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girlwhowaspluggedout writes:
"When Pedro Rivera, an on-call photographer for Hartford, CT's WFSB-TV, used his drone to photograph the scene of a fatal car crash, he probably did not expect to be detained by the local police and be forced to ground his drone and leave the area. What he certainly did not expect was being suspended by his employer without pay for a week after the head of the department's major crimes division contacted WFSB-TV, requesting that disciplinary action be taken against him.
Rivera has now filed a federal lawsuit against Hartford's police department for violating his First and Fourth Amendment rights. The lawsuit seeks more than just damages it asks the court to declare that Rivera did not break any laws by operating the drone.
Shortly after the incident, Hartford police told the media that it was concerned with 'the safety of the officers and the privacy of the victim.' But, as Rivera told the Professional Society of Drone Journalists, 'If privacy is a concern ... it was not with me. It was with all the local news stations that were on the sidewalks with 'long lenses' and had shots so tight, that you could see inside the crash vehicle.' The photo he has provided and the GPS coordinates that are embedded in its EXIF data show what his drone was capable of photographing 150 feet from the accident site.
As Rivera succinctly describes it, 'What happened to me falls in the category of the war on cameras by the police. Whenever the police are videotaped, they try to detain people and confiscate the camera.' It's time to add one more marker to the War on Cameras Map'."
(Score: 1) by quadrox on Thursday February 20 2014, @06:46AM
I don't want to see it, but if it happened, not showing it wouldn't change it for the better in any way. I'd be far more concerned over the fact that my mom was dead than whether somebody got a picture of it.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday February 21 2014, @02:26AM
If nobody gets a picture you don't have to see it. Reminders of awful memories hurt.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 1) by quadrox on Friday February 21 2014, @09:44AM
The picture will only be in the news when it's actually news. At that point in time I believe you will be grieving so much anyway that it won't really matter. But I guess this will be different for different people.
Not that I in any way think that people are entitled to see grisly pictures in order to satisfy their curiosity, far from it. But I definitely think this should fall under free speech.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday February 21 2014, @03:22PM
Yes, it certainly is free speech, agreed. Not all speech is good, self-censorship isn't always a bad thing. There are some things that wile legal, even things you have a right to do, that is just wrong to do. This is one of them.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org