Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Legal or Illegal

A few days ago, I went to the Home Depot to buy some plants for my front yard, as I was walking around the garden department; I noticed that the flowers in the garden were blooming, so, I took out my camera and started snapping like crazy.


A man standing next to me said, "Aren't you afraid that they're going to kick you out of here or sue you for taking photo without their permission?"

I replied nervously, "Oh, I didn't know that it was illegal to take photo in a public area."

So, I placed my camera back into my purse, picked up my plant and headed out to the cash register. On my way home, the man's comment kept lingered on in my head, so when I was home, I googled for it and here it is, “Code 116-53 in the patrol guide clearly affirms the First Amendment of the Constitution as it states: Members of the service (police) will not interfere with the video taping or photographing of incidents in public places. Intentional interference such as blocking or obstructing cameras or harassing the photographer constitutes censorship. Working Press Cards clearly state, ‘the bearer is entitled to cross police and fire lines.’ This right will be honored and access will not be denied. However, this does not include access to interior crime scenes or areas frozen for security reasons.”

Ha! :-p

Below, are some of the pictures that I took when I was in the Home Depot's garden department.




I purchased this plant, Sweet Broom

2 comments:

Cergie said...

It happen often for me too
It's forbidden to catch photograph in super market for instance
Sometimes I see some thing nice, a pretty reflection on the windox of a building and it is forbidden too to have it
I often had to remove my opicture
Because I have an APN it's easy
Have a good week end, Co Tim

Anonymous said...

You have a great weekend too, Cergie. Over here, taking picture in public area does not consider being illegal, there are some special circumstances. If you are stand in a public area, you can still take picture of a private are. The only time that it is consider to be illegal, if it involves personal information, such as a person's date of birth, name, I. D. numbers, or driver license, etc. or misleading information, such as taking picture of the President going out with his daughters and claim that's they are his mistress.