Some organizations have started to question the quality of body-worn cameras that law enforcement officers are provided. Not all agencies use the same type of equipment, and others may struggle to afford it.
New York state Attorney General Letitia James’ office said correction officer's cameras were powered on and captured the beating of inmate Robert Brooks in December at Marcy Correctional Facility. However, COs did not have them activated, so cameras were only recording in “standby mode," also known as video recall mode, and recorded the incident without sound.
“All municipalities, really in the nation, but particularly the Greater Rochester region, should have BWC’s, body-worn cameras; the most sophisticated," Dwight Fowler, president of the United Christian Leadership Ministry of Western New York, explained. "I understand that this is something we’re told is not economically feasible for some of our surrounding municipalities. We do know that Rochester, RPD has moved to a more sophisticated body-worn camera than they initially acquired. It's immensely imperative that all chief of police, all supervisors, throughout the Greater Rochester municipalities, who do not currently have body-worn cameras, put forth the genuine effort to ultimately enable that to become a part of their reality.”
Axon is one of the most common body-worn camera manufacturers across the country. DOCCS says its contract is with Axon, and as of Feb. 3, the department has 5,403 body-worn cameras in use in 41 of the 42 state correctional facilities. It did not respond to Spectrum News 1's request for which correctional facility is excluded from that number.
The Ontario County Sheriff’s Office uses these body-worn cameras, as well. However, each law enforcement agency may alter its individual policy for deputy use.
“All of our deputies wear their body cameras at all times when on duty, and they are required to activate them and record any type of enforcement activity with the public or any self-initiated activity that they’ll notify our dispatch center of,” Ontario County Sheriff David Cirencione explained. “They need to activate their body cameras in the entire, encounter with that person, people or an incident. Whether it leads to an arrest, whether it's a traffic crash [or] a traffic stop. Whatever the entire incident is recorded, they then at the end of their shifts or the beginning of their next shift, come in, doc that camera and that downloads all their footage from the day. [It] saves it and that becomes evidence.”
Although Axon body-worn cameras were the devices chosen before Cirencione’s leadership, his office says they benefit from their durability, longer battery life, and higher quality of video, among many other features.
“You can see this is a live lookout in the county right now of deputies cameras. And just like we have GPS technology on our patrol cars, we now have the capability with the cameras as well,” Ontario County Undersheriff Mike Lago showed. “They're able to bring that up and go live. The body camera would actually vibrate and change color so that the deputy would be aware that someone was streaming on their camera. But, just another tool that we have to ensure safety for the deputies and the public.”
Ontario County’s policy requires deputies to turn their devices on at the beginning of each shift, which takes about 10 to 15 seconds. Deputies are then required to activate their body-worn cameras, by clicking the button twice, whenever they’re interacting with the public. While the devices are on, they’re always recording, but without sound. Video recall footage is collected for up to 18 hours, in 30-minute clips. It’s what Axon calls “video recall mode," and what AG James refers to as “standby mode” in the investigation of Robert Brooks' death following his beating at Marcy Correctional Facility.
“At the conclusion of their shift or at the beginning of the next shift, they doc that camera," Cirencione said. "It downloads everything. So if there's a question, we can go back and see all the calls they went to, and the camera system actually syncs with our records management system. So as soon as they doc that, it logs the complaint number they were on with the body camera footage. It knows by time and the officer being assigned to, and it’s called tagging."
Any footage collected can be used as evidence if complaints occur, or an investigation is called for, like in the situation at Marcy Correctional Facility in December. However, Cirencione says personnel complaints have decreased by about 75% since his office started using BWCs roughly five years ago.
“The primary reason for starting body-worn cameras on the road patrol and the law enforcement bureau was because of discovery," he said. "And, not only that, but 2020 was when we hit our peak with distrust in law enforcement nationwide. And we know that 99% of the time, police officers are out there doing the right thing, and they're following policy and they're following the law, and it benefits and protects the officer, for that encounter to be recorded because it shows they're doing the right thing."
“It's just the benefit of being transparent,” Rago added. “Ninety-nine point nine percent of the times, police officers [and] corrections officers are doing the right thing. And it just gives you that a picture is worth a thousand words, and you're actually getting live video and audio and, you're adding those your senses to it. You're seeing what the tone of the conversation was, you're seeing what elements [they] were in. They're on an icy road. It's dark out. There's traffic, all these other things that play into it that sometimes just in a written statement doesn't provide us a true snapshot of what the officer or the correction officer might be dealing with at that given time.”
In Ontario County, Cirencione says the policy for body-worn cameras for deputies carries into the jail. Correction officers have the same required usage standards as law enforcement agents on the road.
“I would say the risk is pretty high for correctional officers to work inside a facility," Stacy Lambert, chief correction officer for the Ontario County Sheriff’s Office, said. "You have individuals who might be going through a mental health crisis. Maybe they're seeking drugs, or there are so many different categories of individuals. You don't know what someone's thinking. The risk outside on the road is just as dangerous as inside the facility."
Last week, on Feb. 11, a DOCCS commissioner order was updated to require all correction officers across the state to activate their body-worn cameras for all of their interactions, as well. Ontario County started using BWCs when Cirencione says the public's distrust of law enforcement peaked in 2020. The office brought the devices to the Corrections Bureau in 2021 in Ontario County Jail.
“One of the big things we were seeing on the jail side was, in 2020 and 2021, we saw a huge spike in inmates accusing officers of sexual harassment," Cirencione said. "And it seemed to be, that the allegations would occur in places that weren't covered by cameras within the correctional facility. So it was a big ‘he said, she said’ or ‘he said, he said’, ‘she said, she said.' We were never able to definitively determine what was going on, and that's not how we want to run our facility and do business. We want to protect the people that are in our custody, and we also want to protect our officers from being, you know, having false reports levied against them."
“There have been times where we've had instances where inmates are making claims that an officer or sergeant or whoever the case may be, and we're able to go back and review the video and have a finding, whether positive or negative," Lambert added. "Inmates file grievances often. But the claim that it's filed and found it to be in favor of the inmate is, more often it's not."
But consistency is key. If any law enforcement agent has concerns of potential malfunction, they’re required to report it to their supervisor as soon as possible. One of the few exceptions to BWC usage at the Ontario County Sheriff’s Office is an immediate threat to a deputy. However, Axon is also a taser company, and whenever a deputy’s weapon is drawn, their devices are immediately activated.
“If the officer’s entering some type of scenario where they feel like their camera isn't working right, and they feel like it's on, but it's not activating appropriately," Cirencione said. "If it's like a report or something that's in control at the time, then we expect them to take an extra minute to check their camera, just like any other piece of equipment, and try it again to see if it’ll come online. If this is an emergency situation where somebody's life is in danger, or potentially the officer's about to be under attack or is under attack, and the camera doesn't activate right away, they need to protect themselves first, and we'll deal with whatever happened with the camera after that. But yeah, if they're under attack, we expect them to protect themselves first.”
