Elm Staff Writer
After Michael Brown was shot and killed by
police officer Darren Wilson in 2014, Brown’s
family urged that “every police officer working
the streets in this country wears a body camera.”
Conflicting and discredited eyewitness testimony disputed whether Wilson was acting in self-defense. Had Wilson been wearing a body camera, Brown’s family, the public, and the jurors who declined to indict Wilson might have had more clarity regarding the events of Aug. 9, 2014.
In the year after Brown’s death, 95 percent of large police departments had or were planning to implement body-worn camera (BWC) programs.
This case, tragically not the first or last of its kind, incited change in how we surveil American policing — with BWCs.
More recently, however, departments have regressed on what was a potential boon to community-police relations by declining to release what footage they capture. Unfortunately, police activate their BWCs in less than two percent of instances. And to prevent the public from accessing the footage that exists, they claim a “broad exemption” to open-records laws.
The broad exemption allows footage to be kept from the public if it has the potential to interfere with ongoing investigations. The determination of what footage jeopardizes due process is vague and mainly at the department’s discretion.
In the 2014 case of Eric Garner, a publicized video of an officer holding Mr. Garner
in a chokehold while he said “I can’t breathe” did not stop a jury from declining to indict the officer. In response to an open-records request from an AP investigator, one law enforcement official used the broad exemption to argue a shooting video could be permanently concealed, despite the investigation into the death concluding.
The overuse of broad exemption only sows further distrust among communities that crave transparency from law enforcement. Usage of BWCs does not come without popular support.
In 2015, a polling firm found 88 percent of Americans prefer to see officers equipped with them. The DOJ distributed $23.2 million in grants to departments to further provide officers with BWCs and further study how their usage affected policing.
Reports of the effectiveness of the cameras in deterring unwarranted aggression are mixed. A 2012 study on a California city showed that instances of force dropped by 60 percent after official implemented randomly assigned cameras. A more extensive survey in D.C. showed no statistically significant effects of BWC use. The results beg the question: if being filmed doesn’t significantly change policing, what will?
BWCs are just one approach to a multi-faceted issue. Preventing misconduct from happening demands a critical restructuring of how officers are trained to handle conflict and addressing their treatment of vulnerable groups or minority communities.
Regardless of whether BWCs impact the behavior of their wearers, many benefits remain.
Recordings provide a neutral account of what happened. They are essential in determining the accuracy of eye-witness testimony.
The timely release of footage (if it is released at all) is indispensable to subsequent investigations.
In the 2016 shooting of Daniel Shaver, Arizona officials released footage only after a jury acquitted officer Philip Brailsford in his second-degree murder trial. The video shows Shaver crawling across the floor and begging for his life.
In 2014, Marcus Jeter faced charges after New Jersey officers claimed he had reached for one of their guns during a traffic stop. After attorneys saw dashcam video showing that Jeter had his hands up during the stop, they dropped charges against him and instead prosecuted two of the officers involved for charges including assault and false swearing. BWCs function as a watchdog — a tool to help us understand how we need to transform our legal system. They shed light on major incidents that otherwise would remain in the dark. The manipulation of this tool requires a national regulation on how, and when, all records should be released.