Dashcam Tampering

[Red Arrow]

"Yes, Mr. Arrow, we've noticed you've switched hands this week.

I am unaware of anything that would cause anyone to believe that.

Is there some issue we need to be aware of?"

I was thinking of things like monitoring restrooms and other places generally considered off limits.

[rebound]

'RING' 'RING'
"Yes, Mr. Arrow, we've noticed you've switched hands this week.  Is there some issue we need to be aware of?"

Apparently that pitch was "juuuust a bit outside..."  Swing and a miss by Arrow.   

Funny.

[Conan71]

Why just the police?  Why not require all citizens to wear some form of monitoring device to document legal behavior?  

Imagine the crime that would prevent.  Michael Brown would probably be alive today if he were wearing a body camera the day he assaulted and robbed that convenience store clerk.

The program could be setup as some form of individual mandate. You could make it constitutional by representing it as a tax. There could be a fine (tax) for not wearing your tracking/monitoring device.

Of course, it would probably be difficult to get participation at first, and some would consider it an invasion of privacy, so you would want to ease the public into it by requiring it at the employer level in order to obtain liability insurance.  Just think about it!  This would help promote healthy and safe work environments and serve to thwart all kinds of business liability like sexual harassment, violation of OSHA regulations, and hundreds of other dubious labor practices.

Of course not all devices/services are the same so the government would need to regulate offerings to insure quality, compatibility and reliability. Individuals not on any sanctioned employer program would be required to purchase individual tracking & monitoring services through a limited exchange of suppliers that meet stringent requirements.  Ultimately all data would need to be centrally archived and maintained as well.

We would probably need to start with just audio, GPS, and 3D accelerometer data, and ease our way into full video and 3D situational modeling.

I think we've stumbled on something brilliant! What should we call it?

Makes one wonder if Go-Pro has been dumping money into Dem campaign coffers.  What a windfall that would be, especially since the government seems to pay four or five times what civilians pay for a similar product which has very little functional difference.  

[heironymouspasparagus]

I remember the case very well. My father was on the force at the time and he had a son that was close to my age that I played baseball with. Losing a father to gunfire really affected my views on guns to this day.

Your facts from 1971 seem fuzzy. There was probably a lot from the 1970s that you don't remember clearly. Here are transcripts from the appeals trial and the officer's version of that day. It is an interesting read.

http://law.justia.com/cases/oklahoma/court-of-appeals-criminal/1972/59701.html

Yeah...the officers version....  Actually, not fuzzy at all.  (And the 60's were the time I was growing up... I was already getting old by the 70's.)  Trowbridge was a cheesy little slimeball who deserved to get killed in prison.  Spybuck was a gung ho kinda guy who, in today's world would be stealing people's cell phones and slapping them around when they tried to record him.

"who were dressed in civilian clothing, dismounted from their vehicle and walked toward the defendant's house. He testified that he and Officer McCullough had beards and that their hair was somewhat longer than usual."

"The defendant raised his right hand to hip high holding a small caliber pistol."

I also knew several cops on the force at that time through a job I had then.  Some of them told a slightly different version - especially about the warrant and the approach to the house.  Much closer to the one I posted.


This guy had no input on the Trowbridge situation, but as an aside, he was a great guy, a great cop, and I thought of him as a good friend!   He told me about my FBI file and how at the time, it was about 1.5" thick!!  He got to read it.... I could never get the laws of the land to work to get me a copy of it.  FOIA works well, if ya got the money to pursue it aggressively.  Otherwise...meh!

http://www.tulsaworld.com/obituaries/localobituaries/oscar-roy-hunt/article_f2962a3a-9899-11e3-b434-001a4bcf6878.html


Here is another one who was a pretty good friend - as good as can be with a cop without being one....   Used to drag race with him regularly on 11th and 15th streets on the east side of town in the early 70's when TPD had those pastel colored Dodge cars.  The best place to start was at the corner of Wonder Bread and Sheridan, heading east!  Great street racing road!  His cop car could never even get close to my Cutlass!   I told him I could "fix" that car for him so he could actually catch someone with it....

