on sale now at amazon

on sale now at amazon
"I don't like this book because it don't got know pictures" Chief Rhorerer

“It’s becoming a disturbingly familiar scene in America - mentally unstable cops”

“It’s becoming a disturbingly familiar scene in America - mentally unstable cops”
“It’s becoming a disturbingly familiar scene in America - mentally unstable cops”

FCPD body camera pilot to launch in 2018



A thug is a thug. They don’t change because they can’t change. So this is what will happen. These killers will wear body cameras for the allotted time, they’ll say the cameras didn’t make a difference etc and their mouthpiece Sharon “Show me the money” Bulova will swear to it and the camera will be gone. Watch and see.


FCPD body camera pilot to launch in 2018
By Angela Woolsey/Fairfax County Times
The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a proposed pilot program for police body-worn cameras at its Nov. 21 meeting, a move that county elected officials and law enforcement hope will increase transparency around police-citizen interactions.
Scheduled to start in early 2018, the pilot will provide 230 cameras to uniformed patrol officers at the Fairfax County Police Department’s (FCPD) Mount Vernon and Mason District stations for three months, though the department has the option to extend it to six months.
“The pilot program for police body cameras…is yet another example of Fairfax County’s commitment to supporting transparency and police accountability,” Board of Supervisors Chairman Sharon Bulova said. “I am proud of our Police Chief Ed Roessler and his team for working to carry out the pilot, which entailed extensive upfront research and will include training for police officers at the Mason and Mount Vernon District Stations.”
The county’s implementation of a body-worn camera pilot takes the FCPD one step closer to fulfilling another one of the 202 recommendations from the Ad Hoc Police Practices Review Commission, which Bulova assembled earlier that year in response to public outcry over the county’s handling of a fatal officer-involved shooting in 2014.
The commission’s report, which was published on Oct. 8, 2015, recommended a mandate that all FCPD patrol officers “employ body cameras to record all interactions with members of the public.”
Fairfax County previously considered using body cameras in 2015 after the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) and U.S. Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) released a report in 2014 on best practices for establishing a police body camera program.
Using the 2014 report and community feedback, Roessler presented a proposal to the Board of Supervisors’ public safety committee on June 9, 2015, but the board decided to wait before taking any action.
Roessler says that his 2015 proposal was for a full program for the entire police department, rather than a pilot. It carried an estimated start-up cost of $8 million and recurring annual costs of $4 million, while also requiring the addition of eight full-time positions.
Since then, more vendors have started offering body-worn cameras, so the equipment and related storage costs have become cheaper.
The past couple of years have also given the FCPD time to observe how body-worn camera programs in other police agencies around the U.S. have progressed, providing better insight into how a potential program should be implemented.
“It made prudent sense to do a pilot project, because today, you truly cannot understand the costs of the entire program,” Roessler said. “…We’ve learned a lot of lessons from [other agencies], where you can’t just buy these cameras and employ them. You have to test out the IT infrastructure and then the data storage costs, so that’s our intent.”
The Board of Supervisors public safety committee agreed to let Roessler start a request for proposal (RFP) process for possible vendors at its Dec. 13, 2016 meeting.
The RFP ultimately went to the technology company Axon, which will provide the cameras, software, and storage for the pilot program at no cost to Fairfax County.
According to the FCPD, there will still be some expenses associated with the pilot, which has a projected start-up cost of $684,151 for the Fiscal Year 2018, mostly to cover the hiring of personnel needed to provide technical support and manage digital evidence and records.
It will also cost approximately $8,000 to enhance the power and network access required at both of the stations involved in the pilot.
The first three years of storage for evidence collected during the 90-day pilot will be covered as part of a field trial agreement with Axon, but data storage after that will cost $124,000 annually starting in Fiscal Year 2021.
If the pilot is expanded to 180 days, the cost of data storage would increase.
Given those expenses, Roessler says the pilot will be a key test to see whether body cameras are actually effective tools for achieving their intended goals, which are to reduce the use of force by officers and decrease the number of citizen complaints against officers.
