Title says it. I mount a small video camera on the dashboard, or into the face of the dash. It is aimed at me, AND at the driver’s side window.
I am allowed to videotape myself, both in my residence and not in my residence, as near as I can tell. Whether or not someone else stands in the frame is beyond my control.
Additionally, many police departments now have their officers wearing microphones, and have lightbar-mounted cameras running when they are doing traffic stops. However, those tapes are A) the property of the law enforcement agency, and B) show zero in terms of face to face contact and activity. They only show a locked-off shot of the back of my vehicle.
Am I permitted to videotape myself in my car? Am I legally required to tell an officer that they are on camera, because they chose to stand near my car? Is such a videotape admissable in court? Heck, the Rodney King videos, tons of other “on the street, happenstance documentary” video of law enforcement officers has both been used in court and aired all over the world. Surely there is precedent.
What is the law in this regard? Do I surrender certain rights even though I am inside of my vehicle, when I am pulled over by an officer?
I’m not even sure you would have to tell the officer that he’s being recorded. The dash-mounted camera is probably in full view, not concealed, and easily observable. And the officer is in a public space, with no reasonable expectation of privacy.
That’s what I am thinking. Of course, it might mightily anger an officer and that’s never a good thing. ( And, I’m not interested in baiting one either. However, my OP addresses the legality of such a thing.
One does read about traffic stops that turn into something else, usually because the driver of the car is a person already wanted, or there are illegal substances in the vehicle, or on their person. Still and all- it’s kind of a nifty thing to be able to do. I just wondered if it was illegal to do in any states.
There is a black guy in Davis, CA who was pissed at the cops because they apparently picked on him and nobody else. He put cameras on his house to show the frequency of cops slowly driving by.
He kept a video camera in his car. A cop approached him, so he whipped out the camera and started grilling the cop on tape…
“Why are you approaching me?”
“What have I done wrong, specifically?”
etc.
The cop backed down and went away.
Now, he has sued the Davis cops for discrimination.
States vary on eavesdropping law, and some anti-voyeur laws might even apply if they are worded too broadly. Keeping in mind that I am not a CA lawyer, and not offering specific legal advice:
As I read this (pdf) California Supreme Court opinion, you’d pretty much have to paint a sign, verbally tell the officer, or otherwise make sure that the officer knew that the conversation was being recorded, to be completely safe. Of course, if the officer has a mike on or a camera on the car, it will be more difficult for them to claim to claim that they were unaware that the conversation was being recorded. YMMV.
A more complicated scenario would be presented if the officer told you to turn off the camera and you refused. Similarly more complicated would be the case where the officer turns off or dismantles the camera. Or simply covers the lens. Also, the officer could ask you to get out of the vehicle, which would thward your efforts, depending on where you were taken, etc.
As with just about everything, it depends on the laws in your state.
In Washington state, it would be legal.
Turning on the camera’s microphone is more likely to be illegal than just the video. Washington state does not allow audio recording of any private conversation without the full knowledge and consent of every person being recorded. However, the courts have ruled that contact with a law enforcement officer is exempt from this, as it is not a “private” conversation.
So if a state law requires you to tell the police officer that you are recording a traffic stop, do the police need to inform you if they are recording the stop?
No. At least not in New Jersey. I was pulled over a few years ago by a very very green State Trooper. ( Young. Nervous. Supervised by a clearly older Trooper standing a few feet away, witnessing how he handled my traffic stop, etc. ).
He started to ask me for my ID and insurance and then as though smacked upside da head, stopped cold. He raised his voice just slightly and very clearly said, " My Name Is Trooper Smith. Please hand me your driver’s license and insurance card. " He had a script, he’d deviated right out of the gate and caught himself.
NJ State Troopers run audiotape and videotape of traffic stops. I suspect that if I’d had the camera running on that stop, and had told him, he’d have wet his pants. His behavior, enounciation and speech pattern overall made it clear it was a scripted event.
