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Illinois Gen. Assembly revives recording ban on cops by citizens, makes it a felony

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F

FelixOrion

Poet Centuriate
The Illinois General Assembly just passed a bill that would prevent citizens from recording the police.

Earlier this year, the Illinois Supreme Court struck down a state eavesdropping law that made it a crime for citizens to record conversations with police or anyone else without the other person’s permission. The court held that the old law “criminalize[d] a wide range of innocent conduct” and violated free-speech rights. In particular, the court noted the state could not criminalize recording activities where there is no reasonable expectation of privacy, including citizens’ “public” encounters with police.

Now the old law is back, with just a few changes, in a new bill sent to the governor’s desk by the Illinois Senate on Dec. 4. The bill not only passed, but did so overwhelmingly with votes of 106-7 in the House on and 46-4-1 in the Senate.

The new version is nearly as bad as the old one.

Under the new bill, a citizen could rarely be sure whether recording any given conversation without permission is legal. The bill would make it a felony to surreptitiously record any “private conversation,” which it defines as any “oral communication between 2 or more persons,” where at least one person involved had a “reasonable expectation” of privacy.

When does the person you’re talking to have a reasonable expectation of privacy? The bill doesn’t say. And that’s not something an ordinary person can be expected to figure out.

A law must be clear enough for citizens to know in advance whether a particular action is a crime. This bill doesn’t meet that standard, which should be reason enough for a court to strike it down if it becomes law.

But lack of clarity isn’t the only problem with this bill.

Although it appears to be designed to accommodate the Illinois Supreme Court’s ruling striking down the old law, the bill actually is designed to continue to prevent people from recording interactions with police.

The bill says it would only be a crime to record someone where there is a reasonable expectation of privacy, which should mean that recording public encounters with police would not be a crime, and the old law’s fatal constitutional flaw would no longer exist.

But the bill doesn’t really fix the problem. Again, citizens can’t be expected to know for sure precisely which situations give rise to an “expectation of privacy” and which don’t. The Illinois Supreme Court said that police don’t have an expectation of privacy in “public” encounters with citizens, but it did not explain what counts as a “public” encounter. So if this bill becomes law, people who want to be sure to avoid jail time will refrain from recording police at all, and the law will therefore still effectively prevent people from recording police.

The bill would also discourage people from recording conversations with police by making unlawfully recording a conversation with police – or an attorney general, assistant attorney general, state’s attorney, assistant state’s attorney or judge – a class 3 felony, which carries a sentence of two to four years in prison. Meanwhile, the bill makes illegal recording of a private citizen a class 4 felony, which carries a lower sentencing range of one to three years in prison.

There’s only one apparent reason for imposing a higher penalty on people who record police in particular: to make people especially afraid to record police. That is not a legitimate purpose. And recent history suggests it’s important that people not be afraid to record police wherever they perform their duties so that officers will be more likely to respect citizens’ rights, and officers who do respect citizens’ rights will be able to prove it.

The bill might also provide an excuse to scuttle body cameras for police. Police may argue that using body cameras to record encounters with citizens outside of “public” places would violate the law, as citizens have not consented to being recorded.

Even if this bill were constitutional, it would still be unnecessary and a terrible idea. Most other states allow a person to record a conversation with only one party’s consent and don’t try to scare people out of recording police by threatening them with felony charges.

Despite its bipartisan support, Gov. Pat Quinn should do one more thing to bolster his legacy before he leaves office and veto this bill.

UPDATE: We should mention one more thing about this bill. It was introduced on Tuesday, Dec. 2, as an amendment to an existing bill on a completely different subject. The amendment removed all of the bill’s previous content and replaced it with the new ban on recording. The House passed it the following day, and the Senate passed it the day after that. So the people who would have cared most about this bill probably didn’t notice it in time to object. They might have had their attention focused on other issues that were in the news, such as the recorded police killing of Eric Garner.
Click to expand...

There's another bonus for the police, as the small-town Jacksonville Journal-Courier pointed out in a Tuesday editorial:

"This little nugget is also included in this legislation: With permission of a state’s attorney, not a judge, police could legally eavesdrop on individuals for up to 24 hours without a warrant while investigating such serious crimes as murder, sexual assault or kidnapping."
Click to expand...

http://www.illinoispolicy.org/illinois-general-assembly-revives-recording-ban/
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/12/illinois-again-moves-to-ban-recording-the-police/

Oh, Illinois.
 
C

CrankyJay

Banned
uh6SpU1.png
 
C

Cat Party

Member
Eh, I don't think the article is accurately interpreting the bill. The "reasonable expectation of privacy" standard is ubiquitous. It would be prudent, however, to explicitly carve out police interactions in the bill, to avoid the potential for confusion.
 
P

Phobophile

A scientist and gentleman in the manner of Batman.
Yeah no thanks. Chicago is the only good part about my state and giving their cops more authority? The CPD had already been caught spying on protesters and jamming their cell signals.
 
IISANDERII

IISANDERII

Member
"Reasonable expectation of privacy" in the mobil device age where everybody's recording everything at all times and uploading it to youtubes?

Fine.
 
G

GameGuru59

Banned
This isn't just outrageous, its downright dangerous. How the fuck is this even a reasonable idea? Democrat or Republican? What the fuck?!
 
entremet

entremet

Member
GameGuru59 said:
This isn't just outrageous, its downright dangerous. How the fuck is this even a reasonable idea? Democrat or Republican? What the fuck?!
Click to expand...
The elites are scared after Ferguson/Eric Garner protests. This is an attempt to control the masses and keep them in check.

It's modern day fascism.
 
