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This article analyzes police, public, and arrestee survey responses from a single jurisdiction to give a multiple-perspective insight into the use of body-worn video (BWV) cameras by police. Police attitudinal data were collected from before ( n = 190), during ( n = 139), and at the conclusion ( n = 221) of a BWV implementation trial. Public attitudes were collected at the conclusion of the BWV implementation trial via online survey ( n = 995 respondents) and intercept survey ( n = 428 respondents). Arrestee attitudes ( n = 302) were collected for detainees in police custody over a 6-month period immediately preceding the BWV trial. Results showed (a) all three perspectives were supportive of the use of BWV, (b) the extent to which police felt BWV influenced their behavior tempered during the trial, (c) the public who had encountered BWV-wearing officers and the arrestee sample indicated limited belief that BWV would reduce bad behavior, and (d) there was clear contention about the policy and practice decisions around recording. These findings have significance for BWV trials, commenting on the importance of collecting police attitudes at multiple points, separating the attitudes of public who did encounter police-wearing BWV, and data collection/policy for evaluation outcomes.

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Objectives We report the results of a randomized controlled trial of police body-worn video (BWV) cameras in an Australian context, with a focus on how cameras influence evidence gathering, court processes/outcomes, and police/public behavior. Methods The 6-month trial undertaken by the Western Australia Police Force involved a sample of officers (N = 498) acting as their own controls with camera use ("treatment") randomly allocated across shifts. A range of parametric and non-parametric tests were conducted to explore the influence of BWV on interview efficiency, rate/timing of guilty pleas, conviction rates, sanction rates, police use-of-force, assaults against police, and citizen complaints against police. Results The trial generated mixed results in support of this technology within this Australian context. BWV recordings did result in evidence-gathering benefits by producing cost/time efficiencies when taking field interviews. BWV footage had limited impact on court processes/outcomes, with indication that camera evidence encouraged earlier guilty pleas but no corresponding increase in the rate of guilty pleas or convictions. BWV did influence police operational decision-making, with increased sanction rates and use-of-force on treatment days. The extent to which officers engaged with the trial compounded these patterns. There was no evidence that BWV prevents problem behavior, with citizens' complaints increasing on treatment days and no influence of BWV on rates of assaults against police. Conclusions These findings highlight the need for additional context-specific clarity about why police use BWV cameras. In particular, BWV users should clearly specify the causal mechanisms through which cameras will achieve administrative, evidentiary, operational, and/or problem-prevention goals.

Self-selection policing is an approach whereby serious underlying criminality is detected by an offender’s minor crimes (known as trigger offences). Strategic offences are offences that indicate an increased likelihood that the associated offender will engage in later offending. The purpose of this study was to determine if first-time serious traffic offending in Western Australia indicates previous and/or future non-traffic criminality, thereby demonstrating the utility of serious traffic offences as trigger offences and strategic offences. The authors collated the crime data of all first-time serious traffic offenders in Western Australia between December 2004 and December 2014. Using this data, survival analyses were conducted to determine if and when a first-time serious traffic offender committed an initial non-traffic offence within 10 years of their first serious traffic offence. When comparing this data to data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the authors found that first-time serious traffic offenders are more likely than the average Western Australian to have a previous or future initial non-traffic offence. Some groups of first-time traffic offenders were more likely to commit non-traffic offences than others including males, individuals under the age of 25, drug drivers and drivers without authority. These results support the use of first-time serious traffic offences as trigger/strategic offences and could be used to identify and divert traffic offenders with versatile criminal histories and traffic offenders at risk of future criminal activity.