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> The same day as the court’s ruling, DeSantis signed into law two bills affecting law enforcement in Florida. Two judges on the panel that issued the ruling Fr

by aftbit 3y ago

> The same day as the court’s ruling, DeSantis signed into law two bills affecting law enforcement in Florida. Two judges on the panel that issued the ruling Friday were DeSantis appointees. > One new law makes it illegal after a person has been warned to approach first responders or remain within 25 feet while they are performing a legal duty if the intent is to interfere, threaten or harass them. The new law doesn’t prevent people from recording law enforcement but can require them to move 25 feet back, which can make it more difficult. > The other requires that citizen review boards in Florida – intended to provide independent oversight of law enforcement actions – be re-established so that members are appointed by a sheriff or police chief and that at least one member be a retired law enforcement officer. I wonder if the first will stand up to Constitutional review. I imagine there are many First Amendment protected purposes for recording that may require the recorder to be within 25 feet of the officer. For example, if they're recording during windy conditions and need to hear what the officer says. I also wonder how the "intent" will be interpreted by courts. Probably in a way that is most favorable to LEOs. The second law is just a straightforward neutering of citizen review boards.

qwerpy 3y ago
> Probably in a way that is most favorable to LEOs. I think this makes sense. Would be bad if every time a police officer tries to stop a crime, suddenly 20 hard of hearing people need to crowd around him really close in order to record him. Oh look, the criminal got away again. There are situations where different laws will conflict, and I hope in those situations crime prevention and safety take precedence. Modern phone cameras are really good and 25 feet isn't very far. Seems like a good compromise so that cops can do their jobs but there can be some citizen oversight.
- chatmasta 3y ago
  > suddenly 20 hard of hearing people need to crowd around him really close in order to record him It’s already against the law to interfere with an arrest. A mob of people surrounding officers attempting to arrest someone is already illegal, whether they have cameras in their hands or not.
  - nomel 3y ago
    Laws that rely on an officers/departments personal reading of a situation/interpretation are easily confused and abused, especially when it's something as fuzzy as "interference". Having clarity is nice. I personally think it's fine to give an officer some sort of personal space. If I were an officer arresting someone, I wouldn't want someone affiliated with them standing 5 feet behind me, where I would have to worry about being attacked. Not sure how this works indoors though, where 25 feet would make observation impossible. This assumes sane body camera policies are in place, like immediate dismissal if the camera/mic is turned off/covered, during any part up to or during an arrest.
    - clipsy 3y ago
      > This assumes sane body camera policies are in place, like immediate dismissal if the camera/mic is turned off/covered, during any part up to or during an arrest. Assuming fantasies is rarely helpful when judging the effects of legislation.
      - nomel 3y ago
        Without sane body camera policy, deterministic accountability is fantasy. I was speaking from that goal.
    - turdprincess 3y ago
      That seems about as realistic as immediate dismissal from your job if you forget to unmute yourself on zoom.
      - yareal 3y ago
        It's OK to expect higher standards from police officers. Cameras should record all day and officers should only be allowed to mark timestamps they wish to be deleted later. The footage should still be logged in a black box, encrypted with something to make it not easily accessible. That way a cop could "whoopsie" their camera before beating someone, but it would still ultimately be possible to get that recording.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- FireBeyond 3y ago
  I struggle to think of examples where a suspect has actually ELUDED law enforcement due to citizens recording an interaction or arrest, and I'd be very curious to see any such thing. I will agree that such recording has interfered with the arrest process at times, and that is more problematic. But I'm a paramedic/firefighter and often have to work on patients (in an MVA, for example) in much closer proximity to rubberneckers.
  - parineum 3y ago
    I've seen plenty of videos of police where the people filming are actively escalating tensions. It's usually by yelling though, not filming, but the yelling seems to usually be for the video, rather than anything productive.
    - FireBeyond 3y ago
      As someone who works in emergency services, frankly, "so what?". If you can't tune that out as background noise, you're not going to be able to do your job effectively. Otherwise, what, you have police who can only do their job in ideal circumstances. Like when I teach EMTs and paramedics, and we cover things like extricating patients from vehicles. "This is great. The vehicle is level, you're in an apparatus bay at a fire station, you have great lighting, no noise, it's not pouring rain..." More often than not, I see police escalating situations with people of interest and bystanders, rather than the other way around.
      - parineum 3y ago
        I'm assuming you're not speaking about law enforcement since you didn't mention it specifically but I think there's a big difference between a chaotic and interested crowd vs an antagonistic crowd. Law enforcement are often trying to handle a person they view as dangerous and, if there's a crowd of people around who are vocalizing their displeasure with you, you're going to feel more in danger. I don't disagree with you about police escalating _violence_ in these situations which is why I specifically said "tensions". IMO, a bad cop who is completely in the wrong and prone to violence will be more likely to commit violence if their attention is split between their suspect and the antagonistic crowd. Being surrounded by unfriendly people doesn't make people react better than they would have otherwise. There are plenty of bad cops around. All I'm advocating for is that, if you're recording an altercation you believe unjust, record it and don't become part of it.
