Latest news with #bodycameras
Daily Mail
20-05-2025
- Daily Mail
The gadgets at the disposal of Britain's most high-tech police force
If 1987 sci-fi action film Robocop is to be believed, the future of law enforcement is half-man, half-machine, funded by a private corporation and upholding the law with ruthless efficiency. In reality, the latest advancements in British policing are a little more grounded than those bestowed upon Peter Weller's Alex Murphy, but just as technologically impressive - and still getting a helping hand from the free market. From all-seeing police cars to smartphones that all but eliminate paperwork, the UK's most high-tech police forces are kitting out their officers with the latest gear to help them fight crime better. Crucially, it's also keeping them on the streets rather than spending hours filling out paperwork. Forget pen and paper and shuffling back to the station to fill in the forms: today's police officers can take your statement down in an app, and have it sent back to HQ before they've even left your living room. Chief among the leaders in high-tech policing is Lancashire Police, which has rolled out a whole host of digital paraphernalia to its 3,500 officers to use in the field. It has partnered with Motorola Solutions - distinct from the smartphone brand, which it sold off in 2014 - to ensure its cops are the most advanced in the country whether on the road or pounding the pavements. Its kit includes body-worn cameras that will soon be capable of live-streaming to control rooms and Pronto, a mobile phone app that provides almost everything a police officer might need while out on the beat. And during a visit to its sleek Blackpool divisional headquarters, officers told MailOnline they couldn't be happier. PC Dan Brown, a copper for 17 years, has watched as his pen and paper notebook has given way to a smartphone app and more technology than ever. But while he readily admits he's not a techie, he couldn't imagine giving it up now. 'It makes life a lot, lot easier,' he says of the Pronto app. 'If you raise an issue it gets sorted, because the bosses realise how much of a vital pic of kit it is. We went out overnight and did most of the forms done in the car - it makes things so much quicker. 'It keeps us out there, not in the station.' Practically the only paper form he fills in now is one to book someone into custody. The Pronto app is so ubiquitous it is used by more than half of UK police forces. Lancashire was among the first in the world to adopt it. Officers use it to collect statements and gather evidence at the scene, and upload it all to Lancashire Police's secure servers in seconds. It can even prompt them to carry out and log 'golden hour' investigations - those crucial minutes after a crime has occured when some of the most vital evidence needs to be gathered. Persons of interest can be checked against Home Office, Police National Computer and Interpol databases, and number plates can be checked instantly with the DVLA. In the past, officers carrying out these checks would have to take someone to the station, or radio back to HQ to run a plate check. Now, they can do it all themselves in seconds out in the field. Control rooms can dispatch officers to incidents through the software, with sat nav directions pinged to their car's dashboard to save them punching in an address. And when they get there, officers can activate their body cameras to capture any essential footage - with it uploaded to Pronto the moment it finishes recording for them to attach to their report on the incident. 'Buffering' tech means the camera is primed to record before a cop even turns it on - with 30 seconds of footage captured from before it was activated to ensure no vital evidence is missed. Cameras are omnipresent on Lancashire Police vehicles - from front-facing dashcams (left) to cage van cameras capturing suspects being loaded in at the rear (right) An incoming upgrade will see them enabled for streaming, delivering instant footage to commanding officers at headquarters so they can coordinate major incidents. And with statements filed via the app digitally, there's less chance of duplicating reports and less time wasted. It even works offline. In all, Pronto is thought to save officers two hours every single shift, running into hundreds of thousands of hours saved every year. And it could well be tackling crime. It's hard to measure how exactly the tech is helping police fight crime, but Lancashire's crime rate was around 87 per 1,000 people last year, below the England and Wales average. Its 'crime severity score' - an experimental measure that treats serious crimes like murder as having a greater overall impact than offences like possessing cannabis - is also lower than the national average and other similar-sized police forces such as Kent and South Yorkshire. PC Ella Thornton, a road traffic cop with seven years experience in the police, said: 'A colleague over in Cumbria was still on paper records - they couldn't believe what we were doing.' She showed MailOnline around her top-of-the-range Cupra Leon traffic car - a hot estate packing 300 horsepower under the bonnet. Capable of hitting 60mph in less than six