KPD launches new tool for residents to help solve crimes

KHON2 (KAUAI) — The Kauai Police Department is launching a new tool which will allow residents to help solve crimes in their community.

KPD Chief Todd Raybuck said the new technology, called City Protect by Motorola Solutions, adds the ‘digital age’ to a neighborhood watch program.

City Protect allows residents and businesses to voluntarily register the security cameras location. If a crime happens nearby, KPD can look at a map and see which homes nearby have registered their camera and knock on their door, if needed, to request to view the camera footage.

“Too often police receive reports of crimes, sometimes in the middle of the night, or in areas we’re not familiar with so we don’t know if there’s video evidence that could help us solve the crime,” Chief Raybuck explained. “It’s completely voluntarily, the department does not have access to the footage, it just provides the department the information that allows us to follow up and go to homes and request to see if they have the information and/or footage that could help solve the crime.”

And in many cases, timing is everything. With City Protect, it gives police an additional tool to help find suspects quicker.

“Right now if if our officers are dispatched to a neighborhood to investigate a crime, depending on the time of day, if they’re there in the evening hours, which unfortunately, is when a lot of crime happens, they may not have the opportunity nor want to take the opportunity to knock door to door asking people to wake up, talk to the police and in fact, in some cases, they may not want to engage the police at that very moment,” Raybuck explained. “And so it could take sometimes days or weeks for police officers to be able to learn that there may be video footage of the crime and or the suspects. And so by signing up for City Protect, this will allow the police department to automatically look at a map that will identify those participants that have voluntarily signed up, so that we know right off the bat where those cameras are located and who to follow up with reducing a lot of time for us to venture into the unknown of who may have a camera and who may not.”

KPD said registration is completely voluntary and can be withdrawn at any time. They remind the public that registration simply informs KPD of the location of an existing device.

KPD adds participants aren’t obligated to provide video footage if asked either.

KPD is the first police department in the state to launch the new tool. They said they already utilize Motorola technologies and have implemented the new tool under an umbrella of other tools they use with the company already.

We reached out to Honolulu Police to see if they had heard about City Protect or if they were exploring any similar technologies, but haven’t heard back.

City Protect also offers a crime mapping tool for residents as well.

KPD said doorbell cameras, exterior and interior cameras, that would potentially capture images of a person or vehicle outside a home or business could all be valuable to investigating officers and could be registered.

No system sign-on information will be collected in City Protect. KPD said the database will contain only basic contact information, if necessary, KPD will contact a person directly to request the appropriate footage.

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City Protect is used in hundreds of cities across the U.S.