Mapping technology gives easy access to crime stats

If a crime happened in your neighborhood would you want to know about it? Now residents in Lewiston have easy access to that information.

"This is essentially every offense and arrest report the department has received since April 1st through April 26th," says Andrew Robitaille, Crime Analyst at Lewiston Police Department.

The crime tracking system uses Google Maps technology and software provided by a Colorado company called Bair Software. Police say the better informed people are about crime around them, the better prepared they can be to prevent themselves from becoming victims.

"It makes people more vigilant, if they know that crimes are happening in their neighborhood they are more apt to pay attend to what's going on there," says Robitaille.

The Portland Police Department uses a computer crime tracking system called Compstat. Officers and detectives use it to help in their own investigations, but the system is not available to the public. In Lewiston it's thought that by opening up that information to residents in an easy to use system is like having more eyes and ears on the street helping police solve crimes.

"We hope that people will look at it and call in to say that we saw a suspicious vehicle on our street a week ago and just noticed that there was a rash of motor-vehicle burglaries that occurred in our area. So, the more information that we get from the public the easier it is for us to do our jobs," says Robitaille.

Lewiston's crime analyst would like to see other nearby police departments use this new system as well. You can't beat the price, its free of charge. After just a few days of setup work, officers simply enter information the way they do now on their own in-house computer systems.

"That way we have a better picture of crime as a whole as it's occurring n the county and not just stopping at the Androscoggin river," Robitaille added.

While the system gives the public greater access to information it still protects the privacy of crime victims. No specific addresses are given out. But you can see the neighborhoods where these crimes are occurring.

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News & Politics

Tags:

• Public Crime Map
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• Mapping Technology