Utah, San Jose, Deploy Crime Analytics Tool

More than 25 law enforcement agencies are testing a crime analytics tool called Command Central from vendor CrimeReports. Utah has already deployed the solution statewide. Analytics help law enforcement get more from limited police resources by distributing officers where and when they're most needed. Command Central is Web-based, visible to citizens and enables them to report incidents, which enter the analytics.

Similarly to New York City's famed CompStat, Command Central uses analytics to detect anomalies in criminal activity. Through graphics, the system shows crime trends and hot spots. A time of day/day of week heat map displays when selected crimes occur most frequently during the week. The tool offers a scrolling list of the most recent crime incidents by beat or service area, pairing them with a visual map. Graphics compare the number of incidents of specific crimes in multiple areas for a given date range. The system also displays trends and the frequency of those specific crimes within a certain date range.

Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said he viewed Command Control's citizen-reporting component as an improvement over CompStat.

"When you give information to people that comes not only on a weekly report, but with extra alerts during rashes of crime, people are going to start looking. With more people looking, the likelihood of catching criminals is greater," Shurtleff said.

CrimeReports designed the system to be compatible with all law enforcement reporting systems. Not all law enforcements use Command Control yet, but hooking up is easy, according to Shurtleff.

"Regardless of whatever system they were using, after just a couple hours with the guys from CrimeReports in the communications area of the police station, they were able to hook them up," Shurtleff said.

San Jose, Calif., is in the process of installing Command Control in police cars so officers can get real-time analytics of the crimes occurring around them. The version of the system San Jose police have now doesn't update the analytics until the following morning.

The citizen-facing component of Command Control has been popular, said Rob Davis, chief of the San Jose Police Department.

"We've been able to educate the community on what's going on in their neighborhoods so they can stop worrying about the stuff they don't need to worry about and help us focus on the things they can be helping us with," Davis said.