Justice and Public Safety

The organizers of a new program that keeps two St. Louis, Mo., recreation centers open late on weekend nights to keep kids off the streets say they plan to boost social media outreach after low turnout. 

The cameras are relatively cheap, with the best costing almost $2,000, but storage costs add up. There are requirements to have redundancy and in addition, rules require some of the data to be stored for 100 years.

A proposed network of public and private cameras, tied into the department's computer-aided dispatch system, would allow a valuable crime-fighting tool and near-immediate access to live video across the city, officials say.

Money for the cameras is coming from a $978,450 grant from the Governor's Office of Planning and Budget, and what form the system will ultimately take is not currently set in stone.

A five-year contract for body-worn and dash cameras, along with updated Taser equipment, has been approved for the Clark County Sheriff's Office. The equipment is expected to be in place by early fall.

The technical plans for a project to improve the Ashtabula County court records system was approved this week despite concerns on the part of some that the work could prompt potential litigation.

Barton County Communications Director Dena Popp is almost giddy when she boasts about the host of new tools available to 911 dispatchers, which better enable them to help first responders get to callers in need.

Law enforcement and city officials in Norfolk see these advanced capabilities as a boon to public safety, but residents and state lawmakers alike have voiced privacy concerns about the amount of data the cameras capture.

Officials in the California city are being asked to take another look at the ordinance creating the Privacy and Technology Commission amid fears the group lacks enough authority to guide technology purchases.

Of the more than 140 people killed by drivers who fled the scene in the California capital since 2018, dozens died on aging, busy corridors designed years ago with pedestrians and bicyclists as an afterthought.

Quad Cities police officials and the top prosecutors from the region say that body cameras are crucial to protecting officers, investigating cases and keeping cops accountable to the public.

After a middle-school student was charged with bringing a loaded gun and knife to campus in March, a school district in Kentucky is standing by its weapons detectors despite some public opposition.

The Walla Walla Police Department's new body-worn cameras are now in circulation for all commissioned officers. The cameras, supplied by Axon, were officially deployed earlier this week.

Anxiety, depression, stress and other mental health issues have been on an upward trend in K-12, and software tools that provide a holistic view of a student’s physical and mental health could be part of addressing it.

San Jose-area high school students built and trained the artificial-intelligence device SIREN to detect gunshots and instantly communicate with students and staff at an affected school, along with the police department.

Gloucester County is considering adding GPS tracking either to police radios that are worn by officers or to their body-worn cameras, said one municipal police chief in the county.

The Portland Police Bureau on Thursday unveiled a fleet of drones that officers say will help them document crash scenes, locate fugitives and respond to emergencies such as bomb threats and active shooters.

Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele announced this week that ShotSpotter technology would be implemented to help curb gun violence in the boroughs of Pottstown and Norristown.