I met him and his buddies by chance at the state fair one time while this event was going on - we hung around for a while and he was "cryin' in his beer" about how he and the buds were gonna get fired just for letting the guy know they didn't appreciate his disrespect....   Ah, the good ole' days!!

http://law.justia.com/cases/oklahoma/supreme-court/1982/5315.html

[Conan71]

Yeah...the officers version....  Actually, not fuzzy at all.  (And the 60's were the time I was growing up... I was already getting old by the 70's.)  Trowbridge was a cheesy little slimeball who deserved to get killed in prison.  Spybuck was a gung ho kinda guy who, in today's world would be stealing people's cell phones and slapping them around when they tried to record him.

"who were dressed in civilian clothing, dismounted from their vehicle and walked toward the defendant's house. He testified that he and Officer McCullough had beards and that their hair was somewhat longer than usual."

"The defendant raised his right hand to hip high holding a small caliber pistol."

I also knew several cops on the force at that time through a job I had then.  Some of them told a slightly different version - especially about the warrant and the approach to the house.  Much closer to the one I posted.


This guy had no input on the Trowbridge situation, but as an aside, he was a great guy, a great cop, and I thought of him as a good friend!   He told me about my FBI file and how at the time, it was about 1.5" thick!!  He got to read it.... I could never get the laws of the land to work to get me a copy of it.  FOIA works well, if ya got the money to pursue it aggressively.  Otherwise...meh!

http://www.tulsaworld.com/obituaries/localobituaries/oscar-roy-hunt/article_f2962a3a-9899-11e3-b434-001a4bcf6878.html


Here is another one who was a pretty good friend - as good as can be with a cop without being one....   Used to drag race with him regularly on 11th and 15th streets on the east side of town in the early 70's when TPD had those pastel colored Dodge cars.  The best place to start was at the corner of Wonder Bread and Sheridan, heading east!  Great street racing road!  His cop car could never even get close to my Cutlass!   I told him I could "fix" that car for him so he could actually catch someone with it....

I met him and his buddies by chance at the state fair one time while this event was going on - we hung around for a while and he was "cryin' in his beer" about how he and the buds were gonna get fired just for letting the guy know they didn't appreciate his disrespect....   Ah, the good ole' days!!

http://law.justia.com/cases/oklahoma/supreme-court/1982/5315.html

Unless they were on the scene, their "account" of what happened is totally worthless.  Sort of like the "eyewitnesses" at the Michael Brown shooting scene who showed up a few minutes after the whole confrontation was over.

[cynical]

This discussion is goofy. I'm surprised that no one on on this forum appears to be experienced at HR. Here's the current reality: Employees in this country, public or private, have almost no right to privacy while on the job. While the boss shouldn't monitor restroom activities and locker rooms, as far as other job-related activities is concerned, the boss gets to watch, listen, and record. Keystrokes and computer screens are monitored, phone calls are monitored, mobile devices (voice, data, and text) are monitored, cameras are on hand. Customer interactions are routinely monitored. "This call may be monitored for quality control purposes." The term "NSFW" arose because of automated monitoring systems that alert to depictions of too much skin on an office computer. It would, in fact, be perfectly legal for an employer to require its employees to wear cameras while on the job. Why don't they? Because the comprehensive monitoring that is already in place does the job well enough.

Why should the police be granted a right of workplace privacy that no one else has? Their radio communications have long been monitored and recorded. Recording interactions between the police and the public cuts both ways. It can protect a law officer from a false claim of wrongdoing. It can protect the public from genuine wrongdoing by an officer. Carving out privacy safe harbors for cops that don't apply to others would likely be a violation of equal protection unless it could be tied to a compelling state interest of some sort. Protecting cops from discipline or prosecution for their misbehavior is not a compelling state interest.

Restrooms, locker rooms, and privileged communications have a few special rules, but the general rule is that if you're a public or private employee on the job, you're an open book. If you don't like it, be your own boss and/or lobby for privacy rights for all employees, not just cops.

