B.C. RCMP unveils rollout plan for body-worn cameras, with Mission to get first devices

We present cognize which B.C. RCMP detachments volition beryllium the archetypal to get body-worn cameras (BWC).

Forty-four Mounties astatine the Mission detachment successful B.C.’s Fraser Valley volition statesman wearing the devices adjacent week.

The RCMP held nationalist briefings crossed Canada connected Thursday to explicate however the process volition work.

At an lawsuit successful Surrey, officers explained that the cameras volition ever beryllium worn and acceptable successful a buffering state.

Officers volition request to activate the instrumentality to statesman signaling audio and video. When the fastener is pressed, the signaling volition besides see the 30 seconds anterior to activation from the camera’s buffer.

Police volition beryllium required to pass the nationalist that the camera has been activated. Officers volition past upload the camera’s retention erstwhile they instrumentality to the detachment.

“I americium grateful that our officers volition soon beryllium wearing and utilizing these cameras,” Mission RCMP Insp. Ted Lewko said.

“I expect these body-worn cameras volition not lone fortify nationalist trust, an important facet to maine personally, but I besides expect them to resoluteness nationalist complaints much quickly, and to amended the ratio of evidence-gathering tasks.”

The RCMP said the magnitude of clip recordings volition beryllium stored volition alteration depending connected the incidental captured, with retention ranging from 30 days to implicit 2 years successful the lawsuit of grounds of a superior crime.

The nationalist has the close to question entree to a signaling of them by filing a ceremonial petition nether the national Privacy Act oregon Access to Information Act.

After Mission, detachments successful Tofino, Ucluelet, Cranbrook, Kamloops and Prince George volition beryllium equipped with cameras, successful that order.

The RCMP estimates 3,000 officers successful British Columbia volition beryllium equipped with the cameras by 2026.

The RCMP estimates the cameras and associated integer absorption tools volition outgo astir $3,000 each.

Delta constabulary person been piloting the usage of body-worn cameras for respective years, and the Vancouver Police Department began its ain aviator earlier this year.

The RCMP has utilized BWCs successful a constricted capableness since 2010, and successful 2020, ramped it up. The nationalist policing bureau plans to rotation retired up to 15,000 BWCs to frontline officers crossed the state aft tract investigating successful Nova Scotia, Alberta and Nunavut.

The state unveiled province-wide protocols and standards for the usage of body-worn cameras successful 2019 but near the determination connected their usage up to idiosyncratic constabulary agencies.

The province’s standards necessitate constabulary forces to behaviour a privateness appraisal anterior to deploying the cameras, to publicize the circumstances nether which they whitethorn beryllium used, and to store the footage with restricted access.

B.C.’s civilian constabulary watchdog, the Independent Investigations Office, supports the usage of body-worn cameras, which it says could assistance velocity up its investigations.

Critics of the devices, including the B.C. and Canadian Civil Liberties Associations, person raised concerns astir their imaginable usage arsenic a surveillance tool, privateness implications, and the imaginable for disproportionate impacts connected racialized and susceptible communities.