Ohioans For Concealed Carry Discussion Forums

We have found that at least one police department in Ohio, and this one is the Ohio State Patrol, only keeps their dash-cam videos for 30 days. The bottom line here is that if anyone is involved in an incident where a comment is made about being too slow to notify or the officer gives information clearly contrary to the Ohio concealed carry laws, we have a limited time to obtain the dash-cam video. OFCC continues to develop testimony in support of the upcoming legislation to eliminate LEO notification and OFCC needs your help by notifying the organization of these incidents as soon as possible after they happen. Please contact Jeff, Bryan, a coordinator or moderator as soon as possie after an incident.

This is NOT meant as bashing law enforcement.

Gary

{Changed to announcement, and added to title for more description--ep}

Gary:

Must be VHS or Mini-DV, or one of the other "tape" formats. CD or DVD is "permanent", and cheap enough to retain forever.

The tapes, though, are still a little expensive. I would assume that if a critical incident came up, they'd keep the tapes, though.

Probably best to have your lawyer (and/or this group) contact the PD immediately!

It may also be prudent to try to find out what kind of system they're using. There's no excuse for CD's or DVD's to be discarded. They still could be using rewritable CD's or DVD's, but they cost more, and wear out. 'Course, some bean counter could have figured out that they'd save $50/year and.... But, the real reason to find out what system is to be sure that they're not lying when you ask for a copy and "it's already been recycled"....

Paranoid-R-Us ....

Regards,

SMMAssociates wrote:Gary:

Must be VHS or Mini-DV, or one of the other "tape" formats. CD or DVD is "permanent", and cheap enough to retain forever.

The tapes, though, are still a little expensive. I would assume that if a critical incident came up, they'd keep the tapes, though.

I don't believe their policy is "wrong" because what we're talking about is basic footage. Granted, if Canton, Ohio discarded their tapes every thirty days imagine how much better of they would be right now? From a data storage standpoint the Ohio State Highway Patrol would probably be inundated with material.

Now-a-days the more modern dash camera systems are fully digital. They store the data locally in the car, and when the officer pulls into the station lot they're within wireless range for the car to upload the footage to local storage. Since the Ohio State Highway Patrol's records are stored at a central repository I can imagine that their volumes of data would be huge.

Arrests, chases, and other incidents are more than likely NOT discarded and archived with the event. I believe what we're talking about here is when an officer issues a simple citation or is driving around for eight hours. Those otherwise "meaningless" events are discarded within thirty days. I say meaningless fully aware of how meaningful the history of Harless' stops were to his demise.

Unfortunately, I doubt any change would come short of legislation mandating how long something like this had to be maintained. On the flip side, the whole point of what we're trying to say is this:

If you or someone you know is treated wrong, specifically with respect to our issue, please try to tell us IMMEDIATELY. Recently in light of the Canton stop and some aggressive side of the road behavior we've been tipped off to some crazy things happening. Sadly, most of them are more than thirty days away. One is a week old, and we're working on getting it.

-Jeff

p.s. - The whole purpose of this is because we're putting together a portfolio of events to support legislation to remove mandatory prompt notification. If you know anyone who suffered because of that law and we can show the event details in a police report or dash camera footage, we'd like it for our formal testimony presentation.

Can this be made a sticky at least until we can get notification to go away?

That way, it won't be lost or buried for those who are new or less active on the forum.

Jeff:

My comment was mostly related to how the camera results are stored. Offloading it to a server someplace likely would require some pruning, whereas a DVD or CD based system, in the vehicle, wouldn't....

(A friend of mine did a review of available "dashcam" devices for "Law & Order" a while back. I wish I kept a copy - he's generally in trouble when trying to plug a polarized wall plug into a socket.... But I'm pretty sure that preceded "pull up to the building and we'll grab your stuff" systems. Or at least they were above the article's price line. Fortunately, he had some professional help installing most of these systems or we'd still be waiting for the article. Or buying systems that are implanted in the Officer's forehead .)

IAC, you're absolutely correct - TELL SOMEBODY IMMEDIATELY.... Your own lawyer, us, etc....

Linda's correct about the sticky. OK to drop my comments (and Linda's, too). (Although she may send me one of her kids if I'm not correct .)

