Do you consider Police Auditors to be ethical or unethical?

[Nevets]

In the U.S. they are known as First Amendment Audits. Here is the definition from Wikipedia.

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First Amendment audits are a largely American social movement that usually involves photographing or filming from a public space. It is often categorized by its practitioners, known as auditors, as activism and citizen journalism that tests constitutional rights, in particular the right to photograph and video record in a public space (a right normally covered by the first amendment).^[1][2] Auditors have tended to film or photograph government buildings, equipment, access control points as well as any personnel present.^[3]

Auditors believe that the movement promotes transparency and open government, while critics have argued that audits are typically confrontational, criticizing some tactics as forms of intimidation and harassment.

The practice is predominantly an American concept, but it has also been seen in other countries, including the United Kingdom,^[4][5] Canada, India,^{[citation needed]} and Russia.^[6]

First Amendment Audits

Below is what Police Scotland have to say.

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Auditors and Social Media Bloggers are members of the public who attend police stations, other public/civil service buildings, including Ministry of Defence sites or ongoing incidents, with the purpose of capturing staff on camera and live-streaming the footage to social media platforms or uploading with edited content. There has been an increasing number of reported incidents within the United Kingdom whereby Auditors and Social Media Bloggers have used security concerns and limited preventative measures surrounding the filming of staff and premises to provoke staff and site security into potentially embarrassing reactions, often asserting that staff are overstepping legal boundaries. They are also well versed in their own rights and often cite legislation in their interactions with staff. Auditors and Social Media Bloggers operate in an overt manner and their actions will be, on most occasions, deliberately obvious to officers and members of the public. This group should not be confused with hostile reconnaissance (focussed observations intended to collect information to inform the planning of a hostile act against a specific target) which by its nature is covert.

PoliceScotland

To provide an example I will link to a random YouTube video that you can watch. I will use an example from Fettes Police Station in Scotland for no other reason than I am from Edinburgh, so this video is of most interest to me.

Also, considering the UK only has a handful of Auditors, many of those Auditors appear to have criminal records ranging from Child Abuse, Stalking and Harassment, to Drug Dealing. Therefore as this is a Science forum, perhaps we may also have theories regarding the Science behind the reasons that so many Police Auditors have a criminal record.

Do you consider Police Auditors to be ethical or unethical?

Edited September 16 by Nevets

[swansont]

There have been numerous instances in the US of police summaries being in conflict with subsequently shared video evidence. In short, police will lie to cover their 6. Mandating body cameras has been one push to mitigate that, which would reduce the need for citizens to “audit”

If the police are following the rules, they should not have any valid objection to being filmed. They’re supposed to be serving the public. The public has the right to film them in the US; there’s no ethical problem that I can see.

3 hours ago, Nevets said:

Also, considering the UK only has a handful of Auditors, many of those Auditors appear to have criminal records ranging from Child Abuse, Stalking and Harassment, to Drug Dealing.

Evidence?

[exchemist]

3 hours ago, Nevets said:

In the U.S. they are known as First Amendment Audits. Here is the definition from Wikipedia.

First Amendment Audits

Below is what Police Scotland have to say.

PoliceScotland

To provide an example I will link to a random YouTube video that you can watch. I will use an example from Fettes Police Station in Scotland for no other reason than I am from Edinburgh, so this video is of most interest to me.

Also, considering the UK only has a handful of Auditors, many of those Auditors appear to have criminal records ranging from Child Abuse, Stalking and Harassment, to Drug Dealing. Therefore as this is a Science forum, perhaps we may also have theories regarding the Science behind the reasons that so many Police Auditors have a criminal record.

Do you consider Police Auditors to be ethical or unethical?

Depends what they are doing. Filming police is ethical. Trying to provoke police into reactions that are subsequently misrepresented on social media is unethical.
 

However many journalists and media interviewers habitually misrepresent interviewees, which is just as bad. There’s a lot of unethical behaviour about, unfortunately.

[Nevets]

45 minutes ago, swansont said:

There have been numerous instances in the US of police summaries being in conflict with subsequently shared video evidence. In short, police will lie to cover their 6. Mandating body cameras has been one push to mitigate that, which would reduce the need for citizens to “audit”

If the police are following the rules, they should not have any valid objection to being filmed. They’re supposed to be serving the public. The public has the right to film them in the US; there’s no ethical problem that I can see.

