FOCUS Gearing Up for Big Data
credibly time-consuming. It requires an investigator to physically drive to the crime scene and walk the neighbor- hood scouting for video cameras. The cameras can be hard to spot, especially in high rises where they’re not always visible. And when the investigator lo- cates video, he/she still needs to physi- cally download a copy and bring it back to the station. Other evidence collection activities
take time as well, like sending e-mails or placing phone calls to evidence tech- nicians, fi lling out paperwork to request 911 or in-car video recordings, or driv- ing across town to other precincts to pick up copies of recorded interviews. To gather additional evidence from other systems (body-worn cameras, RMS, CAD, crime scene photo data- bases, and so on), investigators need to log onto each standalone system sepa- rately, and extract relevant information piecemeal, which is time-consuming and ineffi cient. All of this evidence is then painstakingly copied and saved onto CDs, DVDs or USB drives, and added to the investigator’s paper case folder.
How New Digital
Investigation Technology Can Help New digital investigation technology is now helping to break down these bar- riers by enabling police departments to seamlessly connect all of their digital silos through one application. The tech- nology provides a one-stop shop for gathering evidence—the investigator doesn’t have to waste time logging on to all of the individual systems to manually collect evidence to build their case. In addition to simplifying access, the technology is able to search across all connected systems and recommend evi- dence that is potentially relevant to the case. Content analytics provides inves- tigators the ability to search audio and video fi les in addition to documents to uncover new insights to help solve cases faster. The investigator also has the ability
to add key words to a search. Let’s say, for example, a witness in a homicide in- vestigation said they saw a panel van with ‘Joe’s Plumbing’ marked on the side, fl eeing the scene. By adding ‘Joe’s
32 LAW and ORDER I June 2016
New technology can help investigators automate the digital evidence collection and analysis process, streamline investigations, increase case closure rates, and facilitate successful prosecutions.
Plumbing’ to a key word search, all con- nected sources—from incident reports in the CAD system to tagged crime scene photos and witness statements— would be searched for the words ‘Joe’s Plumbing.’ In addition to searching documents
and databases for key words, the tech- nology is capable of analyzing audio and converting it to text to make it searchable, so for example, 911 calls and interview room recordings could be searched for the words ‘Joe’s Plumbing’ as well. Then, all the investigator would need to do is review the suggested evi- dence, and select it to add it to his/her virtual case folder. For evidence the investigator does
not have direct access to, he/she can initiate and track evidence requests using built-in workfl ows, and receive automatic notifi cations when those re- quests are fulfi lled. This makes it easier for an investigator to stay on top of heavy workload of active cases, and not lose track of evidence or leads. Furthermore, citizens can submit
video, photos and tips through a secure public portal, and private businesses can use the portal to register their CCTV cameras and provide contact details, making it easier for law enforcement agencies to crowd source evidence. By geo-locating both city-owned and private CCTV cameras, the technol- ogy enables investigators to look at the area where a crime occurred and know where cameras are located, minimizing time spent going door to door.
Analyzing Evidence: Putting the Pieces Together is Complicated Still, collecting digital evidence is just the beginning. Putting all the pieces together to tell the who, what, where, when and why is the bigger challenge. In the old days, we used push pins to plot details and locations of a crime on a map. Today, crime re-creations are a whole
lot more complex and diffi cult to visualize, thanks in large part to many new sources of digital evidence. There could be hours of video footage from different CCTV camera vantage points, audio recordings, body-worn footage, physical evidence, and stacks of crime scene photos. At some point, it has to be sorted and
put into context based on time sequence and location. This is the only way to tell the complete story of what happened, who was involved, where and when it occurred, and why. But this is very diffi - cult to do when the evidence is in many different fi le types and formats. An investigator can spend grueling hours manually sifting through evidence and trying to make sense of it. Another problem investigators need
to contend with is the large range of video and audio formats, codecs and proprietary players. Often, an inves- tigator will obtain a copy of a CCTV video on a CD or thumb drive and bring it back to the station, only to realize he cannot play it back. If there are mul- tiple videos requiring multiple players or codecs, it’s an even bigger issue. A forensic technician could spend days
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