- yareal 3y ago
  Why would it be bad? Surely sunlight is the best disinfectant? Let people film as much as possible. It's been demonstrated that police cameras don't always function... mysteriously.
  - zo1 3y ago
    My personal take about giving an inch on this topic is that it'll embolden people to "get involved" without much facts but having a lot of emotions about a volatile situation. E.g. Some rando drug dealer purposefully shouting at a nearby uninformed mob about "profiling", so everyone gets involved because hey "cops are bad, shame poor brown person", they all shout at the police officer, they all offer their opinion whilst not being a judge or jury. Next thing it's sheer Chaos for the simple encounter, because we forget that mob mentality is a real thing. I don't want to open up that messy box. The rule should be simple, stay at least 25ft away and record if you want to. This shouldn't even be up for debate. Like who even wants to be within 25ft of anything remotely dangerous unless someone you know is involved. Why are we even having this discussion. My theory: Because people want to neuter the police so that they can sow chaos and destabilize society. Bonus points, they take away the people (police) keeping the violence and bullies at bay through the threat of fear and consequences.
    - smolder 3y ago
      Your personal take is that of someone who hasn't been bullied or abused by officers of the law, I'm assuming. Consider that some people have, and they may want police accountability, with no desire to sow chaos.
      - zo1 3y ago
        I'm not a drug dealer, but I did get not so nice treatment from police once. Well, more than once but this was the most applicable to this discussion. I was profiled, verbally assaulted, shouted down, searched, etc. All while AK assault rifles were being waived around to scare me while my car was searched. I knew I did nothing wrong and it was just corruption and intimidation and fishing. So I responded with yes sir, no officer, etc. Eventually it blew over. No idea how it would have went if bystanders started getting involved and causing chaos with proximity to the police.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > Would be bad if every time a police officer tries to stop a crime, suddenly 20 hard of hearing people need to crowd around him really close in order to record him It would. Do we have credible examples? Because we have a lot of evidence of cops lying, and only being caught on account of recordings, with disastrous effects. If one side is hypothetical and the other substantiated, it strikes me as reasonable to favour one over the other.
  - ethbr1 3y ago
    This isn't an either/or scenario. There's a reasonable distance that a law enforcement officer (or paramedic, or firefighter) need to be in control of, in order to focus on their job. Maybe it's 1ft, maybe it's 50ft: the courts should decide. There's also a reasonable public expectation to be able to record police officers doing their job, for subsequent review. Hopefully we can all agree that someone loudly "recording" shoulder to shoulder with police officer disrupts their ability to resolve situations? Just as we can agree that not having any recording of a police officer's potentially illegal actions is antithetical to ensuring justice? There are disingenuous protesters who abuse recording excuses to disrupt law enforcement. There are corrupt cops who abuse recording limitations to disrupt transparency. Both of these things are wrong.
    - heavyset_go 3y ago
      > This isn't an either/or scenario. Right, it's already illegal to interfere with police.
      - ethbr1 3y ago
        If I'm on the ground and an officer is yelling at me, I do not want other people even within that officer's bubble of space. It's unreasonably escalatory in situations that instead need more calm.
        Clubber 3y ago
        >If I'm on the ground and an officer is yelling at me, I do not want other people even within that officer's bubble of space. If you're in that position, particularly for something as simple as he took something you said the wrong way, the cameras might keep the officer from going overboard too.
- Teever 3y ago
  How come this kind of shit is only a problem in places where police are more likely to be involved in criminal events that involve brutalizing innocent people? Does Norway have a problem with an excessive number of people filming police interactions in public?
renewiltord 3y ago
Haha, this was pretty good. I think a bunch of them involved police walking towards the videographer, requiring them to walk farther back.
- jojobas 3y ago
  If the law forbids you from approaching, staying where you are would be fine wouldn't it?
  - wombatpm 3y ago
    Am I allowed to stand my ground with deadly force in such a scenario?
    - bagels 3y ago
      No, you must retreat to your designated free speech zone.
    - Thorrez 3y ago
      What does that mean?
      - lazyasciiart 3y ago
        He thinks he can outdraw the cops.
        ang_cire 3y ago
        Most people competent with a gun can. The requirements for firearms practice (and especially draw-and-fire drills) for cops are pretty minimal across the board. Your average 3-gun or USPSA competitors (who admittedly train much more than a bench shooter probably does) likely spend 30x more hours per year training than a cop does. Here's a per-state breakdown of police training requirements. https://www.apexofficer.com/police-training-requirements https://www.apexofficer.com/police-training-requirements Most of them require 20 hours or less PER YEAR, and that is not just firearms training, but total training across e.g. deescalation, driving, EMT, less-than-lethal force, crowd control, etc. Several of them specify that the firearms training is only 2 hours. Most hobby shooters can knock out 12 hours of dedicated firearms training in a month or 2 of weekend range days, so 6x what a cop might have to do in 12 months. Outdrawing the cops isn't the issue, outnumbering them is. Unless you've also got 300+ buddies you can call for support, you're going to lose in the end.
