Police Body-Worn Camera Transcription For Law Enforcement

Body Cam Footage Transcription For Law Enforcement Agencies

Body cameras are becoming a priority for law enforcement agencies. Our boys in blue are protected from false claims with them, and their recordings can be used down the line for video evidence or scenario training. On the other hand, the public can rest easy knowing that bodycam footage can help clean bad actors off the force and keep our police accountable. Even better, by getting help from trusted law enforcement transcription services, the benefits of these body-worn cameras (BWC) footage can be further enhanced. 

Why Police Departments Need Body Cameras for Audio and Video Recording

The benefits of BWCs are not limited to law enforcement agencies. These body cam videos can be used for a variety of tasks and goals, including: 

Meet our CEO

Ben Walker

Hello, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I founded Ditto Transcripts in 2010. Since then, we’ve been providing certified, accurate, cost-effective transcription services for professionals in law enforcement, legal, medical, academic research, and more.

Connect with me on:

X

LinkedIn

Facebook

How Outsourcing Transcription for Body Camera Video Recording Can Help

Transcription is turning speech into text. It’s a simple process, yet quite time-consuming, and tends to affect service quality if assigned to already-exhausted police officers. 

Transcription service providers can help with police encounters as they help with other law enforcement recordings. Here are some of the most notable benefits from transcription of BWC footage:

Positively Impacts Productivity

Police officers and detectives have a lot of paperwork to go through as part of their jobs. As more and more departments implement body cameras as part of their SOP, writing those reports might involve reviewing patrol and body cam footage to ensure complete and accurate details. 

Transcribing the footage can assist with making the officer’s workflow faster and more efficient. More efficient paperwork means fast evidence review, and our officers will have more time and energy to focus on their main responsibilities, like protecting the public. This can also mitigate overtime and alleviate burnout, which allows law enforcement officers to keep morale up. 

Cost-effective Measure

Sometimes, transcripts are not optional, so police departments and law enforcement agencies must transcribe their various recorded material.

In such cases, they are forced to either hire in-house transcriptionists or have administrative staff or, if there is a personnel shortage, ask the police officers themselves to transcribe the audio and video files for police use. Such measures come with high costs, especially with police officers possibly logging unnecessary overtime to sit through hours of footage and do the transcription work themselves. 

One of the primary benefits of outsourcing is reduced costs; transcription service providers offer an excellent alternative to these in-house setups. Companies like Ditto Transcripts do all the work necessary to produce high-quality and accurate transcripts at affordable rates, freeing up more manpower and resources for law enforcement agencies to allocate to their other duties. 

Enhances Documentation and Review

A modestly sized police department with twenty officers for every shift equipped with body cams performing round-the-clock duties will generate about 480 hours of recorded footage daily. Large police departments can generate a lot more, and longer shifts mean long police reports and transcripts. 

Most of the footage will be inconsequential. However, video and audio footage of police encounters with private citizens or inside a person’s home must be logged and included in reports. 

Having these recordings transcribed makes it faster to document and organize such encounters. There’ll be no need to sit through every recording looking for specific exchanges, as transcripts are digitally searchable in all formats and come equipped with time stamps, speaker labels, and other accessibility features. Everyone, including city prosecutors, will be happier overall. Which leads me to my next point—

Court Use

Verbatim transcripts can be an invaluable resource for the prosecution if the police encounter advances to the point of legal proceedings. Transcripts can help preserve evidence and keep details of conversations intact, which can further be used to enforce or contradict any claim during a hearing. In fact, certain parts of the criminal justice system (if not all of them) require transcripts of any criminal or court proceeding along with their source video exhibits. 

Law enforcement transcription service providers may also offer customized formatting and generation of transcripts ready for printing and presentation in court. Additionally, reliable providers can also have such transcripts certified for court use.

Certification means that the provider is willing to guarantee the accuracy and veracity of the transcript’s contents. Certified transcripts are given more weight in the eyes of the law because the transcription service providers are willing to testify in court about their authenticity and accuracy. 

Security and Privacy

Reputable transcription service providers usually offer discretion and comprehensive security measures to protect their clients’ data and sensitive information. This is especially important for agencies handling law enforcement encounters, as sensitive details like individual names, addresses, phone numbers, and other private information are routinely recorded. 

Some (not all) providers offer CJIS-compliant services, which means all data transfers are protected under the Criminal Justice Information Services’ guidelines. For context, CJIS handles data for all US Criminal Justice System branches, from the FBI to your local county sheriff’s office and everything in between. 

Recruiting CJIS-certified transcription providers like Ditto ensures that transcribed body cam footage are handled just as carefully and discreetly as any piece of evidence. 

Some cases will require the release of records that contain specific information that cannot be released to the public. In the case of video or audio recordings, these details need to be bleeped out using video or audio editing software. Transcripts make redacting or expunging those details easier, ensuring that non-public information is unintentionally disclosed.

Don’t Waste Your Time Transcribing Body-Worn Camera Footage. Choose Ditto

Police work is not easy; dealing with mountains of paperwork can make it even more cumbersome. Let us help you with that. 

Ditto’s human transcription services for law enforcement agencies offer the best quality and accuracy you could ever hope for in a transcription partner. We transcribe audio and video files and turn them into 99% accuracy transcripts ready to be quickly reviewed and used by your department. No need to hire an outside editor to check; we do every step for you. 

We offer flexible services to meet your requirements. Need us to transcribe hours of recording or just one? We’ll do them with the same quality and accuracy as everything else.  We won’t charge you with extravagant and/or hidden fees. All our pricing are upfront, and we’ll inform you of any changes prior to initiating work. 

Ditto also provides fast turnaround times to meet critical deadlines. Video or audio files can be transcribed as fast as 24 hours, often even less. This gives cops more time to focus on police duties instead of hunkering down on their desks and getting their morale sapped by the threat of paperwork. Ditto is also fully CJIS-certified. We keep your files safe, and you can maintain the integrity of criminal justice information security.

For Law Enforcement Agencies, Ditto Transcripts Offers Several Perks, Including:

Always Here
When You
Need Us

Unlike other transcription companies, we prioritize your calls and concerns. Each of our departments has its own dedicated account manager, quality assurance manager, and transcription team to ensure each client receives personalized, outstanding service.

Jack Of All Trades? We Prefer “Expert In All Fields.”

You have everything you need at Ditto Transcripts. Law enforcement transcription. Legal transcription. Any recording, any file, any document, any time. Give us a call at (720) 287-3710 to sign up for our services.

We are honored to be associated with these badges of honor.

We take pride in assisting law enforcement agencies across the United States with their police transcription services needs. Among the dozens we currently work with:

---