seconds, it's a rapid-response force to be reckoned with. But it's the other technology its packing that really impresses: multiple cameras inside and outside the car to give near-360 degree coverage, perfect for snaring dodgy drivers. They can even be AI-enabled to start recording when someone is sat in the rear passenger area to be interviewed. The car can even play back footage instantly, bringing an end to the question 'Do you know why I stopped you?' as the evidence can now be seen straight away. No more dragging speeding drivers to the station. Cars like PC Thornton's are also looped into Lancashire Police's ANPR (automatic number plate recognition) network, which flags cars of interest in a two-mile radius. If the system detects a vehicle of interest - whether because police have been looking for it, or if it is untaxed or uninsured - it bellows out 'Intelligence report!' and gives an approximate location for where the suspect vehicle was last seen. And if any hoodlums need rounding up, they can be packed into a squad car or a newly upgraded cage van - each equipped with multiple audio-enabled minicams that activate upon detecting someone in the back of the car. If they resist arrest, or make any interesting statements, it's caught on camera. 'The camera systems have improved so much,' PC Thornton adds. 'It used to run on USB, and you had to download it to a disc. Now it's just there, ready. 'If you run a reg (plate), you get it back in a second. And if you've captured a drunk driver on camera, it all shows on here.' Lancashire's specialist operations unit boasts high-performance traffic vehicles like this Cupra Leon (right), capable of hitting 60mph in less than six seconds Lancashire has been using tech to fight crime for more than a decade and is one of Britain's most digitally advanced forces Chief Superintendent Chris Hardy told MailOnline that his officers couldn't be happier with the upgrades. Staff surveys have rated the tech innovations as either 'good' or 'great': a near-impossible feat, we are told, as cops are hard to impress when it comes to changing how they work. Ch Supt Hardy, who has been with the force for 18 years, said: 'We're looking at how we can make it quick for the cops, more straightforward, simpler, around our data integrity, so we can get it right the first time. 'Crucially, it's about improving the service to the victim, and that's what's got to be at the forefront of our minds: how we do that in the right way, as quickly as possible. 'The ideal scenario for us is that our officers come in, collect their equipment, and be out for the maximum time possible. 'You can have an officer now in someone's front room, sat down with that device, taking all that critical evidence at the first point of call and doing it there and then as opposed to being delayed with taking paper statements and the gathering of CCTV. 'Our cops are truly mobile. We asked ourselves how to keep police officers out on the streets, and with technology we are doing that.' But that technology comes at a cost: the most recent renewal of the contracts for both the Pronto app and the body-worn cameras, from now until 2029, cost a combined £7.2million, according to public contract records. Ch Supt Hardy, however, is convinced the value for money cannot be overstated - especially as the app is regularly updated with new features, often based on the suggestions of his officers. The marketplace for police software is also fiercely competitive, with Motorola competing alongside the likes of Swedish conglomerate Saab and Frequentis - potentially keeping prices down. The top cop says the finances aren't down to him - but says of the finance bosses who are: 'Given that the contract has just been extended to 2029, I imagine they are quite content with the value for money.' Fergus Mayne, UK and Ireland manager at Motorola, added: 'Officers can serve communities in the streets, or do more training. This is the key piece: it's a real time-saver.' There are more innovations to come. Lancashire Police's Blackpool divisional headquarters, on the outskirts of the northern city Mr Mayne told journalists gathered in Blackpool of cameras that can be trained in AI pattern recognition to spot when something is amiss - someone lurking outside a building at 2am, for example — and the ever-contentious topic of facial recognition. Doubtless, there will be questions asked over technology like that as well as body-worn cameras - now omnipresent, worn by everyone from train managers to supermarket staff. But the technology is here to stay and means officers are out on the streets, where they belong — no robot upgrades required. A former police officer who served with another force told MailOnline: 'Anything that is going to have more coppers' feet on the ground can only be good news for both officers and the public. 'I would spend so much of my shift being weighed down by paperwork and writing up statements at the station when all I wanted was to be out on the streets. 'Being a police officer shouldn't be an admin job and this looks like a streamlined approach that is going to make officers' lives a bit easier and will allow them to be doing what they signed up for: fighting crime.'
