Could Body Cameras Change Police?

A San Diego Officer wearing Camera

Police can be many different things, all depending on the situation. They can be heroes when protecting people from criminals or saving people in danger. Or they can be criminals themselves, harassing, assaulting, or even murdering the people they are sworn by oath to protect. In order to try to ensure that police officers maintain their roles as protectors and heros in society, and not anything less, it should be required that officers wear, and use, body cameras when interacting with civilians.

Following a Ferguson police officer shooting and killing of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager in August, Ferguson police are now required to wear such cameras. These cameras could potentially provide evidence in police brutality cases such as Brown's that would normally not even exist. Because of such evidence, use of force during heated encounters between police and civilians would be decreased dramatically. According to research from the Community Oriented Policing Services website, in a study in Rialto, California, there was a 60 percent reduction in officers using force during interactions with a camera involved. Also, there was an 88 percent reduction in citizen complaints towards officers following the implementation of the cameras.

As with any new technology, the body cameras are not without their drawbacks. According to an article by Ben Kesling featured in The Wall Street Journal, the cameras cannot remain switched on all of the time due to their high battery consumption and limited memory storage. Therefore, officers must turn on the camera manually, when anticipating contact with civilians. Officers will require proper training on how to use and when to use to the cameras.

These issues with the cameras may hinder their effectiveness for the time being. However, as rules regarding camera use become more clear, and technology improves, I believe the cameras will become a key component of police activity, displayed on officers' chests across the country. They represent a necessary step forward in finding the truth in court cases, protecting the innocent and condemning the guilty alike. The cameras maybe the step forward that will bring some good from the tragic loss of Michael Brown, ensuring that in the future people will be safe from the brutality he suffered.

Failure to Protect and Serve an 11-year-old

Raashanai Coley on Halloween
PC: The Sun Times

On September 5th, 11-year-old Raashanai Coley died from a blow to her stomach. Her mother, Nicholette Lawrence, killed her and is now facing charges for her murder in the first degree. According to Christy Gutowski's article in the Chicago Tribune about the tragic death, it wasn't until authorities responded to the Waukegan home that, "details of the 11-year-old's tortured life began to emerge".

In 2011, after police arrested Raashanai's stepfather for child abuse, Raashanai explained, "swollen-faced and timid" to a Waukegan officer, that the stepfather hit her "almost daily for no reason" (Gutowski). The police department followed up with The Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, or DCFS, says Gutowski, and the agency investigated the incident but did not take Raashanai into protective custody.
They left her in the hands of the woman who would later murder her.

A few months prior to her death, the Waukegan police responded to an anonymous complaint about Raashanai's suspected living conditions. The officers responding left promptly though, claiming they saw no evidence of a problem. However, Gutowski states in her article, "Interviews and records show they never saw Raashanai, wrote a report or followed up, despite earlier domestic disturbances, evictions and child abuse complaints involving the family".  Though the officers claim that they didn't find anything noteworthy when responding to the home, they did not even see or speak to the allegedly abused in this case, Raashanai.

Nicholette Lawrence after Confession
PC: The Sun Times

While the police had to respect the constitutional rights of the accused (i.e. not break into the house and look for the allegedly abused girl), the police's lack of authority in such a situation resulted in forcing Raashanai to continue to live with her abusive mother. The young girl was eventually murdered. It could have been avoided had the police been able to further investigate the all of the child abuse complaints, for which they had ample evidence when considering the family's past domestic disturbances and complaints.


In instances such as these, I believe that there should be laws permitting exceptions to the constitution.  Students do lose their freedoms of privacy in schools for their own safety. Also, citizens lose their freedom of speech if the speech includes shouting, "bomb" in an airport, or, "fire" in a crowded area. Other offenses not protected by the bill of rights include producing child pornography and threatening others. All of these exceptions are intended to ensure peoples' safety. Another exception must be made in order to prevent the death of children like Raashanai from abuse. If police have good reason to believe a child is being harmed, as in Raashanai's case, they should not just be permitted, but required, to investigate further and confirm the child's well being without restriction.

