Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Law Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Evidence

Series

Police and policing

Publication Year

Articles 1 - 3 of 3

Full-Text Articles in Law

Hacking Qualified Immunity: Camera Power And Civil Rights Settlements, Mary D. Fan Jan 2017

Hacking Qualified Immunity: Camera Power And Civil Rights Settlements, Mary D. Fan

Articles

Excessive force cases are intensely fact-specific. Did the suspect resist, necessitating the use offorce? What threat did the suspect pose, if any? Was the use of force excessive in light of the situation? These are judgment calls based on myriad facts that differ from case to case. Establishing what really happened forces courts and juries to wade into a fact-bound morass filled with fiercely conflicting defendant-said, police-said battles.

Now an evidentiary transformation is underway. We are in an era where the probability of a police encounter being recorded has never been higher. With the rise of recording—by the public as …


Justice Visualized: Courts And The Body Camera Revolution, Mary D. Fan Jan 2017

Justice Visualized: Courts And The Body Camera Revolution, Mary D. Fan

Articles

What really happened? For centuries, courts have been magisterially blind, cloistered far away from the contested events that they adjudicate, relying primarily on testimony to get the story—or competing stories. Whether oral or written, this testimony is profoundly human, with all the passions, partisanship and imperfections of human perception.

Now a revolution is coming. Across the nation, police departments are deploying body cameras. Analyzing body camera policies from police departments across the nation, the article reveals an unfolding future where much of the main staple events of criminal procedure law will be recorded. Much of the current focus is on …


Privacy, Public Disclosure, Police Body Cameras: Policy Splits, Mary D. Fan Jan 2016

Privacy, Public Disclosure, Police Body Cameras: Policy Splits, Mary D. Fan

Articles

When you call the police for help—or someone calls the police on you—do you bear the risk that your worst moments will be posted on YouTube for public viewing? Police officers enter some of the most intimate incidences of our lives—after an assault, when we are drunk and disorderly, when someone we love dies in an accident, when we are distraught, enraged, fighting, and more. As police officers around the nation begin wearing body cameras in response to calls for greater transparency, communities are wrestling with how to balance privacy with public disclosure.

This Article sheds light on the balances …