6 ms·

Well there is the use case of the PO exercising his or her judgement in a situation where there may technically be a violation, e.g. carrying an open bottle of

Well there is the use case of the PO exercising his or her judgement in a situation where there may technically be a violation, e.g. carrying an open bottle of beer. Today, a PO can simply require the perpetrator to discard the beer and then both parties move on. If we have cameras in that situation, the PO will have no choice but to issue a summons to the person and then potentially have to show up in court if the person requests it. Is that the best use of our police officers and the courts time? I think your intention is to provide citizens protection against police abuse of our rights but I think that the situation is more complex and getting the right mix of tech and humanity in police practices requires better training and education of both the police and the citizenry.

gortok 7y ago
If we suddenly have a rash of police under enforcing, is that really a problem? Body cameras aren’t there to ensure police enforce the law, they’re there because power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
__s 7y ago
Under enforcement based on individual judgement easily introduces racist bias I agree with your point tho, bureaucracy has trouble thinking about edge cases, it's hard to create a complete spec of things like not requiring bringing someone in for an open beer if they aren't clearly drunk
- vageli 7y ago
  > I agree with your point tho, bureaucracy has trouble thinking about edge cases, it's hard to create a complete spec of things like not requiring bringing someone in for an open beer if they aren't clearly drunk. It is very much the job of the courts to interpret the law with respect to those edge cases and their judgements can provide guidance to politicians about how to more narrowly define the law. This is how things are supposed to work _in theory_.
  - InitialLastName 7y ago
    Even on the optimal path, there's a long lag and (potentially) a bunch of ruined lives between "We think we wrote a law that appropriately covers all the edge cases" and "Oh, hey, this court decided this edge case is covered this way". That lag can be helped by giving the bureaucracy enforcers a way to use common sense to bypass the bureaucracy.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - vageli 7y ago
      I agree, but ultimately society has weighed the trade-off and moved in favor of the ruining of some lives for the wheels of justice to grind forward. That is why society tends to reify martyrs imo. We have countless examples in history. For things to change people suffer and we elevate their suffering to some third party that can recognize its injustice. Peaceful protests are exemplars of this notion.
mathieuh 7y ago
Aren't US cops afforded any personal input? I've been stopped in the UK for something I probably should have been arrested for, but the cop said he was just going to let me go because I was nice to him ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- LeftTurnSignal 7y ago
  I've worked with a few police departments in a previous life. For the last few years I worked with the bigger dept they all wore cameras for their entire shift. They still let people go for small amounts of weed, or odd drinking violations (open intox usually) even though it's still illegal here. They only review the videos if there's an incident or complaint. So it's not like there's someone watching 40 x 8 hour videos every day. /this is a smaller rural area in the midwest US, so ymmv but these officers do use discretion and the higher ups don't care if it's nothing big. In the Chief's words, "we were all young and stupid at some point."
  - OrgNet 7y ago
    > They only review the videos if there's an incident or complaint. So it's not like there's someone watching 40 x 8 hour videos every day. Right now there isn't, but some day, a computer might be able to do it.
    - moorhosj 7y ago
      Then you would write a law.
vageli 7y ago
If this became a rampant issue, maybe it would be time to rethink the law? Discretion allows abuse. Laws that are not applied uniformly run counter to the notion of "Rule of Law".
- moneil971 7y ago
  This happens quite a bit with underage drinking. Cop catches some kids who are not quite 21 with beer and instead of fining every kid up to $1,000 and suspending their license (which is now on their record), he makes them ditch the beer and move on. Rethinking the law means we’d decide it’s ok for all teens to drink. Sometimes the laws are solid, but there are shades of gray in terms of how to apply them.
  - thaumasiotes 7y ago
    > Cop catches some kids who are not quite 21 with beer and instead of fining every kid up to $1,000 and suspending their license (which is now on their record), he makes them ditch the beer and move on. Rethinking the law means we’d decide it’s ok for all teens to drink. Doesn't overlooking the beer also mean we've decided it's ok for teens to drink? What is the difference you see?
    - freedomben 7y ago
      I'm quite sympathetic to your argument, although having been a teenager (age 19) that got caught with beer and had a cop let me off (he could clearly see that we were trying to be responsible, and were not causing trouble) I think there is value in not being a total hard ass while still not blanket condoning stuff. That said, in this case I absolutely agree that alcohol should not be restricted to anybody 18 and over. If we have a point where you are "an adult" then you should be a free person at that point. So it really comes down to philosophically purity vs. pragmatism. I'm naturally drawn toward the former, but as I've gotten older I see more value in the latter, even tho intellectual it bothers me.
    - moneil971 7y ago
      I think the difference is in assessing a situation - is it always ok for all teens to drink? Or is it more about assessing whether to sometimes scare them a little by giving them a talking to and reminding them it’s not legal - and other times (if they endanger lives or get caught multiple times) enforcing the penalties as appropriate. Much like speeding or running a stop sign - sometime just getting pulled over is enough to remind you to slow down.
tlrobinson 7y ago
I don’t see this being an issue. Most (all?) police cruisers already have dash cams which almost certainly routinely capture footage of people speeding and breaking various other traffic laws which the police overlook, but no one is going back to review that footage and cite them. Presumably the footage is archived and only reviewed for disputes, court, etc.
dantillberg 7y ago
I would love for the police to enforce the law strictly and uniformly. If the laws are bad, then we will change them.
- pnutjam 7y ago
  True, too often this discretion is only exercised for friends, relatives, and the powerful. Occasionally it gets extended to people who remind the officer of those people, because they fit the preconceptions or remind the officer of their own youth or family. https://genius.com/Dave-chappelle-killin-them-softly-annotated https://genius.com/Dave-chappelle-killin-them-softly-annotat...
- freedomben 7y ago
  I agree with you in theory, but in practice I wouldn't be so sure. There are plenty of people that suffer and have their lives ruined because they are the first victims of a bad law. The legislative process moves very slowly, sometimes it takes decades (look at Cannabis laws for example).
AnaniasAnanas 7y ago
The solution to this would be to stop the criminalization of victimless actions - which carrying an open bottle of beer is.
AngryData 7y ago
Why would they have no choice? Where are people getting this idea that an officer HAS to do something when a law is broken? If that was true, they would be in trouble all the time for driving down the road and not stopping speeders, or getting in trouble for not reporting things other POs have done that is illegal. A police officers discretion in executing the law is an enshrined privilege of being an officer and a camera isn't going to change that. Nobody will ever even be looking at those videos if nothing is reported.

