Local Crime Fighters Go High-Tech With Regional Investigation Center

A new Regional Intelligence and Investigation Center in downtown Allentown aims to "revolutionize" the way police departments in Lehigh County—and several in Northampton County—analyze and share data to solve crimes.

Lehigh County District Attorney James Martin, joined by county officials and police chiefs from South Whitehall, Salisbury, Bethlehem and other municipalities, threw a spotlight on the new center at a news conference Thursday.

Opened in September 2012, the center allows the 17 police departments in Lehigh County and four of the departments in Northampton County—Walnutport, North Catasauqua, Northampton and Bethlehem—to share information, including descriptions of suspects, cars and guns used in crimes.

"It provides a rich search application, which is really the guts of the system, ...capable of querying mulitple internal and external data sources," Martin said. The system "provides basic crime mapping and analytics and the data mart of over three and a half million police incident reports from departments throughout Lehigh County."

Martin planned to meet with Easton police Thursday afternoon in hopes that they would join the center. Martin said budgetary concerns have so far prevented the Northampton County District Attorney's Office from joining in the center.

The center's technology was funded with $1.3 million in grants from the Department of Justice COPS technology program and $500,000 in public safety funds from Lehigh County.

Martin credited the center in the identification of a suspect in the January shooting death of Tyree Wimberly in Bethlehem. An arrest warrant was obtained for Ulysses Rodriguez in the killing. The description of the shooter’s getaway vehicle proved “vital” in finding the alleged shooter, authorities have said.

Whether at the Investigation Center or at computers in their departments, police can use a secure web portal to share intelligence on gangs and the particulars on crimes. If an investigator is working on a robbery in which a silver handgun was used, for example, the investigator can query the system to learn whether a silver handgun was used in other robberies. Martin said that kind of shared data can help police solve crimes faster and identify crime trends and patterns.

Invertigators can search for people, vehicles, weapons, property and phone numbers across police and prison records. With mapping tools, investigators can see the layout of streets and buildings around a crime scene, helping them to become familiar with areas across jurisdictions. Also, the center offers analysis so that connections among people, phones and vehicles can be identified.

The center recently hired a crime analyst.

Martin and former county Executive Don Cunningham came up with the idea for the center in 2007, according to information provided at the news conference. 

Additional phases call for expansion of the system.