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History of photography camera
Essays on the use of police body cameras
Essays on the use of police body cameras
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The Use of Cameras to Provide Better Justice
Cameras go way back to the year 1879, and have advanced greatly throughout the years. They used to be huge and bulky with all kinds of attachments and stands. Now they are so small and thin that they are put in everyday items that we use, for instance, cell phones and laptops. Backs then cameras were less than $40 and they were made with glass that was 6.5 by 8.5 inches thick (Patti). Now in this time of age, cameras can go from a few hundred bucks to thousands of dollars depending on the camera, and they are much smaller with clearer pictures now. In 1912 Kodak came out with the Vest Pocket camera, which sold for only six dollars. It had a glass lens of 2 1/4 by 3 1/4 inches thick, which is much
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In this case, some of the pros of police officers wearing body cameras are that the cameras record all interactions that police officers have with citizens. These body cameras provide evidence of every interaction while the cop is on-duty. These body cameras can end most rumors that are created by public, and get rid of false witnesses or faulty information. The camera may also provide proof of witnesses so that they may be contacted for questioning. These cameras will also make court processes much faster, so that there is more time in court for more important and serious cases. Minor cases as well as large cases will not be dragged out as long with the information the body cameras could proved resulting in smaller court fines as well. These are some of the pros of body cameras. However there are always two sides to every story according to the article "Police Departments Implement Body-Worn Cameras". One of the cons to police officers wearing body cameras is that the police officer has full control of when the camera is on or off. They would manually have to turn on the camera every time they get in and out of the cop cars. Another con is for citizens who may not feel comfortable with the camera, for instance a sexual assault victim may not want their situation to be recorded. The citizen will be able to ask for the police officer to turn the camera off if the citizen prefers. Another problems of cameras are people privacy; they do not want people in the background to be shown. They would have to blur out the faces, before they blur out the faces they would talk to them about what they saw for a witness. Another problem that they could face is money. Money soon adds up. Depending on the camera you buy it can range anywhere from $300 and $1700. That does not include the storage where all this record videos are going. In South Carolina, they have already set 2 million dollars to the side to start having police wear body
One of the sources used to disprove that body camera isn’t the answer includes Jamelle Bouie article, Keeping the Police honest. Mr. Bouie is the chief political correspondent at Slate who graduated from the University of Virginia with a political and social thought degree (Tumblr.com). His work consists of issues relating to national politics, public policies and racial inequality. His work has also been published in Slate online magazine, the New Yorker, the Washington Post and TIME Magazine (Tumblr.com). Slate is an online magazine that post about the news, politics, business, technology and culture (slate.com). In Jamelle article, Keeping the Police honest he talks about incidents where police officers were being recorded and took excessive
I feel body cameras will bring more awareness to police departments when it comes to the honesty in their staff’s action when they are unsupervised. They can be used as hard evidence in court rooms, to help make the correct judgment on the situations in question. A case of which Officer Michael Slager fell victim to when the courts later changed their verdict after being presented with a video of what really happened.
There have been lots of modern technologies introduced in the United States of America to assist law enforcement agencies with crime prevention. But the use of body-worn cameras by police personnel brings about many unanswered questions and debate. Rising questions about the use of body cam are from concern citizens and law enforcement personnel. In this present day America, the use body cameras by all law enforcement personnel and agencies are one of the controversial topics being discussed on a daily base. Body worn cameras were adopted due to the alleged police brutality cases: for instance, the case of Michael Brown, an African-American who was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, on August 2014, Eric Garner died as a result of being put in a chokehold by a New York police officer, and John Crawford, shot and killed by a police officer at a Walmart in Beavercreek, Ohio.
