MEMPHIS, Tenn. — On Wednesday, WREG learned which Memphis Police Officers would get the body cameras first.
Memphis Police said they would be going to one precinct at a time and the Old Allen Precinct will be their first stop.
There’s still no exact date on when body cameras will hit the streets, with officials only saying that it will happen sometime this year.
The City of Memphis has talked about body cameras for about two years, but when it comes to police and the District Attorney’s Office there wasn’t much talking when it came to figuring out how to store the thousands of hours of footage recorded by the cameras.
It’s a process they say is timely and costly.
“There had not been a little bit of talk but at the time we were talking the prospect of all officers in MPD wearing body cameras, the execution of that nobody told us it was going to happen on this certain day,” said District Attorney Amy Weirich.
She went on to say it wasn’t until September when MPD publicly announced the camera roll out that she knew about any set timelines.
When asked about why there wasn’t any communication, Weirich said she simply didn’t know.
“You’d have to ask someone in City Hall or MPD, really someone in City Hall because the minute we found out about it we got to work. But I can’t answer why we didn’t find out about it until late September.”
That’s when Weirich said she hoped to be ready by January 1.
Instead, her office is still communicating with other cities and D.A. Offices to figure out how they’re cataloging video that could possibly be used as evidence.
Weirich stressed the ultimate goal is to get the body cameras on police as quickly as possible.
“We have weekly meetings with MPD command staff. A crew in my office that’s doing this in addition to their jobs as full time prosecutors.”
One of the meetings is set up for this Friday.
Some MPD cruisers have already been outfitted with cameras. The Old Allen precinct will test the cameras for a two to four week period but when they will start is still unknown.
WREG reached out to MPD for a comment but did not hear back.
