Battle Heats Up Between Police Officers And Civilians Who Record Them

Should ordinary people be arrested for filming on-duty police abusing their power? If a string of recent cases is any indication, judicial systems throughout the country think so.

LA Weekly reported Thursday on the troubling case of Jeremy Marks, a teenager who's been in jail since May for using his cell phone camera to videotape an L.A. Unified School District officer slamming a student into the window of a school bus. His working-class parents can't afford to pay the $155,000 bail to bring their son home for Christmas, so Marks may be forced to plead guilty to "attempted lynching" in order to reduce his sentence from seven years to 32 months.

Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley, who recently lost a hotly-contested race for California Attorney General, continues to pursue charges against Marks, despite taped evidence that he stayed largely on the sidelines of the skirmish, quietly capturing the ordeal on video.

Meanwhile, Reason.com published a story this week detailing a similar account in Illinois. After what he describes as repeated harassment by local police claiming he violated the town's "eyesore law" by working on used cars in his own yard, backyard mechanic Michael Allison began tape-recording such encounters. When he finally received a formal citation, the judge denied his request for a reporter during his hearing, prompting him to bring his own tape recorder to court.

The judge then charged him with five counts of violating Illinois' wiretapping law by recording his previous interactions without the officers' consent. He faces up to 75 years in prison.

snip

The problem is, most of the charges have developed around wiretapping statutes written long before technological innovations like smartphones and social networks emerged, facilitating a heightened level of transparency.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/10/battle-between-cops-cameras_n_795295.html

"The judge then charged him with five counts of violating Illinois' wiretapping law" I don't think the judge can charge him with anything but contempt. Judges don't charge, prosecutors charge.

as though they'd divulged top secret info.

Our country is really becoming scary. Again, Hitler's Germany comes to mind. Or The Gulag. :scared:

Switzerland here I come!

Seriously, how you get 'attempted lynching' as a 'lesser' charge for recording police abuse makes zero sense.

And lynching as a lesser charge, even though lynching is murder/attempted murder, what the heck could the more serious charge for 7 years be then?

Video taping someone in public is legal whether that someone is a civilian or a government worker.

Recording audio of someone without permission in public whether that someone is a civilian or a government worker without consent is not. It is the AUDIO that makes all the cases mentioned a violation of wiretapping laws. This is why video surveillance cameras are legal while audio surveillance or both audio and video without consent is not.

I don't think it's a good idea to be throwing out privacy rights just because we live in a society that uses technology that never took those rights into account to begin with. As far as I'm concerned, video recording (without audio) anyone in public without permission should also have been included in the wiretapping law except for journalists and as long as the filming is obvious (no sneaky little cameras not easily seen). I always thought it was a really bad idea to put cameras in phones making it all too easy for the average person to invade someone else's privacy and be able to do so without their knowledge. Video surveillance without audio on private property I'm fine with as long as it's obvious, and there should be a warning sign making people aware as well (I'm amazed how many people don't realize that bars have video surveillance of the entire area in use all the time).

I actually agree that audio taping or video and audio taping of government workers without permission should be just as much a violation of wiretapping laws as it is for civilians... because it IS for civilians.

Though I agree that in all these cases the people doing the filming and audio recording or just audio recording did break the law, but the punishment is outrageous and particularly outrageous in this case.

...if a government agent is out in public or on property you own or have leased, then you may record their actions, by video, by audio or otherwise.

... it is against the law IF it is done on private property that is not yours. THERE IS NO REASONABLE EXPECTATION OF PRIVACY IN A PUBLIC PLACE.

For the rest of us, it's open season.

And whether the recording is done in public or not doesn't enter into it. All this is covered in wiretapping and eavesdropping laws. All states have to comply with federal law concerning video and audio taping, but most states go further than the federal law. In almost all instances, audio recording whether in public or not is illegal without consent. Video taping without audio is far more permissible, and that's because of the eavesdropping laws (video isn't part of eavesdropping laws).

This is why surveillance video even in private spaces cannot include audio. This is what sucks about so much video and audio equipment being marketed that so easily and cheaply allows someone to videotape or audiotape (or both) without people knowing what the law is concerning how they can legally use that equipment, and I don't believe it is fair to people for this stuff to be so easily and widely marketed without making them aware of the laws concerning how it can be used... if it's so easily and cheaply available and so widely used then people just automatically think they can use it however they want legally, but they can't.

It doesn't matter if you don't like the laws, that's what they are, and if you break them you can expect to have to face the consequences.

PERSONALLY, I don't like the idea that anyone can videotape me especially secretly even when I'm in public without my consent. I don't like being filmed in private places like malls or private parking lots or anything like that either. It feels creepy, like I'm being spied on and I feel like it's an invasion of privacy. I particularly dislike personal video/photo/audio technology right is peoples' cellphones because it feels especially creepy to wonder if that strange guy over there is making a call or sending a text or videotaping me or taking pictures of me and what he'll be doing with them. LOOKING at me in public is one thing, it's the recording of me that may be used in ways I have no control over that I don't like. I don't care how far technology has progressed, it's that progression that's stripped away privacy rights people used to enjoy and causes a heightened sense of feeling like you're being spied on anytime you're out in public, and people shouldn't have to feel like that.

Concerning the case in the OP, this occurred in California which has wiretap/eavesdropping laws that make it illegal to audio record ANYONE whether in public or private or whether a government worker or not without their permission. Let's not forget that government workers are also civilians and have the same rights as other civilians. And like I said, though he did break the law, the punishment is just absolutely outrageous. It's particularly outrageous because if he ONLY videotaped the incident without the audio it would have been perfectly legal.

He is always encouraging kids to tape their teachers with their cell phones? Video and especially audio. Is that legal??

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There are single party consent states for audio recording. Also anyone in public has no expectation of privacy. The ruling is mixed when it comes to surveillance cameras and if placards are enough.

Illinois has a law barring video of peace officers as I recall.

The powers that be are afraid also.
They are afraid you will catch them breaking the law
They do not like that.........

That rascal filmed the assassination of JFK!