Vic Police covert motorcycles

Jon Faine program on ABC 774 about 10.30am this morning. Victoria Police
has commissioned four covert motorcycles mounted with video recording
devices. The motorcycles will be used around the Yarra Ranges Shire, home
of the infamous Reefton Spur. The bikes' main purpose will be to follow
and record motorcycle behaviour, not to stop bikes. Infringement notices
for traffic offences will be posted out and the video evidence supplied
to those who request it. The bikes will be working in tandem with patrol
cars, which will stop motorcyclists and provide on-the-spot infrimgement
notices "where it's safe to do so".
The only information supplied to Faine was that there were four bikes,
some red, some blue.
- sanbar

 

I should add, the Police riders won't be wearing identifiable uniforms.
- sanbar

 

....it's cheap to spread rumours to scare people into obedience.

On the actual spur itself there's not much you can do wrong. Very few double
lines and short straights in between corners where the speed might get over
the limit are probably not long enough for any measuring equipment to get an
accurate speed reading.. unless it's right on your rear wheel.

If they see you committing a dangerous offence, and covertly record it, they
can assume that you will continue to commit such offences. Does the police's
duty of care extend to stopping you there and then to tell you to cease your
naughty behaviour to protect the public (including you)? i.e. if they filmed
you committing dangerous acts, and you later crashed and hurt yourself, could
you

If they are in a position to record you and identify you they are in a
position to stop you. I wonder how strong the evidence would be in court if
it were contested... Say the DPP prosecutor stands up and says "Mr Bloggs you
are charged with committing acts a b c d e f & g and we have video evidence to
prove it." and proceeds to play a tape showing Mr Bloggs in his blue Dianese
Leathers and a pink Bieffe Helmet doing naughty things. Mr Bloggs gets up and
says "I met a group of people I have never seen before at the pub and we were
talking about our bikes and we decided to swap bikes and test each other's
bikes. My bike is on the video but the bike I was riding at the time is not
shown. I own yellow Underdog Leathers and a green Shoei helmet. The person
riding the bike in the video is not me and I do not know who he is....".

Nev..
'03 ZX12R
'02 CBR1100XX

 

I also want to know whether it is digital media recording. From my
understanding most digital media it not admissible in court. Most of the
time you have a hell of alot of trouble even using analog material as well.
Essentially it's easily tampered with, and the Police aren't above it.
Rather a good point about being in leathers and stuff too. I wonder if they
would then request that you show them your leathers etc as well, or by this
stage would they simply let it drop and move onto greener pastures.

Cam
'03 954

 

I heard someone on talkback radio once who claimed to have beaten a speed
camera fine. He contested it in court and the police produced the digital
image as proof. The caller was in the real estate business pointed out to the
magistrate that in his line of work when he was required to attend court,
digital images were not accepted as admissible evidence... if it was good
enough or him.. it was good enough for the police. Apparently the magistrate
agreed and threw the case out.

Yeah no worries... they could ask me to present my riding gear... which set
would you like to see? I will have to decide between - black helmet, red
helmet or black/gold helmet, newish black leather jacket, old black leather
jacket or a blue dririder, black leather pants, dark blue jeans, faded jeans,
faded jeans with holes or trakky dacks, Medal boots, rossi boots, white
runners, black runners.... should I bring summer or winter gloves?

Nev..
'03 ZX12R
'02 CBR1100XX

 

This may have been some time back, and it would have been a technicality.

When I used to work for a CCTV firm, one of our kit was a digital
multiplexer, somewhat similar to the analogue units that recorded a number of
cameras time-lapse to VCRs, but this one recorded to internal HDD only.

At the time (some 5-6 year ago) it was the ONLY CCTV multiplexer on the
market in this country (that I knew of) that had data which was admissable in
court.

There are rules as to what can and can't be done digitally, frames must be
stored as individual images (compressed is ok), and not sequencial framing like
MPEG which bases one image on the previous image.
Also, the type of encryption comes into it.

