Why it’s important for the public to understand this right and its limitations
The man had been accused of harassing a female officer. While all of this was happening, a man named Waseem Khan was filming with his cellphone.
The police warned Khan to stop filming and threatened to seize his phone. The incident got weirder when one officer told Khan he would get AIDS from the suspect, if the suspect were to spit on him.
Khan’s story -- of police intimidation in the face of a camera -- is unfortunately common in North America.
In September 2015, two Toronto police officers physically blocked a videographer from filming the arrest of two teens in the west end of the city. The two officers were charged with misconduct but those charges were stayed earlier this year after a private mediation process.
In response to this incident, free expression organization PEN Canada released a statement calling on police to respect the right of the public to film them and encouraged the public to continue filming.
“It is not a crime in Canada for anyone to film a uniformed police officer,” states the news release. “As long as the photographer does not obstruct or interfere with the execution of their duties; and it is a violation of their Charter rights to prevent anyone from doing so.”
Here in Yellowknife last fall, Yellowknifer reporter John McFadden was acquitted of a charge of obstructing a police officer. A year prior, McFadden had been photographing officers searching a cargo van parked outside Shoppers Drug Mart downtown.
“I felt I had the right to stand on the sidewalk and take photographs,” testified McFadden during his trial, which started in June of last year and wrapped up in September.
RCMP officers who testified claimed McFadden was riling up a crowd they said had gathered nearby, and that his behaviour was obstructing the officers from doing their job.
The presiding judge, Garth Malakoe, backed up McFadden’s account and expressed dismay at what he perceived to be a police “willingness to exaggerate” their testimony.
If the police are doing their duty in public, it’s absolutely legal to film them. And if a situation arises where it seems like police are overstepping their bounds in doing their duty, it’s absolutely in the public interest to get it on film.
When it comes to police brutality, capturing transgressions on film has been instrumental in illustrating the problem. There are more examples than I can fit into this column but here is a sampling of a few of the higher profile cases over the past few years:
On Dec. 4, 2014, New York resident Eric Garner was strangled to death when an officer put him in a choke hold. “I can’t breathe,” he can be heard saying on a video that appeared on YouTube of the incident. Last July, Minnesota’s Philando Castile’s death at the hands of an officer was livestreamed on Facebook by his girlfriend, Diamond Reynolds. She later told the public she broadcast the incident so people could see the injustice with their own eyes. In April 2015, video caught a scene unfold as a South Carolina officer opened fire on Walter Scott, a black man who had fled a traffic stop. In Ottawa last summer, Abdirahman Abdi died in a violent arrest while horrified onlookers watched and filmed. In July 2013, Sammy Yatim’s death at the hands of police was filmed and uploaded to the Internet. In 2014 here in NWT, a video uploaded to the Internet caught the scene as Yellowknife resident Gary Jaeb pulled from his truck by a municipal enforcement officer during a stop for not wearing his seatbelt.
Not only is it just plain incorrect to tell a member of the public not to film the police, it’s intimidating. Any person who doesn’t know better would be inclined to listen to the police, as they are authority. It’s natural to want to trust and respect authority, so to hear officers break that trust damages the police relationship with the public.
Since McFadden’s arrest and subsequent acquittal, RCMP in Yellowknife have made an effort to smooth relations with Yellowknifer, which is a positive thing. Yellowknifer depends on the police for many stories, including those that have a deep impact on the well-being of the community.
So the next time you, reader, see the police doing something you think might be of public interest, don’t be afraid to take out that phone and capture it on film. Just make sure to respect police when they give you direction on where you should stand, and make pains not to get in their way as they do their job.
And if the police try to tell you that you straight up can’t film -- do not forget it is your right to keep the camera rolling if you so choose.
