Police body camerasarticles

Bonnie, your comment was wise and on-point. Madison Police AND citizens will benefit greatly with the ability to see how both officer and subject behave.

Historyof police body cameras

Had these police officers been wearing body cams, would administrators have been any more transparent about what transpired? Highly doubtful.

After Mike Brown was killed in 2014 by police in Ferguson, Missouri, there was a collective call to outfit the nation’s police officers with body-worn cameras. Many, including myself, thought this would create more transparency and accountability and potentially reduce the use of force by police departments.

Perhaps it won’t curb bad behavior from either side. People on camera, law enforcement or otherwise, don’t behave the same as those who aren’t. I support body-worn cameras because at least then we have one impartial viewer.

Research on body-worncamerasand law enforcement

The debate over body-worn cameras is as much about our worldview and spending priorities as anything else. State and local governments in the United States spend more collectively on policing than most countries spend on their militaries. And we spend that at the expense of policies and initiatives that lift up people. We need to acknowledge that the most policed and incarcerated nation in the world is not the safest. And then ask ourselves, is there a better way?

Body-worn cameras also aren’t cheap. It has been estimated that it would cost nearly $1.5 million in startup costs and $376,000 annually to outfit the entire Madison police force; funding for the pilot program was allocated in the 2021 city budget at $83,000.

Pros and consof police body camerasEssay

Why trust these studies? They use large sample sizes and this increases reliability. They are randomized control trials, peer-reviewed and can be replicated.

Since then, the Police Department’s track record on transparency has not gotten better. On Oct. 10, a Madison police officer shot another officer chasing a suspect on foot. Initially, the department implied that the suspect shot the officer; it took about a week for the department to correct the record. And in late November, Madison Police Chief Barnes threatened to fire any officer who would leak information about the resignation of an officer caught having sex in his squad car in August 2021; firing an officer is up to the Police and Fire Commission, not the police chief. And there were weeks of silence from multiple law enforcement agencies after the shooting of Quadren Wilson by two officers in the Department of Justice’s Division of Criminal Investigation.

I have done a lot of reading on the topic, and most comprehensive studies have found that body-worn cameras do not reduce the use of force. A 2017 randomized controlled trial by The Lab@DC, an arm of the District of Columbia government, involved 2,224 city police officers. It found no statistically significant impact of body-worn cameras on the use of force.

Police body camerasStatistics

Some studies that argue body-worn cameras reduce the use of force don’t even track a reduction in the use of force but use a decrease in complaints as evidence of effectiveness, including a 2018 report from the Police Executive Research Forum.

Benefitsof police body cameras

Chauvin had multiple complaints against him before he killed Floyd. The problem we have is not the lack of video evidence; it is in holding officers accountable for misconduct. The bar for prosecutors to hold police legally accountable for their actions is remarkably high. Keep in mind a forensic report in Madison showed Madison police officer Matt Kenny lied about what transpired the night he killed Tony Robinson in 2015, and Kenny is still on the police force.

Another argument against body cams: What shows up in video footage depends often on the angle at which it is taken; police body-cam footage can look very different from bystander footage. The same scene can either look like a person is dancing, or, when taken from a body-worn camera, fighting an officer.

Agree w replies above: changing police violence short-term not the goal of body cam- only more consistent documentation. Then, such accumulation, to include prosecution w video evidence “might” affect police culture. We have to hope?!Meanwhile, most interested to know Mr Braunginn’s thoughts on Lyoya execution: bullet to back of head of restrained person? Police deliberately TURNING OFF body cam? Seems to tell a valuable story…

This is a strange take on body cameras and why they're needed. Most of it boils down to a lack of consistent studies showing a reduction in use-of-force incidents by police. But they're not geared for reducing force, that's what training is for.There are varying conclusions from studies on that issue, but here in Madison it's a moot point anyway. Our officers are highly trained according to best practices of de-escalation and they already absolutely minimize use-of-force, as you can easily see in the quarterly reports on MPD's website. It's pretty difficult to realize a statistically significant drop in use-of-force when it was used in just 0.18% of calls across an entire year. In 2021 and 2020.A huge reason why I support equipping our patrol officers with body-worn cameras is for building trust through transparency between the police and the community. There is no greater single tool for oversight, transparency and accountability than a body-worn camera. On February 23, 2022, a 20-year-old Black man died in police custody in a police district holding cell. Was police misconduct involved? Negligence? Or did everyone act in accordance with their training? Body-worn camera footage will no doubt play a big part in the investigation. You can see a glimpse of it on a video put out by the Milwaukee Police Department. Go to YouTube and search Milwaukee Police Department Community Briefing and you'll see what I mean. Another video in the collection regards an officer-involved shooting that happened in February in Milwaukee. It's less than 8-minutes long and worth every second. It shows how body cam footage aids the transparency of an investigation and the ability to communicate with the community. It gives eyes and ears to what happened. Imagine how critical footage like this would have helped some of our recent and historic high-profile incidents. It leaves so much less room for speculation.Please take a few minutes to watch these videos and ask yourself if the cost is worth it. More than 85% of cities our size already equip their officers with body cameras. We are the second biggest city in the state, and the capital city! The smaller communities all around us have found a way to foot the bill. I believe our community is crying out for information and transparency like this after an officer-involved shooting or other critical event and we should have the same opportunity to see what transpired. Please contact the Alders, who will vote on April 19 on a resolution to implement a body camera pilot in the north district. Let them know it's time to join the 21st century and begin collecting our own data through the pilot.

The few studies showing a reduction in the use of force do not hold up well under scrutiny. The 2012 Rialto study (named for the officers in Rialto, California, who were part of the yearlong study) is perhaps most often quoted. But there are questions about its reliability — it included only 54 officers, was not a randomized controlled trial, and did not receive any independent evaluation before publication.

A body camera's effect on reducing the use of force really isn't the point. Instead, it should serve to VALIDATE, with legitimate empirical evidence, what actually occurred, whether that's 1 incident in 100 or 99 incidents in 100. While there could be different interpretations of what the footage reveals, body cam footage can (generally) serve to justify or exonerate actions by both law enforcement officers and citizens. Of course it isn't perfect, but considering how many convictions of police officers have only occurred due to the prevalence of bystanders with video-capable phones, the more video evidence the better. If you don't believe that, there are a lot of dead Black men from the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s who would like a word with you.

Police body cameraspros and cons

Why shouldpolicewearbody cameras

Another large review of the literature on body-worn cameras done by criminologists out of George Mason University came to a similar conclusion. The researchers looked at 70 empirical studies “covering the impact of cameras on officer behavior, officer perceptions, citizen behavior, citizen perceptions, police investigations, and police organizations.” They found that “In total, these study findings do not reveal a definitive conclusion that BWCs can reduce officers’ use of force.”

Some supporters point to the conviction of Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd as evidence that body cameras for police work. But in hundreds of other confrontations caught on video, including the police killings of Tamir Rice and Eric Garner, nothing happened to the officers.

I have grown increasingly skeptical when I hear police arguing for cameras on the basis of accountability and transparency. When have police willingly embraced transparency and accountability? Supporters also argue for the cameras as an additional surveillance tool to aid investigations and prosecutions. But is investing in yet another tool of policing a solution to our social ills?

The Madison city council has been debating the issue for several years now and most recently revived efforts to implement a pilot program to outfit officers in the North Police District with body cams. Police Chief Shon Barnes is a supporter, and the department has recently hosted several information sessions for the public.