BBC News
14-05-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Hospital staff attacked 1,000 times a year in Gloucester and Cheltenham
Staff at two hospitals have been attacked more than 1,000 times a year in total in recent years, figures from a trust have revealed. And staff themselves have been involved in more than 100 violent or verbally abusive incidents on colleagues each year, according to the data from Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation an effort to reduce attacks at Gloucester Royal and Cheltenham General hospitals, the trust has bought 18 body-worn cameras for "hotspot" areas to de-escalate situations and pass evidence to police.A spokesperson for the trust said it was "committed to a safe, inclusive and respectful place to work and to provide care". In total, the trust counted 3,295 violent, aggressive or verbally abusive incidents over the last three financial years, for which it said the triggers number does not include the staff-on-staff incidents, of which there were 442 since 2022/23, according to the Local Democracy Reporting hotspot areas include the emergency department at Gloucestershire Royal approximately 50 per cent of incidents, the trust said, the attack perpetrator is recorded as having capacity, meaning they have the ability to use and understand information to make decisions.A spokeperson for the trust said staff were encouraged to report all incidents of violence and aggression so that action can be taken. Incidents are reviewed weekly by a behaviour standards panel, the spokesperson panel can issue behaviour warning letters, or conditional behaviour trust is also trialling the use of activity coordinators to support vulnerable patients who are more likely to become agitated when visiting hospitals.
CNA
07-05-2025
- Business
- CNA
TASER maker Axon raises annual revenue forecast, shares jump
TASER maker Axon Enterprise raised its full-year revenue forecast on Wednesday, banking on sustained demand for its software products and security devices, sending its shares up more than 7 per cent after the bell. The Arizona-based company makes law enforcement technology such as body cameras, drones and sensors. Axon expects 2025 revenue to be between $2.60 billion and $2.70 billion, compared with its prior range of $2.55 billion to $2.65 billion. Analysts on average estimate of $2.62 billion, according to data compiled by LSEG. The company is the leading maker of police body cameras in the U.S. and supplies drones to law enforcement authorities across North America, Europe and Australia. Capital expenditure for the year is expected to be in the range of $160 million to $180 million, excluding costs related to investments in a new headquarters, the company said. On an adjusted basis, Axon earned $1.41 per share for the first quarter ended March 31, while analysts estimated $1.27 per share. Its quarterly revenue was $603.6 million, compared with the estimate of $583.8 million.
