{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.mccaskill.senate.gov/media-center/latest-headlines/a-possible-ferguson-solution-cameras-on-cops", "A possible Ferguson solution: Cameras on cops", "2014-12-26", "2014", "2014-12", "Democrat", "House", "MO", "Claire McCaskill", "M001170", "www.mccaskill.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "A possible Ferguson solution: Cameras on cops \r\n                \r\n            \r\n            \r\n                Wednesday, November 26, 2014\r\n            \r\n            \n\t\n\r\n            \r\n            \r\n                  \r\n                    By:\u00a0\r\n                    Michael Doyle\r\n                \r\n            \r\n            \r\n                \r\n                \r\n                \r\n            WASHINGTON\u00a0\u2014 The Ferguson fallout will include more police officers nationwide wearing cameras as part of their uniforms.\r\nLawmakers like Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., are talking about federal funding. Researchers are digging into data about costs and benefits. Cities that already have equipped police with cameras are fielding questions from those that are considering it.\r\n\u201cThe officers have welcomed them, and I think the community has, too,\u201d April R. Harris, treasurer of the Greensboro Police Foundation in North Carolina, said in an interview Wednesday, recalling that \u201cbefore we had the cameras, we had here in Greensboro a couple of police situations where it was, \u2018He said, she said.\u2019\u201d\r\nThe Greensboro Police Foundation raised more than $100,000 to purchase the cameras for the city\u2019s police department. While the fundraising drive was a success, the need for it also underscored one of the challenges ahead: the cameras can be costly.\r\nThe cameras\u2019 use, moreover, can open up unanticipated conflicts. Harris noted, for instance, that there are now questions about whether the video taken by a camera worn by an officer amounts to a personnel record that\u2019s exempt from public release.\r\nThere\u2019s no doubt, though, that the shooting of unarmed teenager Michael Brown by Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson is prompting much more interest in the cameras that can capture an ambiguous encounter.\r\n\u201cSince Ferguson, the agencies will look more closely to see, \u2018How can we make this happen?\u2019 but also, \u2018How can we do it right?\u2019\u201d Lindsay Miller, senior research associate at the Police Executive Research Forum, said in an interview Wednesday.\r\nMiller, co-author of an extensive Justice Department-funded study of police cameras, noted that, even before Ferguson, the cameras often first deployed \u201cin smaller and mid-sized agencies\u201d have in the last year or two been adopted by larger agencies.\r\nCharles Katz, an Arizona State University criminology associate professor, agreed Wednesday that the Ferguson incident will accelerate the use of body-worn cameras.\r\nNo good public estimate exists for how many law enforcement agencies currently deploy officers with cameras. The agencies that do use them vary widely in size and sophistication. The two-officer police department in Miller\u2019s hometown in rural Missouri uses body-worn cameras, and so, as part of a test run, does the Los Angeles Police Department.\r\nThe Police Executive Research Forum study included a survey with responses from 254 law enforcement agencies, 63 of which reported using body-worn cameras.\r\nThe analysts identified tangible benefits that include better documentation of evidence, increased police accountability and a reduction in the use of force.\r\nA yearlong study of the Mesa Police Department in Arizona, for instance, found that camera-wearing officers had 40 percent fewer public complaints, and 75 percent fewer use-of-force complaints, than they had without wearing cameras. Camera-wearing police in Rialto, Calif., had an 88 percent reduction in citizen complaints.\r\nBut with the benefits come costs and questions.\r\nIndividual cameras can cost in the range of $800 to $1,200, although TASER International markets an \u201cultra-durable on-officer camera\u201d for $399. Thirty-nine percent of agencies responding to the Police Executive Research Forum survey identified price as a primary reason for not ordering the cameras.\r\nPrivate fundraising, akin to what happened in Greensboro, has been one solution. The Los Angeles Police Department raised nearly $1.3 million in private funds for officer cameras, which began as a pilot project last January. Another solution could be federal aid, of the sort being suggested by McCaskill.\r\n\u201cShe is specifically looking at options for prioritizing federal resources that go to local police departments, so that body cameras come first, before other equipment,\u201d McCaskill spokeswoman Sarah Feldman said in an interview Wednesday, stressing the idea is \u201cnot a mandate.\u201d\r\nOther questions, beyond funding, include:\r\n\u2013 How much discretion will individual officers have to turn off the cameras for certain particularly sensitive encounters, such as meetings with informants or during work at crime scenes?\r\n\u2013 How will the privacy interests of victims be protected, and how will those privacy interests be balanced against the public\u2019s?\r\n\u2013 How will the video recording of encounters change the behavior of citizens and officers alike?\r\nThe questions are prompting states and municipalities to come up with different answers, on policies ranging from how long video recordings are stored to who has a say in the video recording.\r\nPennsylvania legislators, for instance, passed earlier this year a law waiving the previous requirement that police obtain consent before video recording another person. In some other states, the old two-party consent rules still apply.\r\nPolice unions, too, weigh in, and sometimes voice resistance. In New York City last year, the Patrolmen\u2019s Benevolent Association pushed back against U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin\u2019s order that the city initiate a pilot program equipping officers with cameras in selected precincts.\r\nThe pilot program has begun, though union leaders maintain that mandated use of body cameras is a workplace condition that should be negotiated as part of an overall labor contract. Scheindlin insisted on trying the cameras as part of a ruling that struck down the city\u2019s controversial stop-and-frisk policy.\r\n\u201cThe recordings should also alleviate some of the mistrust that has developed between the police and the black and Hispanic communities,\u201d Scheindlin wrote, adding that \u201cvideo recordings will be equally helpful to members of the NYPD who are wrongly accused of inappropriate behavior.\u201d\r\nRead more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/11/26/248308_a-possible-ferguson-solution-cameras.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy\r\n            \r\n             \r\n            \r\n            \n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\tPrint\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\tEmail\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t  \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tTweet", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.mccaskill.senate.gov/media-center/latest-headlines/a-possible-ferguson-solution-cameras-on-cops"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.340148039162159, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}