Chief: Body cameras ‘major turning point’

LITTLE ROCK — The new body cameras that soon will be worn by Little Rock police officers will “give the full story,” according the police chief.

The city’s Board of Directors approved June 9 the purchase of body cameras that will be worn by patrol officers on duty.

City directors approved buying 275 Watch Guard V300 Continuous-Operation Body Cameras, enough to cover all officers on a shift.

Total cost will be about $760,000, part of which will be offset by a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance.

The decision comes at a time when accountability in law enforcement is at the forefront of a national debate after the death of George Floyd, who died May 25 while being restrained by a Minneapolis police officer who kneeled on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes.

The officer, Derek Chauvin, has been charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter.

“I think it gives a full story of what’s going on,” Little Rock Police Chief Keith Humphrey said of the new body cameras officers will use. “We’re still going to have the in-car [cameras]. This is another tool for us to use for better transparency.”

Humphrey said he plans to implement body camera footage in training to show what an officer did right or wrong while on a call. The cameras will provide a camera at the officer’s point of view to get a better look on some situations.

“I think it’s going to be a major turning point in the department,” Humphrey said. “We’ve always had [mobile video recorders]. The problem with those is they’re limited. You’re only able to capture what’s in front of that camera.

“Now, with the body cameras, they go with an officer.”

Humphrey is familiar with Watch Guard. Before being named Little Rock’s police chief, he used the cameras when he served as police chief in Norman, Okla.

“Their customer service is amazing,” Humphrey said. “They’re very detailed when it comes to their product, and I think it’s a great product. We already have Watch Guard cameras in our vehicles, so this ties in with the system we already have.”

The integration between the mobile video cameras and the new body cameras was a strong selling point, according to Jordan Neufer, the technical and equipment section lieutenant for the police department.

“[The mobile video recorders] are integrated with those cameras so that the things that would trigger the in-car camera would also trigger the body camera,” Neufer said. “And triggering the body camera when synced up would also activate the car camera.”

The department hopes to have body cameras fully implemented by September.