
If you see the cops, start recording - Tomte
https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/5/21281264/protests-police-violence-record-phone-video-right-legal
======
rectang
> _But before action was taken by city leaders, Buffalo police lied about the
> incident. In an initial statement, the department said that a person was
> arrested "during a skirmish with other protesters," and that "during that
> skirmish involving protesters, one person was injured when he tripped and
> fell." The video clearly refutes the statement, showing that there was no
> skirmish around the elderly man, and that the officers pushed him to the
> ground for no justifiable reason._

The Buffalo incident offers a vivid example of why police records should be
considered unreliable. Where are the "good cops" among the 20 or so in the
video who had the opportunity to speak up, but in practice chose to maintain
the blue wall of silence?

~~~
dominotw
There is parallel with pilots and airplane crashes. There is a tendency for
airlines to put the blame on a pilot in case of a crash, this disincentives
pilots from speaking the truth. Unfortunately the 'anti cop' sentiment would
have the same effect.

Imgaine how hard it is for us to admit a mistake at work which brings the
website down but here someone's life is at stake.

What happens if a cop makes a mistake and causes grave injury to someone. What
would be his incentive to admit mistake and possibly spend rest of his life in
prison.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
I'm a pilot. This isn't remotely a fair comparison. There are lots of very
complex and nuanced situations in aviation that require judgment calls. People
are going to get it wrong sometimes. We're human.

That's a far cry from this situation. There is no "judgment call" here: don't
violently shove elderly people to the ground for no reason. If you
accidentally do, help them up. If you pass by an elderly person lying on the
ground and bleeding, check on them.

There's no "mistake" here.

~~~
dominotw
> There's no "mistake" here.

I wasn't talking about this specific case though, not sure how you inferred
that from my comment that shoving old man was a mistake .

I was talking about a hypothetical case where it was indeed a mistake.

~~~
craftinator
Great, well in this case, this cop acted violently and aggressively towards a
senior citizen, who was killed through that cop's action. Not murder, but
definitely manslaughter. If you did that to someone, that's what you would be
going to jail for, and rightly so.

~~~
colejohnson66
Not at all excusing what happened, but was he actually killed? I thought he
was taken to a hospital and recovered?

~~~
craftinator
I apologise, I initially read that he had been killed, later followed up on
the article and they had posted a correction that he "easily could have been
killed". You are correct!

------
travjones
Cops may ask you not to record and even threaten you with arrest for
recording. Do not be intimidated; it is your right to record without
obstructing.

If you find yourself in a situation where you might be detained and thereby
unable to control interactions with your device, on iPhone you can disable
TouchID and FaceID by holding one of the volume buttons and the sleep/wake
button simultaneously for a few seconds. This will require you to enter your
passcode the next time you want to unlock iPhone. Anyone have similar
instructions for Android?

~~~
AnimalMuppet
If told to stop recording, I'd be tempted to reply, "Sir, I am recording for
your protection."

Note well: I have not actually tried this. IANAL, and this is not legal
advice. Your mileage may vary.

~~~
0xffff2
Why? What do you hope to achieve other than to possibly inflame the situation?
I can't possibly believe that you think the cop is going to think "gee, that's
a good point citizen, please carry on".

~~~
AnimalMuppet
It forces the cop to either _admit_ that he's a bad guy (or at least crossing
the line), or else to _not_ cross the line. It makes it so he can't try to
pretend to me that he's squeaky clean while actually doing dirty stuff.

~~~
losvedir
I don't think you're modeling the cop very well. They're not going to be in a
state to reason or debate with you, and the statement "for your protection" if
not paid close attention to sounds vaguely like a threat.

------
cwkoss
I think half of the police force should be 'armed' with nothing more than
cameras.

Arrests are not necessary in the vast majority of situations police are called
for, and recording technology is far superior to verbal testimony for serving
our courts

~~~
chrisco255
Cops carry guns because the situation can always get out of hand. Violent
criminals still exist in society.

