Police Officer Who Shot Man in Missouri Did Not Have Body Cam Activated

[Omaha Steve]

Source: ABC News

By MEGHAN KENEALLY and PAUL H.B. SHIN

The police officer who shot and killed a man on Tuesday in Berkeley, Missouri, was given a body camera but it was not activated at the time of the shooting, officials said today.

The shooting sparked new unrest in a region already reeling following an August police shooting a few miles away in Ferguson. About 200 to 300 protesters gathered at the gas station where Tuesday night's shooting happened.

When asked whether he was concerned that the officer's body cam was not activated, Berkeley Mayor Theodore Hoskins said he was "not concerned."

"At this point it's relatively new," Hoskins said of the body cameras. "We only have three [body cams], so if it had been six months from today and we had gone through all the training I would have some concerns."

FULL story at link.

Surveillance video: http://abcnews.go.com/US/video/surveillance-video-released-missouri-shooting-27810540


Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/US/police-officer-shot-man-missouri-body-cam-activated/story?id=27813137

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

1. Simple way to resolve this...

First we must have cameras on every cop nationwide.

Then what are the odds the camera would malfunction at the same time the cop will be shooting a suspect?

Almost incalculable therefore you fine the officer a months pay if the camera is not activated during an incident.

If that doesn't work, two months, etc.

[gopiscrap]

3. I totally agree!!!

[bigdarryl]

5. Cameras on police are a JOKE who's going to

Enforce they wear them.This guy had one and look it wasn't on

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

6. Make not wearing them or turning them on financially punitive to the point where they will

[melm00se]

11. will the police unions

buy into this?

it would almost certainly make this part of ant collective bargaining agreement

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

12. Never, they wouldnt. Their unions must be terminated but that is only part of the problem

WE simply cant control police as long as they have the excuse that our populace is armed.

[ColesCountyDem]

13. Did I just read a progressive posting that "Their unions must be terminated"?

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

14. Police only and yes, you will see many liberals saying that now about police only, nothing new

and I wouldnt agree to this until the last SEVERAL murders by police, it took me too long, actually.

Take a poll, ask how many people believe ending their unions is a necessary step,, temporarily, to gain control over them and to stop the killing...

[ColesCountyDem]

21. I don't care how many people are saying it.

Union busting is NOT a progressive value, period.

[brush]

78. For the most part police unions are a thing apart from traditional unions

Their legacy is not from pitched battles where many union strikers fought and died to establish fair pay and safe working conditions for their members . . . often time they died at the hands of police.

Different animals all together.

[Igel]

31. For whom to gain control over them?

Non-police?

Perhaps we should make sure that the Teamsters aren't controlled by teamster members, and the AFL-CIO isn't controlled by people that are actually members. Only then can proper control of unions by everybody for the benefit of everybody be assured.

Or perhaps instead of "proper control of unions by everybody" is a misnomer. It should be "proper control by the right-thinking people who know best" is what's important here. It's obvious that every American would agree on who the True Right-Thinking People are. Not.

NB: Every union acts first and foremost for the benefit of its members. That's why in some jurisdictions public-employee unions can't legally strike. It's a convenient bit of PR that unions act in the public interest. When police unions defend policemen, they're acting on behalf of their members. When teachers unions strike for higher pay, nobody seriously thinks that with higher pay the rank-and-file teacher will suddenly know more about his/her content area or about pedagogy. When steel workers threatened to strike during WWII and did strike just afterwards, nobody assumed higher quality product would be forthcoming. Behind just about every workplace safety issue that affects customers or clients is a worker-safety or comfort issue. Few make large personal sacrifices altruistically.

[Hoppy]

19. Yes, they don't need no freedom of assembly or speech.

[avebury]

23. Police untions should be allowed, HOWEVER, they

should not be allowed to act in a manner contrary to public safety. There is a difference between a union that exists to protect the rights of its members, it is a whole other thing when they protect the thugs. It is hard to be on the side of police unions when they are part of the problem and are perceived more like mafia enforcers then groups that exist to support workers' rights.

