Axon head-mounted camera records what police see when they keep an eye on Mayberry
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted December 30th 2009 12:32AM
posted December 30th 2009 12:32AM
Taser International, not content with zapping people with electricity, now wants you to be able to capture the action on video -- hands-free. Similar to the helmet cam used on television sports, the Axon system includes a Linux-powered tablet PC, an eye-level HeadCam that records audio and video (using IR in low-light), and a corresponding account on Evidence.com, an online, real time app for accessing and analyzing the data -- sure to become law enforcement's third favorite web portal (after Sprint's GPS data dispersal site and Garfield Minus Garfield). The system -- which will cost $5,700 per officer every three years -- made news recently when a Fort Smith, Arkansas officer was cleared of any wrongdoing in the death of a man who had threatened his wife with a handgun. The policeman was wearing an Axon camera at the time, which the county prosecutor said that the video allowed him to "observe what happened with complete objectivity." Currently officers in San Jose are using the system as part of a free trial, with other departments around the country expected to get in on the action in the near future. And who knows? At the very least we can hope that some hilarious law enforcement hijinks finds its way to YouTube. Get a closer look in the gallery below.
Hopefully it also corrects police who think they can do anything they want.
@B3astofthe3ast
as long is the footage is tamperproof!
@B3astofthe3ast
Exactly! While it might be nice if the feeds from these things were accessible in real-time by the public, sort of a 'watch the watchers' kind of scenario, that would also cause problems.
Maybe they could also send the feeds in real time to the local Public Defender's Office so a (hopefully) unbiased third party has access to unmodified footage.
@B3astofthe3ast
My bet is that sometimes the prosecution will fight nail and tooth to keep the footage out of court.
Im betting there will be a lot of odd camera "breakeges" if this comes to mandatory in some police departments.
Love the pic!
That's pretty cool.
But I bet when officers wear these, they look sorta.. silly?
lol I can see like the SWAT team having these, but street cops don't really need 'em.
@mtnDewFTW
Think back to when you were about four. SIbling/bratty kid does something mean to you. you tell your parents. You have no proof.
Same situation. Larger scale.
The plot thickens.....
Maybe frivolous lawsuits will decrease now.
Looks pretty awesome but I can't see any real need for a street cop to use these, unless they're notorious for getting into some real heavy stuff.
Footage to be seen on the 2010 season of "Cops."
Barney Fife pwns all.
Whoa! A-a-a-andy?
Yeah, Barney?
Is that a helmet cam in your pocket or are you just glad to see me?
I love the "are you serious?" look on the judge's face in the last picture.
Next step is augmented reality police.
I don't think cops will like this... Now there is evidence when they beat up someone innocent.
@kadajawi
Stop making the assumption that all cops beat the innocent, and believe they are above the law. Some of them do, yes. But most of them don't.
@HardToBelieve Well, obviously not all are bad. And I'm not referring to American cops but to cops all over the world. See Copenhagen, see demonstrations in Germany, US, ...
I think the main use of this would be demonstrations, since (at least the German) police uses video cameras to tape demonstrations. But these videos are useless, because the camera cop likes to turn away in case of police brutality. Not possible if they all have such a helmet.
Normal cops usually are fine people, I suppose. But it's not them who will wear these helmets.
They have this in the UK already deployed, there is a low rent TV program based around them chasing miscreants. It leaves out the "falling down the station stairs" part though.
http://www.itv.com/Entertainment/Extremereality/CopsWithCamerasgallery/default.html
This may fly in the big cities, but it'll never work in smaller areas at that price. My community has ~150k people, and our sheriff's department requires deputies to buy their own gun, holster and belt. The vest they provide isn't the most effective either, so if the deputy wants to increase his chance of survival he has to fork out some more cash for a better vest too.
Well if you get some kid with basic know-how of technology involved he can set up the whole thing for $200-$300 per cop rather than $5700, which is what small towns could do.
includes a tablet PC? why?
Why make a system like this so much more complicated, expensive and crash prone than it needs to be?
They make sports action helmet cameras that are really good for inside the $300 range. Just add some tamper proof, tamper evident features and save 4500 dollars.
Im sorry but that unit does not cost $5700 bucks!! Maybe $1000 retail with the mobile PC. Plus its a licence for only 3 years! This is not worth tax payers money to agree to such ridiculous purchase prices. It reminds me of the $10,000 toilet sets in the Whitehouse
Now cops will tease/coax you into getting angry and get you to say something in anger then arrest you for insults/discrimination/threat and what have you, count on it.
I had to resubmit because I mistyped 'count' as cunt, lol
Took me a while to figure out what went wrong.