When the Police Get Filmed, Is There More Accountability?

Slashdot reader DevNull127 writes: Racism is not getting worse. It’s getting filmed,” Will Smith said in 2016. And this week the Washington Post noted a parallel pattern emerging: videos of violent police encounters which “contrast sharply with accounts by the departments or their unions.” The Post provides four examples of police officials providing “inaccurate or outright misleading descriptions of what has occurred… Taken together, the incidents show how instant verification of police accounts have altered the landscape of accountability.” The Post even spoke to the executive director of one of America’s national police officer labor unions, who conceded their profession has been “diminished by events that have been witnessed on video over the course of the last couple of weeks.” Here’s one of the Post’s examples: Evan Gorski, 21, a protester in Philadelphia, was arrested on an allegation he pushed an officer off a bike on Monday, authorities told his attorney. But video circulated on social media painted a much different picture of how Gorski, a Temple University student, tangled with police. In the moment captured by others, Gorski reached between another demonstrator and an officer to separate them. A moment later, Philadelphia Police officer Joseph Bologna Jr. struck Gorski with a baton, chased him down and straddled him as another officer pressed his face on the asphalt. Other officers swung their batons at others gathered around. Gorski’s attorney, R. Emmett Madden, told the Philadelphia Inquirer that prosecutors dropped charges and released him Wednesday after reviewing video from the scene. “The police were lying,” Madden said. “We had a protest police brutality, and then police brutalize my client and try to frame him for a crime he didn’t commit.” Officer Bologna is now facing charges of aggravated assault. Meanwhile CNN report that in the last week at least 8 instances of police using excessive force. were caught on camera, while Vox argue that videos going viral “have been crucial in keeping the police accountable.”