Archive for the 'Police Harassment' Category

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First Amendment Travesty: Michigan Reporter Sentenced

Published June 1, 2009 Assault , Harassment , Photographers' Rights , Photojournalism , Police Harassment 1 Comment
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Photo from the Michigan Citizen

It was Michigan Citizen reporter Diane Bukowski’s rotten luck that her sentencing came on the day that GM announced it was filing for bankruptcy. Already this story wouldn’t have gotten much play in Detroit, but now it’s as good as done.

Bukowski was sentenced to 200 hours of community service and ordered to pay a $4,000 fine today for two counts of resisting and obstructing an officer at a crime scene in November. Of course the story is as shady as a big oak tree. It was a police car chase that ended in the death of two men. Bukowski is well known for reporting on police corruption. The officer in question manhandled Bukowski, deleting all of her photos – and the jurors saw the raw Fox 2 news footage that substantiates that she never crossed the police tape. Nevertheless, the cops have friends in high places and now Bukowski will pay.

She is appealing the ruling.

Watch the original Fox 2 news report here.

Article from the Detroit Free Press

More Made Up Laws Regarding Oil Refineries

Published May 31, 2009 Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment , Street photography 7 Comments
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Photo by wmliu

One of the Daily Kos site’s diarists, Androsko, posted about a recent incident he and a friend experienced while taking photos outside of the Hess Refinery in Port Reading, New Jersey. While they were there to shoot a comedy sketch, the local police smelled terrorism.

A police officer pulled up and told them – surprise! – they weren’t allowed to take photos and they’d have to delete them. Why? As Androkso writes:

He responded that there were town ordinances that were mandated by the state and the Department of Homeland Security. I then asked for the specific ordinance or law, saying that I had read a lot of stories about police and photography in public places. He failed to provide me with anything specific, citing Homeland Security “stuff”.

The officer asked for their driver’s licenses and Social Security numbers, while insisting they weren’t being reported, just that he had to enter their information in the system. The photos were not deleted in the end and they parted amicably. And the harassment goes on….

A commenter points out that the canon of laws is so vast that cops can’t be expected to remember them all, further adding:

So they sometimes operate the way most of us do, sorta figuring if it seems like it might be illegal, it probably is. … Whether or not any laws got passed, it seeped into the collective consciousness, and a lot of folks have vague impressions that ‘you’re not supposed to scope out such places’. Your cop obviously had that vagueness floating around in the back of his mind.

I get that rationale; police officers are human and they can’t be expected to have an encyclopedic knowledge of law. But they need to have a better-than-average one – and more importantly, if you’re stopping someone to tell them they’re breaking a law, you damn well better know which one. (And if you don’t, radio into the station, read up on laws that pertain to your district, bone up for god sakes!) This type of thing is going on all the time, and no matter how wrong, how egregious, how unlawful, it doesn’t seem to matter.

Read Androsko’s whole post here.

Photographers’ Rights Rally June 6th & 7th

Published May 25, 2009 Harassment , Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment , Protests , Rally , Security Guard Harassment 1 Comment
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NPRO Rally June 6th & 7th

The National Photographers’ Rights Weekend Rally is just two weeks away. So put your rally lens caps on and clear your schedules because this year’s event is taking place over two days (not just one like last year) and will certainly cause some controversy – as well as raise awareness for photographers’ rights.

For more info, email npro@discarted.com.

LAPD Lies, Bullies Photogs Off Public Sidewalk

Published May 24, 2009 Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment , Street photography 10 Comments
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20040401-IMG_0092-797245Officer Thomas Malloy, Badge #8641, Serial #22934/Photo by David Sommars

Photographer David Sommars and two friends went to the Port of Los Angeles on Saturday night to take photos of the amazing industrial landscape. As they walked on the sidewalk with their tripods, they noticed they were being followed by a black SUV. Being as the driver was shifty and suspicious, the photographers were more worried that they were being cased for their gear.

But, as it turned out, the driver was Officer Weiss from the LAPD, who had called the three men into the station. When a police cruiser showed up, Sommars asked the officer what law they were breaking, but Officer Malloy declined to offer any information. He just told them it was illegal to audio record him and if they didn’t stop taking photos of him they would be arrested.

His boss, Officer Chacoh, also on the scene, was unfortunately just as ill-informed and tight-lipped. He said they had to go to a different city to take pictures. He was not willing, or capable, of citing a  law they were breaking; he was only able to repeat that if that they continued to take photos they would be taken in.

As Sommars points out, the photos they were taking from public sidewalks were essentially not any more detailed than what you’d find on Google Maps. The police can’t come up with a valid law because there isn’t one, and their harassment of photographers on public streets is illegal. “I’m actually getting very used to being “Lied” to by police officers,” Sommars writes on his blog. “This is not a good thing, and it’s not legal. But hey, they have guns and we don’t, so deal with it.”

UPDATE: Sommars called the number on the card he was given by the officers and was told he could be put in federal prison for 10-15 years for photographing refineries. Wow! If that’s really a law on the books and someone can point us to it, please do.

UPDATE #2: Sommars received a communication from a special investigator on May 26 that the Office of the Inspector General has launched an internal investigation into the officers involved in this incident.

Read Sommars’ full account, along with photos, here.

