PANAMA CITY, Fla. (WMBB) – The Panama City Police Department is buying more body cameras to make sure every officer is equipped with the technology.
PCPD was awarded an $81,000 grant for the cameras.
Police Chief Mark Smith said the department has grown since Hurricane Michael. He said they currently have about 94 officers, but only 85 cameras.
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The department has been using body cams for about a year, and Chief Smith said they are beneficial in many ways.
“We have found that the body cameras have just been great for court purposes, for evidentiary purposes, and also for the officer complaint purposes where people or citizens are coming in and complaining that an officer was rude on a traffic stop or something like that,” Chief Smith said.
Chief Smith already approved the go-ahead to buy 12 new body cams with the grant, and save the rest of the money for future department growth. He expects the cameras to be in next week.
