Body-worn video (BWV), ‘the physical wearing of video cameras, has been in existence for optical evidence gathering’ since 2005.
It is used by such organisations as the British Transport Police at sporting events to track hooligans travelling to football matches, in emergency vehicles to tackle car crime through to police officers recording common assaults on the beat.
However, until recently there were significant challenges with the sheer volume of footage drawing a parallel with the birth of CCTV. A huge amount of data was generated but no one knew exactly how to turn that into meaningful intelligence and evidence.
For example, it was no good capturing what could be useful evidence if it wasn’t permissible in court. All this is changing, though, with new technology to bridge the gap from gathering data to create effective, electronic evidence management.
How can body-worn video help 21st century law enforcement?
BWV is used in four areas:
1) Reactive incidents to record a fight in a pub or a domestic dispute
2) Crime scene management – for example capturing the scene of a murder to give clues to find the perpetrator
3) Intelligence – such as recording who a suspected drug dealer is associating with in order to provide leads of enquiry
4) Training where BWV can give insight into improving how security or police officers handle different conflict situations.
Just the visibility of body-worn video acts as a deterrent. ISS Mediclean found that, during an eight-week BWV trial to record incidents at the Chelsea & Westminster hospital, the visible use of BWV reduced incidents of verbal abuse by 60 per cent and incidents of aggression by 29 per cent.
However, the ‘coming of age’ for BWV is technology to process and manage in a highly-efficient manner the huge amount of footage generated.
For example, Derbyshire Constabulary has used our DEMON Body Worn Video Manager to pioneer and automate the all-important administration and back-office system. We believe this is creating a blueprint for police services across the world.
The over-riding benefit of BWV linked to evidence management is what many police officers term ‘fast justice’. By having undisputable, electronic evidence at first hand to show to a defendant, means that in nine out of 10 cases they will change their plea from ‘not guilty’ to ‘guilty’.
This saves an inordinate amount of time for law enforcement and security officers – freeing up their time for front line security. In fact, little BWV footage is shown in Court as its impact is so overwhelming as evidence.
Also, now that BWV can be integrated into electronic evidence management, it gives a potent weapon in addition to mobile phone and CCTV footage through to maps and static photography. This provides useful intelligence and a more complete picture with which to present to juries and facilitate convictions.
The way forward: one standard for video-evidence management
The real opportunity with BWV, not to mention CCTV, lies in creating a single standard for evidence management in policing. This would propel the benefits of faster justice as well as lower costs by making use of economies of scale.
Another poll out at the end of October 2009 – this time from the ‘Big Brother Watch,’ (a campaign from the founders of the Tax Payer’s Alliance) – highlighted concerns about surveillance.
Out of 1,353 adults, 45 per cent of respondents ‘strongly agreed’ with the statement “that our freedoms are being eroded by a Big Brother state”. With this in mind, as an industry, we need to keep innovating in such areas as BWV and electronic evidence management, and demonstrate its value in reducing crime.
Only by doing this, will we increase public confidence that technology such as CCTV and BWV are vital weapons in our armoury to create a safer society where Big Brother need not be watching you.
