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| U.S. court upholds decision to stop Arpaio's jail cams |
| By AP |
| Published: 08/09/2004 |
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A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld an Arizona court's decision to stop cameras from transmitting live video of Maricopa County Jail inmates to the Internet. The ruling resulted from an appeal by Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who challenged U.S. District Court Judge Earl Carroll's decision to stop the cameras, saying Carroll based it on an inapplicable legal standard. Carroll's March 2003 preliminary injunction prohibited video feed until a lawsuit alleging that the cameras violate the 14th Amendment is resolved. Twenty-four former inmates at Phoenix's Madison Street Jail - which exclusively holds inmates awaiting trial - filed the lawsuit against Arpaio and Maricopa County in May 2001. They claimed the jail cams violated their rights under the 14th Amendment, which prohibits any punishment of pretrial detainees. Jack MacIntyre, a spokesman for Arpaio, downplayed the decision, saying it "doesn't change anything." He said Friday that Arpaio is deciding if he wants to appeal. James Hamm, program director for Middle Ground Prison Reform, the group that filed the lawsuit on behalf of the inmates, said Friday's ruling affirms all that the plaintiffs have alleged. "This is a very important decision," he said. "What happened to these people was that they were being displayed the same way zoo animals are." Three cameras fed live video of a men's holding cell, a booking area and an incoming inmate patdown area on the sheriff's Web site, and later, a crime Web site. Arpaio and the plaintiffs disagreed about the placement of a fourth video camera, which former female inmates say transmitted video of a toilet in a women's holding cell for six months. The sheriff said the camera was moved hours after he learned it was filming the toilet area. Judges Richard Paez and Marsha Berzon affirmed Carroll's decision. They agreed the cameras violate the 14th Amendment and that Arpaio "failed to demonstrate that the district court abused its discretion," according to court records. "Plaintiffs were certainly harmed by Sheriff Arpaio's actions," Paez wrote. "Having every moment of one's daily activities exposed to general and worldwide scrutiny would make anyone uncomfortable. "Exposure to millions of complete strangers, not to mention friends, loved ones, co-workers and employers, as one is booked, fingerprinted, and generally processed as an arrestee, and as one sits, stands or lies in a holding cell, constitutes a level of humiliation that almost anyone would regard as profoundly undesirable and strive to avoid." Judge Carlos Bea disagreed with Paez's and Berzon's opinion, saying the Web cams acted as a deterrent to the general public and offered the public governmental transparency. |
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