What's Your Opinion of Putting Spy Cameras On City Streets? (page 5)

EvilForce

Ok...don't take this as a personal attack...but we are addressing a specific incidence so therefore it relates to you ok?

So your partner didn't finger the other 3 guys and in fact LIED to police officers that no one else was involved. What were the cops supposed to do then?

I will also jump to the conclusion that all 4 of them had been out drinking a fair bit, and alcohol was probably a major contributor to his behavior yes? How many drunken soccer hooligans have been stopped by all the stadium cameras??? TRUST me I have done plenty of stupid stuff in my younger days after one too many drinks...so I'm not judging...but I remember an instance of seeing a camera and in our drunken state "mooning" it. So I don't think cameras are going to stop people from being drunken louts. I'm sure your partner has learned his lesson and got carried away but that's not really what's at stake here.

But because your partner didn't want to rat out his buddies I'M SUPPOSED TO GIVE UP MY RIGHTS TO PRIVACY?!?! Come on!

Your partner commited the crime....and he has gotten punished....justice has been served....he took all the blame what else is Lady Justice supposed to do? For the 3 hooligans that have gotten "off" so to speak, they will get their theirs. Karma has a funny way of working.

You feel that justice hasn't been served since 3 people got off the hook. But where was your partner's responsibility in telling the truth? Doesn't that lay directly at his feet?

What price is your individual liberty and freedom of movement worth to you?

Sincerely

EvilForce

Ellie

I can see your point EvilForce and I do agree with you, he committed the crime and so he had to pay for it, its his own fault that he took all the rap leaving his so called friends to walk away laughing.

I guess I am just too personaly involved with this issue, it wasn't just him who was punished, I had to try to explain to my daughter that her daddy had gone on 'holiday' and wouldn't be home for a while, I had to call his mum to tell her that her only son had been sent to prison for 14 months, try to explain to my very judgemental Jehovahs Witness family that what he had done was out of character.

But my heart also goes out to victims of crime who can't for one reason or another identify their attackers and so have to live with the knowledge that the person who has assaulted/robbed/raped them is walking free, when they the victims are serving a sentence of fear.

I just think the more crime prevention and detection the better, and to say no to cctv just because you feel that in some way it might jeapodise your privacy is ludicrous.

EvilForce

ELLIE thanks for sharing your thoughts...I'm sure it hasn't been easy dealing with his punishment.

We are to the point where we disagree on the foundation of the argument and that's ok. We will have to simply agree to disagree.

What I was attempting in my posts was to have you consider that there are far more effective (though not perfect) ways of fighting crime and reducing it's effect. For we are not to the point where we are arguing about having done everything else and cameras are the only option left.

One last thing and I'll quit badgering you :) .... did you know that Britain is working on facial recognization technology to pick out faces in crowds and cross check them against a database of known current and former criminals and terrorists. What happens if your partner is included in this database and by facial recognization get's "automatically tracked" via camera watching him to repeat? Hasn't he paid his debt to society therefore shouldn't be singled out like this?

Just a thought that crossed my mind.

RichieRich

Bring on the cameras. I live in the country anyhow, where we like our criminals dark and our cops drunken.

Plus- imagine the reality tv we'd get out of it....

Soledad

I just think it's far more effective to have more police patroling the streets than to have cameras, which "may or may not" have a live person monitoring the street. Look, it doesn't take a scientist to figure this one out: near where I live I feel perfectly safe walking around at 2am because there is always a police patrol unit parked out in front of the corner deli. If that police patrol was replaced by a camera and something happened to me, how can I be so sure that the perp will be caught? At least a live cop will chase the guy around a bit.

Dont forget the NYPD slogan now: They'll kNock Your Punk Ass Down!

Ellie

I understand that there are more effective ways of fighting crime and I agree with you, however I do not think they should be at the disclusion of cctv, 'the camera does not lie' as they say.

To be honest I havn't heared about the facial recognition technology that you are talking about, but I would welcome it even if it meant that Gaz would be tracked.

as it is at the momment he is wearing an electronic tag around his leg, he is on a curfew and if he breaks his curfew the tag will alert the police and depending on the circumstances he could be recalled to prison.

This is actually a good thing in my opinion because if a crime where to be committed and the police suspected him due to an accusation or he fitted the description, the tag would actually prove that he was at home at the time (providing the crime where to occur during his curfew hours).

I do not worry about loosing privacy, after all, if you are not doing anything wrong then you have nothing to worry about.

Somebody mentioned earlier something about DNA being taken from babies and kept on a database, I also think this is a good idea.

As I said, anything to help prevent crime is welcome in my eyes.

minimus

Personally, I have nothing against this type of review AFTER the fact but I certainly would not want Big Brother watching our every move.

EvilForce

Ok Mini... you say after the fact...I assume you mean after the fact of a crime?

What kind of crime? Surely murder, rape, burglary right? But what about civil disobedience? How about loittering? Jwalking maybe? Unlawful meeting? Shoplifting from a fruit stand? Where does it stop?

Remember Britains experiment started out very mildly....to catch crooks after the fact....then grew to include catching terrorists (which it has never caught 1 yet) and now has grown to fully monitored and recorded tapes.

minimus

I don't think the government really cares all that much for petty issues.

EvilForce

So after all the evidence that spending money on CCTV's is not cost effective nor highly effective at reducing crime you are still all for it Min???

You don't think a "petty" thing like a protest march against the Bush Administration after 9/11 on the Washington Mall would have been lightly dismissed and CCTV footage not used if it had been available?

What's Your Opinion of Putting Spy Cameras On City Streets?

Share this