All police officers should be required to wear a body camera, as much to protect the officer as to protect the public. If an officer is doing his/her job according to their PD's mission statement to protect and serve then there is no reason for them be against wearing a body camera. You have to think that officer fighting it is doing so because they probably have something to hide.

Body cameras should be mandatory. If a cop refuses to wear one or refuses to keep it turned off then he/she can find themselves another job.

[ColesCountyDem]

43. "...act in a manner contrary to public safety...."

Who gets to define that phrase?

[whathehell]

54. "Who gets to define that phrase"?....The people they are victimizing, maybe?

Seriously..My dad was a union organizer and I'm one of the most pro-union

people you will find, BUT...This shit HAS to stop!

[ColesCountyDem]

55. I agree it needs to stop, but...

It's a very slippery slope to start limiting the right to bargain collectively. Once you OK it for one union, then it becomes OK to do to every union, and I don't think it's a good idea to 'go there'.

[whathehell]

57. True, there may be another way,

but they better do something, because this is becoming INSANE and OBSCENE!

[pocoloco]

27. Every group has it's 10 percenters with their head up their ass

and a varied assortment of trolls!

[melm00se]

15. anyone else

you want to strip the right to collectively bargain?

Scott Walker (and the Wisconsin Supreme Court) was vilified for that kind of proposal and action.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

16. Nope, ONLY police and ONLY temporarily and ONLY until we can stop them from murdering

people, at random with ZERO consequences

Hell, the consequence for Wilson was a million dollars, as i recall..

He may have lost that job too, but if he wasnt a millionaire he could get hired elsewhere as a cop, which is the reason police forces have to be under a national supervision of some sort

[melm00se]

18. to do this

would require legislation and do you think that any union would support any legislator who voted for this?

Most unions would see this as just the first step to limit (or eliminate) them.

[LincolnsLeftHand]

33. So you propose eliminating police unions across the nation because of a shooting in Missouri?

When we don't even have the entire story and all of the evidence at this point indicates the individual who was shot pointed a gun at the police officer. And what is "temporary" and how do you propose that we stop police from "murdering"? I really dislike this concept, as well as the knee-jerk blaming of police officers. None of this is particularly progressive.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

35. Just because of one shooting, yep...come on, get serious or why should i bother

responding...

One shooting

ONE SHOOTING?

[LincolnsLeftHand]

37. So which shootings

Do you think justify eliminating ALL police unions across the country? You want to do away with union protection for all of the police officers serving because why exactly? These same police officers who are working today, tonight, tomorrow and every other day of the year in every city across the country, the vast majority of whom never fired a gun in anger.

[ncjustice80]

42. Becaue most are all civil rights violating, racist thugs.

And the ones that arent cover up for the otjers amd this are just as bad.

[LincolnsLeftHand]

44. Really?

"Most" police officers are "racist thugs"? That's a ridiculous statement without any factual support. And if you think that is true, then what is the solution? It certainly isn't eliminating police unions.

[uppityperson]

47. why do you say only "fired... in anger"? What about fear, hatred, indifference?

Does working 24\7 incur some special privileges? I ask because there are many professions and jobs that fall into that category but don't seem to get the leeway cops do so wanted to check. And "serving"? I thought cops were employees, paid for by tax dollars, like public school teachers, fire fighters, public librarians.

I find it odd how you indicate these things make police special.

[gopiscrap]

70. Welcome to DU

[brush]

79. Yeah, but they left the police union out of it . . .

it was so obvious and transparent that they were curry favor with the police union in case they were needed to bust heads of the other unionists.

[Android3.14]

32. That is an idiotic statement

At so many levels.
Please note, I am calling the statement idiotic.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

34. SO the population being armed like nowhere else isnt part of the problem?

[Android3.14]

36. So the right to bear arms means the government should restrict some workers from unionizing?

You are misusing the concepts of correlation and cause.