EDIT: the ignorant people claiming average police officer does not deal with
violent criminals have obviously never worked as a first responder. They deal
with rape, suicide, murder, assault, domestic abuse, robbery, every week
unless they're some small town cop in a gilded neighborhood.

The cops in St. Louis, Chicago, Baltimore, NYC, etc, see it every single day.

I hear a lot of suggestions by people have have never done the job. People
making spurious claims about what police do and don't deal with on a daily
basis.

I would never support female cops without firearms, for example. A grown man
can easily overpower any woman, period. Especially when they are tweaked out
on drugs.

Cops carry a gun because they have less than 6 seconds to respond to deadly
situations that can save lives.

~~~
tbabb
Plenty of departments in other countries do not carry guns and do their jobs
just fine.

~~~
Yetanfou
Don't bring a knife to a gun fight. The US is saturated with firearms so it
would be foolish for the police not to carry. In the UK the situation used to
be different and to a certain extent still is, the police used to be unarmed
(are they still?). It should be noted however that the number of knife crimes
there is high - people tend to use the weapons at hand. This has led to a call
for a ban on pointy kitchen knives, as if that would change much (if
anything).

~~~
camgunz
This is an argument activists have made for years in favor of gun control. The
prevalence of guns in US society has made us objectively far less safe.

~~~
Yetanfou
There are two things to this:

Compare the rate of gun-related crime in a country like Switzerland (where
guns are readily available and many people have been trained to use them) with
that in Germany (where guns are as rare as hens teeth among the non-criminal
contingent of the population) and you'll notice that Switzerland does not
suffer unduly under a wave of gun crime. Why not? What is it in Swiss society
which makes it possible for people to have access to firearms, the training to
use them yet the wherewithal to know when _not_ to use them? Germany and
Switzerland are neighbours, they mostly speak the same language, they're both
affluent countries. What would Germany look like were firearms as widely
spread as they are in Switzerland? Now compare the Swiss data to those in the
USA and a clear difference shows. What is the difference between Swiss and
American society which can explain this difference? Is it affluence?
Switzerland is a rich country but so is the USA. Is it the fact that the
difference between rich and less affluent is bigger in the USA than it is in
Switzerland? Is it the amount of cultural diversity? The USA is a diverse
country, Switzerland is largely homogeneous. Is is the overarching culture? Is
it the difference in trust level? Switzerland is a high-trust country, the USA
is not.

The other part on the gun control question is the age-old adage that in
countries where guns are outlawed only outlaws have guns. They're not exactly
hard to come by after all. It seems to work in a country like Japan but it
probably takes Japanese culture as well as the physical lack of firearms on
the island nation to pull this off.

~~~
scarface74
Isn’t most crime caused by poverty? I would suspect that a country that both
has a functioning government and a reliable social safety net wouldn’t have as
much crime as one that doesn’t.

~~~
Yetanfou
Take a look at Sweden for an example of a country where poverty is more or
less absent due to a wide social safety net while crime is on the rise. It is
not poverty which causes gangs to go out and rob teenagers of their expensive
branded jackets, iPhones and sneakers. Some turn to crime to get luxury items,
some do it to dominate others (Denmark has created a specific category of
'dominance crime' for this phenomenon), some do it to gain street cred etc.

------
smogcutter
Semi off topic, but one thing that really bugs me about the dialogue around
police is when people (especially authority figures) call non-police
“civilians”. I get that you need a word for it, but “civilians” is a
particularly poor choice.

The police ARE civilians. They are not military, nor are they subject to
military justice or discipline, and their training and function in society is
(whether they like it or not) entirely different. They are members of the
community, not an occupying army.

