Following years of calls for the Worcester Police Department to implement a body camera program, police officials say officers will begin wearing the cams Feb. In a recent memo to City Council, Police Chief Steve Sargent said the department possesses body cams and officers have received training on how to operate them.
The program makes Worcester, the second-largest locality in New England, the last of the region's most populous cities to implement body cameras β officers in Boston, Providence, Springfield, Hartford, New Haven and Stamford already wear the devices.
The rollout also comes as the U. Department of Justice investigates Worcester police for excessive use of force and discriminatory policing based on race and sex. Worcester officials have been considering body cameras since when a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, fatally shot Michael Brown. In recent years, Worcester police have slowly worked toward creating a body camera program, holding community listening sessions on the matter and outfitting a small group of officers with body cams as part of a brief pilot program in At times, police officials have expressed concerns that body cams may make officers hesitant to be proactive and use force when necessary for fear of public criticism.
City officials also said they were having difficulty securing funding for a permanent body cam program. Still, city councilors and social justice activists continued to call for police body cams, and early last year the police department secured funding from the state to purchase cameras.
The department originally said the body cams would be deployed on officers by late , but supply chain issues delayed their delivery. The body cameras will be given to officers whose work includes neighborhood response, traffic and vice. A spokesperson for the police department said the other members of the police department, including staffers in police headquarters, will not immediately wear cameras.
