Thursday, February 24, 2005

* Morse Pod Twin Madison Pod Helps Make Bust

Morse Pod _37
Madison Pod Captures Bust from Above.
File Photo: Morse Pod #19.

6 comments:

Hugh said...

> ... officials showed video taken Feb. 9 of three individuals allegedly dealing drugs on the 4400 block of West Madison Street, in view of a pole-mounted police camera.

>The suspects then were seen being arrested as police swooped in.

File this under dumb criminal stories?

Hugh said...

Study Examines Closed-Circuit CamerasAssociated Press, Thu, Feb. 24, 2005

LONDON - The web of security cameras monitoring Britain's streets, stations and shopping centers has done little to reduce crime or make people feel safer, according to a government study released Thursday.

The government, which spent 170 million pounds ($325 million) on closed-circuit cameras between 1998 and 2003, said it had no plans to fund any more.Video cameras have blossomed in Britain since the 1990s. An estimated 4.2 million cameras now observe the country's 60 million people going about their everyday business, from getting on a bus to lining up at the bank to driving around London. It's widely estimated that the average Briton is scrutinized by 300 cameras a day. ...

Previous studies of the effectiveness of closed-circuit TV systems have come to similar conclusions.

The report found that while a majority of residents backed the cameras, support in nine of the 14 areas declined after they were installed. It said governments had oversold the technology as a "magic bullet" against crime."For supporters of CCTV (closed-circuit TV) these findings are disappointing," said Martin Gill, the professor who led the research. "For the most part, CCTV did not produce reductions in crime and it did not make people feel safer.Study Examines Closed-Circuit Cameras

Craig Gernhardt said...

From the Channel 7 broadcast of this story.

"I think it's crazy. It's almost like Communism. They don't have them in the Caucasian neighborhood.

If you don't have them everywhere, don't put them anywhere,"
said Bonita Page, West Side resident.

Hugh said...

Home Office Research Study 292

Assessing the impact of CCTVExecutive Summary

Aims and Methods

This report evaluates 13 Closed Circuit Television Camera (CCTV) projects (comprising 14 separate systems) implemented in a range of contexts, including town centres, city centres, car parks, hospitals and residential areas. The projects were funded under Phase 2 of the Home Office CCTV Initiative. ...

The main objective of the crime data analysis was to measure the impact of the CCTV projects on crime and fear of crime. ...

Impact on crime

All the systems had the broad objective of reducing crime. Out of the 13 systems evaluated six showed a relatively substantial reduction in crime in the target area compared with the control area, but only two showed a statistically significant reduction relative to the control, and in one of these cases the change could be explained by the presence of confounding variables. Crime increased in seven areas but this could not be attributed to CCTV. ...

Assessing the impact of CCTV

Certain types of offence were affected more than others:

- Impulsive crimes (e.g. alcohol-related crimes) were less likely to be reduced than premeditated crime (e.g. theft of motor vehicles).

- Violence against the person rose and theft of motor vehicles fell in the target areas in accordance with national trends in recorded crime. ...

Spatial displacement was not common but did occur:

- One system showed evidence of displacement of overall crime into the surrounding area.

- Another showed displacement of burglary into the surrounding area.

- Another showed displacement of vehicle crime into the gaps in coverage between cameras. ...

Feelings of safety

Feelings of safety increased in all but one of the areas surveyed following CCTV installation. In three areas the increase in feelings of safety was greater than in the control area. However, none of the results was statistically significant. ...

Project objectives

Many projects did not have clear objectives. Partly this reflected an uncritical view that CCTV was ‘a good thing’ and that specific objectives were unnecessary. It also typified a lack of understanding of what effects CCTV could achieve and the types of problems it was best suited to alleviate.

Installation of CCTV created demands by neighbouring town centres to ‘catch-up’ with systems of their own. The claimed successes of existing projects reinforced these demands and relieved planners of the need to consider other alternatives.

The existence of funding for CCTV created pressure to bid for it, often in the absence of reliable intelligence indicating where CCTV would be likely to have most effect. Where statistics were gathered, they were sometimes inexpertly produced or were even distorted, having being compiled to support a bid. ...

Operation of the control room

Control room operation was an important determinant of a CCTV system’s ability to detect crime. The monitoring schedule is certainly an issue here: six of the 13 control rooms were staffed for less than 24 hours a day.

The control rooms relied on intelligence and communication from the public about incidents in progress in order to direct surveillance. In practice, levels of incoming and outgoing communication were low.

Hugh said...

http://uk.sitestat.com/homeoffice/homeoffice/s?rds.hors292pdf&ns_type=pdf&ns_url=%5Bhttp://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs05/hors292.pdf%5D

Assessing the impact of CCTV

Hugh said...

http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs05/hors292.pdf

'Broken Heart' Past Blogs