6 Fredericton police officers set to wear body cameras
Pilot project planned to begin in next 6 to 8 weeks
The Fredericton Police Force is looking at introducing the use of body cameras for its officers.
Deputy Chief Martin Gaudet said the force will be running a 90-day pilot project in the next six to eight weeks.
"We tried it before and the issue we had is what do we do with this video and audio stuff? Where do we put it?" he said.
"Where do we store it that's practical, that can be redacted and that can be tracked so that we know where the videos have gone, who's touched them, who's redacted them, that's the biggest piece."
Gaudet said the force is using Axon, a company that makes smart public safety technology and weapons.
"We already use their Tasers and we have video on our Tasers as well, so we're using one company, pushing all those videos to the cloud," he said.
"We're told by the company... that (the cloud is) secure. Our corporate IT is working on it, they feel that the portal is secure."
6 officers will wear cameras
Gaudet said it's hard to say what the cost of running the operation will be at this point. The cameras, he said, are about $400 to $500 and the 90-day pilot project is free. After that the cost depends on how much space the police force needs to store its videos.
Six officers will be issued the body cameras, which they will attach either to their chests or shoulders. He estimates they'll take two to three hours of footage a shift.
"The benefit is to capture officer-public interaction, or part of the interaction. The audio and video will be part of the package in any investigation," he said.
That audio and video will be subject to New Brunswick's Right to Information, like other public records.
Coun. Steven Chase, chair of the Public Safety Committee, said he's in favour of the pilot project.
"This is one more tool in our ability to improve policing. It's not perfect but it's a major leap forward in providing accurate information about situations."
Good Morning Mr Akhtar Say Hey to Chief Martin Gaudet for me and please enjoy your email and my blog
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Halifax police agrees withholding information was wrong, settles legal case with CBC
After the public broadcaster took police to court, HRP acknowledges it should have released information
Halifax Regional Police has acknowledged it should not have withheld information about its internal discipline decisions from the CBC, according to an agreement approved recently by a Nova Scotia judge.
CBC went to court last year to get information about internal discipline at the department, in an effort to better inform the public during a time of close scrutiny of police conduct.
In the agreement between HRP and CBC, approved July 27 by a Nova Scotia Supreme Court justice, the department admitted it did not adequately review the records when it refused to release them last year following a freedom-of-information request.
It also acknowledged it has a duty to make "every reasonable effort" to help a person requesting information, but that it took two reviews and a court process for the department to fulfil that obligation.
In Halifax, police have been criticized in cases such as the death in custody of Corey Rogers, a traffic stop where Kayla Borden alleged she was racially profiled, and the handling of Carrie Low's rape case.
In each of these high-profile cases, an internal discipline decision eventually became public — but in the vast majority of other cases, the internal decision is not known.
Mount Saint Vincent University professor and activist El Jones said she sees problems with the Nova Scotian and Canadian access-to-information system.
"Access to records, unless there's a really compelling reason for us not to have them, should not be something that's a struggle," she said.
El Jones is a professor at Mount Saint Vincent University and wrote a report for Halifax on defining defunding the police. (Sinisa Jolic)
Jones chaired the committee that delivered a report defining defunding the police to the Halifax Board of Police Commissioners. She said discipline records can help the public understand what kind of discipline issues are coming up and determine whether there are any patterns.
"We can't really get a full picture if we don't have access to these kind of records," she said, referencing the movement to re-examine the role of police.
"How are we supposed to even begin to understand where reforms need to be made — or where resources need to be put, if that's what you want to do — if we don't really have a good picture of where the failures are?
"I think some of that is captured in these kind of records."
Police and public trust
CBC's Atlantic investigative unit wanted to see what kind of complaints police were receiving from the public and how departments handled them. In each Atlantic province, journalists filed freedom-of-information requests as part of a project called Police and Public Trust.
In Nova Scotia, CBC News used access-to-information laws to ask for 11 years' worth of discipline decisions from every municipal police department in the province.
Every force provided the records, except for Halifax, which in July 2022 declined to release any information at all.
As is the right of access-to-information applicants, CBC appealed to the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia.
