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WNIJ's summary of news items around our state.

Rockford PD Launches Body Cam Pilot Program

Flickr: West Midlands Police
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Photo cropped from original

The Rockford Police Department is launching a body camera program today.

Thirteen volunteer officers will wear body cameras for a 60-day trial period. 

Douglas Pann is the city’s Assistant Deputy Police Chief. He says this kind of program hasn’t been done before with the department.

“It’s really a test-and-evaluate. Once they complete that, then we would look at other vendors also. But at this point, this will be the first one," Pann said.

The police department has been developing the program since June. Pann sees the cameras as a useful tool for the department.

“It will help us to build trust in our community. It will provide the level of transparency that that objective point-of-view of a camera provides," Pann said.

Pann says the department will seek feedback of the cameras. But it hasn’t scheduled any public forums.

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