[LincolnsLeftHand]

38. You want to do away with Unions

AND take away the Second Amendment rights that the founders of this country thought so important they needed to be enshrined in the Bill of Rights?

[GGJohn]

93. Did you say that police unions must be terminated?

Not a very progressive position on a progressive chat board.

[ncjustice80]

41. Make it a criminal offense.

A cop gets in an incident/receives a complaint ans their body cam wasnt turned on? Instant termination and their ass gets arrested and prosecuted.

[tabasco]

69. Never been in the military?

You make it a PART OF THE UNIFORM and if you don't have that shit on you get reprimanded / fined / fired / jailed, in order.

I believe the police, like the Army, have supervisors who are responsible for enforcing standards.

[duhneece]

20. There are body cam's automatically activated

...when the gun is pulled from holster.
Easy Pea-sy.
Can't be more costly than a single human being's life.

[whathehell]

58. They should be utilized..

because the current situation is a fucking outrage and NOT sustainable.

[ManiacJoe]

90. You want the camera activated long before the gun is pulled.

[duhneece]

92. I agree. Can we demand both?

...Just in case the camera 'somehow' isn't activated before the gun comes out of the holster. And more of us need to record police/civilian interactions when we can. AND demand police record every interrogation.

[Chemisse]

72. Exactly. The consequences need to be severe.

Although if the cop is trying to cover up an unjustified act of violence, no fine will deter him from deleting the footage and calling it a malfunction.

[L0oniX]

2. Good thing the cam is not the same thing as a gun or there would be some serious problems.

"At this point it's relatively new," Hoskins said of the body cameras. "We only have three , so if it had been six months from today and we had gone through all the training I would have some concerns."

Was the safety on?


This fuck stick is a mayor?

[gopiscrap]

4. Imgine that!

[Taitertots]

7. How much training does it take to turn it on?

Can you image trying to pull that BS at another job?

Someone died, but I couldn't be bothered to turn on the only thing that could help determine whether or not I was at fault.

[LibGranny]

8. How convenient!

[dixiegrrrrl]

9. Buy 'em books, send them to school and what do they do?

They eat the covers.

[7962]

10. What does he mean by "not activated"? Like a cell phone or what?

If he had it issued and was allowed to use it, then it SHOULD have been on.
This must become a job requirement.

[JTFrog]

17. The dashcam was magically off as well.

Go figure.

[Indydem]

61. If the lights weren't on, the cam is off.

Only in the mind of someone looking for a conspiracy are simple facts about life enough to support their search.

[morningfog]

80. Have you ever seen an African-American killing you can't defend?

[Indydem]

81. That's a ludicrous inquiry.

I've long been on the record that the killings of John Crawford and Tamir Rice are absolute police injustices.

I also think that Eric Garner was killed unlawfully, unfortunately not by the officer who put him in the choke hold, but by the 9 people kneeling on him and crushing the wind out of him. I think that's why there was no indictment, because the choke hold was probably testified to being irrelevant to his death.

So, to answer your bullshit question, there are plenty of killings of African Americans that I have issues with. I think that cops have a perception bias towards African American males. It's not racism and I have no idea what you can do about it, but it's a problem.

That doesn't change a damn thing about the dash cam footage.

[BronxBoy]

87. The cams only work when the

Lights are on? I never knew that. Actually I never really knew how they activated

[Indydem]

88. That's the way I have always seen them

Generally speaking whether it is a traffic stop, or a chase, lights are on. That's how they tied them to conserve recording a lot of donut shop parking lots.

[tomm2thumbs]

22. how about free body cams to the PUBLIC, and they start within 100 yards of any police officer

Hi-def, transmitting directly to the web

[JimDandy]

76. There's a novel idea! n/t

[Triana]

24. Because cops forget their gear all the time.

"Woops, where'd I put my gun?"

"Oh darn, can't find my handcuffs."

[Spirochete]

25. What a coincidence...

Cop thinks "well, I won't get away with leaving the camera off every day, so I'd better shoot someone today"

[unblock]

26. if i were on a jury, i would take that as a sign of malintent.

malintent of what might depend, but malintent of something.