It also might pay to try to find out the storage method that the PD involved is using - to try to establish if pruning occurred "naturally", or if some effort was made to destroy the recording, with "natural" pruning being an excuse.

(In the Harless instance, why the guy didn't AD his shotgun into the trunk - or wherever the dashcam was located - I'll never know.... Some are mounted in the cab someplace - re-designing the car roof isn't at all unusual.... )

Regards,

I am not sure why this would be neccesary. The burden of proof is on the prosecution. If they don't retain the video they have no proof that you didn't Identify promplty.

synack2 wrote:I am not sure why this would be neccesary. The burden of proof is on the prosecution. If they don't retain the video they have no proof that you didn't Identify promplty.

Do they keep proof that you sped when they write you a speeding ticket? The officer's word in court is generally all that is needed for proof. It's your job as the defendant to disprove him.

JediSkipdogg wrote:

synack2 wrote:I am not sure why this would be neccesary. The burden of proof is on the prosecution. If they don't retain the video they have no proof that you didn't Identify promplty.

Do they keep proof that you sped when they write you a speeding ticket? The officer's word in court is generally all that is needed for proof. It's your job as the defendant to disprove him.

Innocent until proven guilty, yeah right...

JediSkipdogg wrote:

synack2 wrote:I
It's your job as the defendant to disprove him.

Your job as the defendant is to make him prove it. I have a program on my smart phone called tapeatalk, I use it all the time for meeting and such so I can refference back to what is said if need be. I have also used it when I am pulled over. I can hit the app hit the red button and sit it on my dash. then I have the proof of what is said.

synack2 wrote:

JediSkipdogg wrote:

synack2 wrote:I
It's your job as the defendant to disprove him.

Your job as the defendant is to make him prove it. I have a program on my smart phone called tapeatalk, I use it all the time for meeting and such so I can refference back to what is said if need be. I have also used it when I am pulled over. I can hit the app hit the red button and sit it on my dash. then I have the proof of what is said.

Until you run into that one rare Officer that is intent on putting it to you, and it just happens to "malfunction" or "disappear" magically, for no known reason after the nice Officer arrests you.

synack2 wrote:

JediSkipdogg wrote:

synack2 wrote:I
It's your job as the defendant to disprove him.

Your job as the defendant is to make him prove it. I have a program on my smart phone called tapeatalk, I use it all the time for meeting and such so I can refference back to what is said if need be. I have also used it when I am pulled over. I can hit the app hit the red button and sit it on my dash. then I have the proof of what is said.

THere's the way it's suppose to be and the way it is. If there's no evidence, and it's your word vs his, the courts generally listen to the officer. If not, how does any speeding ticket ever stick? Remember, this is the state where the courts said last year and officer is legally allowed to visualize your speed and it can stick. So he can walk into a courtroom and say you were doing approximately 80 in a 55. You say prove it. All he has to say is "my training in the academy taught me to properly visualize it" and you're done. America is not what it use to be.

Jim-in-Toledo wrote:Until you run into that one rare Officer that is intent on putting it to you, and it just happens to "malfunction" or "disappear" magically, for no known reason after the nice Officer arrests you.

That is why my phone is setup to record the conversation on a server. If the phone disappears, the conversation is still recorded.

My phone as well puts the file in my dropbox acount so it is synced almost realtime to the internet, that way there is a copy of it elsewhere.

Bob- what program is it that you use? I am interested now!

medmandan wrote:Bob- what program is it that you use? I am interested now!

Yes, I have that setup as a speed dial on my cell phone, although I named the contact "recording", so I can also use voice commands "Call recording".

1. Go to freeconferencecalling.com and set up a free conference call line.
2. You will also establish your online account with them at the same time, which allows you access the recorded calls later
2. When you set up the account, you get 3 numbers: the dial-in line (example:555-555-5555), the conference code (example: 222222), and the host ID (example: 11111).
3. Add that information as a cell phone contact. You have to insert "P" as a 1 second delay -- see your phone options.
4. Using the example numbers, use this type of format: 555-555-5555PPP2222222P11111P5*
5. The "P5*" at the end pauses a second then 5* starts recording the call.
6. After you hang up the call, you can access the recorded call using the online account you setup in step 1.
7. Every cell phone has a means of setting a speed dial option. Set this contact up to use the feature however is convenient to you.