Justice
North Carolina Wants To Ban Public Access to Police Camera Footage
While some U.S. cities move toward releasing police footage for accountability and transparency, North Carolina heads in the opposite direction.
In another *controversial move, North Carolina is now advancing legislation that would prohibit the public from viewing footage captured by police body cameras. The state legislature’s House judiciary committee voted on June 7 to approve a bill that would make police camera footage public only at a police department’s discretion. A person recorded on a police body camera or police dashboard camera would need a court order to get a copy of the footage.
“There would be no mechanism for law enforcement to release videos of public interest to the general public other than through a court order,” wrote the ACLU of North Carolina in a statement.