COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) - Boone County's top prosecutor says police body cameras are an important investigative tool but also create a huge workload crunch for prosecutors who have to review all of the video.
Boone County Prosecuting Attorney Dan Knight made the statements this week when asking the county commission to fund two new positions in his 2015 budget.
Body cameras are now worn by 115 Columbia police officers, and video from each arrest is reviewed by Knight's office. While in the past a prosecutor might read a one- or two-page report, some cases now require an assistant prosecutor to review what could be hours of video footage, he said.
"I think it is going to be a great thing for law enforcement, no doubt about it," Knight told the commission on Monday. "It's creating quite a bit of additional work" for assistant prosecutors.
He said he needs another assistant prosecutor and an office specialist who also would help scan documents to move the office to a paperless, or e-filing, system. The positions would add $109,000 to his budget, for a total 2015 budget of $2.5 million. The office's budget has been $2.3 million each of the past two years.
As of Aug. 25, each prosecutor in his office was handling an average of 438 pending cases, Knight said. The workload likely will increase even more if voters approve the city's proposed property tax hike that could add as many as 40 more police officers over the next five years.
"And each of those new cops will have a body camera," said Commissioner Janet Thompson, who also worries about the extra time needed for time-strapped public defenders to review all the new video evidence.
Because body camera footage is part of criminal cases, it must be shared with defense attorneys as part of the discovery process.
In addition, University of Missouri police are scheduled to start using body cameras in mid-November, and the Boone County Sheriff's Office is considering a body camera pilot project.
"It's a sad day in the state when an officer's word is not good enough, but this is where we are," said Assistant Columbia Police Chief John Gordon. "I don't see them going away."