I was, needless to say, compliant and did as I was told. As for removing a traffic-stop from their car, unless you run into the rare bad seed who is gonna screw with you just ‘cause, it’s very unwise to take a driver out of their car unless you are going to search them, their car, or perform roadside sobriety tests. Its’ just unsafe to do it unless you have to. ( Badge ? Other officer Dopers? ).
Oh, and then last summer, I was pulled over. In Wildwood, NJ of all places. Last week of the summer. NY plates on my car, and ahhhhh the local cop was MAD.
I’d driven slowly through a stop sign. I was watching out for the copious pedestrian traffic, but I really did not see the sign- though it was unobscured and clear as day to see. He was steamed, and I understood why. He saw me run a stop with tons of tourists around. Had I not been watching anyone around me, it might have been bad.
I could tell that he too was being at least audio recorded. I keep my wallet in a hip pouch, and it was on the floor. ( A bad place to have to reach down when a cop is standing at your window… ). I said VERY LOUDLY and very clearly, " My wallet is at my feet inside a leather hip pouch. May I please bend over and lift it up so you can watch me take it out?" No mistaking what I said. He literally stood in closer, leaned in to look at the floor and said, “Yes go ahead”.
Interestingly, here in Austin, the police are REQUIRED to videotape all their encounters. Mini-scandals have ensured when cops have conveniently “forgotten” or “neglected” to turn the cameras on before controversial incidents.
So, here in Austin, at least, a cop couldn’t very well object to your videotaping an encounter, because the cop is SUPPOSED to be doing that himself.
But, as far as i can tell, the cases you cite don’t deal with the confidentiality of communication between a member of the public and a public servant going about his or her assigned duties.
Do the same expectations of confidentiality attach to a police officer in the performance of his or her duties? The person is, after all, a public servant carrying out duties in public, and in constant contact with members of the public. The actions they undertake, and the conversations they have in the course of doing this, seem to me to be qualitatively different from two people engaged in a private conversation.
I have a copy of a little book called You and the Police, written under the cute pseudonym of Boston T. Party. The author deals with a whole bunch of issues that can arise when citizens and the police come into contact, and in many cases makes reference to the applicable Supreme Court decisions (Terry, Miranda, Manuel, etc.).
In one incident, he describes being rousted by a cop who wanted to search his car. When it became clear that his refusal to allow his car to be searched was not going to work, and that the cops were going to call in the drug sniffing dogs, he told the cop that he was going to get his camcorder to film the incident.
Unfortunately, he doesn’t say where he found this information, or whether it is something that has been decided by a particular court case, or by particular state law/s.
I should also point out that the book i referenced in my previous post is now rather out of date. It is from 1996, and some important court decisions and new laws have come into effect since then.
As only one example, he says in the book that you are under no obligation to provide a police officer with identification, but a ruling in the last year or so (can’t remember the case name) determined that you do have to provide ID.
According to the California Supreme Court, the test is:
It doesn’t say anything about a different test applying to public servants, and the logic of the statute does not suggest one. It is a criminal statute.
Sure, but the next question i would ask, then, is whether a police officer, in the performance of his or her duties, can be said to have a “reasonable expectation…that no one is ‘listening in’ or overhearing the conversation.”
While there may be nothing in the legislation specifically referring to public servants, the very use of the language “reasonable expectation” suggests that the legislature was aware that expectations regarding privacy differ depending on the situation and the participants.
Maybe i’m just projecting my own belief that law enforcement should be open and accountable, but i can see no justification for denying members of the public the right to record their encounters with law enforcement.
Right, you would. Which is why I said you’d need to tell the officer to be completely safe. I never said it was a sure thing. In some cases, it’s a no brainer. You are stopped at a busy intersection with a lot of pedestrian traffic, for instance. In the middle of a lonely country road, not so easy.
And the court spelled out the test.
And there may be Constitutional protections for them doing so.
WILSON V. LAYNE (Fourth Amendment prohibits media ride-along camera to follow police into home while executing an arrest warrant.) Hanlon v. Berger (ditto search warrant).