Sheriff Seeks Technology Upgrade

BENTONVILLE — Benton County Sheriff Kelley Cradduck says he’s not “Big Brother” and won’t be activating “Skynet” anytime soon.

Cradduck has asked the Quorum Court to authorize his application for a federal grant to offset some of the cost of a new computer program. The grant from the federal Department of Justice would provide the county up to $79,570, and the county would provide another $70,000 in matching money to purchase the Coplink software program.

About Coplink

The Coplink software program is in use in more than 4,500 jurisdictions nationally, spanning 23 states and including several statewide deployments. Information is shared among users on an interstate and intrastate basis and four of the nation’s six largest cities use the program.

Source: IBM

Cradduck had IBM representatives explain the program to the Finance Committee on March 5. At that meeting, several justices of the peace expressed concern the program might infringe on residents’ privacy by gathering cellphone information or collecting information about firearms ownership.

Cradduck said those concerns are unfounded, but the justices of the peace raised the firearms issue again at the Committee of the Whole meeting March 12 after Cradduck left the meeting.

Justice of the Peace Pat Adams moved to table the grant proposal until the questions were answered to the satisfaction of the justices of the peace.

That motion was withdrawn, but the justices of the peace agreed to have George Spence, county attorney, review the grant application and any other information available and report back to the Quorum Court at its March 28 meeting.

“What if we get this money from the federal government and they have a requirement in there that you must register firearms?” Adams said at the meeting.

Justice of the Peace Tom Allen also said he wanted a review of the application and any accompanying rules and regulations.

“I support it,” Allen said. “We just need to be sure everything the federal government is going to dictate is something we can put up with.”

Spence said Thursday he read through the grant application and found nothing warranting any Second Amendment concerns. He said any contract the county might be asked to sign if the grant is approved also will be reviewed.

Cradduck said applying for and accepting the grant won’t invalidate Arkansas laws that prohibit him from randomly seeking and recording cellphone information or information on firearms ownership.

“The reason we want this is it’s a resource allocation tool,” Cradduck said. “This is not to infringe on anyone’s rights. I wouldn’t have anything to do with it if it did.”

Cradduck said the Coplink program is already in use by law enforcement agencies across the country. The program makes information already in a police department or sheriff’s office files more accessible and searchable.

Cradduck said the program would take information in the Sheriff’s Office database — and new information as it comes in — and place them in “modules” allowing the department to search for information by using key words.

If there was a report of a crime where the information available was a white man driving a red truck was involved, the Sheriff’s Office could search the database using those details and get information on anyone they had contact with matching those parameters. He said the program also allows the Sheriff’s Office to map crimes, identify “hot spots” of criminal activity and aid in predicting where additional crimes are likely.

Cradduck said the mention of cellphones during the initial presentation shouldn’t be taken to mean the Sheriff’s Office is gathering information from individuals without cause.

‘Big’ and ‘Sky’

“Big Brother” is the dictator of Oceania in George Orwell’s “Nineteen Eighty-Four” where society is subjected to constant surveillance. “Skynet” is the computer system that attains sentience and attempts to destroy humanity in the “Terminator” film series.

Source: Staff Report

“It takes any information that is compiled in an arrest report or a burglary report or some other crime report,” Cradduck said. “For instance, if we have a rash of incidents where cellphones are being taken this will tell us if they’re all smartphones, it would tell us if they were all Blackberries. It will tell us if there’s anything that ties these incidents together. What it is not is a tool to spy on individuals.”

Rick Keyes, crime analyst for the Sheriff’s Office, supported Cradduck’s view of the program. He said laws and regulations protect individual privacy and the program isn’t designed to circumvent those guidelines.

“We can’t use anybody’s phone information that hasn’t been touched by law enforcement in some way,” Keyes said.

Cradduck said investigators can’t just take a person’s cellphone during any contact and extract information from it. There would have to be cause shown and legal procedures followed before such an intrusion, he said.

“If someone were in a DWI arrest and they had their cellphone when they were booked in, we don’t have the right to go into their phone and check their contacts,” Cradduck said. “If it were an investigation of harassing phone calls or someone sending child pornography and we wanted that information, we’ll get a search warrant and go through the proper procedures to gather information. In the same way, we can only track guns that have been used in crimes.”

Keyes said the program won’t give the Sheriff’s Office any additional information, but will allow information to be more effectively used. With the Coplink program, he said, he can generate daily reports showing calls for service, the times of the calls and maps of their locations within the one program and do so in about 15 minutes. Generating the same report now would require him to have four computer windows open at once and take him 45 minutes to an hour to complete.

Similarly, he said, if the Springdale Police Department had information for the Sheriff’s Office, they now have to compile a written report and hand deliver it. If Coplink were in use by both departments, the information would be shared automatically.

The sharing of information among law enforcement agencies is something Cradduck pitched to the justices of the peace.

“Information is key to fighting crime,” Cradduck said. “There’s no better tool to fight crime than sharing information.”

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