!"
"It's... Like, a saddie?"
"HNNNNNNN"

Thousands of dollars, and probably weeks of ****ing around to get the warrant, to find maybe a cone's worth of weed and one saddie.


There's also a few times when friends of mine would be walking about after a gig or something drunk off their tits, and a cop ends up stealing money (Like $30 - $40 but still) from some of their wallets while getting details and all that jazz.

I wasn't there for that though, so tbh idk lol
 
Great, this gives the police even more confidence in these situations knowing they aren't on camera.
 
This is ****ing stupid.

I guess all you need is a bunch of stupid oppressive laws and regulations to be an oppressive state but not to be officially labelled as one.

This won't last. The country can't be that stupid.
 
To shoot more dogs and other household pets and throw grenades at more children living in the wrong house without reprimand or consequence, filming must be outlawed... even if they are filming for reality TV at the time (shows like 'Cops'), right? :stare:


And I guess lawmakers who support this bullshit have that "it won't happen to me" mentality, but in fact it was a mayor that had his house raided recently and his dogs were shot and killed or wounded in front of his children - and one of them was in a cage. And the little girl who was killed wasn't a "bad guy", I can assure you - she wasn't even in right house.

If I commit a crime - accident or not - I'm accountable. If I hit a pedestrian with my car, is it cool if I just keep driving, or do I have to stay there and wait for police? Yeah, "face the music" - accept the consequences of my actions, whether accidental or a mistake. If someone was recording my accident, they should get several years in prison, right? :rolleyes:
 
I can picture it now:

Officer: "License and registration"
Driver: "Absolutely Sir, it is also my legal duty to inform you that this conversation may be recorded for quality control purposes."
 
VirusType2 said:
And I guess lawmakers who support this bullshit have that "it won't happen to me" mentality, but in fact it was a mayor that had his house raided recently and his dogs were shot and killed or wounded in front of his children - and one of them was in a cage. And the little girl who was killed wasn't a "bad guy", I can assure you - she wasn't even in right house.
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%2820090104%29Alex_Jones_Awarded_Doctor_of__Journalism_and_Master_of_International_Affairs.jpg
 
I hate Illinois so much... It sucks in here. Can you guys help me get out? Lyk srsly?
 
How to Fix Police Corruption

Step 1: Ignore the real issues.
Step 2: Draft and pass legislation that strips the public of leverage they might have against the police.
Step 3: ?????
Step 4: Profit
Step 5: Repeat 1 - 4 if problem persists.

Reading the article reminded me a lot of when the Abu Ghraib story broke here in the United States. It wasn't the act of torture and abuse that upset people, no, it was the fact that the guards in the prison video-taped it.
 
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