The state of Illinois is going to criminalize the video recording of police and certain government officials if Governor Pat Quinn signs the bill that’s currently sitting on his desk.
Senate Bill 1342 would make it a crime to record “oral communication between 2 or more persons” where anyone, including the police had a “reasonable expectation of privacy.” The Supreme Court of Illinois had struck down a similar law earlier this year, seeing that not only did it criminalize innocent conduct, but it interfered with free speech.
[contextly_auto_sidebar id=”QacONlgKXwSBF7ShVyvltdezibfjA0lp”] From the Illinois Policy Institute:
The bill would also discourage people from recording conversations with police by making unlawfully recording a conversation with police – or an attorney general, assistant attorney general, state’s attorney, assistant state’s attorney or judge – a class 3 felony, which carries a sentence of two to four years in prison. Meanwhile, the bill makes illegal recording of a private citizen a class 4 felony, which carries a lower sentencing range of one to three years in prison.
There’s only one apparent reason for imposing a higher penalty on people who record police in particular: to make people especially afraid to record police. That is not a legitimate purpose. And recent history suggests it’s important that people not be afraid to record police wherever they perform their duties so that officers will be more likely to respect citizens’ rights, and officers who do respect citizens’ rights will be able to prove it.
The bill might also provide an excuse to scuttle body cameras for police. Police may argue that using body cameras to record encounters with citizens outside of “public” places would violate the law, as citizens have not consented to being recorded.
The Illinois legislature clearly wants citizens to be afraid of recording encounters with police. The fact is, government doesn’t like having what it does recorded, that’s why it took forever to get CSPAN, and it’s why we don’t have video in the Supreme Court. Sunlight is always the best disinfectant to government corruption, and considering that Illinois is one of the most corrupt states, it makes sense that they would want to stop citizens from holding them accountable.
Steve Beson of the government accountability group “CopWatch” said about this legislation that “Recent high profile police abuse cases have shown that having a video record of interactions between police and citizens can be beneficial to both parties. In fact, in many states, such as Florida, it is legal to record interactions with police, as long as you’re not interfering with the police function. This new legislation in Illinois, if signed, would severely limit the ability of citizens to legally record interactions with the police.”
It’s extremely important for We The People to retain the right to record public officials, especially the police. Judge Andrew Napolitano explains in the following video how we humans retain the natural right to gather information about the government, and to say about it what we wish. Recording what they say and do in public is part of that.
