VOA慢速英语2015 Body Cameras Seen as Good and Bad for US Police Officers

AS IT IS 2015-05-04 Body Cameras Seen as Good and Bad for US Police Officers

The recent violence in Baltimore, Maryland follows incidents around the United States in which police officers have been accused of wrongdoing. As a result, police departments and civil rights groups have called for officers to wear cameras to record their activities.

On Friday, the Justice Department announced it would begin a body camera program to assist local police in law enforcement. Officials said the Obama administration will provide $20 million to police departments to help buy body cameras for officers. The money is part of a $75 million, three-year body camera funding program. President Barack Obama requested the program in December. The U.S. Congress still has to consider the other $55 million.

There are many questions about body cameras systems, including costs, control of camera images and the technology’s limits.

Charles McClelland is the Chief of Police in Houston, Texas. He supports the use of body cameras. But he admits they also present problems.

“The type of equipment, the placement of the equipment, the downloading time, storage space…all of those are significant challenges.”

For the past two years, the Houston Police Department has been using body cameras as part of an experimental program. The department deploys¹ about 100 of the cameras on its officers each day.

Chief McClelland says deploying² cameras on a few thousand officers and then dealing³ with all the video they produce will cost a lot of money. And those videos can only show part of what happens when the officer is on duty.

Body cameras usually offer a wide-angle view of what is in front of the camera lens. In other words, anything happening on either side of the camera or behind the officer is never recorded. Chief McClelland says that leaves out a lot.

“An officer may turn his or her head, and see something, but the video camera that is in the middle of their chest is pointing straight ahead.”

Rita Watkins is the head of the Law Enforcement Management Institute of Texas. She says there is statewide demand for body cameras.

“I can tell you that right now there are chiefs who are budgeting, within their budget and asking their community leadership for the funds to initiate⁴ and to start a body camera program.”

She says legal experts are considering how photographs and videos taken by average citizens should be treated.

“We also have got the public who is capturing video (with) cameras. And so how do they maintain it and what is their duty and responsibility for making that information available to law enforcement?”

Both she and the police chief are concerned about what happens if a video becomes corrupted⁵, is damaged, or disappears.

“This technology is man-made and sometimes man-made objects will malfunction⁶.”

Chief McClelland says a technical problem could fuel unrest in a city like Baltimore, where there already is distrust of the police. He worries that communication between officers and citizens may shrink because of the cameras.

“The officer is recording⁷ the citizen and the citizen may be using his or her cellphone to record the officer.”

Chief McClelland says body cameras can help law enforcement. But he says they also will become a continuing financial concern for police. He notes the cameras must be replaced over time by newer, better equipment.

Words in This Story

department – n. an office or agency of a larger organization

view – n. an observation; the way something is seen

initiate – v. to cause the beginning of (something): to start or begin (something)

maintain v. – to cause (something) to exist or continue without changing

malfunction – n. a problem; failure to operate

1 deploys   

（尤指军事行动）使展开( deploy的第三人称单数 )； 施展； 部署； 有效地利用

参考例句：

• It then deploys "decoy" programs designed to attract the virus. 然后，它释放“诱饵”去吸引病毒。
• But when that doesn't work, he deploys his secret defense mechanism. 但没有效果，它要施展绝密自卫武器了。

2 deploying   

（尤指军事行动）使展开( deploy的现在分词 )； 施展； 部署； 有效地利用

参考例句：

• Provides support for developing and deploying distributed, component-based applications. 为开发和部署基于组件的分布式应用程序提供支持。
• Advertisement, publishing, repair, and install-on-demand are all available when deploying your application. 在部署应用程序时提供公布、发布、修复和即需即装功能。

3 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

4 initiate   

vt.开始，创始，发动；启蒙，使入门；引入

参考例句：

• A language teacher should initiate pupils into the elements of grammar.语言老师应该把基本语法教给学生。
• They wanted to initiate a discussion on economics.他们想启动一次经济学讨论。

5 corrupted   

（使）败坏( corrupt的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）腐化； 引起（计算机文件等的）错误； 破坏

参考例句：

• The body corrupted quite quickly. 尸体很快腐烂了。
• The text was corrupted by careless copyists. 原文因抄写员粗心而有讹误。

6 malfunction   

vi.发生功能故障，发生故障，显示机能失常

参考例句：

• There must have been a computer malfunction.一定是出了电脑故障。
• Results have been delayed owing to a malfunction in the computer.由于电脑发生故障，计算结果推迟了。

7 recording   

n.录音，记录

参考例句：

• How long will the recording of the song take?录下这首歌得花多少时间？
• I want to play you a recording of the rehearsal.我想给你放一下彩排的录像。