Posted on 07/21/2010 8:14:27 AM PDT by sickoflibs
Anthony Graber is facing felony charges today. His crime? Recording a traffic stop with a video camera — supposedly prohibited in Maryland under an archaic "anti-wiretapping" statute that is well past due for a revisit by the General Assembly.
Mr. Graber was riding his motorcycle on I-95 in Maryland, speeding and popping wheelies and recording the experience with a helmet cam. An unmarked car cut him off as he slowed for traffic, and a man in a sweatshirt and jeans jumped out with a gun in his hand. Five seconds after the armed man exited his vehicle and approached Mr. Graber, he identified himself as a Maryland state trooper. But for the first four seconds of the encounter, it looks like a carjacking. Mr. Graber accepted a speeding ticket.
That was the end of the story until Mr. Graber posted video of the encounter on YouTube. Then six state troopers showed up with a search warrant, seized two computers, two laptops and a camera. The officers served the warrant at 6:45 a.m. on a weekday, detaining Mr. Graber's family for 90 minutes and forbidding his mother from leaving for work and his younger sister from going to school until the search was complete. Mr. Graber says he was shown a copy of a search warrant with a judge's signature on it but was only allowed to keep an unsigned copy — because the judge's identity is being kept secret.
(Excerpt) Read more at baltimoresun.com ...
>> the judge’s identity is being kept secret.
That’s just WRONG.
Federal Courts have ruled that taping police in the performance of their duties is a protected First Amendment activity involving the right to petition government for redress of grievances.
Cops and DAs seem to like using “wiretapping” law in this way in order to bully people into submission or to punish them for some perceived offense.
This is worse than with LIndea Tripp because this happened out in public for all to see. One can argue there is an expectation of privacy for phone conversations. There is absolutly no such expectation for what one voluntarily does on a public street. This is flat out authoritarianism.
WTF?
Maryland Police state ping. They can record you, but not you record them. Yet the police are ordered to ignore illegals (undocumented democrats) , this is where they all came for drivers licences until Real ID forced MD to stop.
The officers served the warrant at 6:45 a.m.
_________________________________
Lucky the cops didn’t execute a no knock - bust down the door - shoot the dog - taze grandma - oops we got the wrong house - warrant.
Hey - if you’re gonna jack with the law like he did....
You take your lumps.
/s
Maryland’s law is just wrong. In Oklahoma it is against the law to set up a remote camera or recorder when no one being recorded knows it is happening. However, if one of the people being taped knows it is happening, it is not illegal.
If you are harmed by someone’s secret taping you can sue but you cannot use the state to prosecute them for a crime.
How else would all of the wired witnesses been able to get evidence against mobsters and corrupt politicians?
“>> the judge’s identity is being kept secret.
That’s just WRONG.”
Well, if this goes to trial, the judge’s name will come out. They will have provide the signed copy of the warrant as part of discovery. Otherwise, any cop could forge a signature on a warrant, give the defendant an unsigned copy, and say that the judge’s name was being withheld for safety reasons.
Federal judges have also been sanctioning cops personally for trying this thugcop garbage.
These idiots are playing with fire, and they’re going to get burned. Badly.
With stronger 2d Amendment rights now spelled out by the SCOTUS, and more CCW around the country, I would urge PD's to go back to wearing uniforms and using marked cars.
In a crisis situation, I need to be able to tell the cops from the scumbags. Cops dressing like unshaven scumbags (and I generously include tattooed cops) is going to inexorably lead to a tragedy somewhere. I have seen them in sweat clothes, torn shorts, tee shirts, etc. I don't mean they should wear full gay-bar YMCA cop regalia. How about a blazer, clean shirt, and pressed khakis ... and shined shoes?
Perhaps if grown American men did not go about dressed like homeless camp counselors, we could shape up a few other things here in Aztlán.
http://openjurist.org/212/f3d/1332/smith-v-city-of-cumming-a
In the Eleventh District Court of Appeals:
As to the First Amendment claim under Section 1983, we agree with the Smiths that they had a First Amendment right, subject to reasonable time, manner and place restrictions, to photograph or videotape police conduct. The First Amendment protects the right to gather information about what public officials do on public property, and specifically, a right to record matters of public interest. See Blackston v. Alabama, 30 F.3d 117, 120 (11th Cir.1994) (finding that plaintiffs’ interest in filming public meetings is protected by the First Amendment); Fordyce v. City of Seattle, 55 F.3d 436, 439 (9th Cir.1995) (recognizing a “First Amendment right to film matters of public interest”); Iacobucci v. Boulter, No. CIV.A. 94-10531 (D.Mass, Mar. 26, 1997) (unpublished opinion) (finding that an independent reporter has a protected right under the First Amendment and state law to videotape public meetings); see also, United States v. Hastings, 695 F.2d 1278, 1281 (11th Cir.1983) (finding that the press generally has no right to information superior to that of the general public) (citing Nixon v. Warner Communications, Inc., 435 U.S. 589, 609, 98 S.Ct. 1306, 55 L.Ed.2d 570 (1978)); Lambert v. Polk County, 723 F.Supp. 128, 133 (S.D.Iowa 1989) (”[I]t is not just news organizations ... who have First Amendment rights to make and display videotapes of events....”); Thompson v. City of Clio, 765 F.Supp. 1066, 1070-71 (M.D.Ala.1991) (finding that city council’s ban on member’s attempt to record proceedings regulated conduct protected by the First Amendment); cf. Williamson v. Mills, 65 F.3d 155 (11th Cir.1995) (reversing district court’s grant of qualified immunity to a law enforcement officer who seized the film of and arrested a participant in a demonstration for photographing undercover officers). Thus, the district court erred in concluding that there was no First Amendment right.
There was little government-determined crime in the Soviet Union. It's a fact; long cited as an apology for Soviet style Communism (authoritarianism).
We have lost our way.
“How about a blazer, clean shirt, and pressed khakis ... and shined shoes?”
Now theres a disguise that would fool everyone!
>> if this goes to trial, the judge’s name will come out
So, as long as it DOESN’T go to trial, the police can show up anywhere they like with a “secretly authorized” warrant (with a signature that might be phony), conduct an illegal search, remove property... ???
Again I would suggest “that’s just WRONG”.
Unless the cops are doing something wrong and illegal, they should have no problem with being recorded. If they do, they have something to hide.
It’s in Maryland. Run by liberals. I won’t be doing pop wheelies in Maryland!
Technically since the police officer jumped out of his car pointing a gun, there was no time for a warning that the officer was being taped before the taping. If he was told he might confiscate the tape on the spot. It was the public viewing that made it a crime, reading the law. But it says they need a reasonable expectation of privacy.
The liberals in MD don't care about this.
Pennsylvania has a similar law, intended no doubt to keep meddlesome citizens from recording their elected officials when they solicit bribes
I have lived in MD for 25 years and have never encountered any such difficulties. Why is that?
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