Gazette.Net: Frederick police use national data-sharing program
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Law enforcement agencies, including the Frederick Police Department, are increasingly using an information sharing system to catch criminals.
Funded by the U.S. Department of Defense, the Law Enforcement Information Exchange [LInX] is a data warehouse of information from local, state and federal agencies. Agencies upload police reports daily, making information available to all participating organizations.
LInX is sponsored by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments police chiefs committee.
The program has been invaluable in tracking criminals and criminal activity, and helped lead to the arrest of the alleged East Coast Rapist, according to Catherine Miller, director of the National Capital Region’s LInX program.the serial rapist operated for more than a decade across several states, including Maryland and Virginia. he was arrested in Connecticut in March 2011, was extradited to Virginia in November, where he is awaiting trial.
The LInX program, which is expanding, operates 10 regional information sharing databases around the country, including the capital region, which includes 120 agencies. Federal partners include the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; the U.S. Marshals Service; and the Drug Enforcement Agency.
“the public probably thinks we have been doing this all along, but this is relatively new,” said Frederick police Chief Kim Dine.
Dine serves on the executive committee of the board of directors for the National Capital Region LInX program.
The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks were a catalyst for the expansion of the information-sharing database, according to Deputy Chief Eddie Reyes of Alexandria, Va. Prior to 9/11, agencies were proprietary of their systems, he said.
“There was a concern that by sharing information, another agency would beat us on locking up the bad guys,” Reyes said. “the other concern was a legal one. If I share my file with another agency, how will I know where it will end up.”
Now, Reyes said, he doesnt know where law enforcement would be without the sharing capability.
“we would be crippled without it,” he said.
The system provides information on criminals and their known associates, including arrests, booking data, traffic stops, photographs, physical description, vehicle tag numbers or partial tag numbers, field interviews, search warrants and a record of items they pawned at pawn shops, according to Lt. Rich Hetherington of the Frederick Police Department. Hetherington is Frederick’s system and security administrator for LInX.
Using cell phone numbers for criminals, and those associated with them, police can create overlapping spiderwebs linking criminals with each other and criminal activity. this provides officers with leads they would not normally have, makes the database “a hugely useful tool,” Hetherington said.
All officers can use the system, but must be trained and sign release forms that they will only use the information for professional purposes. Participating agencies are audited annually.
To use the database, a law enforcement agency must have a record management system and other technology in place allowing for an automatic upload of information daily.
“It’s much more cost effective because it brings data together, and making use of it helps police rule out hundreds of suspects to focus on a handful of suspects,” Miller said.
The program assists police in investigating all manner of crimes, but more than ever it is useful in cold cases and serial cases such as burglary and sexual assault that have taken place throughout decades, Miller said.
Prior to LInX, which he calls “Google for law enforcement,” obtaining files from another law enforcement agency could take between six to 10 weeks, Reyes said.
Frederick police have not made any high-profile arrests using the system, but Hetherington said the agency’s drug unit uses the system frequently. creating spiderwebs of names and phone numbers linking criminals to drug activity has been particularly useful, he said. the agency’s criminal investigation division also uses the system daily, he said.
The biggest strength of the program is its ability to link people, places and incidents. the capture of the alleged East Coast Rapist, Hetherington said, came about because an officer in Virginia was playing around with a vehicle description of the suspect’s van, and by tracking various associations and events, police were able to connect the suspect to the crimes.
“If not for this database, we would still be looking for him, and he had been raping and assaulting women up and down the East Coast for 12 years,” Reyes said.
