By Carlos Miller
A man recording the rescue of a 5-year-old child trapped in a revolving door at a public library was ordered to hand over his cell phone camera to a police officer, who deleted four minutes of video and a photo.
Richard Culp, a 12-year reserve officer with the Akron Police Department, told the man that “this is none of your business and you can’t take pictures; now give me the phone if you don’t want trouble,” according to the Akron Beacon Journal.
Maurice Howard, who said he intended to provide the footage to the local TV station, has since filed a complaint with the Akron Police Department, Akron City Hall and the local ACLU chapter.
It appears that Culp is on his way to learning a lesson in Constitutional Law.
It also appears that the boy’s mother, Cathy Ballard, will also learn a lesson in Constitutional Law.
Cathy Ballard, the mother of Kolbe and his five siblings who were visiting the library, said she was pleased with the officer’s actions initially because she was unaware of Howard’s intentions.
However, she said, had she known Howard was taking the photos for documentation to share with her, the media or others, she would have allowed him to continue shooting.
She also used her cell camera to document the accident, including a picture of her son being comforted by his father, Mark, during the rescue.
Well Cathy, as you now probably know, it really doesn’t matter what his intentions were. You should be more concerned with making sure your child doesn’t get his leg trapped in a revolving door than trying to quash the First Amendment rights of a curious bystander.
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13 responses so far ↓
1 Christopher Martin // May 13, 2009 at 1:00 AM
Mr Miller,
I absolutely love your blog.
Thankfully, there is finally a growing movement online exposing the downfall of this country and your blog is, by far, the most level-headed.
Please keep up the good work!
2 Carlos Miller // May 13, 2009 at 1:05 AM
Thanks, Christopher!
P.S. You can call me Carlos.
3 Duane Kerzic // May 13, 2009 at 1:11 AM
Let’s hope the whole Akron Police Department gets a lesson before this happens again.
I’ve seen kids caught in revolving doors before. If you have the key its not that big a deal but the kids are really scared until they are free.
I wonder if they teach about revolving doors in cop school.
4 Anonymous // May 13, 2009 at 1:30 AM
Could be there was something wrong with the door. I can see why the mother might find that strange but the cop should have talked to him instead of taking his phone. Too many cops have zero people skills.
5 Tom // May 13, 2009 at 9:12 AM
Carlos,
I love the blog. I just found it a few days ago and instantly added it to my RSS feeds. But did you recently change your feed to only show summaries? I only ask because I often read my RSS feeds while on the go without internet access, so a feed without all its content becomes close to worthless. If this is a change you’ve made recently, I really hope you’ll have a change of heart. Either way, thanks for the great blog.
6 xdamousex // May 13, 2009 at 10:54 AM
It always amazes me that people think that ordinary citizens have to obtain permission to videotape people in public, and yet the government is perfectly free to do so without any permission at all.
7 The Boise Picayune // May 13, 2009 at 11:10 AM
Keep up the good work!
8 Kol. Klink // May 13, 2009 at 5:21 PM
If he hadn’t erased it, he would have been charged with Filming While Black by the Only Ones saving children enough.
9 Theo Karantsalis // May 13, 2009 at 7:18 PM
Carlos, I need some clarification here. Aren’t you fair game to be photographed while in public? Here is a sampling of photographs I took around Miami-Dade County. Are any of these photos or videos not fair game? Theo
http://socialmediapress.blogspot.com/2009/05/blog-post.html
10 Kilroy238 // May 14, 2009 at 6:50 PM
Good thing undelete for a memory stick is only 15 bucks.
11 Pinandpuller // May 15, 2009 at 2:02 AM
I hope the cop threw a GPS on that guy’s car for good measure.
12 Voice of Reason // May 15, 2009 at 11:35 PM
Please disregard this post.
13 patiot // May 19, 2010 at 3:47 AM
There is no quashing of my rights. My rights are inviolate, and they are not negotiable. The only thing the government can do with my rights is violate them, and might does not make right.
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