| Subject: *MY* take on all this Willistown nonsense.. |
Author:
Ken Koller
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Date Posted: 11:43:13 09/19/02 Thu
In reply to:
Private Parts
's message, "My take on all this Willistown nonsense.." on 00:05:48 09/11/02 Wed
OK, chiming in a little late here, but here's my two cents. I have a rather unique perspective on this whole issue. Not only am I PD Car photo hobbyist (Thanks to John Griesbacker for getting me into this and look for my new web site coming soon) but I work in the EMS field, AND, hold current media credentials as a freelance photographer with a background in newspaper photography with experience in media law.
First and foremost, simply becuase the police station is publicly owned, does not mean that anyone can simply walk in an poke around. There are buildings and areas that are restricted, either by signage or implication, that you cannot just access becuase you feel like it. I can tell you from experience that most PD aren't too receptive to people wandering through thier lots, with or without a camera. I spent an hour on the hood of my rental car in the parking lot of Suffolk PD's HQ simply for taking a picture of one of thier cars, *AFTER* coming out of thier museum there and photographing the restored car out front. This was a few weeks prior to 9/11 and those of us of German descent are pretty damn white, but I still incurred the wrath of the Suffolk PD wanting to know why I was taking pictures of thier cars. The very next day, a simple phone call to the avaition unit granted me access to the hanger and helos which are right on the runway at Isilip Airport. If there is reasonable expectation of public access to the area, you shouldn't have much of a problem taking photos. (For those here is SoCal, for instance, Long Beach PD parks thier cars at the North Division in the same parking lot as Bixby Knolls Park, which is open to the public, but thier West division is behind a cinder block wall, and not accessible to the public.)
Second, this guy was a prick, and was pushing thier buttons. I shoot photos for a number of websites, magazines and other publications and know the names and contacts for each. He didn't know the name of the site he was shooting for, which doesn't instill confidence in having him tinker around the back of a police station without permission. Sure, there are a number of PD Car sites out there, but if he's a regular photogrpaher for a site, at least have the name or url handy. I shoot for Helispot.com and have actually had people call up the site before they have granted me access to restricted areas. Being of middle eastern descent, I would think that this person would be aware of not only increased scrutinty of this ethnicity, whether right or wrong, and act accordingly. I know many people who cry racist at this, and it can get carried away at times, but let's face it, the majority of terrorist suspsects and attackers have historically been of middle eastern descent and anything that draws suspiscion to someone of this ethnicity needs to be checked out.
Personally, I don't think that the PD did anything wrong here, except ask him to delete his photos, which is illegal. You can ask someone to cease phtographing, but cannot confiscate the film or ask them to delete digital images. By coming back a second time, he was simply pushing the envelope and his luck and deserves the punishment he recieved. As for any sort of backlash against this particular PD or any other Penn. PD, I thin it would be wrong. Instead of being overly critical of this department and thier policy, what we have here is a genuine opportunity to get this hobby out into the mainstream media, and better inform not only PDs of what we like to do, but hobbyists as well as the best way to go about getting thier photos and maybe we can head off any problems like this in the future.
As to the differnce between Big City and Hick towns in the whole terrorism thing, I don't think that simply becuase it is a small town and not NYC should mean that vigilince against possible terrorism should be any less. I would think that an attack against small town USA, Americana at it's best, would be just as devasting to the American pysche. Besides, everyone in the big city is looking for terrorists, but no one thinks they'll strike in suburbia, sounds like a perfect scenario to pull off an attack.
My $.02
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