Watching Big Brother; On This Tour, Hidden Cameras Are Hidden No More

Watching Big Brother; On This Tour, Hidden Cameras Are Hidden No More

By SABRINA TAVERNISE (NYT) 1441 words
Late Edition - Final , Section B , Page 1 , Column 2

Editors' Note Appended

ABSTRACT - Performer and legal proofreader Bill Brown, from Brooklyn (NYC), is independently studying New York City's increasing trend toward surveillance, both public and private, as more hidden cameras crop up along city streets and parks; offers tours of surveillance-heavy streets around Washington Square Park in effort to expose what he says is destroying sense of community; photos (M)

Editors' Note: January 28, 2004, Wednesday

An article on Jan. 17 described a free Surveillance Camera Outdoor Walking Tour in Greenwich Village, led by Bill Brown, a Brooklyn resident who has been mapping the locations of hidden cameras in Manhattan for several years. The article quoted him as saying cameras were a sign of creeping control by the authorities and adding, ''This is warping human beings.''

Last Saturday Newsday reported that Mr. Brown was facing a misdemeanor charge of aggravated harassment in a recent case on Long Island that included evidence from a security camera.

A spokesman for the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office confirmed yesterday that Mr. Brown was arrested on Jan. 8 in connection with an overtly sexual and threatening telephone call to a 9-year-old girl, placed from a Manhattan law office where he worked as a proofreader. The camera image showed that Mr. Brown was in the building when the call was made, the spokesman said. His arraignment is scheduled for March 11.

Newsday also reported that Mr. Brown had a record of arrests in Rhode Island. According to the state Attorney General's Office there, he was arrested six times between December 1993 and March 1994 on misdemeanor charges of making obscene telephone calls. He received probation.