morkalork 3y ago
What's the point of a citizen review board if the sheriff or chief appoints everyone on it? Talk about fox guarding the henhous!
- roughly 3y ago
  > What's the point of a citizen review board if the sheriff or chief appoints everyone on it? I don’t know, but I know what the point of the law was.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- Analemma_ 3y ago
  This sounds like a case of "the citizen review board was created by fed-up voters at the municipal level, and then the state stepped into neuter it". Because DeSantis etc. are about local control except when the locals make a decision they don't like.
  - tadfisher 3y ago
    See also: the Texas "water breaks ban", which actually superceded all county and municipal employee protections in a wide array of classes that exceeded the state minimums.
    - cryptonector 3y ago
      There was no water break ban as such. And no one in Texas will forbid employees from drinking water in the scorching heat unless it is to make a political point.
      - tadfisher 3y ago
        Yes, I explained what the law actually was in my comment. The nickname was earned by removing municipal protections for hydration breaks along with every other protection not specified at the state level.
ImJamal 3y ago
>The second law is just a straightforward neutering of citizen review boards. It says reestablished. How are they neutering something that doesn't exist?
- HeatrayEnjoyer 3y ago
  Where does it say it is creating an entity that doesn't already exist?
  - ImJamal 3y ago
    The word reestablished means that it used to be established but is no longer established. It is now coming back.
    - wholinator2 3y ago
      Not completely. It also means to disband something that currently exists, then recreate it, effectively reestablishing the board. You are paying attention to only one possible reading, which is the one not consistent with the truth. Citizen review boards exist in Florida. These currently functioning boards will have their power stripped immediately and members will be replaced with captive appointees. This is not creating citizen review boards, this is destroying them
      - refurb 3y ago
        Using the word “reestablish” in that way would be the confusing and odd considering the multiple other word choices that would be far more precise.
        bee_rider 3y ago
        Note that this is just a phrase that occurs in the news article, it doesn’t seem to be present in the actual law as far as I can tell.
    - bena 3y ago
dmichulke 3y ago
Is recording someone an expression of > the intent [..] to interfere, threaten or harass them ?
- GoblinSlayer 3y ago
  Maybe there was a precedent where such a person walked in and demanded something?
- advisedwang 3y ago
  The police often interpret recording as a threat (to hold them accountable). They then can construct situations to make it impossible to record without intefering.
jimbob45 3y ago
[flagged]
- ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
  wow.
vkou 3y ago
The first is an absolute farce. All an officer who doesn't want to be recorded needs to do is get in your face (or have his partner get in your face) - at which point, you are now recording within 25 feet of an officer, and must either stop, or face arrest. If you take a few steps back, he can, of course, repeat this process ad-infinitum. Sure, you can argue this in a Florida court, and you might even win, but in the meantime, the law accomplishes exactly what it intends.
- _heimdall 3y ago
  Its worth reading the actual law as written [1]. Looks like the distance is actually 20 feet, and it specifically states that you can't approach a first responder with intent to harass after being given a verbal warning. If a first responder approaches you then you've done nothing wrong. [1] https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2024/75/?Tab=BillText https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2024/75/?Tab=BillText
  - enragedcacti 3y ago
    That isn't the correct bill, the bill that passed has the more broad phrasing "to violate such warning and approach or remain within 25 feet of the first responder" https://www.flsenate.gov/Committees/BillSummaries/2024/html/3418 https://www.flsenate.gov/Committees/BillSummaries/2024/html/...
    - _heimdall 3y ago
      Oh thanks, yeah that clarification is an important one! The or remain addition ruins it, though I also don't see that holding up in court with any reasonable jury. In that scenario, if I start more than 25 feet away and stand my ground if a cop approaches me only with the intent of making me move or stop filming, I've truly done nothing wrong and the cop is intending to infringe on my rights. Will a judge or DA see if this way? Almost certainly not. But if I were on the jury I'd throw that shit out, I don't really care what the law says as written if its a law I don't think is constitutional or reasonable. Juries are there, in part, to act as a check on the legal system.
user_7832 3y ago
> I wonder if the first will stand up to Constitutional review. I imagine there are many First Amendment protected purposes for recording that may require the recorder to be within 25 feet of the officer. It may be possible to stand 25ft back and hold a 15ft long pole with a camera, or place a phone/camera on the ground and then stand back, to get past this issue.
- lvncelot 3y ago
  Legality aside, I can't imagine waving a 15ft long pole towards the police will go over well.
  - smolder 3y ago
    Yeah, very many people can't afford a decent lawyer when they need one, and might not get one even if they can, in which case legality really is... aside.

