The paper days of police officers spending countless hours of
hand-writing reports have ended.
Technological advancements during the past five years have
catapulted local crime prevention into a new era, according to
Hollister Police Chief Bill Pierpoint, who sat down Friday to
discuss the current and future state of crime in Hollister.
The paper days of police officers spending countless hours of hand-writing reports have ended.
Technological advancements during the past five years have catapulted local crime prevention into a new era, according to Hollister Police Chief Bill Pierpoint, who sat down Friday to discuss the current and future state of crime in Hollister.
Computer innovation, he said, is the most glaring trend for local law enforcement.
And as he spoke, technicians from Santa Cruz-based TracNet Corp. installed the department’s newest software designed to vault HPD’s crime-fighting efficiency to its most paramount level yet. The $109,405 program has the capacity for faster electronic storage, crime analysis and other reporting.
“I want to make the city as safe as possible with the resources available,” Pierpoint said. “The idea is to use technology to accomplish this, as opposed to more manpower.”
When he took the city’s top law enforcement job in 1997, Pierpoint said the department owned two laptop computers. For the most part, officers still hand-wrote all reports in the field.
Within one year, the department equipped each patrol officer with a laptop, which has simplified their work and increased productivity, Pierpoint said.
Capt. Bob Brooks remembers his rookie year with the HPD almost two decades ago. Technology has since dramatically improved the investigation process, he said. Officers can more efficiently piece together a crime or series of crimes.
“Collection and dissemination of information has improved tenfold from when I started 19 years ago,” he said.
Brooks referred to speed and accuracy of investigations as “the life blood of the police department.”
During the weekend, TracNet employees installed its own set of laptops. From there, its representatives will offer individual “intense training” to every officer on the force. And although the City Council approved the purchase of the program Dec. 16, it should be fully operational by the end of the month, Pierpoint said.
“They (TracNet) are surprising me in aggressively getting this program into place,” he said.
The HPD opted for the most recent switch of systems because of departmentwide dissatisfaction with the previous program, which also included laptops for each officer and 15 personal computers.
“It was not a stable platform,” Pierpoint said. “Officers would lose reports and have to go back and write reports.”
The San Benito County Sheriff’s Department also continually strives for computer savviness.
Sheriff Curtis Hill’s department is currently installing a similar system made by Nevada-based Abbey Group, which is compatible with the HPD’s new software.
Pierpoint mentioned other examples of the HPD’s technological transformation, including three digital cameras officers use for crime scene analysis.
A fitting example occurred Friday just after midnight when police arrested two alleged 17-year-old graffiti vandals. Police suspect the juveniles are responsible for a majority of the recent tagging in the city, Pierpoint said.
Officers recorded the evidence by digital photography, which the HPD will now computer analyze and compare with other recent graffiti vandalism to connect a possible slew of crimes back to the two suspects.
Another program owned by the HPD, called Dragon NaturallySpeaking, transcribes officers’ speech at up to 160 words per minute. If a particular word is foreign to the program, the officer types it once and DNS never forgets it again.
“You can run the operating system hands-free,” Pierpoint said. “We’ve given the officers the tools.”
Drug-related crime biggest problem
Aside from the most recent computer advancements, Pierpoint addressed other issues the HPD braces to address in 2003. Pierpoint said he’ll never be content with local crime prevention unless the impossible occurs – zero crime.
“There’s always room for improvement,” he said. “We have to realize that there is going to be crime. And we have to do whatever we can to protect.”
He said community-wide involvement is the best solution.
“Don’t see something (a crime) and not tell anybody,” Pierpoint said. “You can’t tell me they do these nasty graffiti works in town without somebody seeing it.”
Pierpoint added that graffiti crimes are not necessarily linked to gangs, evidenced by the two juveniles arrested Friday for crimes police believe have no gang relation.
And although Pierpoint said gangs are “not a major portion of our criminal activity,” the HPD – along with help from the sheriff’s department and District Attorney John Sarsfield – will attempt to “certify” criminals with gang associations according to various characteristics. A certification would result in stiffer sentences if a gang member faces conviction.
Pierpoint said drug-related crime is the most overwhelming problem in Hollister. More than half of Hollister crimes relate back to illegal drug activity, he said.
“People who use drugs don’t have the money to buy,” he said. “That creates crimes of opportunity – robberies, burglaries, things like that – to get the funds to buy their drugs.”
With the city experiencing tighter budgets each year because of the statewide economic hardship, Pierpoint expressed satisfaction with the nearly $5 million budget awarded to the HPD this year.
“But you could always use more money,” he said.
An indefinite decline of funding is another reason Pierpoint was pleased to obtain the new computer system. The Gilroy Police Department recently spent more than $1 million for its record-keeping software, he said.
