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Despite DOJ memos and court rulings, California Highway Patrol still telling people not to film them

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(Article changed on March 27, 2013 at 17:25)

(Article changed on March 27, 2013 at 15:19)


CHP Officer L. Harris by martin Hill
 

Obnoxious CHP cop tries to make people stop filming him

libertyfight.com

 

Update 3/27/13 3:17PM: Hello, and welcome to the California Highway Patrol. Thank you for visiting this article. I hope you like the publicity, because it's only just begun. To mitigate the liability of your degenerate officer's actions, your brass should re-train them properly. If they had trained their officers correctly in the first place, it would have save you a lot of grief, embarrasment and money. Too late. You have demonstrated a proven policy and practice of illegally denying people the County Seat and threatening to arrest motorists for demanding it. You had better respect the God-given civil rights of all people. Viva Cristo Rey!

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When will these cops ever learn? Even with Federal Courts, the U.S. Supreme Court and The U.S. Department of Justice repeatedly admonishing police departments for trying to stop people from filming them, the police continue on trying to coerce, intimidate, and arrest people for filming on-duty police.

Here is a recent example from Southern California. A California Highway Patrol officer L. Harris (ID No. 14858) snarled "you can turn the camera off too", as well as instructing the driver to "tell your friend to get that camera out of my face," when the camera was actually nowhere near his face. He attempted this despite the fact that numerous Federal Courts and even the U.S. Supreme Court, in additon to the U.S. Department of Justice have clearly and repeatedly affirmed that filming police is an inherent right in America. Harris then told the videographer, who never said one word to him, to "stay out of this, it's none of your business" before slamming the vehicle door in anger. When the supervisor was called at the insistence of the driver, he lost complete control and began screaming at the woman in a fury. [ That full story and complete 11 minute video can be found here Lunatic CHP cops go berzerk as female motorist successfully demands her rights under CA Vehicle code.]

Obnoxious CHP cop tries to make people stop filming him

Below is a helpful archive of stories and court rulings on this matter, and a ridiculous video from 2009 where a cop told me that filming him was illegal and tried to get me to turn off the camera.

In 2008 I filed an official complaint regarding the right to film police in public. You can watch the entire internal affairs interview here or if you prefer, just watch the short segments and read the transcript where the two police investigators repeatedly confirm that is indeed 100% legal to film police in public:
Police Internal Affairs Investigators Confirm that Filming Cops in Public is 100% Legal

For those of you who may be confused about our right to film on-duty police officers, here are two letters from the U.S. Department of Justice: One from 5/14/12 and a more recent one from 3/4/13.

http://images.politico.com/global/2013/03/08/garcia_doj_soi_03-04-13.html
STATEMENT OF INTEREST OF THE UNITED STATES
Case 8:12-cv-03592-JFM Document 15 Filed 03/04/13 Page 1 of 13
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF MARYLAND
MANNIE GARCIA, Plaintiff, v. MONTGOMERY COUNTY, MARYLAND, et al., Defendants.

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Catholic paleo-libertarian from California., promotes limited government and civil liberties
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