by aftbit 3y ago

qwerpy 3y ago

> Probably in a way that is most favorable to LEOs. I think this makes sense. Would be bad if every time a police officer tries to stop a crime, suddenly 20 hard of hearing people need to crowd around him really close in order to record him. Oh look, the criminal got away again. There are situations where different laws will conflict, and I hope in those situations crime prevention and safety take precedence. Modern phone cameras are really good and 25 feet isn't very far. Seems like a good compromise so that cops can do their jobs but there can be some citizen oversight.

chatmasta 3y ago
> suddenly 20 hard of hearing people need to crowd around him really close in order to record him It’s already against the law to interfere with an arrest. A mob of people surrounding officers attempting to arrest someone is already illegal, whether they have cameras in their hands or not.
- nomel 3y ago
  Laws that rely on an officers/departments personal reading of a situation/interpretation are easily confused and abused, especially when it's something as fuzzy as "interference". Having clarity is nice. I personally think it's fine to give an officer some sort of personal space. If I were an officer arresting someone, I wouldn't want someone affiliated with them standing 5 feet behind me, where I would have to worry about being attacked. Not sure how this works indoors though, where 25 feet would make observation impossible. This assumes sane body camera policies are in place, like immediate dismissal if the camera/mic is turned off/covered, during any part up to or during an arrest.
  - clipsy 3y ago
    > This assumes sane body camera policies are in place, like immediate dismissal if the camera/mic is turned off/covered, during any part up to or during an arrest. Assuming fantasies is rarely helpful when judging the effects of legislation.
    - nomel 3y ago
      Without sane body camera policy, deterministic accountability is fantasy. I was speaking from that goal.
  - turdprincess 3y ago
    That seems about as realistic as immediate dismissal from your job if you forget to unmute yourself on zoom.
    - yareal 3y ago
      It's OK to expect higher standards from police officers. Cameras should record all day and officers should only be allowed to mark timestamps they wish to be deleted later. The footage should still be logged in a black box, encrypted with something to make it not easily accessible. That way a cop could "whoopsie" their camera before beating someone, but it would still ultimately be possible to get that recording.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
FireBeyond 3y ago
I struggle to think of examples where a suspect has actually ELUDED law enforcement due to citizens recording an interaction or arrest, and I'd be very curious to see any such thing. I will agree that such recording has interfered with the arrest process at times, and that is more problematic. But I'm a paramedic/firefighter and often have to work on patients (in an MVA, for example) in much closer proximity to rubberneckers.
- parineum 3y ago
  I've seen plenty of videos of police where the people filming are actively escalating tensions. It's usually by yelling though, not filming, but the yelling seems to usually be for the video, rather than anything productive.
  - FireBeyond 3y ago
    As someone who works in emergency services, frankly, "so what?". If you can't tune that out as background noise, you're not going to be able to do your job effectively. Otherwise, what, you have police who can only do their job in ideal circumstances. Like when I teach EMTs and paramedics, and we cover things like extricating patients from vehicles. "This is great. The vehicle is level, you're in an apparatus bay at a fire station, you have great lighting, no noise, it's not pouring rain..." More often than not, I see police escalating situations with people of interest and bystanders, rather than the other way around.
    - parineum 3y ago
      I'm assuming you're not speaking about law enforcement since you didn't mention it specifically but I think there's a big difference between a chaotic and interested crowd vs an antagonistic crowd. Law enforcement are often trying to handle a person they view as dangerous and, if there's a crowd of people around who are vocalizing their displeasure with you, you're going to feel more in danger. I don't disagree with you about police escalating _violence_ in these situations which is why I specifically said "tensions". IMO, a bad cop who is completely in the wrong and prone to violence will be more likely to commit violence if their attention is split between their suspect and the antagonistic crowd. Being surrounded by unfriendly people doesn't make people react better than they would have otherwise. There are plenty of bad cops around. All I'm advocating for is that, if you're recording an altercation you believe unjust, record it and don't become part of it.
