“When the police officer had his body cam off, they were yelling and telling me, ‘We’re gonna go to the full extent. We’re gonna put you in a lockbox,’” Timothy said. “Then, when the body cam was finally on, they were so nice.”
How are we still letting cops just turn off body cams? It defeats the entire fucking purpose.
The shouldn’t be able to ever turn them off while they are working and if they do. Immediate suspension, second time formal inquiry, 3rd time he’s out in his ass.
I feel like you guys can’t even control your own police
Fwiw the biggest issue with bodycams is that they’re expensive as hell. Milwaukee wanted to get better equipped with them a few years back and nobody wanted to pay. People want to defund police but it throws so much off. Even when they want to defund, Republicans refuse to push legislation to get more Crisis workers who can help and fund mental health care.
Most voters barely want to fund schools, let alone the police and poor/addicted/troubled lol.
The cost isn’t the cam itself, it’s the servers and their software and IT administrators to maintain them, the personnel to audit the videos, and the personnel to respond to records requests by being able to locate archived files and redeact private information of the people the police interact with in the requested videos. Spinning up and maintaining multiple departments that just didn’t exist before a body cam program was implemented is a significant resource draw.
If the auditing personnel aren’t hired in sufficient numbers, or the IT personnel to keep the video archives actually usable, then turning off of bodycams won’t ever be caught.
But what does that have to do with a bodycam being turned off during an incident? We see them clearly disable them or cover them on their own. I’m not saying they need to be turned on 24/7, that’s obviously not feasible.
The ability to turn the cam off while you shit could easily have come with a rule that states that if you turn your cam off while doing cop stuff you’re fired, but it didnt. Privacy in the bathroom is the excuse, not the reason. The reason is that cameras exonerate the innocent and impugn the guilty without regard to status or favor, and cops want to continue to break the law and hurt people who haven’t broken the law. They’re a street gang. There is no cop who enforces the law without fear or favor, there are only criminals and cops that ignore crime committed by people they like.
The ability to turn the cam off while you shit could easily have come with a rule that states that if you turn your cam off while doing cop stuff you’re fired, but it didnt.
Easy. If you turn off your cam, you’re not a cop anymore, you lose your legal powers.
Take a shit while turning off your cam? No problem, you don’t need to be a cop for that.
Shoot someone after “accidentally” turning your cam off? You just killed someone likely while trespassing with no qualified immunity. Enjoy prison.
Too bad. Make it part of what you sign up for when you become a cop. “You wanna be a cop? Well a few people may end up seeing you pee, just so you know that.”
There are people who have to piss into cups in front of people constantly. Surely that’s not an onerous demand to ensure the integrity of all bodycam footage. Who would ever see the raw uncut (lol) footage anyway? A jury maybe? in which case, blur out the dong. Easy.
I don’t know… I’m just not convinced by the “privacy” angle.
Edit: I guess other people’s privacy could be a concern. Though I bet AI is good enough that, if we really wanted to be honest about it (lol), we could figure out a way to filter other people out completely in a way that can be verified etc. etc. But that’ll never happen.
They don’t work for us anymore; they’re not “public servants.” They’re a (militarized) force that serves the interests of capital. They don’t defend people, they defend private property. That’s where the root of the problem lies. These people aren’t becoming cops to make the neighborhood they live in a safer place, most of the time they don’t even live in the neighborhood they serve. No, these people become cops because it lets them hurt people.
They’re just a gang of thugs that happens to serve the interests of those with the most money and power.
I don’t know. I hear the anger and I think there are some bad cops. But I think they are good ones out there. And they are people too. I can’t punish someone’s rights because of some assholes.
I hear what you are saying and there should be a way to handle it. I’m just not convinced that running them full time is the solution. Maybe limiting the turning off and if it’s done too many times in a row there is lockout and automatic reviews.
How are we still letting cops just turn off body cams? It defeats the entire fucking purpose.
