• "Cop shops" in Texas help fight apartment crime

    Residents in Texas apartment complexes have begun dedicating entire units to police officers so they have a place to rest, take a break, and fill out reports; the cop shops help minimize crime by keeping officers in parts of town where their presence is needed

  • Columbine lessons helped thwart Tampa school tragedy

    Police, having learnt the lessons of the 1999 Columbine High School massacre in Colorado, was in a better position to prevent violence in Tampa, Florida, last week; many school districts have threat assessment teams to try to connect the dots if there is a troubled, and potentially violent, student in their mix

  • Researchers developing graffiti analysis app

    Law enforcement officials could soon have an app for their mobile phones that allows them to snap a picture of gang graffiti and have its meaning translated; gangs often use graffiti as a way of communicating messages like challenges or warnings to rival gangs and understanding its meaning could help fight crime

  • Micro Unmanned Ground Vehicle helps soldiers, first responders

    Weighing just over ten pounds, Dragon Runner 10 (DR10) is small enough to carry in an assault pack and rugged enough to throw into buildings and hostile environments; the DR10 has multiple sensor and payload options, and thus is suitable for reconnaissance and surveillance missions to support small military units, patrols, and first responder teams

  • Phoenix police banned from sporting tattoos

    In an effort to present a more professional image, an increasing number of police departments across the United States are requiring officers to cover up their tattoos; the Phoenix police department recently began requiring its officers to cover its tattoos, a move that has generated criticism due to the intense Arizona heat

  • Face-mapping app for smartphone searching

    A new app, when combined with a centralized server, combs people’s cell phones looking to find photos that have a face in them that match what someone is looking for; the app could be used to look for an abducted child, or a criminal hiding in crowds

  • Anonymous retaliates against BART

    The hacking collective Anonymous released personal data on Sunday belonging to more than 2,000 public transport customers in the San Francisco area in retaliation for the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system’s shutdown of mobile phone service on Thursday night

  • Portable, super-high-resolution 3-D imaging

    A simple new imaging system could help manufacturers inspect their products, forensics experts identify weapons, and doctors identify cancers.

  • U.K. police procurement hub goes live

    The U.K. launches a new, Amazon-style online procurement process which enables police forces to buy specified goods and services online; all forty-three U.K. police forces are expected to be using the hub by June 2012

  • Four days of rioting strains U.K. legal system

    The ongoing unrest in the United Kingdom has begun to strain the country’s criminal justice and law enforcement system; with police arresting hundreds of people over the last few days, local judges have had trouble keeping up with the case load and facilities have quickly become overcrowded

  • Anonymous hacker collective hits rural law enforcement

    In its latest exploit, global hacker collective Anonymous claimed to release ten GB of stolen data from more than seventy rural sheriff’s departments across the United States, leaking sensitive information that could compromise the agencies’ investigations

  • DHS "pre-crime" detectors draw criticism

    A plan by DHS officials to use automated machines to identify people before they commit a criminal or terrorist act is drawing sharp criticism from privacy advocates; DHS is currently developing intention detectors under the Future Attributer Screening Technology (FAST) program; the FAST security checkpoints are outfitted with a sophisticated suite of sensors that are designed to identify several physiological indicators like heart rate or the steadiness of a person’s gaze

  • CrimeView Dashboard helps fight crime in real-time

    In an effort to share information in an easily manageable format, the Chesapeake Police Department in Virginia recently implemented the CrimeView Dashboard; CrimeView is a cloud-based software system that allows an entire agency to monitor criminal activity in real-time with maps, charts, and reports

  • Hi-tech bus helps catch drunk drivers

    With the help of a new $350,000 Breath Alcohol Testing (BAT) bus, police in Lafayette, Louisiana are cracking down on drunk drivers; with the BAT bus, officers have access to five computer stations, three breathalyzers, and a yellow line on the floor for suspected drunk drivers to walk along

  • Virginia police go 3D

    AREVA, an international nuclear services firm, provided the Central Virginia Crash Team with two 3D scanners that use lasers to reconstruct traffic crashes as well as crime scenes to create accurate, scale models as evidence