According to Timothy Williams writer of “Downside of Police Body Cameras” said Chief Strachan of Bremerton will not invest in the cameras because anyone can walk in and request for the footage. They were being asked for anything and everything and the departments just couldn’t handle the large amount of demands that were being requested (par. 1). When dealing with a serious situation like a domestic violence call the camera has to be on. However, the footage captured should never be released to the public due to the fact that it’s a private issue. So far there is no law in place to prevent someone from walking in and watching the
While both dash cams and body mounted cams record interactions between police and citizens, “dash cam- eras are confined to places where cars can go, which are usually public places, such as roads and parking lots. A dash camera cannot easily record inside people’s homes and other places where there is a heightened expectation of privacy”(Freund 97). Thus, allowing body mounted cameras to record the more private aspects of a law enforcement related situations. Also “unlike body-mounted cameras, CCTV cameras do not record conversations”(Freund 98).This could deter people from going to the police when they witness a crime, because they are afraid of being exposed to the person who committed the crime, giving them the information needed if they choose to retaliate. Ebi, Kevin states that “sensitive information can 't get out if it 's never recorded in the first place,” so, if there is a distress call made to the police for help, there won’t be concern that the person in distresses voice, face or the inside of their home could end up on YouTube ("Body Of
Since their inception, police body cameras have been a controversial topic as many do not agree on their effectiveness and legality. To the trained eye, body cameras clearly have no negatives other than the sheer cost of their implementation. Some people, nonetheless, do believe that it is an encroachment of privacy for police to record private and/or public interactions even though it is purely legal. While that may be seen as a negative, it is wholly subjective and must be completely ignored when considering the factual analysis of police body camera use that is necessary to verify their validity. When only taking fact into account, there is no way to deny the nearly infinite benefits of body cameras.
Police officers should be required to wear body cameras because it will build a trust between law enforcement and the community, it will decrease the amount of complaints against police officers, and lastly it will decrease the amount of police abuse of authority. In addition, an officer is also more likely to behave in a more appropriate manner that follows standard operating procedures when encountering a civilian. “A 2013 report by the Department of Justice found that officers and civilians acted in a more positive manner when they were aware that a camera was present” (Griggs, Brandon). Critics claim that the use of body cameras is invasive of the officers and civilians privacy.
One of the many drawbacks that come with using body cameras is due to the fact that there is a locus of control. This may pose a problem because there is an underlying question of who can control the cameras. There can be many videos of incidents that are not captured because an officer decided to turn off their camera. Officers have the ability to turn them off or on which causes the problem of each officer not releasing them. Many departments across the country does not even allow individuals to access the footage that is recorded and with the laws that are in place for many department to deny access to the footage that they have. Due to each officer having to release the footage that they capture, they are allowed to review the footage that they record before they make a statement (Harvard Law Review). This is one of the biggest drawbacks because controlling the video footage is important in not only courts but to ensure the minds of
Body cameras are now widely used by police departments in the United States for safety measures. It would not be a bad idea if The Department of Correction would make it mandatory for all correctional officers to wear body cameras during their shift. Each state here in the U.S. is responsible for maintaining a prison budget, especially when the state is facing severe budget cuts due to economic struggles and drops in tax revenues (Clear et al, 2013). With that being said, proposing body cameras for correctional officers will require a lot of my money, and it will be a challenge to come of up with the funds. The Houston Police Department has requested for body cameras for over three year now and the city understands how critical it is for officers, especially after seeing numerous police use of force and shootings all across the U.S. Houston Police officers are unequipped when it comes to devices that could prevent criminal and civil litigations. HPD Chief Charles McClelland requested City Hall for $8 million to equip 3,500 police officers with small body cameras to record encounters between law enforcement and citizens as a way of improving accountability and transparency; furthermore, to reduce use of force incidents and citizen complaints (Kuffner, 2014). The request made by the Chief has been pending for over three years due to lack of funding. The estimate cost for the device per officer is approximately $2,500. Body cameras will also prevent officers from having fraudulent complaints filed against them. Houston Mayor Anise Parker’s administration stated they are having trouble finding the money to pay for the Chief’s request (Kuffner,
