How smartphone video changes coverage of police abuse

[Commentary] Smartphones tether us to the digital universe. They allow us to take our work wherever we go, to photograph our meals and exchange fleeting videos, and to navigate streets while listening to our favorite music. They’ve also helped catalyze the national discussion on race and law enforcement, fundamentally changing the way journalists report and share news of alleged police abuse.

Smartphone video footage is changing the dynamic in a growing number of instances. From officers pepper-spraying seated Occupy protesters in California to the bloody arrest of a black University of Virginia student outside a bar, journalists have a new lens into alleged police violence toward civilians, and vice versa. In 2014, video of the police killing of Staten Island man Eric Garner drew national outrage, also inspiring a rallying cry, “I can’t breathe,” that has helped galvanize protests of the criminal justice system across the country. It’s unclear whether any of those incidents would have made national headlines had they not been caught on video. And with the Garner case in particular, the footage gave news outlets and their audiences a visceral, real-time depiction of what happened. That helped media escape their reliance on police or witness accounts, also adding shock value. Though the cop who put Garner in the fatal chokehold was not indicted, the video of the killing allowed journalists and viewers to reconsider the legal framework that left him a free man. Journalists, who operate in the court of public opinion, are reliant upon their sources. And in many cases involving alleged police brutality, smartphones may be the best chance to cut through police or eyewitness spin. Cameras, of course, are objective observers.