Atlanta Cops Caught Deleting Body Cam Footage, Failing To Activate Recording Devices
from the all-the-accountability-a-lack-of-internal-accountability-can-provide! dept
Atlanta, Georgia, August 23, 2016:
Officials are promising more transparency on the part of law enforcement, and greater trust between cops and the community. The body cameras “will strengthen trust among our officers and the communities they serve by providing transparency to officer interactions,” said Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed this past week in announcing a purchase.
Oh, we were all so very young then. Look at us (including me!), pointing to the increasing adoption of body cameras as the ushering in of a new era of transparency and accountability. Didn't take long for this lily to get unceremoniously de-gilded.
Cameras are great tools of accountability. They just can't be controlled and maintained by cops. Two years after promising a better police force brimming with accountable officers steadily working to rebuild relationships with the citizens they police, Atlanta residents are being informed their servants/protectors are cheats and liars.
The audit looked at a random sample of 150 videos from officers’ body cameras. In more than half the cases, officers failed to activate and deactivate their cameras at the required time, the audit said.
Officers also miscategorized 22 of the videos, including a use of force incident. Auditors said mislabeling the videos may have led to some being deleted prematurely.
And the audit said that officers failed to capture two-thirds of dispatched calls between November 2017 and May 2018.
These results shouldn't shock Atlanta residents or readers of this site. It doesn't even shock Atlanta Police officials. Police Chief Erika Shields says she's "not happy" with the results of the audit, but also "not surprised." She excuses her officers actions in the worst possible way:
"I knew that what we are asking of officers is a culture shift."
It's your job to make sure the "culture" actually "shifts," Chief Shields. That it hasn't budged despite the addition of body cameras says a whole lot about the culture at the top of the PD. Whatever discipline Shields has meted out (she only says it happens, not how frequently or severely) clearly isn't enough. And the culture that remains in place in the Atlanta PD is downright nasty.
Auditors identified 64 videos “that were deleted by users who should not have had been authorized to delete videos from the system” from November 2016 to 2018.
Officer use-of-force incident videos are supposed to be handled differently. Supervisors are supposed to upload them and they to be labeled properly in case the department or the public needs to review them later.
But the audit found APD supervisors routinely didn’t understand their responsibilities. One zone supervisor told auditors he was unaware that it was his job to upload use of force videos.
Officers know the system is flawed and abuse it. Those in charge of securing recordings officers may not want retained either don't know what they're doing or are playing dumb when questioned by auditors. At the top of the miserable heap is a chief who has allowed flagrant policy violations to occur under her watch.
An official worth a damn would never express their lack of surprise at this sort of behavior from underlings. There should be shock and dismay at these results, not a shrug of "They're cops, what can you do?" emanating from the top person in Atlanta law enforcement. If that's the official reaction, the next audit will just find more of the same.
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Filed Under: accountability, atlanta, body cameras, police
Reader Comments
The First Word
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Sooooooo
ooohhh wait....
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Re: Sooooooo
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Culture shift?
It wouldn't be a culture shift to let a camera run while you are doing police work. The culture shift would be actually doing what can be called police work.
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The police are not to be trusted
I once called an ambulance, and as is usual in my area, a sheriff's deputy was also called. I saw him and have it on video that they pocketed my Colt 1911 pistol and several gold coins.
Yeah, like I'm going to report that. I don't need a big red bulls eye on the back of my head. I can buy another pistol and more gold, but I can't purchase another life.
Most LEO are good people. The issue is when the good folks won't turn in the bad ones. It's hard to break loyalty with folks you work with, but it is worse to break the faith for those you work to protect. As long as there is even 5% of bad cops, I'm not going to trust you. So, if you are a cop, part of your job is to git rid of bad cops.
Bad cops make you less. We respect cops because we hold you to a higher standard. Not everyone is suited to be a cop. Only the best should be. Do not tolerate substandard policing.
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Re: The police are not to be trusted
When police protect their child-rapists, thieves, murderers, scammers and assaulter friends because they are part of the same gang, it is because they not only approve but are no less guilty than whichever of their brethren who themselves performed the acts.
And that means all civilians have reason to be fearing for their lives the moment they see those lights or badges anywhere.
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Re: The police are not to be trusted
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And you should replace every single one of them if their response to an independent 'witness' to their interactions with the public is to turn it off, or 'accidentally' label it saving a kitten from a tree instead of beating the mentally ill man within an inch of his life.
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Re:
TAC, the only problem with your *should* is that the chief lacks the cojones to carry it out.
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Re: Re:
Because CAs and DAs are just as much a part of the problem; they're the ones who go "nothing to see here, move along" when a cop is actually fucking caught for once.
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Re: Re:
TAC, the only problem with your should is that the chief lacks the cojones to carry it out.
By nature, 'SHE' already has a lack of cojones. She might surprise us with the fortitude to implement changes.
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Fuck the Police
If any given officer isn't committing the crimes then they're helping cover another who is. They're *all* part of the problem. Not one of them can be trusted.
The unions are a massive part of the problem. The solution seems to be to disband the police across the nation and replace them with a new set of law enforcement personnel called something other than "police". Ban unions and start off with all the rules we now know we need to govern and restrict our law enforcement. Build in a system of public oversight and tie law enforcement income / continued employment to their behavior and ability to follow the rules. Eliminate the profit motive of forfeiture.
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Re: Fuck the Police
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We all know why they turn off the cameras and there is a simple solution.
No video....no charges.
-or-
No video - no conviction
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no video, no bail
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No video, no oxygen.
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how many comments to any of this??
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Serial Podcast
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A few bad (orchards worth of) apples
And yet another case where where you've got rampant corruption, or, in the best case scenario, gross incompetence on the part of people who have guns as standard equipment.
Because holding people who can literally decide matters of life and death with almost zero risk on their part to no standards makes perfect sense.
And they wonder why people are increasingly distrustful of them and have ever decreasing levels of respect for them.
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Simple solution
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Re: Simple solution
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Re: Re: Simple solution
Every Nation eats the Pint chips it Deserves!
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'Whoops, looks like that damning evidence was deleted.'
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Re: 'Whoops, looks like that damning evidence was deleted.'
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Re: Re: 'Whoops, looks like that damning evidence was deleted.'
Hope they enjoy desk work...
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Cameras should be on any time the uniform is worn
Much of this can be fixed with technology.
Cameras with all-day battery life and capacity are now cheap.
The cameras should be sewn into the uniform with a motion sensor - they stay on from the moment the uniform is moved, and stay on for 15 minutes after the last movement. No "off" switch.
Cameras are charged and downloaded overnight; putting on a uniform with a less-than-fully-charged battery is a firing offense.
And all videos should be saved for a minimum of 2 years.
(I hear YouTube will save all the videos you like, for free.)
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Re: Cameras should be on any time the uniform is worn
Who watches the watchers? The citizens do.
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Re: Re: Cameras should be on any time the uniform is worn
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Re: Re: Re: Cameras should be on any time the uniform is worn
I think you'd have small-scale tyrants operating with impunity within hours.
We need police. We also need to control them. It's difficult, but the alternatives are worse.
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