Gizmodo
07-05-2025
- Politics
- Gizmodo
The DEA Is Abandoning Its Use of Body Cams
This story was originally published by ProPublica. ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox. The Drug Enforcement Administration has quietly ended its body camera program barely four years after it began, according to an internal email obtained by ProPublica. On April 2, DEA headquarters emailed employees announcing that the program had been terminated effective the day before. The DEA has not publicly announced the policy change, but by early April, links to pages about body camera policies on the DEA's website were broken. The email said the agency made the change to be 'consistent' with a Trump executive order rescinding the 2022 requirement that all federal law enforcement agents use body cameras. But at least two other federal law enforcement agencies within the Justice Department — the U.S. Marshals Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — are still requiring body cameras, according to their spokespeople. The FBI referred questions about its body camera policy to the Justice Department, which declined to comment. The DEA did not respond to questions about its decision to stop using the cameras, saying that the agency 'does not comment on tools and techniques.' Reuters reported on the change as part of a story about budget cuts for law enforcement offices. One former federal prosecutor expressed concern that the change would make life more difficult for DEA agents. 'The vast majority of times I viewed body camera footage is based on allegations from a defense attorney about what a cop did,' said David DeVillers, former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Ohio. 'And I would say 95% of the time it absolves the cop of wrongdoing.' The Justice Department started requiring that its federal agents wear the devices in 2021 in the wake of the protests over George Floyd's death the previous summer. 'We welcome the addition of body worn cameras and appreciate the enhanced transparency and assurance they provide to the public and to law enforcement officers working hard to keep our communities safe and healthy,' then-DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said in a Sept. 1, 2021, press release announcing the use of the cameras. In May 2022, then-President Joe Biden issued an executive order expanding the use of body cameras to all federal law enforcement officers. In January, the incoming Trump administration rescinded that order, along with almost 100 others it considered 'harmful.' In early February, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security, was one of the first agencies to get rid of its body cameras. Subsequent videos show plainclothes immigration agents making arrests with no visible body cameras. The DOJ wrote in a 2022 Office of Inspector General management report that the cameras were a 'means of enhancing police accountability and the public's trust in law enforcement.' Studies have consistently shown that departments that use body cameras experience a drop in complaints against officers, according to the nonprofit Police Executive Research Forum, though it's not clear if the drop is due to improvements in officer behavior or to a decrease in frivolous complaints. 'Eliminating these videos is really taking away a tool that we've seen be of benefit to law enforcement practices,' said Cameron McEllhiney, executive director of the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement. 'It's also a great teaching tool, besides keeping community members safe from the potential misconduct that could occur.' The DOJ put a lot of money into the body camera initiative. In August of 2021, it awarded Axon, the company that dominates the body camera market, a $30.4 million contract for cameras and the software to handle the evidence they created. The contract, according to Axon, remains active. But only about one-sixth of it has been paid out, according to federal contracting data. The most recent publicly available version of the DEA's body camera policy dates to December 2022. It only required agents to wear the devices when they were conducting preplanned arrests or searches and seizures that required a warrant. It also only required DEA officers to wear their body cameras when they were working within the United States. Agents had 72 hours after the end of an operation to upload their video evidence, unless there was a shooting, in which case they were instructed to upload the video evidence as soon as possible. The policy laid out in detail how and by whom evidence from the cameras should be handled in the event officers used force, and it authorized the DEA to use the video evidence when investigating its own officers. The DEA had planned to implement the policy in phases so that eventually its officers nationwide would be wearing the devices when serving warrants or carrying out planned arrests. In its 2025 fiscal year budget request to Congress, the agency asked for $15.8 million and 69 full time employees, including five attorneys, 'to enable the DEA's phased implementation plan of nationwide use of Body Worn Cameras.' Records obtained via Freedom of Information Act request by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington show that the Biden-era DOJ had an ambitious plan to capture agencywide metrics and data about the efficiency and use of body cameras by its law enforcement officers. Laura Iheanachor, senior counsel at CREW, said that before federal law enforcement started wearing body cameras, several local police agencies had declined to participate in federal task forces because doing so would have forced their officers to remove their cameras. 'It's a protective measure for officers, for the public,' Iheanachor said. 'And it allows state and federal law enforcement to work together in harmony.'
