It’s October as I write this, and the top tech story seems to be the glitches in the launch of the HealthCare.gov website, which went live on October 1. But it’s a local tragedy that grabs my attention.
On October 22 near Santa Rosa, a young man carrying what appeared to be an assault rifle was shot and killed by a Sonoma County Sheriff’sdeputy. It was almost immediately discovered that the victim’s weapon was a BB gun designed to mimic the appearance of an assault rifle. The problem: There are no independent eye witnesses (obviously, both deputies involved—one was being trained at the time—were witnesses, but hardly independent). We can’t see what happened.
That’s the common thread with the Trayvon Martin shooting earlier this year in Florida. There were several partial—and conflicting—eyewitness accounts. We’ll never know for sure what really happened between Martin and George Zimmerman because, again, we can’t see what happened.
After the Sonoma County shooting, I asked a person I respect, who’s a police chief, about how his officers would respond in the same situation. Here’s what he told me: “If a person is attacking an officer and is within 15 feet with a knife, officers are trained to shoot—at that distance they can stab you before you can draw your gun. A Taser can be used at distances greater than 15 feet. A Taser is never used against a gun.
“Officers never shoot to wound. If [the subject] has a gun in his or her hands, officers should at least have their weapons drawn and pointed at the subject. If there’s any ever-so-slight movement with the gun, the subject should be shot. Shooting at an arm or leg is bad—if you miss, the bullet keeps going and may hit someone. We aim [for] center-of-mass to take them down quickly. If you wound them, they can still kill you.” A subsequent article in The Press Democrat (tinyurl.com/mfbk4o4) indicates that most law enforcement agencies follow a similar protocol.
I think one of the reasons people are outraged by police shootings is that they have no understanding of how police are trained to respond in various types of situations. Whether you agree or not, it’s pretty clear from this description that a gun in your hands immediately escalates the stakes to life and death. There’s also a failure to appreciate that no one, even a police officer, is expected to die for his or her job. The rules try to ensure that both suspect and officer end up alive when a potentially lethal situation arises. But are the rules being followed? All too frequently, we can’t see if they are.
By now, you probably know where I’m going. Wouldn’t some sort of continuous surveillance just be better for everyone? The police chief I quoted said his officers like cameras, because a recording frequently stops a claim of police abuse in its track. The company that makes Tasers even offers a camera attachment (Taser Cam), which starts recording video once the Taser itself is armed. And, of course, who could forget the television show “Cops,” which has spun gold out of police vehicle camera footage.
It’s important that a recording is impartial. One of the downsides of the Taser Cam is it only starts recording when it’s armed, which means precipitating events may not be captured.
Of course, there have been incidents where some police officers haven’t been happy about being filmed in public by private citizens. For example, in April 2012, the city of Boston paid $170,000 to settle a civil rights lawsuit stemming from the 2007 felony arrest of a man videotaping the way a suspect was handled by Boston police. On the other hand, this three-minute YouTube video is pretty amazing (youtu.be/vyS7Qr58wkU). It shows a pleasant encounter between a police officer and a man carrying a pistol—holstered and in plain sight—who is also recording the exchange. Both parties play by the rules of engagement, and that’s recorded on video. The cop does an excellent job, and I strongly suspect he’s been well trained by his department (which is a good thing).
There’s even a trend toward bringing your own surveillance. In Russia, many people have so-called “dashcams” installed in their cars, because of the need to prove what happened in traffic accidents. Basically, a dashcam keeps a running audio and video record of the last few hours (determined by the size of the SD memory card you plug into it). So many people have dashcams in Russia that scientists were able to determine the impact site of a recent meteorite by triangulating views from dashcams in a nearby city. Wouldn’t it be great if insurance companies offered a discount for a dashcam? Of course, that will only happen if it can be shown that dashcam footage helps lower their costs more than the cost of the discounts.
Similarly, cyclists have started wearing helmet cams to show how they’re sometimes treated on the road. One U.K. cyclist recorded an incident where he sounded the “air horn” on his bicycle (a nice loud horn) to warn a driver he was close. The driver chased him down and attacked him. I know my cyclist readers will want to see the video, which can be found here: tinyurl.com/muf8ecv (along with the full story). U.K. police only “cautioned” the driver, meaning he was given a formal warning, which is recorded in police files. The driver admitted he was at fault. Unfortunately, the video went viral, and since the driver was identifiable, he received hundreds of email and phone threats.
Finally, I give you SurveillantCameraMan, who walks around recording people in public (youtube.com/user/SurveillantCameraMan). It’s obnoxious and creepy, but only because there’s obviously someone behind the camera. The content isn’t all that different than what is (or could be) recorded by existing security cameras. And that’s sort of the point. We’re all being recorded. For the most part, we’re unaware of it. And yet, at the times when it might be truly useful to have a video record, we can’t see what really happened.
