Law-enforcement technologyBaltimore police to videotape confessions
More and more police departments are videotaping suspects’ confessions, and presenting these recordings as evidence during legal proceedings; the cost of recording equipment has declined, but all these recordings must be catalogued and stored, and must be accessible upon request, adding to the total cost of system ownership and operation
The Baltimore Police Department is expanding a program of videotaping interrogations in its most serious criminal investigations, following a similar move by a growing number of Maryland law-enforcement agencies
Since 2008, when the Maryland General Assembly endorsed, but did not require, the use of videotaped interrogations, the number of agencies using audio and videotaped recordings has increased from twenty-six to forty-two, including all of the Baltimore region’s largest departments.
TheBaltimore Sun reports that the Baltimore Police Department recently began using videotaped interrogations in its sex-crime investigations, and is now examining equipment and policy options to expand videotaping of homicide and shooting interrogations as well.
Detectives themselves are being trained in the subtleties of where to position themselves during the interrogation, and how their demeanor will likely influence a jury.
Hundreds of police departments now routinely videotape interrogations and confessions, especially since the cost of implementing the technology has declined so rapidly in the last few years. Such recorded interrogations are required by law in several states and the District of Columbia.
While the number of police departments using video recording of interrogations and confessions is increasing at a regular pace, there are many others that are balking at using the technology.
One example is the New York Police Department, which only recently began to use video recorded interviews, and not without resistance from within.
TheGothamist quotes one objection from Michael Palladino, head of the NYPD detectives union, saying videotaping suspects will get in the way of making convictions: “I think once a jury see what goes on in an interrogation — the tricks of the trade that are legal, such as trickery and deceit - there will be sympathy for criminals. Criminals will wind up on the streets instead of behind bars.”
Palladino’s objection of sympathy for the suspect echoes a 2007 study by Ohio State University, which demonstrated that focusing on the subject of the interrogation had the effect of higher credibility of the statement. When the interviewing officers were also shown in the video, the subject’s statement was less believable.
Since that study was released, law-enforcement officials have worked on both the technological and interview technique changes needed to counter that impression.
Bladensburg, Maryland police chief Charles Owens told the Sun that his officers routinely use video interviews in misdemeanors as well as felonies.
Owens describes a recent case in which a suspect accused of several burglaries and an assault on a woman was video-interviewed, and gave a confession during the interrogation.
At trial, the defendant tried to claim that the confession was coerced, but “the audio and video clearly showed that it was voluntary,” Owens said.
The cost of the equipment and systems necessary to videotape interrogations and confessions has declined, and officers’ techniques have evolved and improved, but videorecording of all such interviews presents a considerable logistical problem.
All these recordings must be catalogued and stored, and must be accessible upon request, adding to the burden of conducting a growing number of videotaped interviews. This adds to the total cost of system ownership and operation, and can offset the recent lower prices of the recording equipment, particularly in departments such as New York’s and other major metropolitan departments.
