Placer sheriff’s deputies to start wearing body cameras. Why the change is being made

Placer County officials approved a $4.8 million contract to purchase body-worn cameras as part of a pilot program for county sheriff’s deputies Tuesday.

The program will begin in January 2022 and last three years.

In a presentation to the board of supervisors, Capt. Jeff Swearingen said the sheriff’s office had decided to purchase the Motorola Watchguard V-300 camera system after extensive testing. The system, unlike others, has an in-car camera that activates at the same time as an officer’s body-camera to capture multiple angles for video evidence.

“(Body-worn camera) programs can provide numerous benefits to law enforcement agencies and local criminal justice systems to include: increasing accountability and transparency; reducing complaints and resolving officer-involved incidents; identifying and addressing operational training or performance issues; and enhanced evidence collection and documentation,” according to meeting documents.

The body-worn cameras will be worn by sworn staff on patrol and will automatically activate at the beginning of an incident. Once the incident concludes, the video will upload to a sheriff’s office server to be reviewed and archived.

“The true value of remote uploading will be the ability to keep the deputies in the field in lieu of driving back to a fixed station in order to upload video,” Swearingen said. “Due to the size of the county and extended drive times, we concluded it would not be in the community’s best interest having deputies drive for an hour or more to make it to an upload point.”

To manage the body-worn camera system and its technical demands, the sheriff’s office requested to hire three full-time employees, costing the department a combined $470,000 in salaries per year. The District Attorney’s Office also requested three employees to review evidence.

Swearingen said in his presentation that since the body-worn camera equipment is so expensive, it is more cost effective to lease the 410 cameras for the pilot program. The lease cost the county about $1.5 million per year.

The county will use public safety sales tax revenue to fund the majority of the program, said Bekki Riggan, the deputy county executive officer. There is enough funding to support the program for the first three years, but new funding sources will be needed to finance the program beyond that, she added.

The Placer County Sheriff’s Office is the latest law enforcement agency to acquire body-worn cameras in the region. Police departments in Roseville, Lincoln and Auburn also have body-worn camera programs.

Once the program is implemented, body-worn camera footage is subject to disclosure to the public in critical incidents such as officer-involved shootings and other cases in which deputies use force, according to California law.

“We do feel having a body-worn program will increase transparency and accountability and is aligned with the sheriff’s office core values,” Swearingen said.

This story was originally published April 29, 2021 at 5:00 AM.