MIDDLETOWN, Ohio — The Middletown Division of Police is getting closer to equipping all of its cruisers with cameras and some of its patrol supervisors with body cameras that some residents have demanded for years.
During Tuesday night’s City Council, members authorized City Manager Paul Lolli to enter into a contract with Pro-Vision for the purchase of four in-cruiser camera systems for nearly $43,000. The money will come from the Computer Replacement Fund, according to city documents.
The four video camera recording systems will be installed in the new Dodge Durango cruisers that the city has purchased. The Pro-Vision cameras use the same system that the department already has installed in its other police vehicles, according to the staff report.
The police department also plans to start using 12 body cameras, possibly this week, then rolling out body cameras on all uniformed patrol officers, police Chief David Birk told the Journal-News.
He said each body camera costs $3,300 for a five-year contract and that doesn’t include paying redaction specialists $65,000 to $70,000 each year.
Lolli said he’s unsure of the total cost of the cameras, but the city is considering applying for grants to offset the costs.
Body cameras are “all new to us” and by initially installing 12, the police department can determine how many hours are required to redact some of the footage, Birk said.
He hopes to have all uniformed officers wearing cameras by the end of October.
Middletown has about 40 patrol officers out of 73 officers total on the force, including detectives, narcotics and school resource officers.
Body cameras have proven over time to be “a benefit for police officers,” according to Birk. Unlike some crime scene footage shot by citizens on their cell phones, body cameras show the complete incident from the officers’ perspective, he said.
Birk often tells his officers they work “in a fishbowl” due to the number of cell phones being used by the public.
Earlier this year, after the first police-involved fatal shooting in the city in 26 years, and after the grainy cruiser cam video was released, residents wanted to know why the police officers don’t wear body cameras.
On Feb. 25, after a traffic stop in the Walmart parking lot, one Middletown police officer shot and killed Victor Lykins, 47, of Middletown, who was a passenger in the vehicle driven by his brother.
In December 2022, Middletown police received a $49,608 grant from the state to purchase body cameras. Birk requested $124,218. He said the city rejected the grant because it didn’t have the money to pay the salary and benefits for one or maybe two redaction specialists.
Birk said he’s a “big advocate” for body cameras because he thinks they “show the officers are doing what’s right.”
Council member Rodney Muterspaw, who served on the Middletown Division of Police for 30 years, five as police chief, agrees.
“Body cameras tell the story,” said Muterspaw, who added that without them, when a citizen files a complaint against an officer it’s “he said, she said.”
After George Floyd Jr. was murdered by a police officer in Minneapolis during an arrest made after a store clerk suspected Floyd may have used a counterfeit $20 bill, on May 25, 2020, Muterspaw said body cameras became “a hot topic and really picked up stream again.”
Muterspaw said redaction specialist are important because not everything officers experience on the job should be seen by the public. He mentioned an altercation between a husband and wife.
But he called body cameras “good things when used correctly.”
WHEN BODY CAMERAS ARE EXEMPT FROM DISCLOSURE:
A law took effect in 2019 that gave guidance for using body cameras. It identified 17 instances in which video recorded by body cameras are exempt from disclosure.
Among them are:
- Inside a residence unless the incident involves “an adversarial encounter with, or a use of force by, a peace officer”
- Showing children
- A death or body, unless it was caused by a peace officer
- A nude body, unless the person consents
- “Grievous” bodily harm to a peace officer, firefighter, paramedic or other first responder
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