Businesses typically install CCTV in order to prevent crime, minimise its disruptive impacts, and provide evidence to help with criminal investigations on or close to their establishments.
However, CCTV is often used by police forces to guide investigations, and in some cases the source of the cameras may not necessarily be those owned by a constabulary or local government, but privately owned footage as well.
In some cases, individuals and private companies can be compelled by courts to supply CCTV to the police, although these powers are only used when absolutely necessary and if someone is uncooperative with written requests.
However, whilst undoubtedly beneficial in solving crimes, including the recent conviction of Steven McCullagh, CCTV as a form of evidence is not without complications.
With that in mind, here are some of the challenges police investigators have when using CCTV, what they have to consider and why it can be more useful for certain crimes than others.
Is CCTV Open To Interpretation?
CCTV is often seen as objective video footage of an event, and whilst that is undoubtedly true of raw footage, its use in criminal investigations can often make it subject to interpretation, which itself exposes the biases in a particular observer.
When done deliberately, this can create “alternative truths” through selective editing, the use of still images rather than video footage, the speed at which video is shown and whether commentary is necessary.
This does not make CCTV any less useful, but its deployment in criminal investigations and in a Crown Court is as selective and interpretive as other forms of evidence such as forensics.
Is CCTV Always Available?
A major challenge, as reported by studies into CCTV in criminal investigations, is the fact that CCTV is simply not always available in every case.
Every company has a different protocol when it comes to retaining CCTV, and turnaround times for overwriting footage can vary from a week to 30 days.
If a lot of CCTV is required, due to a large timeframe for the committing of a particular crime, it can sometimes be difficult for owners to access and for officers to view.
In other cases, CCTV taken at night or at unusual distances and angles can be relatively low quality, leaving the identity of certain figures more open to interpretation than is ideal.
Is CCTV Equally Useful For Tackling Crime?
As may perhaps be expected, having CCTV evidence available increases the detection rate of the vast majority of crimes, although it is more useful in some cases than others.
CCTV cannot necessarily determine intent and typically does not include any audio recording, so crimes involving fraud, drug dealing, weapons possession and public order offences may not necessarily benefit from CCTV footage.
As they tend to require more “on-the-ground” police work to solve, using stop and search and reports from the public, CCTV is not always the best tool for the job.
Conversely, robbery and almost all forms of theft were significantly easier to detect using CCTV, which is a primary motivator for businesses to install CCTV near entry points; it can provide vital information that can help to track a criminal before, during and after their crime.
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