Police arrest a college student taping police activities as part of a group called "Cop Watch"

Originally posted by ~Lucidity
reply to post by dainoyfb

 

Uh huh....to varying degrees, but not by a person tailing ya all day. And now that you bring it up, do you love it?

edit on 1/22/2011 by ~Lucidity because: (no reason given)

No, I don't. But as a public figure employed by a government organization which has lost the trust of the people I would expect it as part of the job. I do however love being able to treat them with the same courtesies that they treat us.

As an LEO I don't mind Copwatch we have a group in my city. I convinced some to ride along(no cameras allowed), I have even told them which beats the rookies would be working. If they are going to be watching you be nice to them or they might put some edited videos on youtube I get along fine with Copwatch.

Secure

reply to post by DimensionalDetective


No way should filming anything in public be considered unlawful.

The cop intended to confiscate evidence that might be used against him. That's what's illegal.

...Best film on phone, hit send quick.

Here' is video of LEO's & TSA making a similar arrest for video taping and not showing ID.

He was aquited friday the 21st of January 2011 (yesterday). Here's my my thread "Seattle man acquitted of disobeying a TSA agent"..



Notice how they ask him to quit taping and when he refuses they say well you can be arrested then you can check into it more.

Love this guy, since he seems to know the rules better than the LEO's & TSA do.

Originally posted by jdub297

Originally posted by Klassified
Gee, what a surprise. NOT.

What's good for the goose, is good for the gander. If we can be taped without our consent, so can they. Unfortunately, they will win out on this in the end. But it doesn't make it right. A case on this needs to go all the way to the scotus, although I'm not sure that one case would or could make the difference. But multiple cases might.

It depends on local/state laws, but they may be subject to question if they are too restrictive.

We just had an Indy-area cop caught by a fed-up driver as he sped through streets, ran stop signs, etc.:

A Greenwood police officer has been reprimanded over cell phone video that appeared to show him speeding and disregarding traffic signals.

Officer reprimanded over traffic violations on video

Of course, now he and his buddies will BOLO for the whistleblower.

jw

Sometimes it really does work out in our favor, though not often. But it's still nice to hear about. A few years ago one of our Sherriffs dept. got busted dealing drugs. I felt bad for the good deputies on the force, because they're decent guys, and it made them look bad. But I was glad to see the one go down.

So now he needs to sue for harassment.

reply to post by getreadyalready


"The law in Florida is that both parties have to be aware of the recording, so the kid was in plain view, and the cop was aware of him, so the law was satisfied.
Lawyers are going to rip this law apart in court, but that doesn't help out on the street when you are being bullied into compliance."

no, they can NOT stop you from filming police at work in the "public view" There is no constutitional basis for this law. In fact the current case dec isions would smackdown the law because the fact that the police was in the public..... there is no way this could be constutitional. I hope the ACLU or any media outlet takes this to the supremes because if they denie the citizens the right of looking and recording things in the public view then Amierica is lost and the revolt will soon begin ....

It's always nice to know that the employees run the show, eh?

The employees can do whatever they wish while the employer must sit back and take it. Hell, isn't that how every successful business is run?

These employees need to be shown they are just that and they need to be shown it soon. The fact that us as the employers are expected to kowtow to the employees needs to cease and needs to do so soon.

I find it interesting that there is one employee for every 1000+ employers yet the employers continue allowing the employees to dictate terms.

reply to post by fnpmitchreturns


RIght. That is what I was trying to say. There has to be a reasonable expectation of privacy, and a public street doesn't provide that. So it is not illegal to film them on the public streets. Now in the OP, they claimed it was "evidence" and it may be, but they had no right to arrest the kid.

I found his arrest record..

Pinellas County Sheriff - WIlliam Kilgore

They arrested him for...

Offense Description: RESISTING ARREST W/O VIOLENCE (OBSTRUCTION)

One of the classic "catch all" charges that it appears some police use for people who are guilty of "pop" (****ing off police). Once I had an old officer tell me "PoP isn't a crime. But lots of cops try to make it a capital offense."

Anyway - that's it. No wiretapping, eavesdropping or anything. Unless they boost up some more charges on this kid it seems he's just guilty of "pop" - at least that's my opinion.

Curious. Carlos Miller, a photography activist was arrested and charged with that too. Also it was dropped. Cop in that case didn't even try to make it stick. Seriously stupid charge.

whatever your opinion on the ethical grounds of filming enforcement it's undeniable that they could easily write it off as intent to perform gang activities or as actual gang activities aimed at police officers.

why waste time with courts and get a visit/wake up call at 4AM, like that whistle-blower in Florida who caught the EPA dumping waste.

just build one of these:

SIXTHSENSE

and control it with something like this:

XWAVE
look! no hands!

then anonymously upload/stream or whatever, to Youtube in a pinch
or even better:
www.injusticeeverywhere.com...

going to court will just give any abusive/criminal LEO's all your info,the better to harass you/set you up, so...
there is still the court of public opinion.
after all, if they've got nothing to hide...

you can still tape them, just don't go up to their face and jam a camera in it.

if someone was filming me the way some people film cops, i wouldn't show that much restraint.

you should film them from a distance and use a hd camera with a good zoom, you could be 80 feet and film like your only a couple of feet away with a good quality camera.

cops are human and some of them a-holes. that's not a good combination, especially when they are carrying guns and tasers.

so does this mean that the owner of any recording that has a police officer in it is in violation? even incidentally? lets say you're minding your own business shooting video of whatever for your own personal amusement and a police car drives into frame. can you then be arrested if you do not relinquish your tape? this seems pretty arbitrary i know but where is the line drawn with regard to this "law"? has anyone encountered even a half-assed attempt at an explanation of why this is illegal?

