Worcester police to start using body cameras Monday

CYRUS MOULTON 
PUBLISHED FEB 21, 2023

WORCESTER - Worcester police will go live with body cameras next Monday, giving them a tool that officials say will improve accountability.

“We want to strengthen our transparency and trust,” Police Chief Steven M. Sargent said Tuesday at a media event unveiling the new technology. “Body cameras are another policing tool that will help us deliver high-quality service.”

The new program will outfit 300 officers with the cameras, which are about the size of the palm of a hand. 

One of the features of the cameras - which are governed by a lengthy policy City councilors discussed earlier this month - is that they automatically turn on when an officer pulls his or her firearm or taser. 

“We want to strengthen our transparency and trust. Body cameras are another policing tool that will help us deliver high quality service.”

Police Chief Steven M. Sargent

After a shift, the cameras are returned to a dock where the video is automatically uploaded to a secure website, where it “cannot be altered or destroyed,” according to police spokesman Lt. Sean Murtha. If redactions need to be made, they will be made to a copy of the original video, Murtha said. 

A supervisor must give permission for officers to turn off their camera in permitted situations.

“This will make the city a more fair and equitable city,” Mayor Joseph M. Petty said. “It will protect the police and the public.”

The city and Worcester police have discussed body cameras since September 2014, and a pilot program outfitting 20 officers with the devices ran from May to November 2019.

The pilot was followed by community listening sessions and an evaluation, and the police secured funding for the cameras in January 2022.

Most recently, police presented the City Council with a policy for body camera usage Feb. 7 and, despite the police unions’ push to delay the program until contracts were finalized,  announced a start-date of Feb. 27. 

At a demonstration at police headquarters Tuesday, City Manager Eric D. Batista thanked the unions for working with the city on the body camera program, although in a follow-up he said that the contracts were not yet finalized. 

“The program is still moving forward,” Batista said.