Public Safety Technology in the News

Forensics in Three Dimensions
Miller-McCune, (08/05/2010), Megan Scudellari
Geometric morphometrics, which is three-dimensional analysis of the shape of  a surface to analyze human skulls, lies behind a new forensic technique developed using National Institute of Justice funding that will help
identify the ancestry of children's remains. 3D-ID, a Java program, helps anyone with a computer and a digitizer determine the ancestry of a skull, and can be  downloaded for free from
http://www.3D-ID.org. The program could prove  of use to anthropologists and medical examiners alike.
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Maryland Gets Tough on Auto Theft
GovMonitor, (08/05/2010)
Maryland has become the first state to create a statewide network for license plate recognition (LPR) with a significant expansion of its program, which will use state funding to bring the  technology to local jurisdictions. Previously,  the program included use of the LPR technology by state agencies only. All LPRs  that are part of the program will be networked to share information and granted  access to a statewide database. The expansion doubles the state's previous $2  million investment in LPR technology, with the additional funding coming from a federal Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance grant, federal homeland  security funding and the Maryland Department of Transportation.
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Appeals Court Limits Use of GPS to Track Suspects
Washington Post, (08/07/2010), Spencer Hsu
A federal appeals court has ruled that police will need a warrant if they want to use a Global Positioning system device to track a person's movements for an extended period of time. The ruling clears the way for the Supreme Court to decide the privacy impact of the new surveillance technology in products such as cell phones and vehicle-navigation systems. The decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit struck down the drug conviction of Antoine Jones. The panel said the FBI and District police overstepped their authority by tracking his movements for four weeks, placing a GPS monitoring device in his car after an initial warrant had expired. Civil libertarians say police should have obtained a judge's approval for a warrant based on probable cause that he was committing a crime. Police say officers can freely trail a person on public thoroughfares, and that using technology to do the same thing saves taxpayer money and police resources.
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Planefield Police Using License Plate Scanners
mycentraljersey.com, (08/09/10), Mark Spivey
Police in Plainfield, N.J., are among the most recent departments to use  license plate scanners. The department's system quickly scans and photographs  license plates, catalogs them digitally and runs then against a series of  criminal databases. The department is using the system on a trial basis and will  decide whether to install them permanently in more patrol cars. The technology was made available to police through a Homeland Security grant given to the Union County Prosecutor's Office. The technology automatically matches license plates with owner records and alerts officers of outstanding warrants or other crime-related information. Police have been using the scanners to check license plates in recent violence hot spots, but can also use the scanners for identifying stolen vehicles. The technology used by Plainfield can catalog information up to four vehicles per second and can scan vehicles traveling up to 100 miles per hour.
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Chicago Using Predictive Analytics to Fight Crime, Police Chief Says
Government Technology, (08/09/10)
The
Chicago Police Department is working on a system to track crime hot spots. With funding from the National Institute of Justice, the department is working with the Illinois Institute of Technology and the Rand Corp in order to track every incident that's linked to a known gang member in order to build the analytics engine. This approach, called predictive analytics, is used by agencies that recognize that some types of crime can
be predicted by software. In Memphis, police credit predictive analytics technology with reducing crime by 30 percent. The Los Angeles Police Department is currently using a simulation model that analyzes how different crime hot spots respond to increased policing.
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DMV's Facial Recognition Software Hailed for More Than 100 Felony Arrests,
Thwarting Crimes
silive.com, (08/10/10)
The New York Department of Motor Vehicles has identified more than 1,000 cases of possible fraud in the six months it has been using facial recognition technology. The department uses the software to help identify persons who attempt to obtain more than one driver's license or nondriver identification documents. The software converts DMV's digital, facial photographs into mathematical algorithms. It can help prevent someone from obtaining a second license or nondriver ID to evade license suspensions or commit identify theft or fraud.
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President Obama Signs into Law Ban on Cell Phones in Federal Prisons
CNN, (08/10/10), Terry Frieden
A law signed by President Obama bans cell phone use by federal prisoners. The Federal Bureau of Prisons confiscated more than 2,600 cell phones from minimum security facilities and 600 from secure federal institutions last year. Inmates have been known to direct crimes from behind bars using cell phones, including
gang activity, drug distribution and credit card fraud. The law prohibits the use or possession of mobile phones and wireless devices. Anyone caught trying to smuggle a cell phone to an inmate could face up to a year in prison. The law also requires a government study to be done in a year to measure the
effectiveness of the new law.
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Justice Department Report Cites Backlog in DNA Analyses
Washington Post, (08/10/10), Ed O'Keefe
The FBI has a backlog of more than 3,200 forensic DNA cases, according to a new report. The report released by the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General said the FBI lab is not meeting its goal of processing cases in 60 days, and some cases take up to 600 days for final results. The report faults the agency's seven-year, $10 million effort to develop an electronic system to track the backlog. Delays are also caused by the FBI's efforts to help state and local forensic labs reduce their backlogs, and federal law that allows law enforcement to collect DNA samples from anyone convicted of a federal offense. In its response to the report, the FBI attributed the backlog to a lack of money and manpower.
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Cedar Rapids Hopes Federal Grant Improves Emergency Communications
Radio Iowa, (08/16/2010), Dar Danielson
Cedar Rapids is using a $2.5 million federal grant to help improve its emergency response system. In 2008, a flood interrupted 911 service and public safety communications. The goal of the new network is to ensure that if the dispatch center is knocked out again, dispatchers could go to the sheriff's office or to another neighboring community, plug in, and fully function. The total cost of the communications network is $10 million. Completion is expected in 2012. The city also received money from the state's I-JOBS program for other disaster recovery projects. The former federal courthouse will receive $2 Million for renovations and flood protection.
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License Plate Scanners to Keep Eye on Visitors
Augusta Chronicle, (08/15/2010), Susan McCord
Augusta officials want to place license plate reader scanners on Savannah River bridges that carry thousands of motorists between Augusta with North Augusta. Police say the scanners would be helpful in fighting crime and are applying for federal grants to pay for them. The scanners read the plates and compare them with information from the National Crime Information Center. The system marks each tag with a date, time and GPS coordinates and takes a color photo of the vehicle. Agencies using the technology in other states have found it helpful in recovering stolen vehicles.
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