Australian Police Abuse Man Filming An Alleged Case of Racial Profiling

We have continued to chronicle the arrest and prosecution of citizens for merely filming police in public. Some prosecutors like Anita Alvarez in Chicago have fought hard to send citizens to jail for videotaping police in public, though courts have continued to support the obvious right to such filming. This video shows that police in other countries like Australia are showing the carrying out the same abusive measures.

This video shows police Police in Parramatta, Australia abusing a young man who is videotaping them. The young man felt police were singling out young black men for arbitrary searches. The police respond with an arbitrary search of the videographer.

As in many U.S. cases, police falsely claim that the man is obstructing or “hindering” police operations. Constable A. Loxley is shown demanding “Why are you filming?! Why are you specifically filming us?!”

Officers do not find any basis for a real criminal charge, but threaten to arrest him for swearing. What is striking about this case is that the filming was triggered by the belief that police were abusing minorities — a classic reason from such videotaping. Prosecutors like Alvarez are trying to deter one of the most effective technologies in combating police abuse. Indeed, as we have repeatedly seen, the only reason that some investigations are ordered in some case is the surfacing of incriminating videotapes.