gortok 7y ago

If we suddenly have a rash of police under enforcing, is that really a problem? Body cameras aren’t there to ensure police enforce the law, they’re there because power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

__s 7y ago

Under enforcement based on individual judgement easily introduces racist bias I agree with your point tho, bureaucracy has trouble thinking about edge cases, it's hard to create a complete spec of things like not requiring bringing someone in for an open beer if they aren't clearly drunk

vageli 7y ago
> I agree with your point tho, bureaucracy has trouble thinking about edge cases, it's hard to create a complete spec of things like not requiring bringing someone in for an open beer if they aren't clearly drunk. It is very much the job of the courts to interpret the law with respect to those edge cases and their judgements can provide guidance to politicians about how to more narrowly define the law. This is how things are supposed to work _in theory_.
- InitialLastName 7y ago
  Even on the optimal path, there's a long lag and (potentially) a bunch of ruined lives between "We think we wrote a law that appropriately covers all the edge cases" and "Oh, hey, this court decided this edge case is covered this way". That lag can be helped by giving the bureaucracy enforcers a way to use common sense to bypass the bureaucracy.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - vageli 7y ago
    I agree, but ultimately society has weighed the trade-off and moved in favor of the ruining of some lives for the wheels of justice to grind forward. That is why society tends to reify martyrs imo. We have countless examples in history. For things to change people suffer and we elevate their suffering to some third party that can recognize its injustice. Peaceful protests are exemplars of this notion.

mathieuh 7y ago

Aren't US cops afforded any personal input? I've been stopped in the UK for something I probably should have been arrested for, but the cop said he was just going to let me go because I was nice to him ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

