Trial By You Tube

[Guest]

Following the case of the woman on a tram in Croydon, this clip is now being followed up by BTP.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-16143909

Both went "viral" on You Tube. Would you agree that a law should be introduced to prevent photography posted on social networking sites being used as evidence in court cases? Or should the laws against vigilante behaviour suffice?

[Anna]

Lat, that's a very good point and I have, elsewhere, voiced concerns about YouTube and videos going viral and inciting a lynch mob mentality (the woman in the Croydon incident has had to be remanded in custody before she appears at Crown Court due to death threats after her address was posted via Facebook and Twitter)

Now there is a new racist rant going viral. Well, I didn't know that if a video went viral on YouTube you can earn squillions from it. That is so wrong because it encourages copycat behaviour, be famous for a few seconds cos your mate has filmed it and you're on the Net and you could get rich. There is something really unhealthy about social media when used in this way.

[ahinton]

Lat, that's a very good point and I have, elsewhere, voiced concerns about YouTube and videos going viral and inciting a lynch mob mentality (the woman in the Croydon incident has had to be remanded in custody before she appears at Crown Court due to death threats after her address was posted via Facebook and Twitter)

Now there is a new racist rant going viral. Well, I didn't know that if a video went viral on YouTube you can earn squillions from it. That is so wrong because it encourages copycat behaviour, be famous for a few seconds cos your mate has filmed it and you're on the Net and you could get rich. There is something really unhealthy about social media when used in this way.

Broadly speaking, I agree - but at the same time I cannot easily see what could be done effectively to undermine some people's determination to do this kind of thing, quite simply because it is now not merely possible but so easy to do it in a few instants, especially since the internet knows and respects no legislative boundaries.

[Lateralthinking1]

Prohibiting its use as evidence would cure it.

You would then have a choice. 1. Hand it directly to the police if you wish or 2. Post it on the internet for so-called entertainment purposes only.

Personally I think I would go further to address this issue. If members of the forum were sitting together on a train chatting, or let us say a family, what would happen if someone filmed it and posted it on You Tube? Could we prosecute them for breach of privacy?

If so, the law is being applied in contradictory ways.

[Norfolk Born]

This incident was discussed on BBC1's 'Breakfast' at approximately 0815 this morning. The discussion featured the chap who filmed the incident and a former policeman. Unsurprisingly, they agreed to differ.

[Richard Tarleton]

Erm...can someone unpick the issues a bit more for me here? Is it that you can make money out of you tube clips? I find the story itself positively heartwarming, indeed the entire carriage full of fare paying passengers should have been united in outrage and helping to throw the little so-and-so off. I speak as the veteran of a hundred campaigns against smokers - and latterly mobile phone users in quiet carriages - on trains. I'm all for a bit of direct action by citizens, and posting on You Tube serves as an example to others (both to fare dodgers in this case, and to others to help in similar situations). No doubt, though, the youth has a case for infringement of his human rights .

I was amused by the comment that train staff are trained to resolve conflict situations. A year or so ago I boarded a train at Port Talbot to travel to Paddington. I went to find my seat in the quiet carriage, only to find about 8 ladies d'un certain age with food and wine bottles spread across two tables having a party (the train had only started at Swansea 19 minutes earlier ). I pointed out to them that it was the quiet carriage, they smiled, shrugged and said that it was too late to stop.

The conductor remained locked in his cubicle at the far end of the quiet carriage for the entire journey, not daring to venture out. He wasn't going to take on the ladies, oh no. I complained to FGW (also praising the very busy conductor on the return journey), and got a small discount off my next journey.

[Norfolk Born]

According to the chap who filmed the incident, there was applause from at least some fellow passengers once the miscreant (or whatever you choose to call him) had been dumped on the platform and not been allowed to rejoin the train.

[ahinton]

Prohibiting its use as evidence would cure it.

But that could not be guaranteed. Once the evidence is collected on and distributed via Youtube (or indeed any number of similar facilities) it will be reported elsewhere and one can cite reports as evidence

You would then have a choice. 1. Hand it directly to the police if you wish or 2. Post it on the internet for so-called entertainment purposes only.

In a climate where prohibition of its use as evidence is being advocated and attempted, what would be the point of handing such evidence directly to the police? What would the police be expected to do with it?

Personally I think I would go further to address this issue. If members of the forum were sitting together on a train chatting, or let us say a family, what would happen if someone filmed it and posted it on You Tube? Could we prosecute them for breach of privacy?

You could try, but even getting a judge to accept such a case for trial might prove difficult and, more importantly, even if you managed to do so and you won your case, no damages would likely be awarded if no adverse outcome of such filming and distrubution had been provable during the course of the trial and each party would then almost certainly be obliged to share the not inconsiderable costs, so what wuld have been the point of that other than as a horrendously expensive academic exercise?

If so, the law is being applied in contradictory ways.

How else would you expect the law to be applied, anywhere? The merits or otherwise of each case are different as are the specific circumstances of each case; furthermore, each lawyer's and each barrister's take on all the available evidence will differ as will judges' summing-up pronouncements and fining/sentencing decisions and, on top of all of this, the very proportion of all relevant evidence that is occupied by the available evidence will likewise differ from case to case. How, therefore, could anyone expect anything other than contradictory application?

