Body Worn Cameras Essay

The Effects of Body Worn Cameras by Law Enforcement There has been a great deal of controversy over the recent police involved shootings, and whether or not law enforcement has used excessive force in some situations. With only the word of the police officer or those involved to go on, it can be very difficult to know exactly what took place. In some cases, there may be cell phone video available but a lot of times it is up to the person doing the recording’s discretion what parts they want to record and what parts they don’t. In this case, they would only show what would be beneficial to them and so the recording is then considered bias. In other cases, there would be dash cam video available from the police officer’s stand point. This too

He acknowledges that criminal justice information needs good security because it is information about citizens, often at their most distressed and vulnerable. “Imagine if someone hacked and even edited video of alleged criminals before they were even charged or of child victims describing their attackers.” He notes that with all of the state and local law enforcement officers in the United States, the data requirement will be huge. The only system that can sustain such a requirement with the latest, most flexible technology would be the cloud. The cloud does pose security risks; however, the FBI has issued a policy that addresses both security and privacy issues. It is known as the Criminal Justice Information Services Security Policy. Although the policy does not apply to locally collected law enforcement data, it gives them a good model to consider adopting when storing data in the cloud. It offers excellent guidance on issues of access control, storage security, and internal accountability. Even though police cannot guarantee absolute security, implementing this system would demonstrate that they are holding themselves to a high standard for security and accountability

There have been many studies conducted on complaints against police officers when they are equipped with body cameras versus when they are not. In all of the studies conducted, the complaints against police dropped when they were wearing body cameras. There are two different viewpoints when it comes to this issue. Some believe that people are simply making up complaints against police officers. While others believe that when their actions are being recorded, people tend to behave better. Either way it has been proven that when police wear body cameras complaints against them have decreased. For example, in one particular study, the police department in Mesa, Ariz., did a side-by-side study of 50 officers wearing cameras and 50 without. The results after eight months: officers with cameras were subject of 8 citizen complaints while those without had 23.With citizens regularly capturing incidents with police on their cell phones, Mesa Police Department spokesman Steve Berry said the department wanted to have their own video "to tell the whole story or certainly both sides of the story”