Today I had to bring my mother-in-law to the Office of Motor Vehicles to straighten out a problem with her registration. We went to the Harvey Office on the Westbank Expressway. Now, I knew they prohibit weapons there (in the past, they tried to confiscate my Swiss Army knife) so, of course I left anything I thought they might even remotely call a weapon in the car.
As we went through the metal detector, with all the scary "no weapons" signs all around, the machine sounded off on me. The guard asked for whatever was in my shirt pocket, as she could see it sagging. I had forgotten that the digital voice recorder I usually carry was in my shirt pocket; so I held it up to her saying I forgot it was there. She grabbed it out of my hand and yelled at me.
"It's illegal to bring one of those in here!"
"You're kidding." I replied.
"No, you might record what someone says and then use it against them in court. So you can't have it."
Well, since my mother-in-law was already somewhat upset at having to face the OMV folks anyway, I apologized to the guard and pled ignorance of the law, saying it was just something I always carried around everyday, and knowing full well that I'd have called for her supervisor if I were alone. She said she'd hold it for me and would give it back when I left.
The business at the OMV counter went surprisingly quickly and my mother-in-law was greatly relieved to be leaving the place. I took my DVR back from the guard and said that I thought that was the stupidest prohibition I'd ever heard of. Then I asked if there was a sign anywhere and began to look for one. My mother-in-law started to get nervous and the guard went into the back room, so we left. As I was going out the door, I heard the guard calling to someone in the back that there was a guy "complaining about the law."
When I got home, I did a fairly lengthy search of the state laws at the Louisiana Legislative website; and as I suspected, found no such law anywhere. The closest is RS 15:1303 "Interception and disclosure of wire, electronic, or oral communications" - the anti-wiretapping and eavesdropping law. The law doesn't have any sort of prohibition against having a recorder in any state office building, but it is intended to prevent people from randomly recording other people's private conversations.
The kicker is that it specifically ALLOWS you to secretly record any conversation that YOU are a party to [RS 15:1303, C. (4)]. So everyone who wants to carry a recorder, feel free to use it as long as you are one of the people talking.
Next I think I'll write a complaint letter to the Secretary of the Department.
As we went through the metal detector, with all the scary "no weapons" signs all around, the machine sounded off on me. The guard asked for whatever was in my shirt pocket, as she could see it sagging. I had forgotten that the digital voice recorder I usually carry was in my shirt pocket; so I held it up to her saying I forgot it was there. She grabbed it out of my hand and yelled at me.
"It's illegal to bring one of those in here!"
"You're kidding." I replied.
"No, you might record what someone says and then use it against them in court. So you can't have it."
Well, since my mother-in-law was already somewhat upset at having to face the OMV folks anyway, I apologized to the guard and pled ignorance of the law, saying it was just something I always carried around everyday, and knowing full well that I'd have called for her supervisor if I were alone. She said she'd hold it for me and would give it back when I left.
The business at the OMV counter went surprisingly quickly and my mother-in-law was greatly relieved to be leaving the place. I took my DVR back from the guard and said that I thought that was the stupidest prohibition I'd ever heard of. Then I asked if there was a sign anywhere and began to look for one. My mother-in-law started to get nervous and the guard went into the back room, so we left. As I was going out the door, I heard the guard calling to someone in the back that there was a guy "complaining about the law."
When I got home, I did a fairly lengthy search of the state laws at the Louisiana Legislative website; and as I suspected, found no such law anywhere. The closest is RS 15:1303 "Interception and disclosure of wire, electronic, or oral communications" - the anti-wiretapping and eavesdropping law. The law doesn't have any sort of prohibition against having a recorder in any state office building, but it is intended to prevent people from randomly recording other people's private conversations.
The kicker is that it specifically ALLOWS you to secretly record any conversation that YOU are a party to [RS 15:1303, C. (4)]. So everyone who wants to carry a recorder, feel free to use it as long as you are one of the people talking.
Next I think I'll write a complaint letter to the Secretary of the Department.
