NY1 is taking the NYPD to court, trying to get access to video footage recorded by police body cameras.
For more than a year, several dozen officers have been using the cameras as part of a pilot program, but the public and reporters have yet to see any of the video.
Last year, through the state’s Freedom of Information Law, NY1 asked to see unedited random examples of what the body cameras have recorded, but twice, the NYPD essentially denied our request, saying if a reporter wanted to look at even an edited portion of the footage, the station would be charged about $36,000 for labor costs. So NY1 is now taking the NYPD to court.
In the court filing, lawyers representing NY1 argue that denying access to all of the requested footage is against one of the primary purposes of the body camera program – to bring transparency to policing in the city.
The filing states, "If the NYPD gets its way, the promised 'transparency and accountability' would be contingent on the willingness of members of the public to pay exorbitant review and redaction fees every time footage is requested. That cannot be the law."
The legal dispute comes as the NYPD is planning to expand its body camera program to potentially thousands of officers.