[christx30]

29. The autopsy of the guy will show

most of what we need to know.
When i was in high school in Austin, there was a teenager that was shot by a cop down the railroad tracks from where I live. 2 weeks after the shooting, they released the autopsy results. The only way the bullet's path would happen is if the guy had his right arm raised up in front of him, as one would if he were holding a gun.

[unblock]

45. an autopsy may or may not be particularly revealing.

to be helpful in that regard:

first, the injuries would have to narrow down the possible arm positions to either only positions consistent with holding a gun or only positions consistent with not holding a gun.

second, the result has to be consistent with the other evidence. if there there's no gun at the scene, or if the gun ended up somewhere that's inconsistent with the injuries or other facts, then the arm position doesn't suggest much.

third, having an *arm* in a position consistent with holding a gun doesn't necessarily mean you *are* holding a gun, or even that your hand necessarily would look like you were.

finally, holding and pointing a gun is likely not the only possible explanation for any particular arm position. someone could be shot while reaching out to shake someone's hand and might suffer the same injuries.

[uppityperson]

49. thank you, well put, better than I did.

[uppityperson]

48. as if he were holding a gun, that is the problem. not only when, but as if

because there are situations in which the arm and have could also be in this position that did not involve a gun.

[logosoco]

30. And yet we have young people taking multiple selfies during just a trip to the bathroom!

This sounds like a real crap excuse. But, then again, watching Eric Garner get murdered while being recorded didn't make much difference anyway.

[NJCher]

85. It didn't make any difference in the outcome of the grand jury

However, it made a hell of a difference in the response of people.

The visual removing the doubt in the minds of many people, they turned out in protest.


Cher

[valerief]

39. Unless there are serious repercussion for these killer cops who turn off their cams,

this killer cop rampage will continue, as it has for our country's history.

[DeSwiss]

40. What a coincidence, imagine that.

- Give these assholes cams with no off switch.

Problem solved.

[Indydem]

46. And what do you do with all that video?

How do you store 8gb per officer per shift per day?

[DeSwiss]

53. They could ask the NSA how it does it for starters.

- But we're not talking about ''reels of films'' nor bulky VCR tapes. I have flash thumb-drives whose dimensions are approximately 1'' x.5'' x .25'' with 16GB capacity.



They cost me about $3.50 a piece.

At that size, you could tape an officer's whole career and store it in a shoebox and have room leftover for a dozen donuts......

[Indydem]

59. Overly simplistic

The reality is that it can't be stored on thousands of individual thumb drives or SD cards.

The proper way to do it is to download it, label it with the officer and the date and shift, and store it on spinning drives with redundant backups.

You may think that's simple enough, but that's going to require a staff of IT personnel to do the work and keep it operating properly.

OR we could just set rules that officers turn the cameras on during interactions and accept the fact that on occasion human error may cause officers trying to do their job to forget to turn them on.

[DeSwiss]

62. Agreed, it is too simple.

And besides, I think putting cams on them is a stupid way to address this problem anyway. The main key is to stop giving racists and psychopaths guns, but that's another story for another time.

I was only suggesting albeit hyperbolically, that there was a way to avoid them turning the damn things off. I sure as hell don't want to add to the expense of having them around in vivo, nor two-dimensionally. Getting rid of the majority of them would be the best way of handling the ''police problem'' in my opinion.

- But I really don't give a crap either way, as I'm with George......

[uncle ray]

65. actually, it's quite easy to deal with.

many of the police body cameras automatically upload their data when installed on their charging dock. it requires practically zero manpower until data is to be recovered. no doubt, there are cloud based solutions to uploading video too. in fact, there have been several recent stories of police trying to delete videos of their actions off of people's phones, only to find they were automatically uploaded to their cloud.

the other posters point is that data storage is now very affordable, would you like prices on terabyte drives? storage for an entire departments video for a year would cost less than a single ballistic vest.

