Police Souveillance Illegal?

A disturbing trend, where police will prosecute those that record their public actions based on anti-wiretapping statutes:

Wendy McIlroy, Are Cameras The New Guns?

In response to a flood of Facebook and YouTube videos that depict police abuse, a new trend in law enforcement is gaining popularity. In at least three states, it is now illegal to record any on-duty police officer.

Even if the encounter involves you and may be necessary to your defense, and even if the recording is on a public street where no expectation of privacy exists.

The legal justification for arresting the “shooter” rests on existing wiretapping or eavesdropping laws, with statutes against obstructing law enforcement sometimes cited. Illinois, Massachusetts, and Maryland are among the 12 states in which all parties must consent for a recording to be legal unless, as with TV news crews, it is obvious to all that recording is underway. Since the police do not consent, the camera-wielder can be arrested. Most all-party-consent states also include an exception for recording in public places where “no expectation of privacy exists” (Illinois does not) but in practice this exception is not being recognized.

There is a litany of cases where individuals have been charged with felonies — wiretapping is a federal crime — for recording belligerent police officers overstepping the bounds.

So, here we have a case where the police would like to make public activities — pulling over a driver on a highway, or frisking teenagers on a city street — private, or even secret.

However, citizen souveillance — where bystanders capture police actions via cell phone cameras — have become an important check on police abuse. Consider Rodney King, or the G-20 bystander, Ian Tomlinson, who died after a police beating in London last year.

The US has a fairly deep case law about public recording — no one is required to ask or receive permission to take pictures or video of public places: places where it is generally understood to be public — but the police have a narrow and immoral agenda. They want to conceal their actions, and we really need federal protections. However, in a time when President Obama is holding on to the excesses of Bush’s imperial presidency, don’t expect any action on this front.