Random Thoughts - Training Camp edition

[JAF-N72EX]

On 8/6/2022 at 8:05 PM, CBears019 said:

It’s so rare that there’s a camera in place where the crime happened, that’s operating at the time of the crime, with good quality, and an owner who’s willing to provide the footage.  It happens, but rare.  I couldnt tell you how many times my job would have been made so much easier if a camera was only positioned like a few degrees in a different direction.

Two part question just out of curiosity. How helpful are those Police cams? I don't know how it is where your from, but half of them don't even work here and they also don't have enough manpower to watch 24/7.

Also, has the "shotspotter" technology ever helped that you know of? 

This is what I mean: https://www.shotspotter.com/

[CBears019]

7 hours ago, JAF-N72EX said:

Two part question just out of curiosity. How helpful are those Police cams? I don't know how it is where your from, but half of them don't even work here and they also don't have enough manpower to watch 24/7.

Also, has the "shotspotter" technology ever helped that you know of? 

This is what I mean: https://www.shotspotter.com/

I’ll start with shotspotter.  I’m in a suburb probably 45 min west of Chicago, so we don’t have those.  If you read articles in the paper they will tell you shotspotter is super unreliable and brings unnecessary police presence to certain areas of the city when no actual shootings occurred.  However, a few months ago i was in a Chicago district working on a case.  Their radio kept going off like every ten minutes with different shotspotter activations.  The detectives i was with were saying that they are almost 100% accurate.  I think the disconnect between them and the media is that when no person was actually hit by a bullet and/or there is no victim in the area to speak with the police it probably gets documented differently from a shooting (criminal damage, reckless conduct, etc).  Idk just speculating here.

As for police cameras, not entirely sure what you mean.  I know Flock cameras are all the rage right now.  Essentially cameras installed on major roadways primarily designed as license plate readers.  We dont have those in our town yet, but they’re coming.  One nice feature of Flock is that once you have them in your town you are essentially a part of a social media group with other police agencies with Flock.  You can become “friends” with other agencies and once you do that you are allowed access to all of their Flock cameras as well.
 

Those are real helpful for tracking stolen autos.  I also recently had a string of robberies that ended up stretching to suburbs way south of my town.  I was able to connect our offender to a total of like 9 robberies in 5 or 6 different jurisdictions mainly based on seeing the car he was driving nearby a different robbery location like a hour and a half away from my town on a flock camera.

[dll2000]

I keep hearing of crimes that are being quickly solved by  doorbells.  I remember one neighbor put in security cameras years ago and some other neighbors were kind of pissed about it.   It felt weird to them.  

Now in 2022 about 40% of the homes in my neighborhood have ring doorbells and growing.

The cameras everywhere and on our phones  and various tracking software are a huge invasion of privacy, but on other hand they are also a huge crime deterrent.   My parents never knew where I was unless I was in bed sleeping.

Much of this generations parents know where their kids are at all times.  Like the Weasley's clock.

 

[dll2000]

4 hours ago, CBears019 said:

 

Those are real helpful for tracking stolen autos.  I also recently had a string of robberies that ended up stretching to suburbs way south of my town.  I was able to connect our offender to a total of like 9 robberies in 5 or 6 different jurisdictions mainly based on seeing the car he was driving nearby a different robbery location like a hour and a half away from my town on a flock camera.

Crimes are often committed by same people again and again.   Big reason why longer prison sentences resulted in a such a huge drop in crime for awhile.

In 70s things got really bad - why we had hit movies like Dirty Harry, Death Wish and Warriors. 

All kinds of rehab programs were tried and nothing really worked - then they just tried longer sentences and that seems to have done trick relatively speaking.   Nothing works completely.  But all the rehab gimmicks over various decades seem to have mostly failed spectacularly in terms of recidivism.  

Crime seems to have gone back up again as we have gotten away from that politically - not just that there are multiple reasons I am sure.   I was a criminal justice major in undergrad.   We had to study this stuff and different methods and their results.   

Chicago seems particularly bad of late.   Done a lot of real estate closings with people moving out of city to suburbs and number one reason they give me is they don't feel safe in city anymore.  Whether it is real or not, the perception is 100% real anecdotally.  

I invited some people to Bears Family Fest and they almost didn't go because they didn't want to go to city with their kid.  I also invited a number of people to a Cubs game in Sept. and they turned turned me down for same reason.  I am just going to sell the tickets now - I don't love going to baseball games anymore anyway.   Kids friend had a birthday party at Chicago museum scheduled and they almost cancelled it for same reason.   The moms actually had a meeting about it and a long discussion.

 

[Bfan]

19 minutes ago, dll2000 said:

I keep hearing of crimes that are being quickly solved by  doorbells.  I remember one neighbor put in security cameras years ago and some other neighbors were kind of pissed about it.   It felt weird to them.  

Now in 2022 about 40% of the homes in my neighborhood have ring doorbells and growing.

