Next stop: Friday. Enjoy your evening Sift, readers.
A- Under the Sun posts another story from Hurricane Andrew as we approach the 20th anniversary of the storm.
B- A guy gets stopped and checked out while videotaping in a Surfside neighborhood and Carlos Miller is all over it. Personally, if a stranger is walking down my street videotaping, I would feel grateful if the local police made sure everything was on the up and up.
C- South Florida is great at preserving its past, as Random Pixels shows us.
D- Curbed Miami links to an article on some of Fort Lauderdale's bigger private pools.
E- Culture Designers tells us what/who "Cushy" is but I'm still not 100% sure I understand.
Formed just 18 months ago with $5K and a fistful of moxy, Cushy’s already become the go-to place for anyone looking not just to realize their vision, but to refine it as well.F- The305.Com has the trailer to a new HBO series featuring the Dolphins.
“Whether you come to us with something fully formed or a scrap of an idea written on the back of a bar napkin, we can help take it to the next step,” says Vahan.
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31 comments:
C- Good one! :)
B- I'm siding with Carlos on this one.
What's the difference between you taking pictures in Wynwood - which is someone's neighborhood - and someone taking pictures in your neighborhood?
What does that mean - "up and up?"
I'm assuming you've never been questioned by police when you're out on your weekend photo tours in other people's neighborhoods.
If there was a person that I had never seen before walking down my street videotaping the houses or the cars or the kids playing in the street, I'd want the police to make sure this suspicious person is checked out. I think that's reasonable given some of the people that pass through South Florida.
I don't wander through South Florida residential neighborhoods videotaping or taking photos, Bill. If by "other people's neighborhoods" you're referring to Lincoln Road or Ocean Drive or parts of the Art District in Wynwood, then I'm guilty.
But I think most reasonable people not trying to force an issue totally see the difference.
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Rick,
You do realize that police need to have reasonable suspicion that a crime is being committed in order to legally detain somebody?
Walking down the street with a video camera in your hand is about as reasonably suspicious as walking down the street wearing a hoodie over your head.
Since when did it become illegal to photograph or video in public?
The guy was videotaping, Carlos. You know that in the first 15 seconds of the clip. You claim that he was just carrying a camera because it sounds good. Whatever.
I am not a lawyer and neither are you. But I will say that a stranger walking down a residential street videotaping houses, cars, and perhaps children in the neighborhood meets a Terry definition of "reasonable suspicion" that criminal activity may be afoot. That would justify a brief detention of the person for the officer to further investigate the situation.
That's my opinion. Your opinion was that he was "carrying a camera" and was stopped without reason.
I'm assuming that the guy is suing Surfside since he has such an airtight case. Hopefully, you'll report the results.
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Anon...a stranger walking through your neighborhood dressed in a ninja outfit and carrying a bat isn't a crime either. But I suspect that you would want that guy checked out. Or maybe not. Since it's not a crime.
You think it is appropriate for police to hassle someone just because they have a camera? You are an idiot.
I sure wish I lived down there because I would find out when that IDIOT MORORONIC COP was working and would gather everybody I could to start walking all over the place acting like I was videotaping just to make a point. Maybe even hand out flyer's with that idiots picture on it warning folks that this IDIOT was harassing people for carrying a camera.
Uh oh....Carlos Miller's Angry Army of Armchair Lawyers has arrived!!
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It's been my experience that people leery of cameras to the extent they feel threatened are usually engaged in criminal activity. And it always seems that way to the officers as well. They know it can't be a matter of casing a place, HD pinhole cameras cost a lot less than a good digital camera. Anyone casing a house or neighborhood will use a hidden camera. At that point the officers have a choice - either conclude the person who called is extremely paranoid, or, figure they're up to no good and afraid of it being photographed.
Rick, are you a police officer?
No, are you?
And, more importantly, what in God's name does that have to do with anything?
