Slashdot | Recording Police Misconduct is Illegal

Matthew Gaylor freematt at coil.com
Mon Jul 16 13:13:17 PDT 2001


"Aimee Farr" <aimee.farr at pobox.com> wrote:
>BTW, Mass. has always been "funny" about electronic surveillance. State
>history is very interesting, and so is the law. (Early on, their police
>wouldn't wiretap, it was not "gentlemanly." Ahem.)

In Ohio curiously enough, it is legal to record as long as one of the 
parties involved know that there is a recording being made.  So in 
Ohio recording the police would be OK as long as you personally do 
the recording.  However, this spring near the Ohio State University, 
there had been an on going problem with out of control drinking 
parties that spawned setting fires, turning over cars, and tossing 
bottles and rocks at the police.

Over the years the police have responded with riot tactics, liberal 
use of pepper spray and giving students and residents free civic 
lessons on what happens when you're on the wrong side of a PR-24 or 
ASP baton. Which in turn has caused a plethora of civil rights 
lawsuits many being settled out of court and the city routinely hands 
out millions each year to settle claims.  What I did find surprising 
this year was watching a TV news video of the police spraying pepper 
spray from a fire extinguisher size sprayer at residents filming the 
police in action.  The police spokesperson said something to the 
effect that "The public has got to understand that it is just 
unacceptable to videotape the police from a porch in a riot 
situation."  The resident got sprayed on his own porch, not doing 
anything more violent than filming the Police.  This must be the 
latest technique to minimize another Rodney King episode from 
happening in the first place...Just think what might have happened if 
the King chronicler got peppered with a few large bursts.

So I guess the moral of the story is that if you must record the 
police you should do so clandestinely.

Regards,  Matt-


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