This might seem like pedantry but it’s not: using the word civilian for non-
police takes the militarization of the police as an unquestioned assumption.

~~~
standardUser
Strongly agree. This is just one example of how police culture is toxic and
likely un-fixable without dramatic changes to the entire concept of policing.

------
Vysero
I haven't had a run in with the police in a long time. Based on a lot of the
video footage I have been seeing revolving around these riots I would say the
problem of police brutality is exceptionally larger than I was giving it
credit for being not just a few weeks ago. I hold out hope that the majority
of officers aren't like those I have seen in the media (left and right)
committing acts of unprovoked, and unnecessary violence, but I am starting to
loose some confidence in my conviction.

I have to be honest, I am not sure what the solution is here. On the whole, I
think they need better training, but what that would look like.. I am afraid
to say that topic is over my head.

------
throwawaylalala
I disagree with record; you should STREAM. Get it off the device so it can't
be conveniently destroyed and deleted.

~~~
korethr
Any suggestions for such a setup?

~~~
WilTimSon
ACLU has an app specifically for that, which uploads videos to them
automatically.

~~~
6gvONxR4sf7o
[https://www.aclu.org/issues/criminal-law-reform/reforming-
po...](https://www.aclu.org/issues/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police/aclu-
apps-record-police-conduct)

------
latchkey
A helpful resource for apps for recording:
[https://www.aclu.org/issues/criminal-law-reform/reforming-
po...](https://www.aclu.org/issues/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police/aclu-
apps-record-police-conduct)

------
CJefferson
Anyone have any good suggestions for android recorders? Preferably something
which will start uploading somewhere (dropbox? A server of my choice via ssh?)
ASAP

~~~
Zenbit_UX
If you install the Dropbox app there's a setting that let's you autosync your
DCIM folder with the cloud, beware the data cost if doing so outside of wifi.
Also, you may not want this setting on 24/7 or one day you'll be shocked to
see what Dropbox saved on your behalf.

~~~
StavrosK
SyncThing is a great alternative that syncs between your phone and any
computer you install it on (instead of some company's servers).

------
wayneftw
I haven't had a run-in with the police since I was in my twenties, but I think
just for fun - I'm going to get a bodycam, a dashcam and a bunch of security
cameras for my property.

You never know when they might come in handy.

Anyone have any general advice for building them yourself with a Pi or
Arduino?

~~~
dharmab
Don't build a dashcam yourself. Building batteries that don't fail in the heat
of a car parked in the sun is a hard problem, as is the automatic saving when
a crash occurs. Buy a dashcam with a proven reliable battery or capacitor.

------
werber
I almost always wear a shirt with a pocket so I can record without it being
obvious.

~~~
neilv
My layperson understanding is that there might be legal implications of the
"without it being obvious" part. For example, I don't know whether that could
be a problem in Massachusetts:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_call_recording_laws#...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_call_recording_laws#Two-
party_consent_states)

~~~
driverdan
That's for audio, not video. If you don't record the audio it wouldn't apply.
If you do you shouldn't hide it to be safe.

------
api
"Why are you worried about surveillance if you have nothing to hide?"

~~~
athenot
You are probably being downvoted because of the oft-repeated argument in favor
of surveillance of citizens by some form of authority.

However it's interesting how flipping that argument around would cause all
sorts of discomfort by the very people who advocated it in the other
direction. (Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe that was in fact the point
you were making.)

~~~
api
That was exactly my point. This is what people should tell the police in this
situation. It didn't get across.

------
readhn
-Don't Talk to the Police-

Regent Law Professor James Duane gives us startling reasons why we should
always exercise our 5th Amendment rights when questioned by government
officials.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE)

[http://www.olddominionbarassociation.com/Resources/Documents...](http://www.olddominionbarassociation.com/Resources/Documents/How%20to%20Invoke%20the%20Fifth%20Amendment.pdf)

------
trfhuhg
Does anyone know how a post with 200 comments and 230 upvotes published just 2
hours ago ends up on the 4th page?

~~~
colejohnson66
Flags.

------
aesh2Xa1
The NY ACLU app "stop and frisk" is now absent from the Play store. Any ideas?

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.nyclu.stop...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.nyclu.stop.and.frisk.watch)

