If you look for statistics on how many CCTV cameras there are in the UK you will find varying answers, all of which say it is a substantial number but the fact is no one really knows just how many there are. You'll see phrases like "The UK has 1% of the world’s population but 20% of the world’s surveillance cameras" while other figures estimate there to be some 1.85 million cameras - roughly 1 for every 32 people. The London Underground Network sports 11,000 cameras alone, or at least it did in 2009, there may be more now.
These are there allegedly for the detection and prevention of crime, and sometimes when used properly and responsibly they can yield useful evidence which is often used as a strong argument against any protests regarding things like invasion of privacy. The problem is, the evidence shows they are very often not used properly and responsibly but rather prejudicially and unfairly.
We don't need to look far for evidence which demonstrates that point. If you consider Danny Major's case, a serving police officer at the time of the alleged offence, was convicted of assaulting a detained person. Short clips of CCTV footage from within the station were used prejudicially against Danny at trial, which in fact were of no real consequence to anything, while at the same time he and his defence were told that no other relevant footage existed. There was in reality 13 hours of relevant footage which shows officers colluding and conspiring against him, one of which had at the time a history of violence and has continued with violent conduct since. It was later discovered that this officer had the victim’s blood on his uniform, another claim which was denied at the time of Danny's trial. You would think his conviction would have been quashed by now, every plank of the case against him can now be discredited with evidence which had been withheld from him at the time of his conviction, including CCTV footage. Yet the Major family must continue their fight for justice because those who exist purportedly as a safeguard against miscarriages of justice, including the CCRC, have effectively rewritten the prosecution’s case in order to accommodate the evidence which wasn't before the Jury.
Nick Rose was convicted of murdering Charlotte Pinkney, yet there were in the teens of witnesses who reported having seen her alive after the last possible time he could have done so. At least one of the areas she was said to have been seen was covered by CCTV, there may be more. Every witness, no matter how credible, no matter what their reason for being sure of the time and date they saw Charlotte are said to have been 'mistaken'. It had been claimed that there was no CCTV footage with Charlotte on it after they allege Nick killed her, yet there should have been CCTV footage which could confirm or deny the time and date of at least one sighting. So where is that footage now? As you would expect in a case where someone has always, and continues to, protest his innocence, when it was asked for it had been erased.
In 2008, Lee Mockble along with 2 passengers was driving through Birmingham on the day of a football derby. As he did, his car was attacked by known football hooligans. One of his passengers was injured by glass from the car window which had broken in the incident as evidenced by a trail of his blood left on the street and pavement as he later fled being chased by members of the same group. The person who threw the projectile causing the injury had been seen doing it by a police officer who knew him by name and arrested him but not the others who were with him. Realising his passenger was bleeding heavily, Lee turned his car in an attempt to find paramedics but as he did his car came under attack by the other members of the group who came out into the road throwing bricks and waving sticks. He swerved to avoid the group on his side of the road but as he rounded the corner on the opposite side of the road he ran over another member of the same group who had fallen into his path and later died from his injuries. That is the account he provided that day, and it has not changed since. Action 77 in the police log states that there was no CCTV cameras which is marked not to be disclosed, yet the crime scene photos clearly show the signs which state the area is indeed covered, “keeping Birmingham safe”. At trial the earlier incident was described as a silly isolated ‘moment of madness’ despite other items in the police logs marked not to be disclosed demonstrating that the group were very well known as being hooligans. It was claimed there was no later attack on Lee’s car, no reason to swerve, no bricks being thrown yet there is damage to the car which could not have been caused either by the earlier incident or as a result of running over Mr Priest who had stumbled and fallen before the car went over him. There were 3 if not 4 cameras covering the scene, you would expect the CCTV footage to confirm or deny either account, yet there it is in the log, no cameras in the area and later accounts say instead that any cameras covering the relevant area were faulty. It must be one or the other, it can’t be both, a camera that doesn’t exist (even ignoring the signs which say the opposite) cannot be faulty. Strangely, as in Danny Major’s case, there is nothing wrong with any camera or lack of availability of any footage which covers areas of no consequence to the prosecution’s case and are not disputed.
On the 13th of January, the Huffington Post reported on the case of Alex Bryce, a Labour Researcher, who had been charged with assaulting and obstructing a police officer. The CCTV footage shown on their website shows something entirely different, yet despite requests from Mr Bryce’s defence team the CPS refused to disclose it, the footage only being seen when the case called at court at which point the case was thrown out. According to the article, no CCTV footage is available of an earlier incident which the officers concerned claimed justified what appears to be their assault on Mr Bryce and his partner despite that incident allegedly happening at the gates of Parliament itself.
In August 2008, Sean Riggs became disturbed after suffering a breakdown, hostel staff made six 999 calls asking for him to be taken to a place of safety but the police refused to attend. He left the hostel and was later arrested and restrained. He died later the same day but his family were told there was no CCTV in the van which transported him, and that CCTV covering the police station yard is missing. However existence of CCTV cameras in the station yard appears only to have been acknowledged after Mr Riggs’s family insisted on being shown around the station whereby they observed the camera for themselves. They were later told that the camera had been faulty since May of that year. More than 3 years later, Mr Riggs’s family still haven’t had an answer as to why he is no longer with them.
There are of course many, many other cases similar to one or more of those I’ve mentioned. These instances relating to CCTV are by no means rare as any cursory search on the internet will show anyone interested enough to look for it. CCTV may be a valuable tool in the detection and prevention of crime, but what can be done to prevent its prejudicial use? Is it really the case that a country so extensively covered by CCTV cameras has such an appalling record not only of maintaining the equipment but preserving pertinent evidence obtained from it? Or is it like the diaries in Eddie Gilfoyle’s case or the “missing” documents which caused the collapse of the trial against officers for alleged police corruption – faulty, missing, destroyed but actually available in reality? If it is the latter, then the often claimed non-existence of CCTV evidence which is supposed to be there to protect us all, is in fact evidence of widespread national corruption at all levels of a justice system proclaimed to be the best in the world. CCTV evidence has become more of a threat to the civil liberties of the innocent at risk of wrongful conviction than it ever could be for the genuinely guilty.
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