Most importantly, how is the police officer in the clip "threatened" by the camera? They conducted the entire stop with the thing rolling.
Otherwise....spot on, Anon!
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So now videotaping is enough to get you arrested?
You may want to rethink that position, I don't think that's the society you really want.
Then again, maybe it is.
Since when has carrying a camera become a crime? Police should enforce laws as written by the legislature and stop making up their own reasons to harass innocent people.
Since cops think that cameras are criminal equipment and the camera stores do not issue warnings that "using this equipment as intended may cause undue stress due to police harassment" it is time that camera owners initiated a class action lawsuit against all camera stores and manufacturers. Perhaps that would generate enough attention to bring an end to the harassment as major corporations would now pressure cities to end the war against photography
Anon @ 11:13...did you watch the video? The guy wasn't arrested.
And videotaping can get you arrested. Do you need examples or can you figure that one out on your own?
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Anon @ 11:14....the guy was videtaping...he wasn't just carrying a camera no matter what Carlos told you.
C'mon, guys. Do your homework before you drop a comment.
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B. Rookies are known renegades. Our LEO is eager to earn some stripes. He does not live in surfside either. Told me he can't afford the rents...
Rick, video recording is not a crime. You should know that by now. You've been reading my blog for several years.
You sound like the prosecutors in my case, trying to make a crime where there is none.
It's not my opinion. It's the law.
Numerous court cases have determined this. The U.S. Department of Justice did a good job on citing these cases when they issued guidelines to the Baltimore Police Department a couple of months ago.
http://www.pixiq.com/sites/default/files/united_states_letter_re_photography_5_14_2012_0.pdf
"Rick, video recording is not a crime."
And that's why the guy wasn't put in cuffs and hauled away to jail.
Carlos...c'mon. You know I'm not saying that, just like you know that guy wasn't stopped for just "carrying a camera" down the street. And it's disingenuous for you to state otherwise.
Video recording can be a crime under certain circumstances and you well know that.
What the issue here is whether the circumstances as they are presented give the officer authority to conduct a Terry stop. My opinion is they do. You can disagree and that's fine.
But please...enough with the line that the guy was hassled just because he was carrying a camera down a street. That's BS and you well know it.
Although it does get you hits and your readers riled up.
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Rick, video recording is only a crime if you are recording people who have an expectation of privacy.
If he was shooting up the skirts of women or sneaking around their windows, then they would have probable cause to detain him.
Walking down the street shooting video is not a crime.
You're making yourself sound like an idiot arguing that it is.
ugh, the police can obviously ask questions, but they cannot detain someone unless they are suspected of committing a crime. there is a difference.
"Walking down the street shooting video is not a crime.
You're making yourself sound like an idiot arguing that it is."
Of course, that's not what I'm saying. But look, Carlos...if you're unable to distinguish the difference between carrying a camera and actually videotaping with a camera how can I expect you to be able to comprehend what I've said in this thread, oh, 2 or 3 times.
Thanks.
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Rick, the video starts with the confrontation with the cop so how do I know whether he was video recording or not before the stop?
Because the cop said so?
LOL. OK.
Cops lie, Rick. You know that.
And photographers never do, Carlos.
LOL. OMG. ROFLMAO.
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Rick,
It doesn't really matter whether he was video recording or not. It wouldn't give the cop reasonable suspicion to detain him.
Stop embarrassing yourself. A lot of lawyers read your blog.
carlos,
Books have been written about this subject and the issue has been examined by the Supreme Court. You and Rick have a difference of an opinion on whether this was a justified Terry stop. It's great that you write a blog about photographer's rights, but that doesn't make you an attorney, judge or a Supreme Court justice. Thanks for your insights and opinions...but that's all they really are.
Anon,
Insights and opinions is all they really are whether you are an attorney, judge or Supreme Court justice.
I'm not pretending to be a doctor performing brain surgery.
I'm just passing along what's been told to me by countless attorneys over the last five years I've been writing this blog.
