By JENNY DREASLER
WISH-TV | wishtv.com
Body cameras are coming to two major Hamilton County police departments.
The Carmel and Fishers departments plan to equip their officers with body cameras by 2019.
It’s all part of an effort to catch up with the times when it comes to technology.
“It holds police officers accountable, along with the public,” said Carmel Lt. Joe Bickel. “Because any time that you are recording someone, video recording, their behavior will probably change a little bit. It will probably be better than it normally would have been.”
Bickel
Bickel said Carmel will spend $1.3 million to buy 113 body cameras as well as 90 new replacement in-car cameras for police squad cars.
It’s a new addition Bickel said will be pivotal in policing, as the new cameras have the technology to sync up with already in-place squad car dash cams. Bickel said Carmel has had cameras in squad cars since 1996.
He said the ability to use technology in unison will give Carmel police multiple angles of video and audio.
“We want to be able to record the camera from inside the patrol car, as well as the body mic that’s on the patrol officer,” Bickel said.
With the ability for anything to go viral, Bickel said, the video “caught on camera” will also help shed light on situations that could have been controversial.
“It’s also protecting the officers from any false allegations of misconduct,” Bickel said. “Because we do get citizens’ complaints. One thing to help resolve that or to see what exactly maybe occurred is we look at the in car camera. Now that we’ll have body mics interfaced with our in car cameras, we’ll be able to see what’s going on no matter where the officer is.”
The Hamilton County Reporter recently published an article that announced Fishers Police Department will be adding 100 body cameras to its toolbox as well.
Like Carmel, the body cameras will be a first for the department.
“Any time that we can have quick access to real time accurate video of an incident that will always assist our officers as they continue to safely and effectively resolve any situation,” said Sgt. Tom Weger.
Weger said the Fishers Police Department is still narrowing down the body cameras between two vendors and how to pay for them.
“Our officers are assessing many different aspects of the individual companies and the technology that they offer,” Weger said. “From everything to how user-friendly it is to how wearable it is, and then to overall what the capabilities are and how well it will interface with our current technology.”
Both departments plan to use the cameras for anything from evidence support to training purposes.
With the new devices in place, both Carmel and Fishers hope the devices will not only help the departments keep up with technology, but better police the streets in a safer way.
“I think this is just another tool that we can have access to help us do our job more safely and effectively,” Weger said.
Carmel expects to have the body cameras in place by January 2019. Fishers hopes to have body cameras ready to go by September 2019.