To voice your concerns regarding this incident, contact the following:

Los Angeles Police Station – Harbor Area
2175 S John S. Gibson Blvd, San Pedro, CA
Phone (310) 726-7700
Fax (310) 726-7739

Office of the Inspector General Los Angeles Police Dept.
Phone (213) 202-5866.
Fax (213) 482-1247
oigcompl@lapd.lacity.org

Janice Hahn – District 15 City Council Member
City Hall Office (213)-473-7015
200 N. Spring Street, Rm 435
Los Angeles, CA 90012
councilmember.hahn@lacity.org

PATH Cop Targets Mom, Grandma and Newborn

Published May 18, 2009 Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment 20 Comments
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Kim Hudson

On Friday afternoon I was in the Christopher Street PATH station in New York City with my mom, my sister and her baby. My mom and I were taking pictures of the baby, her with an iPhone and me with my camera, when the Port Authority officer came over and told us sternly “No pictures, no pictures.” Though I knew this was absolutely ridiculous – and groundless – I wasn’t going to make a scene there with my family. All we could do was laugh. If three women cooing over a baby are now a security threat, well … I don’t know. It’s just unfathomable.

Considering the hot water New York’s MTA subway system and Amtrak have been in lately, you’d think the PATH would be more aware of the law. What’s more, Boing Boing posted an NYPD document yesterday outlining their stance on photographers – and, in a nut shell, it says it’s perfectly legal and they should refrain from harrassing people shooting in public places. (The NYPD does not patrol PATH stations, but the agencies work very closely with each other.)

I contacted PATH authorities to find out their policy on photography. They told me their private bylaws allow them to outlaw photography in their stations – despite it being a public place and a government entity. To voice your concerns about this incident, contact the Port Authority Police at (201) 216-2677.

Greek Photographer’s Case Dismissed

Published May 18, 2009 Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment , Street photography Leave a Comment
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The British Journal of Photography reports that the case against the Greek tourist who was arrested for taking a photo of a little girl on the subway in April was dismissed and can “return to Greece free.” (Does that mean he was detained in London for a month?) As we posted last week, Pericles Antoniou, 53, was on the subway with his family when he inadvertently took a photo of a young girl. Her mother went ballistic. Antoniou was arrested.

There aren’t many details about this story since it hasn’t been covered by any mainstream outlets as far as I can tell, which is shocking in itself – this is a huge civil rights violation, even in England which has a history of being extremely hostile to photographers.

Thanks to Byron.

Can I See Some ID?

Published May 15, 2009 Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment , Security Guard Harassment Leave a Comment
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Not that we’re endorsing fraud, but this is a funny idea – download your very own  Homeland Security photography license to show off to overzealous cops and security guards.

From JWZ via Boing Boing

Homeless Advocates Are The New Domestic Terrorists

Published May 14, 2009 Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment Leave a Comment
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Photo by Phil Connelly

The Fresno Police Department’s Homeland Security force is going after some big fish – because we all know what a threat homeless advocates are.

Phil Connelly sparked the interest of anti-terrorism officials in April when he was monitoring city crews removing property from a known homeless area of Fresno, CA and photographed them dumping the materials in a city maintenance yard. City employees grew concerned over Connelly’s presence and contacted the Fresno Police Department’s Homeland Security Bureau, who tracked down Connelly via his license plate. However, rather than visiting the suspected “terrorist”, Connelly  only received an intimidating letter from Homeland Security saying his behavior “caused concern among several city employees.” 

Now, there’s more to this story that involves a $2 million dollar judgement against the city for destroying the homeless people’s belongings, and this could be an intimidation tactic (as Connelly believes it is).

But, as Sgt. Ronald Grimm, the Homeland Security Coordinator for the Fresno Police Department, told the local ABC news station:

“It was textbook casing. Similar to what a domestic terrorist, an international terrorist, or simply, what a citizen meaning to do harm to the government would do just prior to an event.”

Actually, I’m willing to bet it couldn’t be farther from “textbook casing.” Do terrorists follow city workers in broad daylight and photograph them from at most a few feet away? Sgt. Grimm can’t really expect people to believe that, but it’s just another ridiculous, lazy justification that government officials like to use these days to infringe on our rights.

Maybe we should all send Sgt. Grimm a letter because his justification for what was done to Connelly is causing me grave concern. 

Watch the news story at ABC 30’s web site.

Read more about Connelly’s incident here.

Taking Photos of Little Girls Is Illegal in London

Published May 12, 2009 Harassment , Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment , Street photography 6 Comments
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Photo by d.anny

A Greek photographer has been arrested – yes, arrested – for taking photos of a little girl on the London subway. According to the British Journal of Photography, when Pericles Antoniou inadvertently took photos of a young girl in April and her mother complained, he says he did the courteous thing and showed the mother the photos and then erased them all. The girl’s father wasn’t satisfied though, and demanded that police arrest Antoniou. He was charged with “public harassment” and causing “alarm and distress.”

As Antoniou writes in a letter to the Greek ambassador to Britain:

It is inconceivable for one to think, in the country where Bill Brandt, Marτin Parr, Killip were born and their works are based on street photography, that I had to be humiliated and accused of taking photos (!!!) while being in the Metro – subway. It is noted that in the National Portrait Gallery there is a photo exhibition currently which is about photos taken of people in streets!!!

His court date has been scheduled for May 18.

Check out the Facebook group that was created for Antoniou’s cause here.

Threatened With Arrest

Published April 17, 2009 Harassment , Photographers' Rights , Police Harassment 26 Comments
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Last week I wrote about a confrontation between myself and the LAPD while legally photographing a crime scene where a man had been killed. During the encounter LAPD officers berated, bullied and threatened me with unlawful arrest for supposedly obstructing their investigation. At no point did  I encroach on the crime scene, or cross police tape to photograph the incident. I was well within my legal rights granted to me by the US Constitution and LAPD’s Media Relations Handbook.

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