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“I sat down with my boss, who’s the township manager. They didn’t have a Ferguson moment in Evesham, but the risk of something like that happening is always a possibility. Studies on police squads that use the technology have found a vast reduction in complaints against police conduct as well as greater transparency. Advocates believe the equipment will help curb aggressive behavior from all sides. It may have been the first step toward building better relations between communities and their residents in the wake of the police shooting deaths. In response to the death of Brown and several other black men recently - all unarmed and at the hands of police - President Barack Obama announced this week a proposal for $75 million matching program over three years to help state and local governments purchase body cameras for their police forces. They have called for their police department in Ferguson, Missouri, to be kitted out with the equipment in the hope that such monitoring would prevent other police shootings and provide greater transparency when it comes to officers’ interactions with civilians. The parents of Michael Brown also wish there had been video evidence of the August shooting of their unarmed 18-year-old son by police officer Darren Wilson. The lawsuit was eventually settled out of court, but the case pushed Chew to look into the police being able to have their own video footage. "If we had it on video, we wouldn’t have wasted so much time and manpower hours,” he said.

Chew, a captain at the time, remembered officers spending “hundreds and hundreds of hours at our end, preparing for the lawsuit,” which was ultimately countered by a 15-second video recording someone took during the incident. Their families sued for excessive use of force. Officers were involved in an incident at a carnival, breaking up a brawl by using pepper spray on people who turned out to be minors. Chief Chris Chew wears his every day.Ĭhew became chief 16 months ago and says that before he took the job, he had been thinking about body camera equipment, after a lawsuit the police department faced several years ago. Every officer wears one - those on patrol, those in court.

The hard black plastic pack clips onto the front of their standard black shirts with such ease that it almost blends in. Yet this department of 73 police officers started field-testing body cameras over a year ago, and last July the equipment became part of their uniform. The police here can’t even remember the last time they had a homicide. The small business district offers a Brooks Brothers and a Trader Joe’s. It’s a middle-class suburb with manicured lawns, and the schools look new, the playgrounds welcoming. EVESHAM TOWNSHIP, New Jersey - Evesham Township looks like a storybook town, the last place in America where the police department would need body cameras.