MELBOURNE. Fla. — Melbourne police are now equipped with body cameras.
The chief said the cameras will improve transparency and help better protect officers and the public.
Melbourne police launched the pilot program on Wednesday, providing body cameras to more than a dozen officers.
“We’re going to start this implementation with 15 officers who will be wearing the body worn camera for a period of about 30 days,” said Melbourne Police Department Chief David Gillespie. “After that, we will start rolling out incrementally to the rest of the department.”
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The city has a 5-year, $1.6 million agreement with Axon Enterprise for 146 body cameras and all the necessary software, hardware and licensing.
“The camera will turn on in two different ways. It can be manually activated by the officer simply by a double tap of the front button, or there are signal units that will talk to the camera that will be in the police car,” said Lt. Brian Hart with the Melbourne Police Department. “If we’re turning on our emergency lights, it’s going to turn on the camera for us.”
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If training goes as planned, all of the department’s body-worn cameras will be in use by October.
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Cox Media Group