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(Text KB)CBC is not responsible for 3rd party content
The CBC felt early versions of the released information were too heavily redacted to understand some cases, as locations, pronouns and even inanimate objects were redacted. Both CBC and HRP agreed the names of the complainants and the officers could be redacted to protect their privacy.
CBC continued to press until it believed the police and city's obligations had been sufficiently met and enough information had been revealed. When that happened, both parties agreed to a consent order dismissing the case.
With the signing of that agreement, the legal case between the public broadcaster and the municipal police is over. The Halifax police agreed to pay $1,500 in costs to CBC.
The department declined to do an interview after the case ended, but acting public information officer Melissa MacInnis provided a statement.
"HRP recognizes and acknowledges that there is an increasing expectation of access to information related to policing, and we have a role to play in reviewing our processes as well as how we have done things historically," she wrote.
"At the same time, our resourcing and systems associated with access to information have not kept up. We are looking internally on how we can support this area better using our current resources as well as what additional supports may help."
The statement did not say why HRP failed to adequately review the records and decided to withhold them in the first place.
Information accessed
CBC obtained written decisions from more than 120 Halifax files, most of which were from complaints dealt with between approximately 2019 and 2021. All the complaints were investigated and police determined most were unsubstantiated.
In many cases, senior officers who investigated the complaints concluded there was no evidence or not enough evidence to support the allegations.
In an interview, CBC asked Nova Scotia's Information and Privacy Commissioner Tricia Ralph about the importance of the access-to-information system and the difficulty of going to court to get documents disclosed.
Ralph said although Nova Scotians need to receive information about their public bodies, going to court may be out of reach for many.
Tricia Ralph is the information and privacy commissioner for Nova Scotia. (Robert Short/CBC)
"It turns on the applicant to have to get the resources and the time and the money it takes and take on their provincial government or some municipal government and go to court and fight them for access to the records," Ralph said.
"I think it's pretty obvious that it's a lot more difficult for the average Nova Scotian to do that than it is for a major government to do that."
Ralph said she has been asking for updated legislation to strengthen access-to-information laws in Nova Scotia. The current legislation has not been updated since 1993.
Ralph said her office, and all offices that are subject to access-to-information legislation, are struggling to deal with the amount of work to be done, and should be better resourced.
"Oftentimes when someone is making a request for information it's different than when the laws were drafted. It's not, you know, go into someone's desk and pull a couple of notes and grab these few papers. Sometimes it's thousands and thousands of pages of emails and text messages," she said.
Ralph said sometimes organizations may take the view that access requests are unimportant and other work should take priority over them.
"But it's important to remember that we as a society have decided that it is important, and it is important for Nova Scotians and Canadians to know what their elected officials are doing and that is formalized in the law. And it's important for us to continue to respect those laws and follow them," she said.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Police body cameras aren't always bad news for accused, lawyers say
More New Brunswick officers will be wearing cameras when interacting with the public
Last week, the Fredericton Police Force announced its six-year pilot program with body cameras was successful, and it equipped all of its front-line officers with the technology.
The Saint John Police Force plans a full rollout this summer. RCMP began testing body cameras this spring in three detachments, none in New Brunswick.
Fredericton police Chief Martin Gaudet said the cameras increase transparency, help gather evidence and protect the officers.
Two defence lawyers say that though police technology is meant to strengthen evidence gathered, it's not all bad for the accused. And sometimes, it doesn't even make it to trial.
An example is the trial of Matthew Raymond. He was found not criminally responsible for shooting and killing Donnie Robichaud and Bobbie Lee Wright, and Fredericton Const. Sara Burns and Const. Robb Costello, who responded to calls of shots fired in 2018.
One of the officers was wearing a body camera, but because Raymond had already admitted to the shooting, and the footage did not help explain his state of mind, it was not relevant enough to the issues at trial.
Defence lawyer TJ Burke says body-camera footage from the arrests of people charged with the first degree murder of Justin Breau in Saint John is playing part in the prosecution that's currently underway.
Defence lawyer TJ Burke says body cameras can also help police officers when they are accused of a crime. (Hadeel Ibrahim/CBC)
Burke and defence lawyer Gilles Lemieux said body-camera footage seems to make the biggest difference in impaired driving cases. This is because those cases rely heavily on the police account of how impaired the driver was acting.