Evidence?

Providing evidence is a slow process which I can only do one at a time, as I also have a business to run and a Mother suffering from Pneumonia and COPD, so I can't dedicate my entire time to providing evidence which I was hoping was common knowledge.

But I will begin with PJ Audits, aka Peter Allsop.

 

Case 1

The above refers to this case here: Case number 2603443/2019

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Mr Peter Allsop has been arrested and is facing serious charges for taking money from lorry drivers and fraudulently giving them the qualification with out them ever attending the courses required. Obviously the lorry drivers involved are also getting investigated as a new legal getting this by deception. The reason for my letter is that a number of people within Wilkinson’s have been dismissed from [their] job for paying this man and getting their CPC. You have a driver Colin Edson who works for you who I know is one of these drivers. Obviously you can check this as he would have not attended the courses and more than likely been driving for your company on the days the courses were fraudulently claimed to have happened. Therefore he has been driving for your company illegally for the past 5 years and I am sure as a company you would not and will not condone this. I am also sending the same letter to all authorities that deal with the qualification i.e. Joupt as I am disgusted that this has gone on for so long. I know of a number of drivers who have paid this man and feel that this is something that needs addressing with every company that [has] employed these drivers. Whilst I know that this classed as whistleblowing I want to remain anonymous as I have to live in the area where the drivers I am reporting live. Thank you for taking the time to read this and hopefully you will deal with this serious allegation immediately.

Gov.uk

I will provide other cases.

1 hour ago, swansont said:

There have been numerous instances in the US of police summaries being in conflict with subsequently shared video evidence. In short, police will lie to cover their 6. Mandating body cameras has been one push to mitigate that, which would reduce the need for citizens to “audit”

If the police are following the rules, they should not have any valid objection to being filmed. They’re supposed to be serving the public. The public has the right to film them in the US; there’s no ethical problem that I can see.

Evidence?

Case 2

This is Auditing Lancashire. The above refers to this Child Abuse case in link below.

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Kevin Paul James Brown, 26, of no fixed address but formerly of the Salvation Army in Heaton Street, admitted causing cruelty to Connor Brown, who was just five months old when the offending came to light.

Preston Crown Court heard how on July 18 last year staff at a homeless unit in Blackburn where Brown and his then partner and Connor’s mother, Chantelle Wilcock, were staying had noticed a bruise on the baby’s eye.

Lancashire Telegraph

1 hour ago, swansont said:

There have been numerous instances in the US of police summaries being in conflict with subsequently shared video evidence. In short, police will lie to cover their 6. Mandating body cameras has been one push to mitigate that, which would reduce the need for citizens to “audit”

If the police are following the rules, they should not have any valid objection to being filmed. They’re supposed to be serving the public. The public has the right to film them in the US; there’s no ethical problem that I can see.

Evidence?

Case 3.

Coincidentally this involves the Auditor in my YouTube video in the OP.

The above video is regarding this case below where it is alleged that Berke Ersoy got found guilty of 18 drug dealing offences and is currently serving seven years. I personally can only find evidence of one drug offence.

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BERKE ERSOY, 24, of Wychelm Road, Shinfield, Reading, convicted of using threatening behaviour to cause distress and admitted to possession of a Class C drug in Wokingham on January 4, 2021. Community order made. Requirement to carry out 50 hours of unpaid work in the next 12 months. Must pay £870 in court fees. 

The Reading Chronicle

Edited September 16 by Nevets

[Bufofrog]

Typically these "auditors" are idiots that just want hits on YouTube.

Edited September 16 by Bufofrog

[swansont]

2 hours ago, Nevets said:

I will provide other cases.

Anecdotes are not evidence. It should be expected that some auditors have police records, because a random sampling of the population will include people with police records. For your allegation to have merit, you would have to show a statistically significant deviation above the expected fraction*. If there are few auditors, as you have alleged, such a deviation could just be an artifact of a small sample size.

Without knowing how many auditors there are, you can’t establish the fraction that have records. And there could be bias, because auditors might get arrested without a legitimate basis, owing to police overstepping, or due to attempts at intimidation because they don’t like being filmed. I’ve seen videos with such threats of arrest.

* one-third of working-age men

https://www.personnelchecks.co.uk/latest-news/criminal-record-checks-increasing#:~:text=Data from the Ministry of,someone with a criminal conviction.