BALTIMORE – A Baltimore board has authorized a city plan to extend a multimillion dollar contract with the country's top vendor of body cameras for police.
The city's Board of Estimates on Wednesday amended an existing $11.7 million contract with Axon Enterprise Inc, an Arizona-based company formerly known as Taser International.
Baltimore's contract with Axon is now $18.5 million until 2023. It's designed to equip some 2,500 officers with the company's body cams, software and storage.
In recent years, civil rights activists around the country have called for body-worn cameras following a succession of deadly police shootings and other fatal encounters with citizens, particularly unarmed black men.
Some critics worry that the body cams are not being used as tools for transparency, but rather as tools to further law enforcement interests.
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