Yahoo
07-05-2025
- Yahoo
Lawsuit: Guards video-recorded strip searches at Michigan's women's prison
Women in Michigan's only prison for females were, per policy, video-recorded on corrections officers' body cameras while they were nude during routine strip searches and while showering and using toilets, according to a new lawsuit. Twenty Jane Does filed the civil lawsuit May 6 in Washtenaw County Circuit Court, with one of their attorneys, Todd Flood, telling the Free Press that he and his colleagues have more than 500 retained complainants in the case, with incidents occurring from January through March of this year. The lawsuit names the governor, the director and deputy director of the Michigan Department of Corrections, and about three dozen employees, from corrections officers to the warden, at the Women's Huron Valley Correctional Facility. It seeks $500 million in damages. It indicates the MDOC implemented a body-worn camera policy in January that allowed staff to wear active cameras at the women's prison, including during strip searches. Officials characterized the cameras being in "passing recording mode," but they still captured real-time images and data, according to the lawsuit. "It's a clear violation of the law to videotape or take photographs of someone naked," Flood said, adding that while money was allotted for body cameras for prison guards "they did not allot money for video-cameras to commit illegal acts to videotape strip searches." Messages were left for MDOC spokespersons. In a news release, attorneys said MDOC officials failed to halt the privacy violations "despite multiple warnings about the policy's illegality from advocacy organizations and state legislators." Concerns started to be raised Feb. 17, with the lawsuit indicating "internal communications reveal that officials were fully aware of these legal concerns yet continued the practice for five more weeks." The lawsuit indicates the policy changed March 24, with body cameras to be placed in "sleep mode" during routine strip searches, meaning no data, audio or video would be captured. But Flood said there are incidents of recording when women are naked still occurring when corrections officers go into bathrooms or showers. "Even after the official policy change, corrections officers flagrantly continued to record women in states of undress, demonstrating the deeply entrenched culture of voyeurism and disregard for women's dignity," according to the lawsuit. Flood said the plaintiffs are looking for "no invasion of privacy when a lady goes to the bathroom or when they're in a shower stall." They also seek destruction of all recordings made during the illegal period and mandatory training for MDOC staff, according to the lawsuit. The prison, located near Ypsilanti, can house up to 2,006 women, according to the MDOC website. Flood said there are female and men corrections officers at the prison. Prior to the implementation of body-worn cameras this year, the lawsuit indicates, strip search policies at the prison varied depending on the individual officer. Since the cameras' introduction, it indicates, officers began uniformly conducting strip searches in the "most invasive manner possible, claiming they need to perform searches 'by the book' now that they were being recorded." Flood said of the more than 500 complainants, about 15 have been released from prison since his team's investigation began. He said also they received several phone calls from prison guards who did not believe this was something that should be done and they were being told to do it. According to the lawsuit, the MDOC forced "hundreds of women — the vast majority of whom are rape survivors — to submit to video recording while completely nude during strip searches, while showering, while using toilets, and in other states of undress. This conduct constitutes a felony under Michigan law (MCL750.539j) and represents a brazen and calculated violation of fundamental constitutional rights to privacy, bodily integrity, and human dignity." More: Detroit man says he needed mental health treatment as an inmate, but was punished instead It indicates the impact has been "devastating," with many plaintiffs experiencing debilitating panic attacks and insomnia among other physical ailments. Several have withdrawn from visiting with family, resigned from prison jobs and left educational programs. Attorneys for the plaintiffs sent a questionnaire, receiving responses from 319 women at the prison about their experiences, according to the lawsuit, with 83% reported being recorded during strip searches with body cameras. It indicates that 30% were recorded while showering and 38% while using the toilet. "Women described being forced to endure the profound violation and humiliation of having their exposed bodies recorded, leaving them feeling sexually exploited by the very institution charged with their care," according to the lawsuit. It indicates women were "forced to bend at the waist, spread their buttocks and expose their vaginal and anal cavities to live cameras worn by corrections officers." According to the lawsuit, the body camera policy was to be uniform across all MDOC facilities, but officers at men's facilities "frequently exercised discretion to refuse wearing cameras during strip searches. By contrast, officers at WHV strictly enforced the policy, creating a two-tiered system that disproportionately subjected women to recorded strip searches." It also indicates hundreds of women filed grievances challenging the policy, but officials failed to process the grievances, assign grievance numbers or provide appeal forms. The lawsuit detailed each plaintiffs' experiences as well as including emails about the policy and communications from advocates and legislators expressing concerns. Contact Christina Hall: chall@ Follow her on X, formerly Twitter: @challreporter. Support local journalism. Subscribe to the Free Press. Submit a letter to the editor at This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Lawsuit: Strip searches video-recorded at Michigan women's prison