Originally posted by dainoyfb
What specific charge was the arrest based on? I haven't seen anything mentioned about that?

He was charged with:
RESISTING ARREST W/O VIOLENCE (OBSTRUCTION) Statute: 843.02/M
From search of William Kilgore at Pinellas County Jail "Who's In Jail":
www.pcsoweb.com...

Billy might have been arrested while recording the police, but he was arrested for, and charged with, "obstructing" police.

The cop probably knew recording police in public was ok, but got around that by claiming the "tape" was EVIDENCE... per the article: ".. an officer walked up and said the tape was evidence.." .

Asking William to surrender evidence of a crime is a "lawful order",... like it or not,... refusing a police officers lawful order is "obstructing" and or "delaying"... a misdemeanor committed in the officers presence, ergo an arrestable offense.

Laws are very aggressive when it comes to preserving "evidence", for example in Cal if a police officer outside your door reasonably believes "evidence" inside is being destroyed.. warrant-less / forcible entry is justified, considered "exigent circumstances".

Originally posted by diodotus
whatever your opinion on the ethical grounds of filming enforcement it's undeniable that they could easily write it off as intent to perform gang activities or as actual gang activities aimed at police officers.

Not true. They can try to do that. They can say that out loud in an effort to scare someone. However filming in itself is never illegal. They need proof of such plans/activities which is a different crime.

Originally posted by GovtFlu

He was charged with:
RESISTING ARREST W/O VIOLENCE (OBSTRUCTION) Statute: 843.02/M
From search of William Kilgore at Pinellas County Jail "Who's In Jail":
www.pcsoweb.com...

Billy might have been arrested while recording the police, but he was arrested for, and charged with, "obstructing" police.

Interfering or "obstruction" can only be used when there is significant efford to mess with the cops. Such as standing in way, physically touching them or getting on their face. So we know this whole charge is based on a lie to begin with.

The cop probably knew recording police in public was ok, but got around that by claiming the "tape" was EVIDENCE... per the article: ".. an officer walked up and said the tape was evidence.." .

Asking William to surrender evidence of a crime is a "lawful order",... like it or not,... refusing a police officers lawful order is "obstructing" and or "delaying"... a misdemeanor committed in the officers presence, ergo an arrestable offense.

They can say that all they want but that is another lie. Makes you wonder if the cop actually knew this and did it on purpose or was just unqualifed. It's not a "lawful order". By definition it is actually "unlawfull order". Cops cant just come up to you and make something up like "If you dont jump off that bridge we're gonna arrest you for not obeying a lawful order".

Laws are very aggressive when it comes to preserving "evidence", for example in Cal if a police officer outside your door reasonably believes "evidence" inside is being destroyed.. warrant-less / forcible entry is justified, considered "exigent circumstances".

Yes they are but they dont apply to this kind of situation. They'd need a warrant to get that evidence.

Meanwhile, Kilgore wants to know why the Tarpon Springs police are so scared of his filming. He says it raises a lot of other questions.

What happened to "if you have nothing to hide, then theres nothing to worry about".

The Police in the UK, especially London, have been guilty of these tactics before, but have now been put in their place. Under the Terrorism Act, it is illegal to film "military personel or installations if it is likely that such could be used in preparing for an act of terrorism". Under this quite specific law, the Met Police seemed to think

1. That they were military
   
2. That they could prevent anyone from filming anything without suspicion
   
3. And that they could confiscate and destroy any such recordings
   

It got to the point where tourists were being stopped filiming or photographing Buckingahm Palace! It all came to a head when a news crew was harrassed and they took it to court. As a result, the Met now have new "guidance" on the law, basically meaning they got caught out abusing their power and have been slapped down.

What is ironic in this whole thing is that we have programmes like "Police, Camera, Action!" and "Road Wars" where the suspects will protest at being filmed and the Police will tell them "It's a public place, they can film what they like"... Nice hypocrasy chaps!

I even fell foul of some over zealous officer once filming some activity near my house. I was walking to the shops one day and noticed a raid going on (cannabis farm - if only I had known!). I stopped to film the whole thing, as it was an interesting event in an otherwise uninteresting little market town and some officers took offence to this. Fortunately, I knew the law, to the letter I might add, where as they obviously didn't.

Firstly, when asked to relinquish my camera, I asked if the Superintendant had declared this area as subject to the Terrorism Act and as such special provisions applied, the answer was "no".

Secondly, i asked if they were military personnel, to which the answer came back "no".

So then, I asked, "what law am I breaking?",

"You're not allowed to film the Police", was the answer.

"Oh really, I said, what specific Act of Parliament and what section was this then?"

No one could answer that, but they still insisted I hand over my phone. At that point, I quoted the Terrorism Act and the specific sub section to them, greeted by glazed expressions and advised them that the confiscation of my property and any deletion of images would result in me filing Theft and Criminal Damage charges against them. At this point, I think they decided it wasn't worth the hassle and they had bit off more than they could chew. One did try to threaten me with arrest fro breach of the peace, mind you.

Again, I asked exactly how I had "breached the peace", again quoting verbatim that particular Law and asking when I had used "threatening, violent or aggressive behaviour or language likely to cause a nuisance or distress".

Again, glazed expressions and the realisation that I wasn't an ordinary Pleb and was best left alone.

It pays to know your rights. I like to wind them up too, I have a few stories to tell about me getting one over on the Fuzz, it's a hobby of mine. But then, I suspect, it's safer to do so in the UK as they aren't armed!