It looks like New York might become the first state in the country to mandate that special video cameras, accompanied by a bright spotlight and laser, be attached to police handguns to provide a visual record of shootings. In the state legislature, former cops from both major political parties are supporting at least a pilot program for the technology. Certainly the devices, which can optionally record audio, could help answer critical questions in the wake of killings like the one involving Sean Bell. But of course there's a downside: Imagine what a media huckster like TMZ's Harvey Levin would do with the footage from one of these things.
Internet voyeurism felt relatively harmless when the objects of attention suffered little for being the object of any particular video or picture, and when they were more uniformly self-selected. Gun camera footage, when it becomes widespread and, inevitably, hugely popular, is going to raise far uglier questions.
Excerpt of WCBS' video report on the technology (with no disturbing footage of anyone getting shot):
[WCBS]
