Author ORCID Identifier
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
5-13-2022
Publication Title
Justice Quarterly
Abstract
While body-worn cameras (BWCs) are increasingly becoming commonplace in police organizations, researchers and policymakers still know little about their implementation in the field and the factors related to their actual use. Using data collected from 146,601 incidents in Phoenix, Arizona, the present study examines the prevalence and correlates of BWC activation. In doing so, we examine the impact of incident-level factors, officer characteristics, neighborhood context, and changes in BWC activation policy on whether an officer who is assigned to wear a BWC activates their camera during a police-citizen contact. Cross-classified models are used to simultaneously assess the influence of factors at multiple levels of explanation. Our analysis suggests that a wide variety of individual, situational, organizational, and neighborhood factors are related to an officer’s decision to activate their camera. BWC policy that confines, structures, and checks officer activation has a robust impact on an officer’s decision to activate their BWC.
Recommended Citation
Katz, C.M. & Huff, J. (2022, May 13). The Achilles heel of Police Body-Worn Cameras: Understanding the Factors that Influence Variation in Body-Worn Camera Activation. Justice Quarterly. https://doi.org/10.1080/07418825.2022.2071325
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Comments
This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Justice Quarterly on May 13, 2022, available online: https://doi.org/10.1080/07418825.2022.2071325