uh the answer your question is I think the studies are already out there to support the fact that uh officers are safer uh they'll receive less citizens complaints uh when a when a false allegation is made we have the proof to show what actually did happen during the uh the contact between the the citizen and the officer and do you feel that your officers and officers around the country are well trained enough that the video will more often than not vindicate them rather than get them in trouble yeah absolutely and I think I think there will be times that the video will show something that we did do incorrectly procedurally but I'm okay with that the truth is the truth no matter where it comes from and the idea is that if people are going to videotape my officers from their Vantage points and only put the provocative part of that video uh on some posting somewhere I want to be able to have the entire conversation from the officers Vantage Point uh with all of the other things that go on the the radio traffic the conversation and the ambient noise that's behind them I want an accurate depiction of what's said and done are there any ways that you think this camera's being used that you hadn't thought of I don't know so much that we didn't think of but officers are using it to videotape uh evidence uh one of the First videos we got from officer York was a guy who stole a uh iPad out of uh somebody's car uh after they carjack the vehicle well we use the Apple technology to track the iPad but once he was on the ground being taken into custody he begins to give a story and I think a story that most officers would have missed because they're still in the middle of the Tak down the rest procedure but he has already locked himself into what he said happen at that Split Second so you can't go back and change that now you've just told us on tape all the reasons why you're not the right guy h so I think that was unexpected yeah creating that permanent imprint of memory that you know memories are so fallible but there you have it it's right on video tape right and he's already chronicled the day's events while he's being taken into custody so he doesn't have time to sit in the police car and start to you know contemplate a new lie that that somehow would vindicate him from what he had just done huh one of the concerns is that because the technology is so new and because there's so much video um that just processing it might cost more than police departments like yours can handle well we subscribe to evidence.com which is another product from taser and that product is getting better and I will be the first to tell you and the officers will too that the administrative end of what goes on is timeconsuming and a bit cumbersome um marking videos to correspond with the call that was there to redact videos that need to be released to the media or to the public uh or to courts what things can't you know juvenal can't be seen we don't give out names and and critical information on those so those are cumbersome um the sheer volume of data that is produced uh by the cameras um and I I'm going to say it was 2 or 3 weeks ago we were at 19,600 videos well the ones that aren't important they will automatically drop off the system uh based on a on an algorithm that's built into it those ones that are important will be memorialized relatively forever how do you determine which are important and which are not uh they're related to an actual case a complaint uh an investigation um because what we had originally started to do is we had the officers record every basic human contact they had that was the idea uh that in itself became cumbersome and the officer said hey chief we know when to turn this thing on and we know when to turn it off allow us to make the decision on when we take and this is a beta test period so I said you know what you got it let's do that let's try it so for this next 6 months that we're using these uh cameras the officers are deciding what contacts that they want to record and that was met with some uh controversy some of the officers thought that was crazy and they should record everything other ones felt that it uh it helped build the trust level between the administration of the department and themselves interesting do you think that these cameras are going to change the way police work is done in America absolutely let's go back to what happened at the Marathon bombing in Boston it was the first time that I can remember that the police department and the federal agencies asked the community for all of their videos give me every picture every video you have we've never done that that's completely outside of the Paradigm we normally do things uh that is a bit ctitious at times we go out and grab the videos without telling anybody what we have well not this time but the other thing is look at if um one of the one of the Boston detectives said hey look I just checked that Barrel that dumpster with my dog I know there was no device there an hour ago or whatever the timeline was um and he was right we end up seeing on the video he was absolutely there and he did check it and it was placed after the you know uh the race had begun but if you're an officer setting up for a Super Bowl or an NBA All-Star game or whatever that big event is a marathon if your officers were wearing those cameras around why they were setting up it relieves liability it shows that it documents all the things that they did prior to the event um and it also might catch something that's important later uh to uh Propel the investigation into a specific area it's fascinating so I mean it's it is because those are things that you normally wouldn't think of because really what we started out was this was Instant Replay for law enforcement this was your Monday Night Football was the was the foot in or was the foot out uh this is kind of where it started but now I think you can see a lot of other areas that can to be used for well one of the things the guys were talking about was that um it almost it almost doesn't have to be used it modifies Behavior just by the virtue of people seeing that a police officer is wearing one it modifies the officer's behavior and apparently um the suspect or the civilians as well people were much politer when they know that they'll be videotaped and it will be used later um when I was a young police officer working a traffic job uh as a motorcycle officer uh being quick was not always one of the best things for a cop I used to carry a tape recorder with me back in the day uh that just kept me honest uh to not say anything I shouldn't say so uh I'm the first guy to tell you it modified my behavior just by the fact that I was recording what I was saying I was much care more careful about what I said interesting and so now that there's actual video capturing what people say everybody's a little bit more hesitant right and um there's there's a concern by the officers that this is Big Brother uh looking out after him but it really isn't anything to do with that and I actually told a group of them the other day I don't have time in my workday to go see what you did uh you know just to check up on you that no one in this organization has that time it's much too lean of a staffing model nor are we you know compelled to do that anyway but if they do do something that arises to that comes to the attention of the administration at least we can see exactly what's there again transparency is all we're looking for the truth is the truth no matter uh if it's on video or if it's something that we write down and Report the bottom line is the way that Municipal policing has policing Powers is by the trust of the community does the community complain about it is the community concerned about privacy issues so far not um there will always be some vocal minority that wants to raise some issue but they never rais the issue when we were being videotaped by cell phones and and other things they were all happy with that well now that we're actually protecting ourselves and videotaping our own actions to raise a concern now is actually somewhat comical to me does it in any way hinder police officers from doing their work you know there might be certain circumstances that it could get in the way of an interview somebody who wants to tell you something uh maybe as a witness or as a confidential informant that you wouldn't want to tape and we wouldn't do that I mean I think there are instances when that will come uh we as law enforcement executives have to trust in our people and their training to do the right things at the right time and we do that already this is just another tool on their tool belt really I mean we give you a gun a taser a baton uh pepper spray and we expect you to know when and when not to use those and what order to use them in it's it's no different than any of those it's all about training and believing that you've hired the right people and you have that trust relationship uh you talk cost prohibitive I'll tell you what uh it's expensive but look at the difference uh an axon camera uh and the equipment to go with it for an officer is hovering around $1 or $1,200 I think uh if I was to buy incar cameras you know you see a lot of those dash cams those are about $6,000 uh a piece and albeit you don't have to buy as many of them probably 60 to 70% of what we do in Municipal law enforcement maybe different for a sheriff or a highway patrol but in Municipal law enforcement happens outside of the vehicle so alls I have to do is save myself a couple lawsuits uh with a tape and it pays for itself and right now we're using asset forfeiture money to fund this program so we're using bad guys money to film bad guys it's kind of cool