Houston Chronicle June 25, 2019
As HPD, other local police embrace body cams, foolish for FBI, DEA to ban them in joint operations[Editorial]
Few incidents illustrate why it is vital that police wear body cameras more than the botched drug raid that left two residents of a Harding Street home dead and four Houston officers wounded. Investigators are still trying to determine what went wrong, but there is no video to help them because officers weren’t wearing cameras.
Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo says that although patrol officers had cameras at the time, the department hadn’t yet implemented a plan to equip SWAT officers and those serving warrants. HPD has since expedited that plan.
But even if the whole force is issued cameras, there are some circumstances where officers wouldn’t be allowed to wear them: joint operations with the feds.
Nationwide, local police are banned from wearing body cameras during any operation conducted by joint task forces involving the Drug Enforcement Administration, U.S. Marshals Service, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives or FBI. The Justice Department says body cameras could reveal “sensitive or tactical methods used in arresting violent fugitives or conducting covert investigations.â€
It seems unlikely that body cameras would reveal any “tactical method†you wouldn’t see watching “SWAT†on TV. But even if they did, the federal agencies are missing the point. They aren’t the KGB or any other secret police force. This is America, where police operations for the most part are public record. That’s so taxpayers are assured that justice is served on their behalf, and so police are protected from scurrilous charges.
More:
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/opinion/editorials/article/As-HPD-other-local-police-embrace-body-cams-14056760.php
