It's hard to believe such a bad law was even passed in the first place. The concern with this court decision is that it wasn't declared unconstitutional because filming the police should be the right of any citizen, but because the law was too far reaching. Why is it OK for police to film protesters but not the other way around? Filming should be allowed for any citizen. As the government likes to say, what are they afraid of? ars technica:
In Cook County today Judge Stanley J. Sacks declared Illinois' eavesdropping law—which is one of the toughest in the nation—unconstitutional in his ruling in the case of Christopher Drew, who was charged with the felony crime in 2009. The eavesdropping law prohibits citizens from making audio or visual recordings of others without every recorded person's explicit consent. Sixty-year-old artist Drew audio-recorded his interaction with a police officer who was arresting him for selling art patches at the side of the road. A police officer found the tape recorder and Drew found himself with a Class 1 felony charge, which carries up to 15 years in prison. “That's one step below attempted murder,” Drew said in a January interview with the New York Times.
