* * *

Body cameras show tremendous promise as a tool to improve policing in the U.S. The first randomized, controlled trial of the technology found that it halved the use of force by police officers and sharply reduced citizen complaints. Anecdotally, their presence seems to improve the behavior of cops and civilians alike. Even acknowledging the privacy dilemmas that they create, they're a least bad option.

But the privacy dilemmas are real.

Since their promise is precisely that abusive police officers won't be able to hide their misbehavior, law enforcement cannot be allowed to decide what footage to withhold.

Yet even most transparency advocates wouldn't want a naked burglary victim's footage uploaded to YouTube. "People invite us into their homes on their worst possible day, and I don't think they invite us with the intention of having that interaction made public," LAPD Chief Charlie Beck said. "Families call us when they're in crisis. Victims call us when they've had horrific things done to them by evil people. To make those things public re-victimizes them and doesn't serve justice." And that is hardly the end of circumstances where footage would best be left unreleased. Say, for instance, that homicide detectives are canvassing the residents of an apartment complex for information about a murder that happened the prior evening. In gang territory or a neighborhood with a strong norm against "snitching," the thought that any criminal enforcer could send someone down to the police video library to see who cooperated with the cops would be chilling. What would a Stringer Bell or Tony Soprano do with such access?

The ACLU has as good an answer as any I've seen to the difficult question of when police should have to begin recording themselves: "They should require that a police officer activate his or her camera when responding to a call for service or at the initiation of any other law enforcement or investigative encounter between a police officer and a member of the public. That would include stops, frisks, searches, arrests, consensual interviews and searches, enforcement actions of all kinds, and any encounter that becomes in any way hostile."

After reflecting on the choices before policymakers, Kevin Drum offers some tentative advice about who should have access to footage after it has been recorded:

The police department itself should not be allowed to decide what footage to make public.

In fact, the police department probably shouldn't even be involved in these decisions.

However, civilians caught in police videos should have some say. If they don't want footage of their encounter made public, that should be given some weight.

But how much weight? In the case of, say, a routine domestic dispute, I'd give it a lot of weight. But in a matter of serious public interest—especially those involving allegations of police misconduct—civilian desires for privacy will have to take a back seat.

There should be different guidelines for footage taken in public places vs. footage from people's homes.

We also need rules that govern generic research requests. It's in the public interest, for example, to know whether traffic stops of white drivers seem more motivated by probable cause than stops of black drivers. A review of bodycam footage could provide valuable evidence on that score. But what are the regulations governing this?

He adds, "the fundamental question underlying all of this is: Who decides? Not the police themselves. Maybe judges? An independent agency? But if it's an agency, how do you prevent it from becoming captured by the police department?" The answer, I think, is to empower several sorts of decision-makers to liberate footage, so that if any are captured, that would be exposed or mitigated.