An interesting Q&A on employee privacy rights can be found here: https://www.privacyrights.org/workplace-privacy-and-employee-monitoring#2a The site, BTW, is sympathetic to privacy rights, but is realistic in laying out the facts. Even sites that start out with the proposition that "most states have laws protecting employee privacy rights" go on to explain that such protections are exceedingly narrow, and monitoring is exceedingly broad.

[Gaspar]

This discussion is goofy. I'm surprised that no one on on this forum appears to be experienced at HR. Here's the current reality: Employees in this country, public or private, have almost no right to privacy while on the job. While the boss shouldn't monitor restroom activities and locker rooms, as far as other job-related activities is concerned, the boss gets to watch, listen, and record. Keystrokes and computer screens are monitored, phone calls are monitored, mobile devices (voice, data, and text) are monitored, cameras are on hand. Customer interactions are routinely monitored. "This call may be monitored for quality control purposes." The term "NSFW" arose because of automated monitoring systems that alert to depictions of too much skin on an office computer. It would, in fact, be perfectly legal for an employer to require its employees to wear cameras while on the job. Why don't they? Because the comprehensive monitoring that is already in place does the job well enough.

Why should the police be granted a right of workplace privacy that no one else has? Their radio communications have long been monitored and recorded. Recording interactions between the police and the public cuts both ways. It can protect a law officer from a false claim of wrongdoing. It can protect the public from genuine wrongdoing by an officer. Carving out privacy safe harbors for cops that don't apply to others would likely be a violation of equal protection unless it could be tied to a compelling state interest of some sort. Protecting cops from discipline or prosecution for their misbehavior is not a compelling state interest.

Restrooms, locker rooms, and privileged communications have a few special rules, but the general rule is that if you're a public or private employee on the job, you're an open book. If you don't like it, be your own boss and/or lobby for privacy rights for all employees, not just cops.

An interesting Q&A on employee privacy rights can be found here: https://www.privacyrights.org/workplace-privacy-and-employee-monitoring#2a The site, BTW, is sympathetic to privacy rights, but is realistic in laying out the facts. Even sites that start out with the proposition that "most states have laws protecting employee privacy rights" go on to explain that such protections are exceedingly narrow, and monitoring is exceedingly broad.

Just haven't taken it far enough. That's why there needs to be a centralized regulatory branch for monitoring. That means the boss must be monitored too!  Let's consider the medical profession. . .

Most medical malpractice incidences are never even realized, never make it to litigation, and those that do almost never make it to court.  People put their lives in the hands of physicians and care professionals every day and die by the hundreds from simple mistakes that their loved ones will never even know about.  

Was the procedure done correctly?  Did the doc wash his hands properly?  Were the instruments appropriately handled? Were medications given in the right sequence and at the proper rate? Were the linens clean?

For Heaven's sake why are we allowing all of these people to die at the hands of careless doctors, nurses, and medical staff?  We must have body cameras, especially in professions involved in health and public safety.  That means cops, docs, firemen, crossing guards, construction workers, dentists, teachers, day-care workers, massage therapists, hairstylists, truck drivers, and anyone who serves or handles food.  

Oh Lord! I just realized that some of these people may be racist too.

That's it! The right to privacy has been taken too far, for too long.  We need the government to fix this.

[patric]

Why just the police?  Why not require all citizens to wear some form of monitoring device to document legal behavior? 

Imagine the crime that would prevent.  Michael Brown would probably be alive today if he were wearing a body camera the day he assaulted and robbed that convenience store clerk.

Sarcasm aside, Gaspar may have a point.

With New York City is rolling out a limited pilot test program for police body cameras, former law enforcement officials and the relatives of Eric Garner are questioning what good additional footage will do in future cases if the Staten Island grand jury decided not to indict the police officer who put Garner in an apparent choke hold even with the incident caught on cell phone video.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/eric-garner-case-puts-twist-body-cameras-solution/story?id=27366336

Now, Owasso had only been using body cams a week before they documented Lt. Mike Denton's bad behavior, but he got his same exact job back.   

Even city buses have cameras, not because we have it in for bus drivers, but because they have a responsibility on their shoulders that demands that level of accountability.   It's the culture of who you work for that determines how deep the accountability rabbit hole goes.