Innocent Until Forced Guilty

Overcrowded Los Angeles Prison

The court room of America is no longer a place where the prosecution and defense are on an even playing field. According to an article featured in The Economist last week, titled "The Kings of the Courtroom", prosecutors are dominating the entire criminal justice system. 

In the modern court room, the prosecutors, especially U.S. attorneys, have an arsenal of tricks designed to sway the evidence in their favor. One of the most powerful is plea bargaining, which allows U.S. attorneys to deal out shorter sentences in exchange for guilty pleas. Because of this policy, "more than 95% of cases end in such deals" and are never even brought to trial. However, it is very unlikely that 95% of defendants are in fact guilty. The article explains that many defendants choose to give in to such deals because "harsh, mandatory minimum sentencing rules can make such a choice rational. Rather than risk a trial and a thirty year sentence, some cop a plea and accept a much shorter one". Therefore, the government is strengthening its grip both with its appointed attorneys and with its laws. 

While forcing the innocent into pleading their guilt does sound corrupt, the alternative has the potential for causing far greater issues. As I discussed in my blog last week, (please see blog post titled, "Is the Constitution Dead?") the overcrowding of the criminal courts has caused over seventy-four percent of felony in New York City's Bronx to stretch longer than six months. With this being the case, and Kalief Browder, a teenager from brooklyn, spending over three years of his adolescence in jail awaiting trial because of it, I fear what the abolition of excessive plea bargaining might result in. After all it supposedly removes 95% of felony cases from the waiting line. Without it, the justice system may "buckle under the weight" of all the extra trials (The Economist). 

United States voters should not be forced to decide between waiting in jail for a trial, or giving into the prosecution's manipulative bargaining. Both end in perpetuating a justice system which has put a higher percentage of its population in jail than any other nation in the world. The justice system shouldn't compromise on what it believes is the lesser of two evils, but rather should create a solution that ends in freedom and fairness for its people.

Is the Constitution Dead?

In 2010, a sixteen year old boy from Brooklyn, Kalief Browder, was accused of grand larceny and thrown in prison for it. He was entirely innocent. He remained in jail, awaiting his speedy trial, until after his twentieth birthday. Jennifer Gonnerman, in her article entitled "Before the Law", which was featured in The New Yorker last week, tells Kalief''s story, revealing the cruel realities of America's so called "justice" system. 

The Bronx criminal courts refused Kalief his constitutional right to a speedy trial. New York's law that a "speedy trial" must occur within six months is similar to most other states. However, according to Gonnerman, New York's time limit works differently because "the clock stops for many reasons- for example, when attorneys submit motions before trial- so that the amount of time that is officially held to have elapsed can be wildly different from the amound of time that really has". This might be no problem for the attorneys handling a case. No more than simply pushing around a schedule.  But, for the accused, this "technicality" means weeks more in jail, all the while, completely detached from regular life. This problem is compounded because "the Bronx courts are so clogged that when a lawyer asks for a one-week adjournment the next court date usually doesn't happen for six weeks or more". This happened to Kalief time after time again.

With New York giving the lawyers the ability to so easily delay trials, it is possible that there was another, more sinister, reason for the prosecuting attorneys' unpreparedness. Gonnerman explains the opinion of Kalief's lawyer, "Prestia . . . alleges 'mailicious prosecution'", suspecting that "'they were seeking undue adjournments of these cases to procure a guilty plea from plaintiff.'" In other words, the prosecuting attorneys were forcing Kalief to suffer in jail in the hopes of him eventually cracking, and pleaing guilty. It is likely that Kalief is not the only one suffering from this gross abuse of the law either. Gonnerman says, "In 2011, seventy-four percent of felony cases in the Bronx were older than sixth months". 

I believe that this issue demands attention of both the Supreme Court and lawmakers in Congress. Kalief deserves reparations for his suffering, and a solution must be proposed for the additional seventy-four percent of cases that are also dragged out past sixth months. The criminal courts are not just infringing upon constitutional rights with unfair stipulations, but also jeopardizing America's values. New York's laws are pemitting the court system to shift from one designed to defend innocent Americans, to one which heavily favors the prosecutors. This system, supposedly intended to protect Americans, is responsible for imprisoning more than a quarter of the world's total jail population, and has led Kalief to say, "I feel like I was robbed of my happiness".