This is not a complicated matter.
A man was walking down the street with a camera. He may or may not have been video recording.
A cop finds him suspicious, detains him, interrogates him, pats him down, then releases him.
Where is the reasonable suspicion that we was about to commit a crime? Or that he just committed a crime?
If, for example, a woman on the next block was complaining of a man peeping into her windows - even if she did see a camera - then the cops sees this guy with a camera, that would be a reasonable suspicion to detain him.
But that's not the case here. The cop justifies the stop by saying he found him suspicious by video recording as he was walking down the street.
Do you see how ridiculous this sounds?
So where do you draw the line in public where video recording is not reasonably suspicious and is reasonable suspicious?
The way Rick explains it, if you have a healthy mix of commercial use, then you are free to video record or take pictures.
But if you are walking down a residential street, then you are suddenly reasonably suspicious and open to get stopped and frisked.
You don't have to have a law degree to see how unconstitutional that is.
You just have to be able to read and understand case law.
Carlos, Would you think this was more suspicious if you knew that there were three house break-ins on that block within the last week? And that they all took place around the same time of day that this stop took place?
Maybe the officer knew more than you do.
This seems like a consenual stop to me, I think the guy was free to leave at any time.
Obviously if the guy was arrested for something (whatever it might've been, drugs in pocket, let's say) his defense would've had the ability to question the legality of the stop. At that point maybe we would find out that there were several break-ins and that's why the officer was suspicious. Or not. in which case the evidence would be suppressed.
And yes, the prurpose of the Constitution is protect the innocent. We shouldn't have to be stopped. But it may be that the cop was reasonable in his suspicion that the guy was involved in criminal activity.
Carlos: do you have any knowledge whether the police officer had been dispatched there? Was there a complaint by a resident? Is that area a high crime area? How was the photographer dressed? How long had he been in the neighborhood?
If he was walking down the street with burglary tools, then it would have been enough to give the officer reasonable suspicion to stop him.
But a camera?
What does that have to do with break-ins? Unless, perhaps, he stole the camera.
Then he most likely wouldn't be openly video recording with it.
And if the officer had been dispatched there, he would have said so.
This is town known for speed traps, so the cops don't have a lot to do there. No, it's not a high-crime area.
You guys are grasping at air here.
A cop pulls up, stops his car, gets out of his car and starts asking him questions.
That is not a consensual encounter. The first thing the videographer asked if he was free to go and the cop kept approaching him, asking him questions, so obviously he was not free to go.
It's not about how you guys "feel" about a person. It's about the law. And no, I'm not a lawyer but the law books and case law are not kept under lock and key and only visible to lawyers.
Anyone can read it.
If I believed the cop had a legal right to stop him, I wouldn't hesitate to say it.
I did that last week in the Florida incident where cops tased a man after he had jaywalked.
http://www.pixiq.com/article/florida-cops-tase-man-after-he-jaywalked
The cops had asked for identification and he refused to give it to them and then he was just refusing to cooperate and he was tased and arrested.
And the cops were in the right there because he had committed a minor infraction, so they had the right to detain him.
In that case, the fact that they were carrying a camera never came into question with the cops.
But this guy was not jaywalking. He was walking down the street. The only reason the cop stopped him was because he had a camera.
It's not that difficult, guys.
Guys, this is a non-event. Surfside, also know as Safeside or Suicide, is a perfectly nice place to live. Residents are pleased to have their own police and sanitation departments. The current mayor rides around on a skateboard and the beach is relatively free of total nudity. Irrespective of Rick and Carlos (both of which may as well be on some kind of public service payroll) our LEOs are sworn to uphold the law and see it fit to prevent crime when convenient. They do not start battles that can't be won. Honestly, a quy walking open-carry-camcorder is easy pickings. The real consequential crimes take place behind closed doors out of site of vigilant snooty neighbors and law abiding drifters or provocateurs...
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