[cynical]

Just because it doesn't change the outcome every single time doesn't mean it isn't worthwhile. There are two purposes served by the cameras: deterring police misconduct and helping sort out the facts after an incident. Just because in one or two cases the sorting-out process didn't work out as predicted doesn't mean that it must always fail. And just because the deterrent effect of the camera failed to prevent the police from killing Eric Garner doesn't mean that it will always fail to deter police misconduct.

Seat belt laws save many lives, but some people die while wearing them. The criminal laws in general deter criminal conduct, but crimes are still committed. No one seriously suggests repealing Title 21 of the Oklahoma Statutes because Oklahomans continue to break the law. Perfectionists have to remember the old saying, "the perfect is the enemy of the good."

Incidentally, in his snarky reply Gaspar failed to answer the question I asked: Why should the police be granted an occupational right of privacy that no other employee, public or private, has?

Sarcasm aside, Gaspar may have a point.

With New York City is rolling out a limited pilot test program for police body cameras, former law enforcement officials and the relatives of Eric Garner are questioning what good additional footage will do in future cases if the Staten Island grand jury decided not to indict the police officer who put Garner in an apparent choke hold even with the incident caught on cell phone video.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/eric-garner-case-puts-twist-body-cameras-solution/story?id=27366336

Now, Owasso had only been using body cams a week before they documented Lt. Mike Denton's bad behavior, but he got his same exact job back.   

Even city buses have cameras, not because we have it in for bus drivers, but because they have a responsibility on their shoulders that demands that level of accountability.   It's the culture of who you work for that determines how deep the accountability rabbit hole goes.

[Gaspar]

Incidentally, in his snarky reply Gaspar failed to answer the question I asked: Why should the police be granted an occupational right of privacy that no other employee, public or private, has?

You are right. I didn't address that and perhaps should have.  I don't think the police have been granted that right by anyone, nor will they.  Sure, some like to interfere with people filming crimes, or crime scenes but I think that is more to due to a failure to understand the laws or lack thereof. 

I am unaware of any right a police officer has to privacy while engaged in a public activity.  Unfortunately our laws are not equipped to address new technology, and technology is moving faster than the law.  It's confusing. . .I can't take a picture of you at your desk and publish it online without your consent, but can I take a picture or video of a police officer at work and publish it online without his/her consent? 

Snarky as my previous posts were, and a bit outrageous at that, it will come to pass, all of it.  This is the natural progression of our path towards centralized government control, and our exponential growth and acceptance of technology to document our every waking moment. 

I already know people who wear a Narrative camera and many of the new wearable watches will incorporate cameras as well. At a recent tech show, I saw a device fitted into a rather stylish pair of glasses that records 360 degrees of video for 16 hours.  We have clients that plot employee locations on a map based on GPS data from their cell phones.  The employees are aware of this, but the benefit of a free smartphone outweighs any perceived invasion of privacy.

My snarky response was not a rebellion against the idea, because there can be no rebellion.  As a society we are surrendering our privacy in exchange for technology.  My post was simply to get the reader away from the myopic concept that video monitoring of police officers would somehow be a terminus of this concept.  The technology is already decades ahead of the law.  Strapping a body cam to every cop is far from a solution, and presents a whole new set of problems that the law is still ill-equipped to address.

Before we jump, it is probably wise to check the depth.

What is the penalty for failure to capture adequate video? Is there a fine for equipment or operator failure?  How may layers of liability can we afford to add? At what point do we reach total paralysis?

It's a fun philosophical exercise. 

[Vashta Nerada]

Why just the police?  Why not require all citizens to wear some form of monitoring device to document legal behavior? 

Imagine the crime that would prevent.  Michael Brown would probably be alive today if he were wearing a body camera the day he assaulted and robbed that convenience store clerk.

The program could be setup as some form of individual mandate. You could make it constitutional by representing it as a tax. There could be a fine (tax) for not wearing your tracking/monitoring device.

Of course, it would probably be difficult to get participation at first, and some would consider it an invasion of privacy, so you would want to ease the public into it by requiring it at the employer level in order to obtain liability insurance.  Just think about it!  This would help promote healthy and safe work environments and serve to thwart all kinds of business liability like sexual harassment, violation of OSHA regulations, and hundreds of other dubious labor practices.

