The New York Times has a story this week about gunshot location systems, which use microphones installed around a city to detect, and triangulate the location of, gunshots, so that police can be sent to the scene. The Times has discovered that in at least one city, however, the system recorded a loud street argument. And the recording, which was made in New Bedford, Mass., is likely to be at issue in the case against two men charged with murder.
If the courts start allowing recordings of conversations picked up by these devices to be admitted as evidence, then it will provide an additional incentive to the police to install microphones in our public spaces, over and above what is justified by the level of effectiveness the technology proves to have in pinpointing gun shots.
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