(Newswire.net — December 9, 2014) — Chicago, Illinois. — An old law preventing people to record police, had been earlier this year struck down by the Illinois Supreme Court. The General Assembly, however, passed a new bill, which is in fact even worse than old one, Illinois Policy reported.
The bill was proposed on Dec. 4, and passed with votes of 106-7 in the House and 46-4-1 in the Illinois Senate, the report says.
The new law bans recording any considered private conversation, without permission. Actually, the new bill prohibits any oral communication between two or more persons, the report says, where at least one person involved had a “reasonable expectation” of privacy.
So the question is, when does the person you’re talking to have a reasonable expectation of privacy?
A law must be clear enough for citizens to understand in advance whether a particular action is a crime. This bill doesn’t meet that standard, which is why the Supreme Court struck it down in the first place. Nonetheless, the lack of clarity isn’t the only problem with this bill, Illinois Policy reported.
Under a mask of protecting privacy of the residences of Illinois, the aim is actually to push through the backdoor the protection of police business. In light of the recent events, this law would prevent people from generating evidence that could shed some light on certain cases of alleged police brutality.
The catch is in the term ‘reasonable expectation of privacy’, which, according to a bill, excludes police actions. Ordinary people, however, could not tell if some police action has reasonable expectation of privacy, or not. It is fair to conclude that the citizens-witnesses would engage auto-censorship to avoid any inconveniences.
The Illinois Supreme Court said that police don’t have an expectation of privacy in “public” encounters with citizens, however it did not explain precisely what counts as a “public” encounter, Illinois Policy reported. But there is more.
According to Illinois Policy, the bill proposes that unlawfully recording a conversation with police, an attorney general, assistant attorney general, state’s attorney, assistant state’s attorney or a judge, stands as a class 3 felony, which carries a sentence of two to four years in prison. Meanwhile, the bill proposes an illegal recording of a private citizen a class 4 felony, which carries a lower sentencing range of one to three years in prison.
In addition, according to Illinois Policy, the bill was passed as an amendment to an existing bill on a completely different subject. The amendment removed all of the bill’s previous content and replaced it with the new ban on recording, so it has been masked in order to slip through. That could explain the vast majority votes, so people probably didn’t notice it in time to object.