Long Island Press Long Island Press
Serving the opinion leaders of Long Island
Long Island Press Long Island Press
Long Island Press Long Island Press
  • Home
  • Long Island News
  • Columns
  • Entertainment News
  • Living
  • Special Series
  • CURRENT LONGISLANDPRESS.COM
  • SECTIONS
    • Home
    • Long Island News
    • Columns
    • Entertainment News
    • Living
    • Special Series
    • CURRENT LONGISLANDPRESS.COM

Covert Ops: Long Island’s High-Tech War on Crime

by Shelly Feuer Domash on September 20, 2012
Long Island's High-Tech War on Crime

Long Island's High-Tech War on Crime

With a recent slaying in Roosevelt, a team of Nassau County police manning an inconspicuous location in Massapequa stand at the ready. The unsolved murder has ignited tensions in the neighborhood, and their unit is determined to stamp out the flames.

Suddenly an alert goes off—there’s been another shot fired in the neighborhood. They launch into action.

Simultaneously, other officers at police headquarters in Mineola are notified. So are the local precinct cars, which descend on the scene as detectives pull video footage from an onsite camera.

The blurred images reveal a small group of men hanging out on a street in front of a known Bloods gang house, the site of the previous shooting. A silver Infinity emerges from the corner of the screen, slowly pulling up to the group. A gun is visible and the shot goes off.

The detectives don’t recognize the faces, but they call in the local cops who do. They run any plates from that area at that time and put out an alert to other officers approaching the scene. They’ve identified the shooter and his vehicle and warn cops at the scene that the occupants are armed and dangerous.

Within minutes, the cops find the car with a gun inside. Its occupants are arrested.

“What was going to happen?” asks Det. Sgt. Patrick Ryder, head of the elite unit. “They were going to confront each other and shoot each other. One was going to die.”

Ryder and his team were able to respond so quickly and so effectively primarily due to just one of several state-of-the-art, high-tech weapons in their ever-growing arsenal: the ShotSpotter Gunshot Detection System, a precision-based gunfire, surveillance, analysis and alert system.

Sensors located on top of buildings and light poles identify the sound of a gunshot and differentiate it from other noises, such as a vehicle backfire or fireworks. Up to 20 sensors are installed per square mile, each able to detect gunfire within a 1- to 2-square mile range. A Global Positional System relays information about a shooting within six seconds of a firearm’s discharge. The system can identify how many shots were fired, which shot was fired first, and if the shots came from a moving vehicle. It can also pinpoint the location of a gunshot to within three feet.

The quick response and apprehension in Roosevelt is but one example of Nassau’s Intelligence-Led Policing at work, a program touted by top police officials in Suffolk, too. Mostly operating behind-the-scenes of local communities, the initiative is a whole new way to approach law enforcement, from home invasions and burglaries to crimes more severe, such as assaults and murder. Every day this strategy is being utilized across Nassau and Suffolk counties, whether residents—or criminals—know it or not.

Officials hope it can help fill the gap left by the retirement of hundreds of cops in the last few years.

Major crimes including murder, rape, assault, robbery and burglary are up in Nassau and slightly down in Suffolk, according to crime statistics encompassing the first six months of this year. The number of police in both counties has been on a historically precipitous decline. And more and more Long Islanders are arming themselves, following a national trend. All of these factors speak to the added weight placed on local precincts to not only keep crime rates down and neighborhoods safe, but to work more efficiently with the resources they currently have.

Supporters say proof of the program’s impact is as evident as simply walking down the blocks of the communities in which it’s utilized.

“Go back to the community and they will tell you it is safer now,” says Nassau County Police First Deputy Commissioner Thomas Krumpter. “They know it is safer, they know there are less shots fired.”

Yet despite its successes, this means of warfare isn’t without its detractors, who criticize the tactics as an affront to civil liberties or merely smoke and mirrors designed to cover up what is a dangerously low level of cops on the streets.

“You can have all the intelligence in the world and it is not going to tell you that some guy is coming out after having a couple of drinks and decides to stick up a gas station,” says Joseph King, a professor of law and police science at John Jay College. “Nothing is going to tell you that. The only thing that may tell you that is a patrol officer driving by and seeing something.”

Nassau’s headquarters for its program is as covert and unassuming as some of its technologies—the NCPD Real-Time Intelligence Center housed unsuspectingly right under residents’ noses.

PAGES
1 2 3 4
Your reaction
LOL
100%
Cool
0%
What!?
0%
Meh...
0%
Sad
0%
RAGE!
0%
Long Island News, News
ACLUAmerican Civil Liberties Unionbig brothercamerasCover Storycovert opscriminal justiceEd ManganoEdward ManganoEdward Webberfeaturedfeatured-scrollFloral ParkGlen Cicconegun permitsgunshot detection systemHempsteadIntelintelligenceintelligence-led policingJames BurkeJames CarverJason StarrJohn Jay College of Criminal JusticeJohn KingKevin Fallonlaw enforcementlicense plate readersLong IslandMineolamurderNassau CountyNassau County Police DepartmentNCPDNew Hyde ParkPatrick RyderPBApolicePolice Benevolent Associationprivacyred light camerasRooseveltSCPDShotSpottersouthern state parkwaySuffolk Countysuffolk county police departmentThomas KrumpterUniondaleYaphank
ACLU, American Civil Liberties Union, big brother, cameras, Cover Story, covert ops, criminal justice, Ed Mangano, Edward Mangano, Edward Webber, featured, featured-scroll, Floral Park, Glen Ciccone, gun permits, gunshot detection system, Hempstead, Intel, intelligence, intelligence-led policing, James Burke, James Carver, Jason Starr, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, John King, Kevin Fallon, law enforcement, license plate readers, Long Island, Mineola, murder, Nassau County, Nassau County Police Department, NCPD, New Hyde Park, Patrick Ryder, PBA, police, Police Benevolent Association, privacy, red light cameras, Roosevelt, SCPD, ShotSpotter, southern state parkway, Suffolk County, suffolk county police department, Thomas Krumpter, Uniondale, Yaphank
About the Author
Shelly Feuer Domash
You might also dig
 

Big Brother Winner: Who Won Big Brother?

by Long Island Press on September 16, 2010
Hayden Moss was declared the winner of Big Brother 12 Wednesday night, winning $500,000. Moss, nicknamed “The Animal,” beat out Lane “The Beast” Elenburg in the final round of the Head of Household contest. According to RealityWorld.com, 24-year-old Moss [...]
 

‘Big Brother 9’ Winner Faces Drug Charges

by Long Island Press on October 22, 2009
After all that time spent eating worms and peeing in a hole, we would have taken our half a million dollars in prize money, put on our Mickey ears and headed to Disney, but Big Brother Season 9 winner Adam Jasinski decided opening an online oxycodone [...]
Long Island Press is a registered trademark of Schneps Communications. © 2017. All rights reserved.