The cameras everywhere and on our phones  and various tracking software are a huge invasion of privacy, but on other hand they are also a huge crime deterrent.   My parents never knew where I was unless I was in bed sleeping.

Much of this generations parents know where their kids are at all times.  Like the Weasley's clock.

 

Relatively small town in Northern Illinois and the big thing around here you do with security cams is post video of the critters that wonder through your backyard at night.  One neighbor post one of a little rabbit hopping through the yard and suddenly an owl streaked in, snatched it up and flew off. I had to peel my wife off the ceiling she was so sfartled.

[dll2000]

6 minutes ago, Bfan said:

Relatively small town in Northern Illinois and the big thing around here you do with security cams is post video of the critters that wonder through your backyard at night.  One neighbor post one of a little rabbit hopping through the yard and suddenly an owl streaked in, snatched it up and flew off. I had to peel my wife off the ceiling she was so sfartled.

I am going to do that too one day with night vision.   Getting around to it.

I live by a pond and I can see tracks of all kinds of various critters and coyotes in winter.   Whole other world at night out there.

 

[dll2000]

8 minutes ago, Bfan said:

Relatively small town in Northern Illinois and the big thing around here you do with security cams is post video of the critters that wonder through your backyard at night.  One neighbor post one of a little rabbit hopping through the yard and suddenly an owl streaked in, snatched it up and flew off. I had to peel my wife off the ceiling she was so sfartled.

Which town?

[Bfan]

Just now, dll2000 said:

Which town?

Sycamore

[CBears019]

1 hour ago, dll2000 said:

I keep hearing of crimes that are being quickly solved by  doorbells.  I remember one neighbor put in security cameras years ago and some other neighbors were kind of pissed about it.   It felt weird to them.  

Now in 2022 about 40% of the homes in my neighborhood have ring doorbells and growing.

The cameras everywhere and on our phones  and various tracking software are a huge invasion of privacy, but on other hand they are also a huge crime deterrent.   My parents never knew where I was unless I was in bed sleeping.

Much of this generations parents know where their kids are at all times.  Like the Weasley's clock.

 

Ring cameras are ok for what they are, but they’re pretty limited.  If someone comes right up to your front door (or wherever you have your camera) without a mask on, sure it’ll get a good image of them.  Should at least show any unique clothing items they’re wearing.  If something happened at your neighbors across the street, or you’re looking at a car driving by right in front of your street you’re likely just going to be looking at a shadowy figure.  The motion activation also sucks sometimes.

I wouldn’t rely on just the doorbell camera.  Get ones on your garage, back yard, etc.  The more coverage the better.  I’ve recently become more impressed with the Arlo brand especially when continuously recording, but of course you then run into the predicament of how much data can you store and for how long.

[dll2000]

59 minutes ago, Bfan said:

Sycamore

Been there a few times for court.   Cool old court house there.   There is a judge there that talks so incredibly slow.  He is comical.

 

 

[HuskieBear]

1 hour ago, Bfan said:

Sycamore

that's where i'm from originally (dekalb/sycamore, my parents have bounced back and forth for 20 years between the two)

[AZBearsFan]

1 hour ago, CBears019 said:

Ring cameras are ok for what they are, but they’re pretty limited.  If someone comes right up to your front door (or wherever you have your camera) without a mask on, sure it’ll get a good image of them.  Should at least show any unique clothing items they’re wearing.  If something happened at your neighbors across the street, or you’re looking at a car driving by right in front of your street you’re likely just going to be looking at a shadowy figure.  The motion activation also sucks sometimes.

I wouldn’t rely on just the doorbell camera.  Get ones on your garage, back yard, etc.  The more coverage the better.  I’ve recently become more impressed with the Arlo brand especially when continuously recording, but of course you then run into the predicament of how much data can you store and for how long.

We have Arlo instead of Ring. They’re nice. And they (or at least mine) don’t record over themselves after just a few days like a lot of systems do which for your Detective CBears needs is huge. 

[Bfan]

29 minutes ago, HuskieBear said:

that's where i'm from originally (dekalb/sycamore, my parents have bounced back and forth for 20 years between the two)

Born in dekalb hospital but we lived in Sycamore and i've been kicking around the area ever since.

[Bfan]

1 hour ago, dll2000 said:

Been there a few times for court.   Cool old court house there.   There is a judge there that talks so incredibly slow.  He is comical.

 

 

It is kind of picturesque.  It was used in at least one movie.  Unfortunately I forget which one.

[dll2000]

1 hour ago, Bfan said:

Born in dekalb hospital but we lived in Sycamore and i've been kicking around the area ever since.

I grew up in Rockford, IL.

We played youth football championships back in day at NIU.  Had a lot of friends that went to NIU.  I know the area.

I live in Lake in the Hills now.  I went to law school at DePaul and stayed living in city for about 4 or 5 years after.