"When you have a body cam, especially if there's sound, you can not only see the person having difficulty, but you can hear their speech," Lemieux said. "It certainly makes it more definitive."
Burke said this makes questioning the basis of the arrest more difficult, but it can be useful if the officer has not followed proper procedure or shows something that police testimony might not include.
"Sometime the evidence that a police officer describes in writing is not always the evidence that you see," Burke said.
"The visual of the body-worn camera sometimes is different than the way the police officer describes it."
Lawyer Gilles Lemieux says privacy concerns come with any new technology. (Andrew Vaughan/Canadian Press)
In cases of dangerous driving, Burke said, camera footage can help get to the heart of the matter more quickly.
Before cameras, courts had to rely on officers' descriptions of how the alleged offenders were driving.
Now, judges can see with their own eyes. This way, lawyers can go straight into arguing whether the driving captured on camera was indeed dangerous.
"In this particular case, the use of the body-worn camera footage is useful to the defence and the Crown," Burke said. "It's not always a slam dunk case whenever there's body worn camera footage."
When officers become the accused
Burke also defends police officers when they become the accused. He said if they are accused of misconduct or assault when arresting someone, their own body camera footage would be key evidence.
"It's an officer safety tool," he said.
Even though it has some benefits to the accused, Burke said, just like any other policing tool, the cameras help the prosecution more than the defence. In New Brunswick, any charge police want to lay must first go through the Crown's office.
Before proceeding with a charge, prosecutors review all evidence in a case to decide if there's a reasonable prospect of conviction.
Information Morning - Saint John 12:58 Burke said if body camera footage shows a police officer, during an arrest, failing to give someone the right to speak to a lawyer, for example, the Crown can decide against laying the charge, without that footage ever making it to court.
People are allowed to file a request to view body cam footage that shows their arrest, Gaudet said.
Lemieux said he doesn't see body cameras disrupting the way the justice system works. He said it adds accountability and like all technology, has its pros and cons.
Looking ahead, he said he does have some concerns about privacy, especially for people caught on the camera but not involved in the investigation.
Gaudet said the force has policies about privacy, such as turning the cameras off when entering a school or a hospital.
Burke said he has also seen an improvement in how well footage is edited to obscure personal information and the identity of minors.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
"RCMP began testing body cameras this spring in three detachments, none in New Brunswick."
Go Figure why I try to record everything
Steven Coppersmith
Reply to David Amos
Why are you always getting involved with the police?
David Amos
Reply to Steven Coppersmith
They picked fight with me in 1982 after asking me to testify at a Coroners Inquest and it continues to this very day
Ralph Linwood
Reply to Steven Coppersmith
If you are honest, polite and having nothing to hide, there really is no reason to take a video. Just do as your told and all will be fine. Most people that are recording their interactions seem to have some kind of objective to portray the police in a bad light when in fact they are breaking the law.
Richard Huntington
Reply to Steven Coppersmith
Because he is angry with his life choices that have lead him into conflict with the authorities and he is incapable of blaming himself, finding it easier to blame others.
David Amos
Reply to Richard Huntington
I wonder if that is your real name
Anna Greene
Reply to David Amos
41 years ago....and you still hold a grudge? Or could it be that you are anti-authority and continue to find yourself in a place where you have contact with police.
David Amos
Reply to Anna Greene
Reply to David Amos
David Amos
Reply to Anna Greene
David Amos
Reply to Anna Greene
"Fredericton police Chief Martin Gaudet said the cameras increase transparency, help gather evidence and protect the officers."
Yea Right
David Amos
Reply to David Amos
I have a copy of a cop body-cam video talking about me to a friend they had falsely arrested
Steven Coppersmith
Reply to David Amos
Yes 100% true. You will be recorded.
David Amos
Reply to Steven Coppersmith
Go Figure why I am keeping a record of this
Anna Greene
Reply to David Amos
"you" should not have that. The police, lawyers and your friend should.
David Amos
Reply to Anna Greene
Are you sure about that?
Mike More
Reply to David Amos
They don’t?
David Amos
Reply to Mike More
I hope they do because I have already have a record of this on the internet
Reply to David Amos
Reply to Anna Greene
Content Deactivated
"Defence lawyer TJ Burke says body cameras can also help police officers when they are accused of a crime."
