A year after Los Angeles Police Department investigators discovered that the recording devices in about 50 LAPD patrol cars had been deliberately disabled, the Los Angeles Times reported that LAPD officers have continued to tamper with voice recording equipment in their patrol cars in order to “avoid being monitored while on duty.”
Specifically, some LAPD officers had removed antennas from patrol cars. The antennas reportedly help record what officers say while out on the job. The patrol cars also have cameras that automatically activate when the car’s emergency lights and sirens are turned on, and work with the small transmitters officers wear on their belts to help send audio recordings back to the precinct.
Top LAPD officials including Chief Charlie Beck were reportedly aware of the problem last summer but opted to not investigate who was responsible for removing the antennas. Instead, Beck and his fellow LAPD officials warned the officers to stop meddling with the equipment.
According to Sgt. Dan Gomez, removing the antennas didn’t completely ruin the LAPD’s ability to hear and record what the officers say while on the job, but it did limit the voice recorders’ range by as much as one-third.
However, when members of the LAPD Police Commission, which is tasked with overseeing the department, found out about the LAPD officers tampering with the antennas this past September, some commissioners told the Los Angeles Times they were “alarmed by the officers’ attempts to conceal what occurred in the field, as well as the failure of department officials to come forward when the problem first came to light.”
As police commission president Steve Soboroff said, the commissioners should have gotten involved right away. “This equipment is for the protection of the public and of the officers. To have people who don’t like the rules to take it upon themselves to do something like this is very troubling.”
LAPD officials insist that the missing antennas didn’t affect the department’s ability to determine whether an officer had acted appropriately, which was the point of the equipment. But many are concerned that a lot of the patrol cars missing antennas were in the Southeast Division, a part of the city where there is tension between police and minority community members.
Even more concerning is that the department has no way of knowing how many conversations police officers had that were not recorded as a result of the antenna tampering. As the Daily Mail reported, an investigation into a officer-involved shooting incident in February found that audio recordings varied in quality so much that it became evident the antenna issue had still not been entirely remedied.
On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Police Commission called for a public hearing to discuss the issue of the antenna tampering, since it was discovered in recent weeks that small antennas were missing or broken on dozens of transmitters worn by the officers, particularly officers who worked in the Southeast Division.
Commissioner Robert Saltzman said he specifically wanted to hear directly from senior police staff why they opted to not investigate the issue further and reprimand those officers responsible for tampering with the antennas, as well as why the LAPD chose to not notify the commission about the issue immediately.
Saltzman stressed that the antennas were an important part of the LAPD’s efforts to reduce accusations of police brutality. He also reminded LAPD officials that part of the reason why the Department of Justice decided to end its federal monitoring program of the department last year was because the department required officers to have video and audio recording equipment on their person and on their car.
Why the officers opted to remove the antennas from their cars and tool belts is not known. But Neil Richards, a law professor at Washington University, said the officers may have done this because no one likes to be watched.
“Pervasive surveillance of this sort makes us jittery and distracted; it’s stressful as we all need times and places — even during the work day — when we can be alone and be ourselves,” Richards said.
“Maybe they worry about their actions being taken the wrong way by their superiors. Maybe they worry that worrying about being watched distracts them from their jobs. Maybe they might have something to hide, but the wide spread of this phenomenon suggests that they just don’t like being watched. (But it’s interesting and ironic that those who watch us to stop us from breaking things themselves broke things so they wouldn’t be watched!)”