A small victory for common sense

[Grim Reaper]

Charges dismissed against Md. man who taped traffic stop

A Harford County Circuit Court judge Monday dismissed wiretapping charges against Anthony Graber, a motorcyclist who was jailed briefly after he taped a Maryland state trooper who stopped him for speeding on I-95. Graber used a camera mounted on his helmet, then posted the video on YouTube.

In April, a few weeks after the traffic stop, Harford County state's attorney Joseph I. Cassilly charged Graber, a staff sergeant in the Maryland Air National Guard and a computer systems engineer, with violating the state's wiretapping law. That law dates back to the 1970s and was originally intended to protect citizens from government intrusions into their privacy. If convicted on all charges, Graber faced up to 16 years in prison.

Judge Emory A. Pitt Jr. had to decide whether police performing their duties have an expectation of privacy in public space. Pitt ruled that police can have no such expectation in their public, on-the-job communications.

Pitt wrote: "Those of us who are public officials and are entrusted with the power of the state are ultimately accountable to the public. When we exercise that power in public fora, we should not expect our actions to be shielded from public observation. 'Sed quis custodiet ipsos cutodes' ("Who watches the watchmen?”)."

Graber was also charged with possessing a “device primarily useful for the purpose of the surreptitious interception of oral communications" -- referring to the video camera on his helmet. The judge disagreed with the prosecutor that the helmet cam was illegal, and concluded the state's argument would render illegal “almost every cell phone, Blackberry, and every similar device, not to mention dictation equipment and other types of recording devices."

Pitt's decision is the first ruling in Maryland to address the legality of citizens taping police in the course of their duties. Because it is a circuit court ruling, it is not binding on other judges. However, unless it is appealed, said Graber's attorney, David Rocah of the ACLU of Maryland, "it is likely to be the last word" on the matter and to be regarded as precedent by police.

No word yet on whether the state's attorney will try to appeal the decision. Graber still faces traffic charges stemming from the incident.

It's sad that this had to go to court in the first place, but at least common sense prevailed.

[loCAtek]

Well, good. In Cali anyway, a visible camera is implied consent to be recorded. This is why in that Oakland BART Shooting case the cell phone video was allowed in court.

[oldr_n_wsr]

Don't a lot of cop cars have a video camera in them also?

[Gob]

Using that law to try to do the guy, smacks of desperation does it not?

[Long Run]

Because, of course, our police and courts do not have important matters to attend to, so why not waste a little time on a nothing issue.

[Andrew D]

Well, at least as far as the defendant was concerned, it was hardly "a nothing issue." At stake was whether or not he would spend as long as sixteen years behind bars. I don't know your age, but I am now forty-seven. Being imprisoned until age sixty-three (when my wife would be seventy-six, if she were even still alive) would not be "a nothing issue" to me.

The decision was entirely correct. The notion that a public servant, in the course of performing a public duty, and thereby initiating a conversation with a member of the public, has some right of "privacy" with respect to that conversation is preposterous. How can one reasonably expect to have a right of privacy when the circumstances are that one is a public official engaged in a public duty and conversing, in that public capacity, with a member of the public?

Those of us who are technologically enabled, which I am not, should take every opportunity to record, in every way possible, every interaction any of us ever has with "law enforcement". Sometimes, such recordings will result in the arrests and prosecutions of "law enforcement" officers who violate the law. More often -- and in the long run, perhaps more importantly -- they will act as a deterrent: If Officer Bubba does not know whether he is or is not being recorded, he will be at least somewhat more likely to comport himself as if he were.