As far as I was aware, you can't just rock up to court with a black box
saying it complies with whatever rulings are allowable in court, each unit has
to specifically certified for that purpose.

You'll never get away with claiming "digital" on one of today's fixed or
mobile cameras, they are indeed admissable in court.

Back to the cameras on the bikes, might be questionable depending on what
their recording mechanism is. If they're using portable DV camcorders, then
no, it's not encrypted, and it uses MPEG.
For this reason, IF they're doing it, it won't be with standard DV camcorders.

 

I think they have been specifically legislated to be legal.

I saw something on TV about VicPol trialing digital video recording equipment
in some of their TMU cars. It was recording at all times, but only kept a 60
second buffer. When manually activated it would continue to record, and keep
the previous 60 second buffer. When the Lights and/or sirens were activated
it would continue to record, and keep the previous 60 second buffer. The
impression I got from the police giving the demonstration to the TV crew was
that rather than being used as prima facie evidence for court (they burn the
HDD images to disk for storage each day for later use if required), it was
very good at pacifying [probably not the right word to use] motorists who
argues when handed tickets, which would probably lead to fewer traffic matters
going to court... if a driver argued that they had not committed the
infringement which the cop wrote the ticket for, he could take them to the
police car and play them the video and show them what they did.

Nev..
'03 ZX12R
'02 CBR1100XX

 

pity its an offence for you not to know who is driving/riding your vehicle,
and you end up copping the whole fine....

my defence would be well I thought the bike behind me was going to hurt me,
so I was scared and decided to try and get away but he kept following me. -
Provocation

 

Nev.. said....

Could you, what?

In any case, they do it now with speed cameras. They'll snap you doing X
km/h over the limit - and remember, according to them, any speeding is
dangerous. You speed on your merry way. The camera didn't stop you.

The article mentioned cops in cars up the road being told of your
naughty behavior, who'll then pull you over and say, "stop it, it's
'orrible.".

As for the scenario about the rider in different leathers, etc.
interesting point. Normally, with a speed camera fine you pay up unless
you can point the finger at someone else. What happens if the other
person denies it, I dunno. I would imagine 99% of offenders merely
accept it and pay up.

 

"Mad-Biker.com Mad-Biker.com>" wrote

Are you saying that when we do a crew change for the fire-truck, and I
tell the relieved crew to leave my ute back at the station, I'm
breaking the law if I don't know who's going to drive it there?

following me. -

That's a bit sookie.

Theo

 

my defence would be well I thought the bike behind me was going to hurt me,

My mate tried that one.. didn't work ;-)

He was being tailgated at night by an unmarked cop (literally 2ft
distance) and after getting onto an 80km/h freeway exit, was busted for
still doing 100.

 

No, but if you don't know who was driving it, then you were
driving it.

G

 

and you will lose!

 

\Yeah right, someone stole it....

Hammo

 

Remember that Pollie recently who loaned his ute to somebody at a local
football club where he was guest speaker or something, and the ute got
picked up with a load of dope? He lost his party endorsement apparently,
but got off the police charge of being involved with the dope bust.

Kim

 

I think we might find the have three other issues.

One will just be if someone comes up behind you on a bike, you behave.
The other will be getting a clear enough image with the vibration,
buffeting etc.
Getting you the other way is highly problematic unless the officer has
control of the zoom (on the normally shyte bullet cameras - and even
then all they will get is digital zoom).

The more I think about it, this has all the markings of a scare
campaign. Like the scare campaign on the "entire length of the Monash
Freeway" and the scare campaign on "timed cameras on the hume".

Jase

 

That was a bit more complex. The (prospective, not a pollie yet)
candidate had also had business dealings, in the form of a "business"
loan, from the alleged drug dealer. This had nothing to do with him
not knowing who was driving the vehicle.

Theo

 

No argument there, but that was not the question. Mad-biker (allegedly
speaking from a knowledge of the law) said it was illegal for me to
not know who was driving my vehicle.

Theo