There is no point in wasting money on this equipment if the officer won’t wear them and some of them can be turned off and aren’t used to show any evidence. Senator Tim Scott stated some interesting facts that would be crucial to the Freddie Gray Case. Scott states “Obviously if you had six officers with six different police cameras, six different angels, we would know exactly what happened” (Diamond 2015). If there would have been something in the van we would have been able to not only see Gray but see if the wounds were superficial or brought upon by Gray himself. There are several videos out there that have some videos of officers with body cams on and the actions and behavior are completely different then the videos we see people put up all over social media. Watching the video of the Gray incident there is no struggle or any resist of arrest what so ever and none of the officers applied any force, the only thing is that Gray was screaming of pain but nothing other than that. The officers just drag him until you see him finally go into the back of the police van. This is one of the most interesting cases I have ever studied and still shocked as the result of the young mans’ death. The officers whom I previously stated above that were indicted will be back in court on July 2 of this year to be brought to their charges (Fenton
One study done on community perceptions of BWCs found that “Consistent with their positive views of BWCs and likely related to the increasingly normative nature of video surveillance throughout society, the community members expressed relatively little concern regarding potential invasions of privacy for either police officers or citizens related to BWCs” (Crow et al. 604). Little research has been done on the topic of how the public views body cameras, though this finding is very misleading. It only surveyed two counties in Florida (possibly the worst place in the country for police misconduct) and it was done right after the media caught the attention of police violence in 2015, so of course the citizens there wanted BWC for their officers. In a country where the government has faced much scrutiny for illegal surveillance in the past, it is not a good idea to further violate the privacy of those who have not committed a crime. The body-worn cameras should only be used by the police when it is
There has always been surveillance of the general public conducted by the United States government, the usual justifications being upholding the security of the nation , weeding out those who intend to bring harm to the nation, and more. But the methods for acquiring such information on citizens of the united states were not very sophisticated many years ago so the impact of government surveillance was not as great. As a result of many technological advancements today the methods for acquiring personal information - phone metadata, internet history and more - have become much simpler and sophisticated. Many times, the information acquired from different individuals is done so without their consent or knowledge. The current surveillance of people
The idea for photographing came around in 1814 when Joseph Niépce wanted an image of his son before he left for war. He succeeded in making the first camera in 1827, but the camera needed at least eight hours to produce one picture. Parisian Louis Daguerre invented the next kind of camera in 1839, who worked with Niépce for four years. His camera only needed fifteen to thirty minutes to produce a picture. Both Niécpe’s and Daguerre’s cameras made pictues on metal plates. In the same year Daguerre made his camera, an Englishman by the name of William Henry Fox Talbot made the first camera that photographed pictures on paper. The camera printed a reverse picture onto a negative and chemicals were needed to produce the photo up right. In 1861, color film came along and pictures were produced with color instead of being just black and white. James Clerk Maxwell is credited with coming up with color film, after he took the ...
With recent developments in technology, government and private surveillance has increased. Not only has the surveillance increased but also those who wish to surveil. This surveillance, like any other social issues has its pros and cons. The good it has brought to society is not something to be overlooked. On April 18th 2013, 3 days after the Boston marathon bombing took place, the Federal Bureau of Investigation released some photographs and a video of two suspects. Later that day the two brothers Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were identified. Cameras worn by police officers, popularly known as “cop cams” or “body cams”, have also help bring some unjust officers of the law to justice as well as public attention. Also videos captured by citizens (on their mobile devices), security systems of various companies and establishments have helped in various police investigations. Also it gives society a sense of security because surveillance deters eccentric or deviant behavior. The examples, amongst others have shown these systems have helped to
Within the battle against crime, police forces and governments are increasingly using security cameras in public places. Some people are against this, stating that it intrudes on their privacy as citizens. Though individuals have rights as citizens according to our First Amendment there is a serious need to cut down on the amount of crime commented. In this research paper I will discuss security cameras and how they play an enormous role in cracking down on law-breaking. Security cameras have become universal in many countries. Before you could only catch sight of security cameras in banks and at high-security areas, they are now entering public places such as: malls, streets, schools and airports. Most people are offended by these cameras