Two stories.
First and locally, from the P-D:
IMPERIAL — School security cameras that can be monitored remotely by Jefferson County sheriff’s deputies are being unveiled today at the Windsor School District.
The cameras in the Imperial-based district of about 3,100 students are among the first in the metropolitan area that can be monitored from outside the schools by a police agency.
In other words, the Windsor Prison System is installing surveillance cameras in all of its penitentiaries. Of course you would want them to be monitored by local authorities.
All kidding aside, the Windsor S.D. suits are citing Columbine as a reason. Trouble is that Columbine had cameras cameras everywhere when it happened. All that did was to show us video of the tragedy. It’s not like the perps, who were losers starved for attention and eternal fame (or infamy), weren’t going to make it hard to discover who did it. The cameras only made that kind of thing easier.
Remember, YouTube didn’t exist in 1999.
Second, from Babylon-on-Potomac and in the Washington Times:
Video cameras proposed on guns for D.C. police
A D.C. Council member wants to put mini-cameras on roughly 4,000 police firearms to make officers accountable for using lethal force, but other city officials are not convinced about the value of the technology.
Council member Harry Thomas Jr., Ward 5 Democrat, is proposing a bill to equip the Metropolitan Police Department’s weapons with relatively untested PistolCams, which record video and sound when a gun is drawn.
Uh, don’t their cars already have cameras? And pray tell, which way are these cameras going to point? If they point outward, they might do no good in the dark. If the point inward, then you’ll see nothing but the cop’s body.