L

liquidtmd

Banned
Regardless of the actual law, this practice

It was introduced on Tuesday, Dec. 2, as an amendment to an existing bill on a completely different subject. The amendment removed all of the bill’s previous content and replaced it with the new ban on recording. The House passed it the following day, and the Senate passed it the day after that. So the people who would have cared most about this bill probably didn’t notice it in time to object
Click to expand...

Is THE most disgusting, disingenuous, sleazy, fucking arrogant thing I hear of.

The 'system' is broken - you don't need to film it, it's right here
 
M

mr jones

Ethnicity is not a race!
Ya, I was going to post a thread myself about this.

So... what happens when a cop comes to your door, and you answer, recording with your iPhone? You can be arrested for it???
 
C

commedieu

Banned
mr jones said:
Ya, I was going to post a thread myself about this.

So... what happens when a cop comes to your door, and you answer, recording with your iPhone? You can be arrested for it???
Click to expand...

judging by your avatar, you'll be shot. As it will be confused for an aggressive filming.
 
dark_chris

dark_chris

Member
mr jones said:
Ya, I was going to post a thread myself about this.

So... what happens when a cop comes to your door, and you answer, recording with your iPhone? You can be arrested for it???
Click to expand...

Beaten.
If you're black, you get shot. Cop will say your phone is being aggressive.
 
O

Ourobolus

Banned
"Hey, the people are already distrustful of cops, what should we do?"
"How about we make it so that if they are distrustful, they'll go to jail!"
"Brilliant! They'll HAVE to trust us then!"
 
K

Koomaster

Member
Why is this recording thing such a big deal? Are people still afraid cameras can steal your soul or what? And making it a felony? Yeah, put MORE people in jail because they recording a conversation or made a video. Makes sense. Just put all citizens in jail, everyone is guilty.
 
A

Aurongel

Member
There's a constitutional amendment that lets you record anyone on public property but Illinois doesn't want you to record people who are intended to be public servants?

Yeah, okay.
 
B

Blader

Member
UPDATE: We should mention one more thing about this bill. It was introduced on Tuesday, Dec. 2, as an amendment to an existing bill on a completely different subject. The amendment removed all of the bill’s previous content and replaced it with the new ban on recording. The House passed it the following day, and the Senate passed it the day after that. So the people who would have cared most about this bill probably didn’t notice it in time to object. They might have had their attention focused on other issues that were in the news, such as the recorded police killing of Eric Garner.
Click to expand...

So they passed this bill by slapping the name of another bill -- and nothing else -- onto it?

That's hilariously gross. What the fuck.
 
F

FStop7

Banned
Insane. Absolutely insane.

But it's not that much of a surprise, given the reputation that Chicago cops have. Perhaps even worse than the NYPD and LAPD.
 
S

Sho_Nuff82

Member
Zoe said:
As the new bill is written now, is it different from any other state with two-party consent like California?
Click to expand...

It's deliberately vague with regards to what constitutes a private situation. Since the courts don't want to get jammed up in the next 10 years with people appealing such rulings, logically they will strike it down.
 
T

Taramoor

Member
FelixOrion said:
Riders are awful pieces of shit that should be banned in the US.
Click to expand...

It's not really a rider when it completely overwrites the text of an existing bill.

Riders, amendments and attachments, are incredibly important to the process because legislative bodies in this country have to deal with so much. They need to be able to do dozens and sometimes hundreds of things at once. This isn't even considering their value in getting less cooperative representatives to show up to vote for bills they might not wholeheartedly support, or their use as a post-facto budget management measure since they can dictate where funds go and prevent money from mysteriously vanishing into the pockets of third party contractors.

The shit that was pulled was more akin to swapping names on a test.
 
Y

Yaphett Kotto

Member
It was introduced on Tuesday, Dec. 2, as an amendment to an existing bill on a completely different subject. The amendment removed all of the bill’s previous content and replaced it with the new ban on recording. The House passed it the following day, and the Senate passed it the day after that. So the people who would have cared most about this bill probably didn’t notice it in time to object.
Click to expand...

Wait, so they took a bill, that could have been some old, weird bill about not placing your horse on your own lawn for all we know, and pretty much stated "forget everything this bill has said; it is now about not recording police?"

Holy shit, this country.
 
F

FelixOrion

Poet Centuriate
Taramoor said:
It's not really a rider when it completely overwrites the text of an existing bill.

Riders, amendments and attachments, are incredibly important to the process because legislative bodies in this country have to deal with so much. They need to be able to do dozens and sometimes hundreds of things at once. This isn't even considering their value in getting less cooperative representatives to show up to vote for bills they might not wholeheartedly support, or their use as a post-facto budget management measure since they can dictate where funds go and prevent money from mysteriously vanishing into the pockets of third party contractors.

The shit that was pulled was more akin to swapping names on a test.
Click to expand...

Ah right my bad, I misread what I even quoted. This is straight up criminal. There's still a lot of room for abuse in riders, imo, but I digress.
 
B

Blader

Member
FelixOrion said:
Riders are awful pieces of shit that should be banned in the US.
Click to expand...

I know what riders are, I just always thought they were tacked on (usually unrelated) amendments, not completely substituting one bill for another with only the name intact. This sounds like some kind of legislative fraud.

Is that a thing? And if not, how is that not a thing?
 
M

MacGurcules

Member
Well, I suppose it's better than the fifteen year prison sentence for recording government officials that you could have gotten back in 2011. Progress!
 
Velcro Fly

Velcro Fly

Member
I'm so glad I don't live in Illinois and I'm even more glad they voted Pat Quinn's stupid ass out. Rauner being in will empower the GOP to fight dumb crap like this.
 
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