Sheriff’s deputy praises department’s cameras

Deputy Saylor Strain says uniform-mounted devices improve interaction with public

When San Bernardino County sheriff’s Deputy Saylor Strain turns on his new uniform-mounted camera, just about everyone is on their best behavior.

Well, except for one tiny dog. Strain, accompanied by a Southern California News Group reporter and photographer during a recent patrol shift near San Bernardino, had nothing but praise for the technology, which the department adopted in September at two stations and has now rolled out to all but the Needles and Highland stations.

There was no timeline for those stations to receive the cameras, said Mara Rodriguez, a sheriff’s spokeswoman.

“I believe my interactions with the public have been better. I feel like people act differently and I get their true selves. And I get the truth … They know they are being filmed,” Strain said.

San Bernardino County’s became one of the last law enforcement agencies in Southern California to buy the cameras after the Board of Supervisors in February approved a five-year, $6.5 million contract with Axon En- terprises to provide 965 cameras as well as other equipment and technical support.

Difficulties in transmitting the video from the High Desert station to the department’s servers in the nation’s largest county by size delayed adopting the technology, Sheriff Shannon Dicus has said. That hurdle was overcome by uploading videos to the online cloud.

Strain’s Central station, and the Hesperia station, were the first to deploy the cameras.

Strain, at 27, is a field training officer. He first attended Arlington High in Riverside before graduating from another Riverside high school, Ramona, in 2014. He received a degree in criminal justice from Cal State San Bernardino in 2018. Strain played baseball and was fast, he said, but hitting was another matter.

So Strain spent three years as a sher

Strain secures his body camera before departing the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department Central Station in San Bernardino.

Strain completes a report on the missing girls in his patrol car. All but two of the Sheriff’s Department’s stations have been equipped with the body cameras since September. Officers in the Needles and Highland stations don’t have them.