More Police outrages

[Ian Grant]

Photographer forced to scrap images

At a recent demonstration in Birmingham, UK a photographer was forced to delete photographs he made which contained images of Police Officers.

Back in the early 70's I had a similar thing happen twice, in the same city, in one incident the camera back was opened and the film destroyed after I photographed a policeman kicking a demonstrator.

It seems the British Police are now a law unto themselves.

Ian

[eclarke]

How are British Police doing on REAL crimes? Here in the U.S. it seems that they are doing a crackerjack job of pursuing "terrorism" but can't quite seem to get a handle on open firearm shootouts. We have had 3 of these between groups of police and criminals in Milwaukee this year, MILWAUKEE!!! ..Evan Clarke

[MP_Wayne]

I read the article at the link you provided. The reason give "compromise officers in future undercover operations" is, in a word, lame. If there are intentions to use officers later in undercover ops, a responsible police force will not put them in an event (protest) that is to be covered by media! If the police force needs those resources, they would (and should) use those officers undercover NOW to infiltrate the protest groups.

The milque-toast excuse was just a smoke screen to trample on the photographer's ability to cover what was going on at the protest.

[Early Riser]

In the US police officers are considered public property when it comes to photographing them while on duty and in the course of their work. The excuse that someday they may go undercover is totally bogus as that excuse could be used with every single law enforcement officer in the country, whether or not they will ever go undercover. We'll see how long this right lasts.

Being able to photograph or document police officers while on duty is one of the few ways that the public has to keep law enforcement officers honest and professional. How many more police abuses would we have out there if the police did not think twice now, due to Rodney King type videos, before beating someone?

[lns]

That's outrageous. If no one can monitor the police, then you risk a police state. My American perspective is the same as Early Riser's. Think of the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Pictures of the police attacking peaceful civil rights marchers changed history. -Laura

[Ian Leake]

I'm amazed the photographer was able to find any police on the streets to take photos of!

[david b]

well luckily for the digital shooter, the images are never really gone until the card is formatted.

[Ian Grant]

Originally Posted by david b

well luckily for the digital shooter, the images are never really gone until the card is formatted.

What an irresponsible post, what if the UK Police read this forum

Ian

[snegron]

Originally Posted by Early Riser

In the US police officers are considered public property when it comes to photographing them while on duty and in the course of their work. The excuse that someday they may go undercover is totally bogus as that excuse could be used with every single law enforcement officer in the country, whether or not they will ever go undercover. We'll see how long this right lasts.

Being able to photograph or document police officers while on duty is one of the few ways that the public has to keep law enforcement officers honest and professional. How many more police abuses would we have out there if the police did not think twice now, due to Rodney King type videos, before beating someone?

Agreed! We all know how officers have absolutely no control over their impulses and need to be "kept honest" by having us photograph them in public! We all know how their training is an absolute sham and that in reality they never risk their lives for anyone.

I propose we send a letter to all of our government representatives and request that all police forces be disbanded immediately! We don't need these primitive ruffians in polyester outfits running around with fast cars and weapons, preying on us poor, innocent photographers! We can run our society much better without any type of law enforcement officers. We can do a much better job at capturing child molesters, rapists, thieves, drunken drivers who kill innocent families, and dealers who push drugs on our children and loved ones than police! All we have to do is hug the bad guys and tell them that we love them. I'm sure that they won't do anything bad to us once we show them how much we love them. After all, we know that there is no such thing as a bad human being; only victims of uncaring societies.

I really wish that we could see how far our society would survive without any law enforcement officers. It would be interesting to have all officers quit their jobs all at once. I'm sure that we would all get along splendidly. After all, don't we all idolize criminals as seen with all the fantastic Hollywood movies glorifying the thug way of life?

It seems that all this "cop bashing" I have seen on APUG recently has inspired me to come up with this great new concept of a "cop-less" society.

p.s., I don't know about you, but if some perverted maniac breaks into my home and threatens at gunpoint to rape my family and kill me, I sure wouldn't mind having one of those polyester-wearing ruffian officers show up and stop him from doing this. Even if that officer is a tad bit rude to the intruder, I still wouldn't mind. Or maybe some of you might think that the officer should say to the gun weilding maniac, "kind sir, would it be possible for you to stop hurting these people? Thank you kind sir. Please turn around, at your conveniance, and place these metal restraints on your wrists so we can safely transport you to our clean holding facility. I apologize if it causes any discomfort on your tender wrists. Thank you kind sir for complying."

I can't blame law enforcement officers for seeming a bit unfriendly sometimes. After all, they deal with human garbage every day just to keep our cities safe for us and our loved ones.

[nc5p]

This happened in Albuquerque last summer. Someone was taking pictures in or near a bar when "alcohol beverage" cops went in (to get free booze or payoffs no doubt). They arrested the guy and took his pictures. Same excuse, they were "undercover" (in other words they didn't want photos of their "business deals"). I'm not sure how the court case went, the district attorney probably dropped charges. That was downtown, the site of the more recent incident. It isn't safe to be caught with a camera down there.