bagpiper

I still have a stack of my old memo books. Once in awhile, when I am cleaning out my closet I take a peek at a few pages,  it’s brings back tons of memories of where, when, and what I was doing on a particular day.

There are plenty of mundane, routine day to day activities but mixed in between them are noteworthy  events/cases that were headline news, including 911. 

After my father passed, I discovered a stack of his old memo books, they were from the mid 1950’s through to the mid 1990’s. 

I can understand why the department is moving towards a digital memo book, and the potential benefits. I still wonder if the cops will be able to get a complete copy of their memo book to keep upon discontinuance of service. 

One very important reason you did and should keep your memo books, was for use in accurate recall of the events that you recorded that day for court testimony. It’s not unheard for cops to get subpoenas for cases that are sometimes 10 years old. These court appearance requests can come way after an officer’s retirement date. 

Of course the Department could now furnish you with a copy of your memo book activities on request, but from my experience, such a request may be easily denied, or delayed, because the release of the memo books might cause potential embarrassment, be part of an ongoing case, or they are not legally compelled to produce said documents. 

My other concern would be the misuse or alteration of digital records. With a handwritten document, an  officer can look at their handwritten notes, and swear that they wrote it, whether it was yesterday or 30 years in the past. 

The memo books contained had a single sided lined area for official recording of the officers day.  On the back of those pages was a blank sheet, which was often used for recording contemporaneous statements, facts, 911 transmission, diagrams and other observations. The combination of these notes and the official memo book entry often provided a complete overview of events. 

District Attorneys always photocopied both the blank page & lined pages surrounding an event when processing a criminal complaint in court. These notes were known as “Rosario” Material - and by law - everything recorded by the police about a subject had to be furnished to the defense, subject to restrictions. 

What  mechanism is in place to ensure the same confidence of continuity that handwritten notes provide vs a digital copy?  Where are those hand written notes? Something that is quickly handwritten in the heat of the moment may now be avoided because  is frustratingly done with a smart device. This is not to say that use of body cams and smart devices can’t record audio and video of an event, but its already quite difficult to get people to talk openly to the police. 

Sometimes you could only obtain witness information by pulling someone aside in a crowd  and speak confidentially with them. That same person now would completely avoid the police knowing that there is a chance for their digitally recorded conversation to be publicly released. 

Just this week in NY, a witness to a MS13 related homicide was found murdered himself shortly after his identity and address was furnished to the defense due to newly enacted NYS Bail Reform and Discovery Rules. 

If an officer was furnished with a fresh printout of their 20 years old memo book right before testifying, I can’t think of any method how one can swear with 100% confidence the words contained in that copy contain the same exact facts, words, punctuation, diagrams, composed 20 years prior other then keeping a screenshot after making said entry. 

Another concern is the access of too much information by too many individuals. When working on big cases, the flow of information was very compartmentalized. The case details were kept amongst a very few individuals. 

Access to confidential records & electronic databases,  has always been closely monitored for improper access and use by by law enforcement agencies and is severely punished when discovered. Unfortunately the improper access does happen, and DMV and accident databases are probably the most well known records abused. 

Having access to patrol duties can open up a can or worms. Internally, the data can be used to understand how to efficiently deploy personal, aid in training, get up to date information. On the other hand, the same information could be provided to bad actors to gain an understanding on deployment and how often somewhere is patrolled. 

Time will tell how it will work out. 

THIS IS AN OFFICIAL COPY - UNLESS CHANGED BY THE EDITORS - 

 

wlym said:

I wonder if it will follow the current Adobe CC model: Release full of bugs, charge expensive subscription, ignore bug reports, add feature-bloat, ignore bug reports, shove Adobe Stock down users' throats, update with same old bugs and add NEW bugs, profit!

I have been using Photoshop for a long time, at least all they way back to version 2, so I have seen my fair share of Adobes apps over the years and their associated costs. Everyone would like apps to be free, and like I always enjoys saying “if it’s free, it’s for me, and I’ll take three” Leaving aside the talk of bugs, app bloat, confusing app ecosystem and a host of lots of other valid-complaints, I am currently paying a discounted rate $32 bucks a month, which provides access to their full suite of apps (including Mac & iOS), Betas, previous stable versions,huge font library, and cloud storage. Of all the software companies that now offer a subscription instead of a purchase, Adobe is the only company where I feel that I am getting a great deal. I always have access to the lastest version of Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Premier, Fonts, etc on 2 Macs and my iOS devices If I divide every Adobe/Font that I use by the $32 I pay monthly- it’s $1-2 per apps a month ! I am looking forward to trying this new app and I am patiently waiting for beta access on the IPad Version of Photoshop. If any one wants to be purchase some vintage Adobe Apps on Diskette and CD‘s, I may try to recoup some money by posting them to EBay.

razorpit said:

Apple doesn't force you to run MacOS on their hardware....

No but they sure as hell nag the sh*t out of you until you do.

If are forced to use MacOS if you want to buy new hardware going forward, so your new $25k Mac Pro wont be able to run a 3rd party app that Apple wont sign because of political or religious conflicts with Apple board ? and not because if malicious code ?

I am installing the beta on one of my macbooks as I am reading this article- very disappointed with the potential issues of  the apps that I regularly use that do not come from the app store

Benjamin Franklin once said: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Metriacanthosaurus said:

And it's still $399, now for half the storage as before. Talk about DOA release.
Who is this for exactly? The person who wants the cheapest way to get Apple support? Oh wait no that's the larger and better and cheaper 9.7" iPad at $329.

So its for the person who wants the smallest and least usable Apple Pencil support? What a joke.

Because no one is going to buy this as just an iPad, because its a terrible buy in that regard.

People who fly drones Who wants a bigger screen than the iPhone and smaller than a full-size iPad