yareal 3y ago
Why would it be bad? Surely sunlight is the best disinfectant? Let people film as much as possible. It's been demonstrated that police cameras don't always function... mysteriously.
- zo1 3y ago
  My personal take about giving an inch on this topic is that it'll embolden people to "get involved" without much facts but having a lot of emotions about a volatile situation. E.g. Some rando drug dealer purposefully shouting at a nearby uninformed mob about "profiling", so everyone gets involved because hey "cops are bad, shame poor brown person", they all shout at the police officer, they all offer their opinion whilst not being a judge or jury. Next thing it's sheer Chaos for the simple encounter, because we forget that mob mentality is a real thing. I don't want to open up that messy box. The rule should be simple, stay at least 25ft away and record if you want to. This shouldn't even be up for debate. Like who even wants to be within 25ft of anything remotely dangerous unless someone you know is involved. Why are we even having this discussion. My theory: Because people want to neuter the police so that they can sow chaos and destabilize society. Bonus points, they take away the people (police) keeping the violence and bullies at bay through the threat of fear and consequences.
  - smolder 3y ago
    Your personal take is that of someone who hasn't been bullied or abused by officers of the law, I'm assuming. Consider that some people have, and they may want police accountability, with no desire to sow chaos.
    - zo1 3y ago
      I'm not a drug dealer, but I did get not so nice treatment from police once. Well, more than once but this was the most applicable to this discussion. I was profiled, verbally assaulted, shouted down, searched, etc. All while AK assault rifles were being waived around to scare me while my car was searched. I knew I did nothing wrong and it was just corruption and intimidation and fishing. So I responded with yes sir, no officer, etc. Eventually it blew over. No idea how it would have went if bystanders started getting involved and causing chaos with proximity to the police.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> Would be bad if every time a police officer tries to stop a crime, suddenly 20 hard of hearing people need to crowd around him really close in order to record him It would. Do we have credible examples? Because we have a lot of evidence of cops lying, and only being caught on account of recordings, with disastrous effects. If one side is hypothetical and the other substantiated, it strikes me as reasonable to favour one over the other.
- ethbr1 3y ago
  This isn't an either/or scenario. There's a reasonable distance that a law enforcement officer (or paramedic, or firefighter) need to be in control of, in order to focus on their job. Maybe it's 1ft, maybe it's 50ft: the courts should decide. There's also a reasonable public expectation to be able to record police officers doing their job, for subsequent review. Hopefully we can all agree that someone loudly "recording" shoulder to shoulder with police officer disrupts their ability to resolve situations? Just as we can agree that not having any recording of a police officer's potentially illegal actions is antithetical to ensuring justice? There are disingenuous protesters who abuse recording excuses to disrupt law enforcement. There are corrupt cops who abuse recording limitations to disrupt transparency. Both of these things are wrong.
  - heavyset_go 3y ago
    > This isn't an either/or scenario. Right, it's already illegal to interfere with police.
    - ethbr1 3y ago
      If I'm on the ground and an officer is yelling at me, I do not want other people even within that officer's bubble of space. It's unreasonably escalatory in situations that instead need more calm.
      - Clubber 3y ago
        >If I'm on the ground and an officer is yelling at me, I do not want other people even within that officer's bubble of space. If you're in that position, particularly for something as simple as he took something you said the wrong way, the cameras might keep the officer from going overboard too.
Teever 3y ago
How come this kind of shit is only a problem in places where police are more likely to be involved in criminal events that involve brutalizing innocent people? Does Norway have a problem with an excessive number of people filming police interactions in public?

