Cincinnati police officers are now field testing wearable clip-on video cameras. The device is called AXON and ironically is being marketed by Taser International. A similar experiment in London, but not with the AXON technology, proved to be a flop. Walking-patrol Bobbies had the cameras on their helmets and faulty batteries caught fire.
The Taser technology is described as an on-officer tactical computer and an audio-video recorder that captures incidents from the officer’s perspective. It’s a small, lightweight headset that fits into an officer’s ear and aims wherever he or she looks. Besides recording up to 10.5 hours of video, it’s also an earpiece for police radios. The total package: audio-video earpiece imager, speaker and microphone integrates into the communications loop between existing radios and the communications headset, recording video of critical incidents from the visual perspective of the officer. “It helps me to remember an incident under stress where I might not remember what I did or what I said and it will be right there for everybody to view including myself,” said a Cincinnati police officer. The system is about $1,500. The Laser connection? Zalud Report suggests that there have been a number of lawsuits involving taser use and that recording the use could provide helpful to police – when reasonably and correctly applied – and helpful to the victim or survivors.
Security Blog viewers can see a video of Cincinnati’s use of the system in a television news report at: