In article , tony cooper
wrote:

My son has a friend (a former class-mate) who is an undercover cop
working drug enforcement. During an arrest awhile back, some
bystander snapped some shots of the "perps" (1) being manhandled onto
the ground. My son's friend took the camera and reformatted the SD
card.(2)

The photographer squealed that he was photographing "police
brutality". The cop defended his action by saying that, as an
undercover cop, he should be able to protect his identity.

Both sides have a point.

the cop was very clearly in the wrong. he does *not* have the right to
reformat the card, destroying not just photos of himself but everything
else that was on it. at a minimum, that's destruction of property and
given that he manhandled the perps, i suspect he did the same to the
bystander.

Police brutality should be exposed, (pun
intended) but arrestees don't always go along quietly. Undercover
drug agents are at risk if their identity is known.

his identity is made known the moment he flashed his badge. after
that, there is nothing to protect. he's also in public and is subject
to being photographed. and rest assured that word gets around what the
undercover cops look like, photos or not.

(1) Love that cop talk!
(2) The cop is a pretty good amateur photographer and can work his way
around the Menu of any camera.

that's wonderful, but he broke the law. hopefully the bystander has a
good lawyer and also knows how to run an undelete utility.