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Committee weighs stricter sanction for disabled body‑worn cameras; sponsors propose tightening for intentional cases
Summary
Senate Bill 505 would tighten rules about required body‑worn camera recordings, add university police into the statute and create statutory sanctions for intentional disabling or loss of required recordings; committee debate split police organizations and civil‑liberties groups.
Senator Cervantes sponsored Senate Bill 505 to tighten enforcement and remedies when law enforcement fails to record required interactions on body‑worn cameras. The bill would explicitly include university police under the statute and adds language addressing spoliation of evidence when required recordings are not preserved.
The committee heard extensive testimony from law‑enforcement officials, county attorneys, unions and civil‑liberties groups. Agency witnesses—including the Department of Public Safety, Albuquerque Police Department, New Mexico State Police and chiefs representing municipal forces—objected to language that would create an automatic presumption that an officer acted in bad faith when required footage was not preserved. They urged retaining judicial discretion to evaluate mechanical failure, exigent circumstances, or unintentional loss.
Public‑safety witnesses emphasized officers encounter rapidly evolving, dangerous situations and said cameras sometimes fail or are displaced in struggle; they opposed a statutory presumption that would treat technical or inadvertent failures as intentional misconduct. “The words as they are now with May is the right word,” a police chief testified, adding that the current statute balances accountability and the realities of policing.
Civil‑liberties advocates and trial attorneys said stronger statutory consequences are necessary to deter purposeful disabling of recording devices and to preserve public trust and evidence integrity. The ACLU of New Mexico and the New Mexico Trial Lawyers Association urged the committee to keep or strengthen sanctions for wrongful disabling and to ensure university law‑enforcement units comply with camera rules.
During the hearing, senators debated a proposed committee amendment. The sponsor proposed a compromise: restore much of the preexisting statute (striking a rules‑committee change) and add the words “knowingly and intentionally” to ensure sanctions only apply where the officer purposefully failed to record. Senators discussed drafting technicalities, whether to retain negligence‑based language and how to craft a committee substitute for clearer review.
Law‑enforcement groups warned the debate and the proposed statutory presumption risk chilling officers’ willingness to act in dangerous situations, exacerbate recruitment and retention challenges, and invite costly litigation. Supporters said the change is targeted at instances where officers intentionally avoid recording and pointed to internal‑affairs findings in prior high‑profile cases as justification.
Committee members voted to adopt sponsor amendments to the draft and agreed to return the measure as a committee substitute for further consideration; no final floor vote on the underlying bill was recorded in the transcript.