Of course not all devices/services are the same so the government would need to regulate offerings to insure quality, compatibility and reliability.

Individuals not on any sanctioned employer program would be required to purchase individual tracking & monitoring services through a limited exchange of suppliers that meet stringent requirements.  Ultimately all data would need to be centrally archived and maintained as well.

We would probably need to start with just audio, GPS, and 3D accelerometer data, and ease our way into full video and 3D situational modeling.

----------------------



Throw in APCs, assault rifles, body armor, pepper spray, mass surveillance... couple that with unbridled authority and a national network of fraternal unions and lawyers that can help you literally get away with murder, and it's a deal. 

[heironymouspasparagus]

 

Unless they were on the scene, their "account" of what happened is totally worthless.  Sort of like the "eyewitnesses" at the Michael Brown shooting scene who showed up a few minutes after the whole confrontation was over.

We all know cops wouldn't lie or distort the circumstances or brag to their buddies about what they had done....

[cannon_fodder]

Gaspar:

You asked the question - why force the police to monitor their behavior with recording devices and not force every citizen to do the same.  I can answer that with... points

1) The police are government employees sworn to protect and serve the public.  As a public employee with a duty owed to the public - the public has a right to know what they are doing.

2) They are authorized to exercise the power of government upon its citizens. They can take your property and your freedom. They are authorized to carry firearms and usually, on their word, they can use that firearm to end the life of a citizen with impunity.  Given that they are allowed to exercise the utmost power over citizens, it is important that they can be held accountable for their actions.

3) Part of a police officer's job is to initiate confrontation.  They are required to confront people who they suspect are criminals.  This necessarily puts them in situations in which an accurate records of events would protect them from false claims of miscreants AND assist them in prosecuting any wrong behavior they witness.

4) A police officer is an employee - an employer can mandate 100% surveillance of their employees as they see fit.  UPS, FedEx, and many commercial carriers have GPS system tracking speed, braking, movements, etc.  Drivers are regularly fired for breaking company rules.  Many other employers record all activity of their employees.  As employees, officers are subject to the same rules.

5) Recording officers is effective.  In jurisdictions were cameras were implemented complaints against officers tumbled by as much as 80%.  FACT - when people are being watched, or even think they are being watched, they tend to follow the rules more. Historically, police departments do not self-police very well.  Massive corruption is usually brought to light by federal investigations (see repeated indictments of TPD) or citizen action.

and

6) Most citizens are not public employees, are not granted authority to exercise the power of the government, do not regularly instigate confrontations with suspected criminals (and when they do, many turn on their cameras), are subject to recording on their jobs, and are watched while on their jobs.

The reasons presented against cameras are:

1) Your slippery slope argument, which I distinguished above.
2) Cost - which continues to drop and is cheap compared to fighting civil rights violations, and
3) It may cause the officers to be less effect - to which I respond, if you are doing something you don't want people to know about... you probably shouldn't be doing it.

So bring on the cameras (as previously ORDERED by the Court)!

[Vashta Nerada]

Performing for the (dash)camera; how police manipulate recorded encounters.

"Dont go for my gun!"
"Stop resisting"
"why are you trying to get my fu@king gun!"

[patric]

Recording officers is effective.  In jurisdictions were cameras were implemented complaints against officers tumbled by as much as 80%.  FACT - when people are being watched, or even think they are being watched, they tend to follow the rules more. Historically, police departments do not self-police very well.  Massive corruption is usually brought to light by federal investigations (see repeated indictments of TPD) or citizen action.

All the technology in the world wont matter if the legal system is too broken to make use of it.
Reinstated Owasso Police Lt. Michael Denton is in his second 15 minutes of videotaped mayhem fame, this time charged with a felony that includes striking another officer with a shotgun.

http://www.tulsaworld.com/homepagelatest/owasso-police-officer-charged-with-felony-misdemeanor-in-nowata-county/article_c19822b0-7606-55cc-ab28-15f8d8450c72.html