renewiltord 3y ago

Haha, this was pretty good. I think a bunch of them involved police walking towards the videographer, requiring them to walk farther back.

jojobas 3y ago
If the law forbids you from approaching, staying where you are would be fine wouldn't it?
- wombatpm 3y ago
  Am I allowed to stand my ground with deadly force in such a scenario?
  - bagels 3y ago
    No, you must retreat to your designated free speech zone.
  - Thorrez 3y ago
    What does that mean?
    - lazyasciiart 3y ago
      He thinks he can outdraw the cops.
      - ang_cire 3y ago
        Most people competent with a gun can. The requirements for firearms practice (and especially draw-and-fire drills) for cops are pretty minimal across the board. Your average 3-gun or USPSA competitors (who admittedly train much more than a bench shooter probably does) likely spend 30x more hours per year training than a cop does. Here's a per-state breakdown of police training requirements. https://www.apexofficer.com/police-training-requirements https://www.apexofficer.com/police-training-requirements Most of them require 20 hours or less PER YEAR, and that is not just firearms training, but total training across e.g. deescalation, driving, EMT, less-than-lethal force, crowd control, etc. Several of them specify that the firearms training is only 2 hours. Most hobby shooters can knock out 12 hours of dedicated firearms training in a month or 2 of weekend range days, so 6x what a cop might have to do in 12 months. Outdrawing the cops isn't the issue, outnumbering them is. Unless you've also got 300+ buddies you can call for support, you're going to lose in the end.

morkalork 3y ago

What's the point of a citizen review board if the sheriff or chief appoints everyone on it? Talk about fox guarding the henhous!

roughly 3y ago
> What's the point of a citizen review board if the sheriff or chief appoints everyone on it? I don’t know, but I know what the point of the law was.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
Analemma_ 3y ago
This sounds like a case of "the citizen review board was created by fed-up voters at the municipal level, and then the state stepped into neuter it". Because DeSantis etc. are about local control except when the locals make a decision they don't like.
- tadfisher 3y ago
  See also: the Texas "water breaks ban", which actually superceded all county and municipal employee protections in a wide array of classes that exceeded the state minimums.
  - cryptonector 3y ago
    There was no water break ban as such. And no one in Texas will forbid employees from drinking water in the scorching heat unless it is to make a political point.
    - tadfisher 3y ago
      Yes, I explained what the law actually was in my comment. The nickname was earned by removing municipal protections for hydration breaks along with every other protection not specified at the state level.

