[clue-talk] surveillance cameras

[David L. Willson]

On Sat, 2007-09-22 at 22:19 -0600, Grant Johnson wrote:
> Nate Duehr wrote:
> >
> > On Sep 22, 2007, at 8:14 AM, Sean LeBlanc wrote:
> >
> >> I just hope the people on the street are continued to be allowed to
> >> videotape/photograph the cops and other people on the street during 
> >> events.
> >
> > Just watched the latest episode of CrankyGeeks where they interviewed 
> > a blogger who was jailed for over 200 days for filming the riots at 
> > the G8 summit in the Pacific Northwest a couple of years ago, and then 
> > refused to hand over his footage.  It's more complex than that, 
> > including the question of whether or not he was covered under the same 
> > rules a "journalist" would be, and the resulting debate about whether 
> > or not bloggers are "journalists"... but anyway... best to just 
> > download and watch the discussion.
> Although I agree that he should not have to hand over the tape, and 
> should not have been jailed for not doing so, he used the incorrect 
> argument for not doing so.   He claimed he was protecting his sources.   
> They already knew the source of the tape.   He shot the video.
> 
> I am not sure the argument for "No, you can't have it.  It's my tape, 
> now go away!"

I'm interested in what a police officer who wants your video-tape says
when you say that, or like this: "Gimme." "No." "Gimme, or you're under
arrest."  "Um...  What for?"  "Gimme, dammit." "I'm right back to 'No.'
then, aren't I?"  Is this discussed online anywhere?  There seems to be
no rational reason for the recorder to have been asked for his tape, or
to have been jailed for not surrendering it, but there must have been
some reason, right?  This wasn't a martial arrest, but a regular police
arrest, which, without the filing of some charge, must end within 24
hours, IIRC.  What was our camera-man charged with?