Every armed public safety officer at Syracuse University will start wearing body cameras on Oct. 1.

The Department of Public Safety employs a total of 42 public safety officers and 36 of them, those who are armed, will be required to wear body cameras on shift, said newly appointed DPS Chief Bobby Maldonado. The move comes amid public pressure resulting from instances of police brutality and subsequent protests around the country.

A trial program for the use of body cameras was started last year in response to the shooting death of Mike Brown, an unarmed teenager in Ferguson, Missouri. Former DPS Chief Tony Callisto spearheaded the program, said Maldonado.

“Our decision to proceed with body cameras was a proactive decision, not a reactive decision,” Maldonado added.

Although Maldonado was not involved in the decision to implement DPS’s body camera program, since he only started his job as DPS chief this summer, he said he supports the decision. If he were DPS chief when the decision was being made to purchase body cameras, Maldonado said he would have gone through with it as well.

“I think that body cams demonstrate transparency and openness of our officers and their interactions with the community. It’s going to make both law enforcement and the community more accountable,” he said. “Everyone is more accountable, be it the peace officers that are using them, but also the public we engage with.”

The university spent $36,000 on body cameras, at $1,000 per camera, said Maldonado.

Maldonado added that the body camera footage, which will be downloaded onto a private server at the end of each officer’s shift, will not be readily available to the public. It will be used as evidence by the district attorney to prosecute cases and released to the public on a case by case basis.

“If you had an interaction with a peace officer here on campus, you’re not going to be able to ask the peace officer to share that data with you,” Maldonado said. “If somebody wanted to make a request, they’d make a request through my office, the office of the chief, and then on a case by case basis we will make a decision on when to release the data.”

In July, an officer from the University of Cincinnati was indicted in the death of an unarmed man. The officer, Ray Tensing, shot and killed DuBose during a routine traffic stop. The shooting was captured on Tensing and other officer’s body cameras.

There has not been a DPS-involved shooting on the SU campus.

Published on August 31, 2015 at 12:20 pm

Contact Rachel: rsandler@syr.edu