LeftTurnSignal 7y ago
I've worked with a few police departments in a previous life. For the last few years I worked with the bigger dept they all wore cameras for their entire shift. They still let people go for small amounts of weed, or odd drinking violations (open intox usually) even though it's still illegal here. They only review the videos if there's an incident or complaint. So it's not like there's someone watching 40 x 8 hour videos every day. /this is a smaller rural area in the midwest US, so ymmv but these officers do use discretion and the higher ups don't care if it's nothing big. In the Chief's words, "we were all young and stupid at some point."
- OrgNet 7y ago
  > They only review the videos if there's an incident or complaint. So it's not like there's someone watching 40 x 8 hour videos every day. Right now there isn't, but some day, a computer might be able to do it.
  - moorhosj 7y ago
    Then you would write a law.

vageli 7y ago

If this became a rampant issue, maybe it would be time to rethink the law? Discretion allows abuse. Laws that are not applied uniformly run counter to the notion of "Rule of Law".

moneil971 7y ago
This happens quite a bit with underage drinking. Cop catches some kids who are not quite 21 with beer and instead of fining every kid up to $1,000 and suspending their license (which is now on their record), he makes them ditch the beer and move on. Rethinking the law means we’d decide it’s ok for all teens to drink. Sometimes the laws are solid, but there are shades of gray in terms of how to apply them.
- thaumasiotes 7y ago
  > Cop catches some kids who are not quite 21 with beer and instead of fining every kid up to $1,000 and suspending their license (which is now on their record), he makes them ditch the beer and move on. Rethinking the law means we’d decide it’s ok for all teens to drink. Doesn't overlooking the beer also mean we've decided it's ok for teens to drink? What is the difference you see?
  - freedomben 7y ago
    I'm quite sympathetic to your argument, although having been a teenager (age 19) that got caught with beer and had a cop let me off (he could clearly see that we were trying to be responsible, and were not causing trouble) I think there is value in not being a total hard ass while still not blanket condoning stuff. That said, in this case I absolutely agree that alcohol should not be restricted to anybody 18 and over. If we have a point where you are "an adult" then you should be a free person at that point. So it really comes down to philosophically purity vs. pragmatism. I'm naturally drawn toward the former, but as I've gotten older I see more value in the latter, even tho intellectual it bothers me.
  - moneil971 7y ago
    I think the difference is in assessing a situation - is it always ok for all teens to drink? Or is it more about assessing whether to sometimes scare them a little by giving them a talking to and reminding them it’s not legal - and other times (if they endanger lives or get caught multiple times) enforcing the penalties as appropriate. Much like speeding or running a stop sign - sometime just getting pulled over is enough to remind you to slow down.

tlrobinson 7y ago

I don’t see this being an issue. Most (all?) police cruisers already have dash cams which almost certainly routinely capture footage of people speeding and breaking various other traffic laws which the police overlook, but no one is going back to review that footage and cite them. Presumably the footage is archived and only reviewed for disputes, court, etc.

dantillberg 7y ago

I would love for the police to enforce the law strictly and uniformly. If the laws are bad, then we will change them.

pnutjam 7y ago
True, too often this discretion is only exercised for friends, relatives, and the powerful. Occasionally it gets extended to people who remind the officer of those people, because they fit the preconceptions or remind the officer of their own youth or family. https://genius.com/Dave-chappelle-killin-them-softly-annotated https://genius.com/Dave-chappelle-killin-them-softly-annotat...
freedomben 7y ago
I agree with you in theory, but in practice I wouldn't be so sure. There are plenty of people that suffer and have their lives ruined because they are the first victims of a bad law. The legislative process moves very slowly, sometimes it takes decades (look at Cannabis laws for example).

AnaniasAnanas 7y ago

The solution to this would be to stop the criminalization of victimless actions - which carrying an open bottle of beer is.

AngryData 7y ago

Why would they have no choice? Where are people getting this idea that an officer HAS to do something when a law is broken? If that was true, they would be in trouble all the time for driving down the road and not stopping speeders, or getting in trouble for not reporting things other POs have done that is illegal. A police officers discretion in executing the law is an enshrined privilege of being an officer and a camera isn't going to change that. Nobody will ever even be looking at those videos if nothing is reported.