Chatham County Sheriff's Office buys body cameras to put extra eyes on patrol

Of the 24 county agencies WRAL News called Tuesday, six answered and reported their law enforcement officers wore body cameras: Chatham, Franklin, Granville, Hoke, Person, Nash and Orange counties.

In Chatham County, the sheriff’s office spent years researching the technology that will get the best view of police encounters.

The small device costs around $900, but those at the Chatham County Sheriff’s Office said it’s a small price to pay for having extra eyes on patrol and keeping the public's trust.

They previously had dash camera video, but they said body camera video with provide a more comprehensive view of an encounter.

“I think the public wants transparency and they want to see what's going on,” Sheriff Mike Roberson said.

Roberson said he hopes the brand new body cameras will show the entire picture of patrol.

“We're going to put them where we think they're going to get the most use- our patrol, our civil unit and our detention unit to start off with," he said.

From the box to the belt, 66 extra eyes will hit the streets of Chatham County.

“Well the idea is to show what happened so, whether it's positive or negative, to show it happened,” Roberson said.

The department put careful research into selecting the style, ruling out options that haven't been as successful for departments across the country, like body camera's one wears on the chest.

“If I was drawing my weapon, and I was actually using it for force than the camera would only capture my hands and behind the weapon," Captain Chris Cooper said.

“This camera here offers us the ability to maneuver the lens. So I actually can maneuver it up and down. Which works great for me because I'm a little shorter,” Cooper said.

Officers will be trained to use the body cameras, and they are setting a policy that they will be on anytime police interact with the community.

The department said they have plenty of storage space and servers to hold the video footage. The footage will hold for about 180 days.

North Carolina law requires one to have a court order to obtain body camera video.