What if they prove the cop is a crook?
Steve Freeman
Reply to David Amos
Firstly the officer will get supended with pay and milk the system for a few years.
Then the officer will quit just before the police service fires him/her.
Andrew Stat
Reply to David Amos
Then they get suspended, with pay. Different rules for them.
Ralph Linwood
Reply to David Amos
Then that footage will be used to prosecute them.
David Amos
Reply to Steve Freeman
Bingo
David Amos
Content Deactivated
Reply to Ralph Linwood
Dream on
David Amos
Reply to Andrew Stat
Yup
Reply to Ralph Linwood
seems in this day & age it's alot easier to just play the video of what happened than have an officer scribble 3 pages of notes in a little book and try to describe it.
David Amos
Reply to Daniel Henwell
Only if the video is complete from start to finish
Ralph Linwood
Reply to David Amos
Indeed. Of course this goes both ways. Maybe the people cherry picking parts of public / police interactions should post the entire video to provide context, not just the part where the mean coppers took the guy down "for doing nothing".
David Amos
Content Deactivated
Reply to Ralph Linwood
Check my work
Reply to Ralph Linwood
Shawn Tabor
Reply to Shawn Tabor
oops, forgot to turn the cam on ..
Axon would likely be a good investment, over a Billion in Sales last year ...
Content Deactivated
Reply to Scott A.
Reply to Steven Coppersmith
Reply to John Lawrence
Ralph Linwood
Reply to Ralph Linwood
Reply to Mick Fontana
Reply to Robert Hartman
Reply to Ernie Parks
Reply to G. Timothy Walton
Reply to Norm Head
...
But just to make sure we're on the same page, when you said "'poor' criminaIs", you were referring to the poIice, right?
Reply to Dan McIntyre
In the USA however bystanders cameras have been detrimental when it comes to recording interactions. George Floyd's 9 minute suffocation from a cops knee on his windpipe pops into mind while the cops mysteriously lost the recordings on their body cams.
Reply to Mike Barkman
Reply to Roger Pritchet
Content Deactivated
From their discussion of results: "a sizeable proportion of the sample chose a career in law enforcement because of the excitement associated with the career as almost 78% wanted a career with interesting or exciting work, 45% watched the police at work in their communities, about 27% were drawn by popular entertainment media portrayals of the career, and 7% selected the career after seeing it first-hand through a ride-along or college internship."
I was thinking of a different survey, though. That one was done at a police academy in Quebec about 10 years ago. I remember reading the news report but I couldn't find it now. But I found this one and it has remarkably similar results, despite being done much more recently and in the USA.
Yes, that’s because saying things that aren’t true is a natural display of human nature.
Reply to Nick Bean
So, maybe your memory isn’t perfect.
Reply to Nick Bean
Now read my second paragraph.
😆
Perhaps it may prove better to get clarification before you post such unnecessary rants.
Not funny but it is something a lawyer would write
A person (cop), who accepts the product of th e f t, in payment to enforce vict imle ss laws (h armin g pea ceful people) is not to be trusted.
Censorship is not a virtue John.
Clearly someone can't handle a difference of opinion.
Would it have been better to buy millions of dollars worth of equipment upfront and then find out you're cancelling the program 3 years later?
Reply to Craig McMaster
They both said now the judge gets to see and hear it all . There is always some one trying to instigate an excessive force complaint.
No wonder the advocates and activists don’t want them.
Huh? Anti-poIice brutaIity advocates and activists have been calling for these cameras for ages.
Police ask 'why' in Raymond interrogation, but get little in response
Matthew Raymond is facing four counts of first-degree murder in Fredericton shooting
Hadeel Ibrahim · CBC News · Posted: Oct 13, 2020 9:44 AM ADT
"Canadian law allows police to lie during an interrogation."
A task I would never trust a poIice officer with.
Georges: Quick! Don’t call 911!
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Lol, love how he just tries to reinvent history. Body cameras for police in general have been brought in everywhere for ONE reason---too many people getting hurt or killed by police during some of their "interactions" with the public.
George Floyd, as a prime example, is why there are body cameras on police everywhere these days.
In my experience there is no such thing as a true story, but there are lots of stories with a specific emotional point to them.
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