[french frank]

I'm not sure why the police get involved, as, in both these cases, no one present at the time and affected by what was happening made a complaint even though they were in full knowledge of what occurred.

In the second case, the person manhandled and bundled off the train appears to be the 'victim' (at least in the story quoted the concern seemed to be that the conductor was not left to deal with the situation for which he had received 'special training').

Would it be different if the video clip was used to prosecute the fare-dodger?

[Lateralthinking1]

I don't think people, other than perhaps frenchfrank, are understanding what I am saying .

First, RT, it doesn't really matter whether you as an individual, or I, have a view about smoking, mobile phones, fair dodging etc in these instances. It is about people needing to comply with the law in any action including attempted enforcement. Actually, I am not on the side of this fare dodger or instinctively against the person who removed him but that is not the point.

Secondly, AH, you say "once the evidence is collected on and distributed via Youtube (or indeed any number of similar facilities) it will be reported elsewhere and one can cite reports as evidence". It seems odd that you should argue against a proposed change on the basis of how you perceive things currently are.

I am saying that anything posted on such sites should not be legally permitted to be used as evidence. I would suggest that any reporting of it being posted on a site should not in itself be used as evidence other than as evidence of a perpetrator - the poster - attempting to pervert the course of justice.

Thirdly, there is then the question of whether such material should be used as evidence if simply handed to the police. That is rather than being posted on the internet so that public and press alike can bark like animals vigilante style. I have not answered that question. However, I point out that the practice of taking photos in these instances is rather like a cameraman snapping you and your family on the beach.

It is back to Orwell. The Big Brother state - speed cameras and the like - is now in the blood and brain of the modern citizen. You might see amateurish helpful intervention. I see blackshirts. Personally, I don't want to live in a country where cameras are banned because there is official merchandise on sale but anything goes when it comes to the privacy of something basic like having a coffee on a street.

[Richard Tarleton]

First, RT, it doesn't really matter whether you as an individual, or I, have a view about smoking, mobile phones, fair dodging etc in these instances. It is about people needing to comply with the law in any action including attempted enforcement.

Well I've never done anything illegal but I have made jolly sure on many occasions that the behaviour in question does not continue. And with only one conductor per train, it's desirable that more people are prepared to do the same. It's things like this make me come over all Daily Mail I haven't followed the story in detail but I do hope the man who "helped" the conductor isn't in trouble.

[ahinton]

AH, you say "once the evidence is collected on and distributed via Youtube (or indeed any number of similar facilities) it will be reported elsewhere and one can cite reports as evidence". It seems odd that you should argue against a proposed change on the basis of how you perceive things currently are.

I did not and do not "argue against a proposed change" (in the law) and, in any case, none such is even being proposed yet (although it might come to be so).

I am saying that anything posted on such sites should not be legally permitted to be used as evidence. I would suggest that any reporting of it being posted on a site should not in itself be used as evidence other than as evidence of a perpetrator attempting to pervert the course of justice.

The principal problem that would arise from the passing of any law to preclude postings on such sites being used in court as evidence is that those sufficiently determined to bend and break the law for their own ends will then start to throw spanners in the works of other forms and sources of evidence that could similarly be argued as potentialy or actually inadmissible; my concern about any such law would be that its effect might risk compromising what may be put forward as evidence in court regardless of the mere nature of the source of that evidence. All such evidence, whatever its source or the nature of its source, has to be tried in court and conclusions drawn as to its validity; it would not be difficult to figure out how those intent on breaking certain laws and getting away with it would seek to cite such a law in support of questioning the admissibility of other forms and sources of evidence.

Thirdly, there is then the question of whether such material should be used as evidence if simply handed to the police rather than being posted on the internet so that public and press alike can bark like animals vigilante style. I have not answered that question. However, I point out that the virtual equivalent would be for half the town to stand and applaud as a cameraman snaps you and your family on the beach.

That may well be true in some cases, but much would depend upon what the police did with any such evidence handed directly to them and, in any case, if such evidence is posted on the internet and someone then hands a copy to the police, the police's powers to deal with it on an exclusive basis would be compromised to pieces by reason of the said evidence already having been in the public domain before it came into their possession. What you're referring to here is, I think, less a matter of what might or might not - or ought or ought not to - be admissible as evidence in a court of law than whether the law should permit people to post certain items on the internet that might later be used as evidence by others, which is quite a different issue and one that would be impossible to address merely by means of changes in individual countries' laws on such matters.

[Lateralthinking1]

I think you are worried in a libertarian way that my suggestion could actually be introduced into law whereas a ban on posting certain items on the internet could not be because that would be impossible to enforce.

My view is that I get on a bus subject to the conditions of the company. That is my choice. I am aware that I could be on the bus company's camera. That is reasonable. But if I am photographed by another passenger without my consent I would see it as an invasion of my privacy and tantamount to an assault. Here in this time of rapid technological change, with its associated cultural assumptions, members of the public do need some serious education on how to stay inside their own boxes.

Finally, there are many forms of evidence that are impermissible so I think on that point you raise a red herring.

[John Skelton]

you raise a red herring.

http://thomstark.net/images/featured/redherring.jpg

[Lateralthinking1]

Is that raised? It looks more like a fly-by-night.

Efforts should be made to contact both individuals involved in the clip with a view to persuading them jointly to take the photographer to court.