[Indydem]

60. Interesting article.

http://www.npr.org/2014/12/19/371821093/transparency-vs-privacy-what-to-do-with-police-camera-videos

[Niceguy1]

56. execpt that there are situations

That the right to privacy overrides that..ie bathrooms, medical settings, when minors are involved, etc. Constant recording isnt feasible

[blkmusclmachine]

50. Cops on film hasn't done squat since before Rodney King, or a thousand other examples.

The jury will always see it the cop's way, everybody's lying eyes be damned.

[NJCher]

86. that's not necessarily true about the jury

Please read this. It tells what the real problem is. I posted it here the first week of Dec. Put yourself on a grand jury, having to do what the law says. This is what the law says:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/12/04/why-its-so-difficult-to-charge-police-officers-who-kill/

Now, I will shortcut you a bit on reading that link: what you find is that at the bottom of this mess, who's at fault for these grand jury decisions? Republicans. Yep, effing republicans.

Rehnquist? Read up on him.

The root of most problems: republicans.

And that's not an oversimplification. I dare anyone to prove otherwise.


Cher

[GOLGO 13]

51. Union busting will not be tolerated in any circumstance.

To say differently is un-American.

[ncjustice80]

74. Unions are for workers. Cops are not workers.

Police unions are as ridiculous as having a union for military officers or bank ceos.

[Travelman]

84. Cops are not workers?

On what planet are cops not workers? I don't know a single cop who doesn't work his or her ass off.

[ncjustice80]

91. Workers meaning the proletariat.

Martial professions such as police and military are not members of the proletariat. Rather, they are proxies for the 1%.

Police are at best a necessary evi, but in general only serve their wealthy masters, keeping the poor and the non-white in line

[Odin2005]

94. Nice to see another Marxist, here.

[Warpy]

52. They fired a cop here whose camera went "off" at convenient times.

He was involved in a shooting and it was ruled justified, but without that body camera, there will always be questions from the family about their dead 17 year old daughter/sister/cousin.

They need to fire them or put them on desk duty. Not activating that lapel cam also removes evidence that can clear a cop as well as damn him for overreacting.

[uncle ray]

66. if we held them personally responsible for their actions when the camera is off, they won't forget.

[Warpy]

68. The Feds came down hard on the local PD

and I think they're going to take that stuff a hell of a lot more seriously since the threat of having the DOJ come in and take over its management is no longer seen as empty.

[wundermaus]

63. Something sure does indicate duck...

Body camera not turned on?
Dash cam not turned on?
An 18 year old black kid (man?) with a gun pointed at a policeman?
Dead black 18 year old kid (man?).
Case closed.
...
Sounds like a duck...
Looks like a duck...
Walks like a duck...
Yup, it's a duck.

[LiberalElite]

64. Could body cams

be designed so they're automatically activated when put on?

[SummerSnow]

67. They probably leave their cameras off on purpose.

There should be some kind of device or something that detects them turning it off.

[Cha]

71. How convenient. :(

[workinclasszero]

73. Well isn't that just interesting?

Couldn't see that coming eh?

[1step]

75. shocking

[Trillo]

77. Redundancy.

Maybe citizens need body cameras.

Borg notwithstanding, perhaps they could be screwed into the forehead at birth, and always be on.

[cynzke]

82. The Body Cam

is a device that can protect the police officer AND avoid costly civil suits. So I would think that MOST cops understand this is to their benefit.

http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2014/12/23/police-use-body-camera-footage-showing-woman-resisting-arrest/
http://wbaa.org/post/increased-body-camera-use-police-leads-questions

[madokie]

83. I'm sure even if it was it wasn't

fuck the trigger happy murdering assholes

[cambio.y.esperanza]

89. easy out

"it's new" .... how sickening. How many more bodies before these cops are held accountable?

[Sunlei]

95. Americans have a right to observe our Gov. at work, we pay them. No camera? we can not take their wo

we can NOT take this officers word for what happened. They have a history, a long history of deception.