“Clearly the body-worn cameras will round out the best practices of accountability, but we’re going to have to balance maintaining staffing levels and paying benefits,” the FCPD chief said. “The cost of this is a big challenge.”
In order to determine the effectiveness of both the cameras and policies implemented to govern their use, Fairfax County police have partnered with American University professors Richard R. Bennett and Brad Bartholomew to conduct a 270-day-long analysis of the pilot.
A study of the Metropolitan Police Department’s body camera program found that the devices had no discernible impact on citizen complaints or officers’ use of force.
The Washington, D.C., agency, one of the largest in the nation, deployed 2,600 cameras starting in December 2016 as part of its $5.1 million program.
Released on Oct. 20, the report by the city government group, The Lab @ DC, called into question the belief that implementing body cameras would prompt significant behavioral changes in policing.
Roessler says that Bennett and Bartholomew have analyzed that study, along with a similar one done in Boston, Mass., in order to find ways they could potentially improve upon them when looking at Fairfax County.
“My challenge to the professors [was] what are the gaps that you see from an academic perspective to where I, as the chief, could make sure my policies provide a greater randomization sampling of all the nuances of how body-worn cameras work?” Roessler said.
The two researchers are currently in the process of gathering data about use-of-force incidents and complaints lodged against officers so they can have a point of comparison when the pilot program starts.
The pilot is expected to officially launch within 100 days of the Board of Supervisors’ Nov. 21 vote, since the department needs time to train officers, install information technology, and hire temporary civilian employees to provide technical support, process evidence, and handle Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for the recordings generated by the body cameras.
In approving the funding and implementation of the body camera pilot, the Board of Supervisors also gave the police department permission to follow a model policy for how the equipment and data will be used and stored.
The policy, which can be found in draft form on the Board of Supervisors’ committee meetings website under Oct. 10, is the culmination of research and discussions that the FCPD has been conducting with a group of community stakeholders, including mental health advocates and civil rights groups, since 2014, according to Roessler.
Officers equipped with body-worn cameras must wear them outside their uniform or vest on a full-time basis, and they will be expected to activate the device during any public encounter related to a call for service or law enforcement action, including subject and traffic stops.
Officers should start recording when they arrive on the scene, or as soon as it is practical and safe to do so, and leave it on for the duration of the incident, including the transportation of an individual to a detention facility.
The policy prohibits officers from intentionally obstructing their body-worn camera or avoiding recording a police incident.
Officers can record citizens in public areas or in a private residence if they have legal authority to be there, but individuals can opt not to be recorded unless it is necessary for an ongoing criminal investigation, arrest, or search.
Body cameras must be deactivated in state, federal, and local courthouses as well as medical or mental health facilities unless a use-of-force incident is expected or occurs.
The policy instructs officers not to use their cameras to make surreptitious recordings of other law enforcement personnel, to record detailed statements in alleged rape or sexual assault cases, or to conduct Lethal Assessment Program (LAP) assessments, which are used to determine risk factors when responding to the scene of a domestic violence-related incident.
The cameras are also not to be used when communicating tactical and strategic plans, meeting with undercover officers and confidential informants, appearing before a magistrate, or engaging in personal or administrative activities.
Officers should not activate their body-worn camera when community members report a crime and request anonymity, or in restrooms and locker rooms.
While this is the policy that will be implemented at the start of the pilot, Roessler and the stakeholder group from 2014 will meet to monitor how the existing policy is working, and they have the ability to alter it throughout the duration of the pilot program.
“It’s going to be a live document,” Roessler said. “…If we missed something and need to enhance the policy, I shall enhance the policy immediately to maintain compliance. I will make sure we hold ourselves to the highest standard of accountability that we can.”





No comments:

Post a Comment