Full-Scale Body-worn Camera Policy and Implementation Program to Support the City of Los Angeles Airport Police Division

This application involves the proposed purchase of 400 body-worn cameras (BWCs) for use by the City of Los Angeles/Los Angeles World Airport Police Division (APD). This is intended to be part of a City-wide implementation of BWCs, and the 400 purchased BWCs will be used by APD’s approximately 400 uniformed officers with citizen interaction responsibilities to enhance their ability to accurately capture public encounters, enhancing safety for both the officers and members of the public. APD is the only remaining law enforcement branch of the City of Los Angeles that does not currently have BWCs. The agency has jurisdiction over Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) as well as surrounding commercial, industrial, and residential areas. As LAX itself is one of the top terrorism targets on the United States West Coast, it is critically important that law enforcement have access to as many tools as possible that can assist with documenting citizen encounters. Additionally, the use of BWCs will enable local courts to more efficiently and effectively prosecute criminal activity, as the presence of video evidence is often a prerequisite to successful prosecution in Los Angeles.

Activities associated with the project include the purchase and implementation of 400 BWCs including the camera equipment itself, power cords/docking stations, warranties, technology refreshers at years two and five of the cameras lifecycles, licenses for the cloud-based camera management system (which includes storage), and manufacturer-provided training. Once initial operational training has been done with a group of specialized training officers, they will then integrate agency rules with the operational training to develop an agency-specific training program that will be used to train the remainder of the officers in using the BWCs.

Three measures of successful performance will be tracked as part of this project. First, a proportion of captured video will be reviewed in order to proactively identify potential training issues before they result in negative outcomes in the field. Secondly, the current process of responding to citizen complaints is inefficient due to the lack of ability to effectively review prior officer behavior. The implementation of BWCs will streamline this process by providing video that can be used in internal investigations as required. Finally, a reduction of the rate of incidents of use of force has been observed by many departments that have implemented BWCs, and is expected to be used as a performance measure for APD.