# Am I permitted to videotape myself if I am pulled over by a police officer? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 20, 2006, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-permitted-to-videotape-myself-if-i-am-pulled-over-by-a-police-officer/340863 "2006-01-20T19:15:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2006, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-permitted-to-videotape-myself-if-i-am-pulled-over-by-a-police-officer/340863/21 "2006-01-21T23:58:57Z")
Silly question time (I mean, my questions below may seem silly). 1. Does Boston T. Party say the police officer should get a chance to examine the video camera prior to its use to ensure it is not, in fact, a firearm merely disguised as a video camera? 2. Doesn’t the subject of the traffic stop have a right to a copy of the video tape the police officer is (supposedly) making? 3. If the police officer “conveniently forgot to record” or “conveniently misplaced the tape,” doesn’t that–absent any other evidence to support the officer’s assertions–suffice to bring the issue to a close? ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2006, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-permitted-to-videotape-myself-if-i-am-pulled-over-by-a-police-officer/340863/22 "2006-01-22T04:05:09Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > 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. Readily agreed. However, there were riots quite a few years ago in Tomkins Square Park in NYC’s Lower East Side. There was a person videotaping what the cops were doing that night. ( Struggling to quell a bad riot, and a few did get out of hand. Cops, that is. ). The person videotaping the police was arrested for not surrendering the raw video footage. [This Site](http://www.eskimo.com/~recall/bleed/0806.htm) , scroll down to 1988. > [@](#): > > 1988 – US: Tompkins Square Park Police Riot, (6 & 7th). > > Clayton Patterson arrested for not turning over original 3 hour & 33 minute video tape. Eventually the tape got five cops indicted, a chief retired, a captain moved out of the 9th precinct, cops disciplined & some fired. It started Clayton Patterson down a long & weary road (15 years of court battles). > See Tompkins Square Park Police Riot (1988) Directed by: Clayton Patterson & also his Captured: A Film Video History of the Lower East Side; Also see Paul DeRienzo’s 45 minute documentary of the police riot. > > [http://nwo.media.xs2.net/articles/89\_04coverup.html](http://nwo.media.xs2.net/articles/89_04coverup.html) > [http://www.geocities.com/artandpolitics/captured/](http://www.geocities.com/artandpolitics/captured/) > [http://pdr.autono.net/tsp.html](http://pdr.autono.net/tsp.html) Chilling stuff. The police were out of control, they badly needed to control media footage of their behaviors. Arresting a man on a street who is making videotape of the actions of poilce is just plain bad business, IMHO. The police as a group are intensely protective of their need not to be recorded performing their job. ( Even when they are doing so very admirably). If they lose control over images, you wind up with footage for the world to see of Rodney King being beaten to a pulp, and so on and so forth. [Cite proving above statement, using LA and Oklahoma City incidents as examples.](http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=03/04/07/032218) ---
**Author:** ![AmbushBug](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ambushbug/32/4600_2.png) [@AmbushBug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AmbushBug)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2006, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-permitted-to-videotape-myself-if-i-am-pulled-over-by-a-police-officer/340863/23 "2006-01-22T06:00:25Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > 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. No, it determined that a state law (Nevada, where I myself now reside) requiring a person to _identify himself_ (i.e., “officer, my name is John Smith”) was not unconstitutional. From here: > [@](#): > > In contrast to the “credible and reliable” identification requirement in Kolender, the Nevada Supreme Court has interpreted the instant statute to require only that a suspect disclose his name. It apparently does not require him to produce a driver’s license or any other document. If he chooses either to state his name or communicate it to the officer by other means, the statute is satisfied and no violation occurs. ---
**Author:** ![AmbushBug](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ambushbug/32/4600_2.png) [@AmbushBug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AmbushBug)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2006, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-permitted-to-videotape-myself-if-i-am-pulled-over-by-a-police-officer/340863/24 "2006-01-22T06:04:49Z")
Oops, missing link from my post: [http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/03-5554.ZS.html](http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/03-5554.ZS.html) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-permitted-to-videotape-myself-if-i-am-pulled-over-by-a-police-officer/340863.md?page=1)