'Pittsburgh CopBlock' Documents Moon Police

He said he heard a man was lying in a Moon driveway with "bumps and bruises."

With a video camera in tow, a man who identified himself as Craig Freeman drove to the scene in June to film officers as they responded to the incident. He later uploaded a grainy video to YouTube to document the incident. 

Freeman and others have formed a small activist organization dubbed Pittsburgh CopBlock, which is an offshoot of the national CopBlock.org. According to Freeman on the organization's blog, the group hopes to prevent and document what it describes as instances of Pittsburgh-area police officers abusing their authority.

The group has created a YouTube channel dedicated to trailing the police as they respond to various incidents. The Moon Police video has garnered about 800 views since it was uploaded June 26.

Freeman said in the blog that he is 31, has a history of juvenile arrests for underage drinking and is on probation after being involved in a car crash without a valid, state-issued drivers license. He could not be reached for direct comments.

From the blog:

“Hi, my name is Craig. A.J. and I are the creators of the Pittsburgh CopBlock YouTube channel – inspired by Copblock.org. We made the Pittsburgh CopBlock channel because we are tired of watching police and public officials blatantly and openly violate the laws [that] they are sworn to uphold.”

In the video, Freeman commends Moon officers for their response at the scene. The video is titled "Moon Twp police good job helping victim [sic]."

Chief Leo McCarthy said he has not seen the video, but officers in his department have viewed it.

"It's their First Amendment rights; it's free speech," McCarthy said of the group. "Our officers know when they're on the scene that they have to be cognizant of the fact that they are on video. In Mooncrest [neighborhood] there are 19 surveillance cameras filming at all times."

McCarthy said he hoped the group would not seek to directly interact with police officers.

"It becomes a problem when they interfere," he said. "It's a problem if they're distracting officers and causing a scene to escalate or cause harm to be inflicted on an officer."