Efficiently investigating is pretty far down my list of priorities in this context. Accountably investigating, accurately investigating, and norm/right-respecting investigating are above above efficiency, though I'm glad if it can follow those.
Having to contact and converse with the owner who put up the doorbell cam contributes to this. Having oversight from a judge contributes more.
Are they looking for a particular person, or when a blue sedan that may look like yours drove by? Who knows — you should always exercise discretion.
This IMO needs to change, if they can legally lie to you they can lie in court. They do both.
In the trial context, good defense attorneys will be able to introduce contradictory evidence, or will challenge the credibility of a witness by finding facts that make them look bad -- even police officers. With police officers it's a bit harder, though, because the public largely believes (wrongly, I'm afraid) that police are more trustworthy than the general public.
I have heard this discussed in court as a reason to not find the officer guilty. Records get sealed of course and you cant discuss it.
It makes sense. In many cases, subjects of investigations are unaware of them.
You may never have a situation where you wouldn’t want to share camera footage with authorities. But many people do, for a variety of reasons, and creating a norm where your home is a node of some surveillance network has obvious negative potentials.
The whole ecosystem of fear around home surveillance, Nextdoor, etc is awful and companies like Amazon are exploiting it without regard to the impact that it will have.
... For example?
> Creating a norm where your home is a node of some surveillance network has obvious negative potentials
Would you mind explaining what those are? They're not "obvious" to me.
Given the training and conduct this cannot be surprising.
The number of stories where police act in bad faith is overwhelming.
So I get why people would be hesitant to collaborate -- your neighbor might get shot of you report a door left open.
Let's cut the bullshit: if the cops are looking for someone matching your exact description or time+place with minimal doubt, you are probably not doing the "lord's work" as folks from the Southern US would say.
The requests should be done in person in a way that naturally limits it to when it would be required rather than just curiosity or convenience.
But the requests themselves, the requesters, the durations, and the judges that signed off on them should be digitally available.