Police body cameras are only as helpful as the rules that govern their use and distribution.
And good government groups say Rhode Island’s body-worn camera regulations are riddled with loopholes that give police officers a pass at the expense of public transparency and access.
That’s why they’re again asking the Rhode Island Attorney General’s office to strengthen state policy.
“Transparency is critical within law enforcement agencies, particularly when there is an officer-involved shooting,” an Aug. 7 letter from ACCESS/RI states.
It’s the third time the nonprofit coalition of watchdog and access groups, including the Rhode Island Press Association, of which Rhode Island Current is a member, has asked the AG’s office to strengthen the state body camera program since the state legislature approved the law in 2021.
So far, the calls for change have gone mostly unanswered.
“The AG doesn’t take the position of the open government groups when it comes to body cameras because the AG has this duality of also being the chief law enforcement officer,” John Marion, executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island and a signatory to the letter, said in an interview Thursday. “They typically side with their colleagues in law enforcement.”
Rhode Island Attorney General Neronha’s office acknowledged but did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
In a written explanation in response to ACCESS/RI’s proposed revisions last year, Neronha’s office said its approach to state regulations strikes an “appropriate balance” between letting police officers perform their duties, respecting privacy and providing evidence for public accountability.
State law required the AG’s office and the Rhode Island Department of Public Safety to seek public input when developing regulations, and again ask for feedback each year. But it doesn’t force state regulators to accept those suggestions.
ACCESS/RI members submitted nearly identical lists of proposed changes in 2022 and 2024. A few recommendations were incorporated. Most were not.
Waiting for change
Requested revisions include requiring law enforcement agencies to make full audio and video footage from use-of-force cases publicly accessible within 30 days of the incident. The existing law requires sharing camera footage from extreme or deadly force by an officer after “substantial completion” of evidence collection and witness interviews. It notes that such completion is “expected to occur within 30 days.”
But it doesn’t outright require a 30-day turnaround.
The lack of specificity results in inconsistent and varied compliance with state law, said Tim White, a former board member for the New England First Amendment Coalition. White serves as an investigative reporter and managing editor for WPRI-TV 12.
“When police agencies want to release body-worn camera footage, they do it quickly and they do it free of charge,” White said in an interview. “They often release video hours within an incident when they want to stop a crime or catch a bad guy.”
Conversely, when law enforcement agencies face scrutiny, including when they use potentially unnecessary force, video footage can take weeks to release to the public, often accompanied by “exorbitant” fees, White said.
Transparency is critical within law enforcement agencies, particularly when there is an officer-involved shooting.
Case in point: an officer-involved shooting in Pawtucket in June. The city shared redacted video footage the following month in response to public records requests by various media outlets, but has yet to share footage of the shooting itself or the events leading up to the incident.
“Worse, there appears to be a malfunction or deactivation of the involved officer’s [body worn camera], resulting in an inexplicable gap in the video — and yet more questions about law enforcement actions that day,” ACCESS/RI’s letter states.
Pawtucket Police Chief Tina Goncalves said in a written response Thursday that the police officer’s body camera was in “off-duty mode” before receiving the call, and did not automatically activate as intended when the officer took out his gun.
White, who has covered law enforcement in Rhode Island and Massachusetts for a combined three decades, has found that access to body camera footage, and records generally, depends less on state policy and more on individual agency culture.
White called Goncalves’ explanation “unacceptable,” further highlighting the problems with vague state guidelines as well as the lack of training on how police officers should use their cameras.
Goncalves also noted that the city follows the state’s regulations for body worn cameras.
“Should the Attorney General’s office seek to revise the policy, the Pawtucket Police Department would actively participate in that process,” she said.
The regulations also lack clarity on when officers are allowed to turn off or mute their cameras. Outside of deadly force incidents, in which cameras can’t be turned off until the incident is concluded, police officers can stop recording or mute their camera audio when dealing with minors, speaking to witnesses who want anonymity, or if they see activities or circumstances that are “sensitive or private in nature,” among other scenarios.
ACCESS/RI called the policy “confusing and overbroad,” giving officers too much authority and discretion to stop recording.
The sound of silence
Body camera footage released by Providence police who responded to a car crash involving U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers last month includes several lengthy silences due to muted audio of police body cameras.
Providence Police Col. Oscar Perez has publicly denied that the city law enforcement cooperated with ICE in its arrest of a self-admitted MS-13 gang member in Providence. But the lack of sound in the recorded footage raised suspicions for Steven Brown, executive director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island. Brown also signed ACCESS/RI’s letter to the AG.
“It’s troubling to have the police department talk about how they did not in any way collaborate with ICE during the incident yet there is this half hour of silence in which police are talking with ICE agents,” Brown said in an interview.
The ACLU has since asked Perez in writing to “address the legitimacy” of muted recordings and release the remaining footage from other officers who responded.
Anthony Vega, a spokesperson for Providence Mayor Brett Smiley’s office, said in an email Thursday night that Providence police officers are allowed to mute camera audio when speaking with other law enforcement officers under department policy.
“After a thorough review of the incident, Providence Police identified some non-compliance and has addressed that with staff,” Vega said. “The Department remains committed to fairness, accountability and transparency.”
Rhode Island is not alone in its struggle to balance law enforcement protections and investigatory powers with public access, said Justin Silverman, executive director for the New England First Amendment Coalition, who also signed the letter to the AG.
State regulations governing police body cameras are still a new phenomenon — a reaction in many places, including Rhode Island, to the 2020 killing of George Floyd by a Minnesota police officer.
“Many states inappropriately rely on the investigatory exemption to withhold footage for an unreasonable amount of time,” Silverman said. “There’s an inclination to really defer to police departments.”
While Silverman acknowledged that there are sometimes legitimate reasons to withhold or redact body camera footage, Rhode Island’s regulations leave room for misinterpretation, or worse, abuse.
“Our recommendations are really focused on narrowing the language of the policy and getting very specific about the circumstances that would need to present to withhold footage,” Silverman said.
Try, try, try again
Despite failing to persuade the AG’s office on most of the requested clarifications and revisions to the state body camera policy thus far, Silverman insisted it was not a fruitless exercise to try again.
“We’re also educating the public about what could happen because of these policies, how community members might be left in the dark over a police incident we don’t have video for because of restrictive policies that need to be revisited,” Silverman said.
Brown was less optimistic.
“If the AG’s office were truly interested in promoting access with the body camera policy program, they would have long ago adopted many of the recommendations that ACCESS/RI has offered,” he said.
One alternative path to progress could be reforming the state’s public records act.
Among the 48 revisions proposed to the Access to Public Records Act during the 2025 legislation was a requirement that law enforcement turn over body camera footage in use-of-force cases within 30 days. The legislation stalled in both chambers of the Rhode Island General Assembly, drowned in a litany of objections by Gov. Dan McKee’s office and other state cabinet heads. Proponents for records reform expect to introduce similar or identical legislation next year.
This story was originally published by the Rhode Island Current.