The shouldn’t be able to ever turn them off while they are working and if they do. Immediate suspension, second time formal inquiry, 3rd time he’s out in his ass.
I feel like you guys can’t even control your own police
Um. No. We absolutely cannot
You can tell…by the way that it is.
Fwiw the biggest issue with bodycams is that they’re expensive as hell. Milwaukee wanted to get better equipped with them a few years back and nobody wanted to pay. People want to defund police but it throws so much off. Even when they want to defund, Republicans refuse to push legislation to get more Crisis workers who can help and fund mental health care.
Most voters barely want to fund schools, let alone the police and poor/addicted/troubled lol.
https://www.jsonline.com/story/communities/west/news/wauwatosa/2021/04/12/cost-body-cameras-setback-milwaukee-area-departments/6966971002/
The cost of a body cam doesn’t have anything to do with policies on whether or not they can be turned off.
The cost isn’t the cam itself, it’s the servers and their software and IT administrators to maintain them, the personnel to audit the videos, and the personnel to respond to records requests by being able to locate archived files and redeact private information of the people the police interact with in the requested videos. Spinning up and maintaining multiple departments that just didn’t exist before a body cam program was implemented is a significant resource draw.
If the auditing personnel aren’t hired in sufficient numbers, or the IT personnel to keep the video archives actually usable, then turning off of bodycams won’t ever be caught.
But what does that have to do with a bodycam being turned off during an incident? We see them clearly disable them or cover them on their own. I’m not saying they need to be turned on 24/7, that’s obviously not feasible.
Besides the fact that it effects even having one to turn off you mean?
Privacy. Can’t go to the bathroom. They use it and abuse it.
The ability to turn the cam off while you shit could easily have come with a rule that states that if you turn your cam off while doing cop stuff you’re fired, but it didnt. Privacy in the bathroom is the excuse, not the reason. The reason is that cameras exonerate the innocent and impugn the guilty without regard to status or favor, and cops want to continue to break the law and hurt people who haven’t broken the law. They’re a street gang. There is no cop who enforces the law without fear or favor, there are only criminals and cops that ignore crime committed by people they like.
Easy. If you turn off your cam, you’re not a cop anymore, you lose your legal powers.
Take a shit while turning off your cam? No problem, you don’t need to be a cop for that.
Shoot someone after “accidentally” turning your cam off? You just killed someone likely while trespassing with no qualified immunity. Enjoy prison.
Too bad. Make it part of what you sign up for when you become a cop. “You wanna be a cop? Well a few people may end up seeing you pee, just so you know that.”
There are people who have to piss into cups in front of people constantly. Surely that’s not an onerous demand to ensure the integrity of all bodycam footage. Who would ever see the raw uncut (lol) footage anyway? A jury maybe? in which case, blur out the dong. Easy.
I don’t know… I’m just not convinced by the “privacy” angle.
Edit: I guess other people’s privacy could be a concern. Though I bet AI is good enough that, if we really wanted to be honest about it (lol), we could figure out a way to filter other people out completely in a way that can be verified etc. etc. But that’ll never happen.
They don’t work for us anymore; they’re not “public servants.” They’re a (militarized) force that serves the interests of capital. They don’t defend people, they defend private property. That’s where the root of the problem lies. These people aren’t becoming cops to make the neighborhood they live in a safer place, most of the time they don’t even live in the neighborhood they serve. No, these people become cops because it lets them hurt people.
They’re just a gang of thugs that happens to serve the interests of those with the most money and power.
I don’t know. I hear the anger and I think there are some bad cops. But I think they are good ones out there. And they are people too. I can’t punish someone’s rights because of some assholes.
I hear what you are saying and there should be a way to handle it. I’m just not convinced that running them full time is the solution. Maybe limiting the turning off and if it’s done too many times in a row there is lockout and automatic reviews.
People always seem to forget the second half of the old saying about “bad apples.” The full phrase is, “a bad apple spoils the bunch.”
In other words, all it takes is one rotten person to bring an entire group down.