Police, Camera, Arrest?

Heard of s44?  No, probably not, because you're most likely a normal law-abiding person who doesn't consider themselves to be a Terrorist.  However you could now quite easily be arrested under anti-terrorism legislation for...

... taking a picture of a Police Officer.

Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 makes it an offence to take a photograph of the police in a public space. So why is this a bad, very bad thing?  Essentially there needs to be a governing device in order to prevent abuses of power.  The Police seem to have a habit of accidentally losing filmed evidence of them doing anything wrong (clumsy), therefore it often falls upon footage shot by you and I, the innocent public (not terrorists, note) to expose the odd occasion when the police may do something wrong.

If we, the innocent public (not terrorists, note) are prevented from doing so, for fear of being arrested, then the police can effectively do whatever they like.  I don't think that's a very good idea.

This article in The Register sums it all up far better than I, and contains a link to the footage taken by film maker Darren Pollard which is quite alarming.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? - Who watches the Watchers, or, Who guards the Guards.

So why am I concerned?

I, like millions of others here in the UK, own and use a 'camera'.  I like to feel that I'm a reasonably honest, upright member of society and I object strongly to any legislation that may prevent me from going about my lawful daily life. s44 does just this.  More importantly to me, is that I'm fairly 'police friendly', and feel that any legislation such as this actually damages the trust we place within the police to protect us.

Finally.  Had the amateur footage not come to light showing the attack on Ian Tomlinson, his death would have been put down to a heart attack.  Following disclosure of the footage, a second postmortem was ordered, with the new outcome of a police thug being potentially charged with manslaughter.

Isn't it time our cameras were seen as a tool of justice, not terror?

Also see:

• Police lie about death of Ian Tomlinson - (youtube)
• Ken Livingstone, ex Mayor of London - (youtube)
• More G20 violence - (youtube)