… without fear of being arrested for violating the law against video or audiotaping cops in public:
(Reuters) – The Supreme Court refused on Monday to revive a controversial Illinois law that prohibited audio recordings of police officers acting in public places, a ban that critics said violated the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Without comment, the court on Monday let stand a May 8 ruling by the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago that blocked enforcement of the law, which had made it a felony to record audio of conversations unless all parties consented.
In a 2-1 ruling, the 7th Circuit called the law “the broadest of its kind,” and said it likely violated the free speech and free press guarantees in the First Amendment.
It would have been better if the Supreme Court had taken the case and then upheld the decision of the 7th Circuit, but one takes what one can get. By the way, if law enforcement officials are doing nothing wrong why should they fear videotaping and audiotaping of their actions in public? Just sayin.’
And no, this is not a privacy issue. These are public servants acting in an official capacity. They have no protected zone of privacy when they are out in public and working, just as you as an employee have no expectation of privacy at your workplace. So take that and stuff it in your Xmas stocking, Justice Posner.
Seventh Circuit Opinion in the Alvarez case can be found here: LINK
It sounds like that ruling only bans audio taping, but you still can’t take pictures which was the big thing. Look at the videotape of the drunk cop whaling the Hell out of the female bartender half his size just because she was OBEYING the Dram Shop Law. Look at the videotape of the suburban cop beating the shit out of a drunk who can barely stand, although one was taken by the dumb cop’s own dashboard camera. Violent words pale beside violent video.
The decision encompasses both audio and visual recordings.
Thanks, the Reuters blockquote only mentions audio.
good. the cops should be videotaped
My understanding of the constitutional law and the supremes decisions is that constitutionality of these laws is the presumption of privacy. This presumption is based on precedent and common sense. The no video/audio laws are titularly intended to piggyback on this presumption. It’s the same as the laws that require the filming crew to get releases from passerbys in movies. The best known example of this is the taxi in Tootsie that almost runs down Dustin Hoffman. It was unscripted. The studio ended up literally buying the cabbie a new cab to get him to sign a release.
While Scalia and Co. don’t believe the constitutionality of the concept, the vast majority of First Amendment decisions presumes that there are places and situations that are uniquely assumed to be private. Your phone is such situation. The Mail another. The most obvious place is your house and all physical access to it. If your garbage is in your house, the cops have to have a warrant to go thru it. However, when you place it on a public thoroughfare for pick up, you no longer have that presumption of privacy.
Cops have no presumption of privacy while on duty. Among other things, beat cops wear a uniform actually designed to stand out from the crowd during daylight hours. Detectives are generally not in uniform, but they are expected to flash the badge before taking any official actions not involved with precipatate pursuit. Once again, no reasonable expectation of privacy. Therefore, no way they get privacy while in the performance of their duties.
Facebook privacy is going to end up in the courts. It is probably going to come down to: is there an expectation of privacy when you have a password? The answer is NO … IF your password can be retrieved by answering some dumbass question that half your family knows the answer to. This is going to apply to all the other dumbass “passworded” sites as well. Just my opinion, but I usually read the Supremes right.