Citizens have been watching movies on DVD and recording their favorite shows with TiVo for years. But the New Jersey State Police have yet to make the jump to digital, reports the Newark Star-Ledger. New Jersey’s largest law enforcement agency still records its motor vehicle stops using VHS cameras, filling more than 165,000 tapes that have clogged storage facilities over the last decade.
But times are changing. The State Police will install digital recording equipment in 600 patrol cars, at a cost of $4.7 million. The original cameras were installed after an April 1998 incident on the New Jersey Turnpike in which troopers fired into a van carrying four unarmed minority men, injuring three. The shooting highlighted the practice of stopping motorists based on race.