ImJamal 3y ago

>The second law is just a straightforward neutering of citizen review boards. It says reestablished. How are they neutering something that doesn't exist?

HeatrayEnjoyer 3y ago
Where does it say it is creating an entity that doesn't already exist?
- ImJamal 3y ago
  The word reestablished means that it used to be established but is no longer established. It is now coming back.
  - wholinator2 3y ago
    Not completely. It also means to disband something that currently exists, then recreate it, effectively reestablishing the board. You are paying attention to only one possible reading, which is the one not consistent with the truth. Citizen review boards exist in Florida. These currently functioning boards will have their power stripped immediately and members will be replaced with captive appointees. This is not creating citizen review boards, this is destroying them
    - refurb 3y ago
      Using the word “reestablish” in that way would be the confusing and odd considering the multiple other word choices that would be far more precise.
      - bee_rider 3y ago
        Note that this is just a phrase that occurs in the news article, it doesn’t seem to be present in the actual law as far as I can tell.
  - bena 3y ago

dmichulke 3y ago

Is recording someone an expression of > the intent [..] to interfere, threaten or harass them ?

GoblinSlayer 3y ago
Maybe there was a precedent where such a person walked in and demanded something?
advisedwang 3y ago
The police often interpret recording as a threat (to hold them accountable). They then can construct situations to make it impossible to record without intefering.

jimbob45 3y ago

[flagged]

ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
wow.

vkou 3y ago

The first is an absolute farce. All an officer who doesn't want to be recorded needs to do is get in your face (or have his partner get in your face) - at which point, you are now recording within 25 feet of an officer, and must either stop, or face arrest. If you take a few steps back, he can, of course, repeat this process ad-infinitum. Sure, you can argue this in a Florida court, and you might even win, but in the meantime, the law accomplishes exactly what it intends.

_heimdall 3y ago
Its worth reading the actual law as written [1]. Looks like the distance is actually 20 feet, and it specifically states that you can't approach a first responder with intent to harass after being given a verbal warning. If a first responder approaches you then you've done nothing wrong. [1] https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2024/75/?Tab=BillText https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2024/75/?Tab=BillText
- enragedcacti 3y ago
  That isn't the correct bill, the bill that passed has the more broad phrasing "to violate such warning and approach or remain within 25 feet of the first responder" https://www.flsenate.gov/Committees/BillSummaries/2024/html/3418 https://www.flsenate.gov/Committees/BillSummaries/2024/html/...
  - _heimdall 3y ago
    Oh thanks, yeah that clarification is an important one! The or remain addition ruins it, though I also don't see that holding up in court with any reasonable jury. In that scenario, if I start more than 25 feet away and stand my ground if a cop approaches me only with the intent of making me move or stop filming, I've truly done nothing wrong and the cop is intending to infringe on my rights. Will a judge or DA see if this way? Almost certainly not. But if I were on the jury I'd throw that shit out, I don't really care what the law says as written if its a law I don't think is constitutional or reasonable. Juries are there, in part, to act as a check on the legal system.

user_7832 3y ago

> I wonder if the first will stand up to Constitutional review. I imagine there are many First Amendment protected purposes for recording that may require the recorder to be within 25 feet of the officer. It may be possible to stand 25ft back and hold a 15ft long pole with a camera, or place a phone/camera on the ground and then stand back, to get past this issue.

lvncelot 3y ago
Legality aside, I can't imagine waving a 15ft long pole towards the police will go over well.
- smolder 3y ago
  Yeah, very many people can't afford a decent lawyer when they need one, and might not get one even if they can, in which case legality really is... aside.