Allen County Sheriff Tom Williams was confident a state-of-the-art video recording system the department acquired over the summer would be valuable to law enforcement efforts.
In less than four months, he’s seen firsthand just how powerful — and cost effective — the AXON (Autonomous Extended On-officer Network) system can be.
To illustrate, Williams recounted a recent incident in which a suspect accused of wrongdoing approached the sheriff. The suspect alleged that he, in fact, had been mistreated by a deputy.
Had the allegations proven correct, the county could have found itself as the defendant in a civil lawsuit, Williams noted.
The sheriff’s reply?
“Let’s go to the video,” he told the young man.
The video showed that not only was the man’s allegations unfounded, “but that the young man actually caught a break from the deputy,” Williams said. “He understood that he wasn’t as nice as he could have been during the situation, and that the deputy had responded in a professional manner.”
With all of the other tools the AXON system provides, Williams isn’t bashful about boasting of its capabilities.
“This is a bigger leap for me, as a long-time officer, than when we went to portable radios,” the sheriff continued. “I predict that within a few years, 60 to 70 percent of law enforcement agencies will have a system like this. Even now, we are at a steep learning curve in figuring out everything this can do,” Williams said.
THE AXON system utilizes head-mounted cameras that run continuously, with video and audio recorded at the touch of a button to an attached computer, about the size of a cell phone that is contained in the officer’s shirt pocket.
The camera is mounted to the officer’s ear and picks up nearly everything the officer sees, Williams said. Likewise, an internal GPS (global positioning system) sensor pinpoints exactly where the recording is taking place.
Other taps to control buttons provide digital “marks” to the video so officers or other investigators can advance to important points of the video. That’s helpful if a video is an hour or two in length, Williams said, because it pinpoints critical parts of the footage.
Once recorded, the computer is plugged into a device that automatically uploads the entire video — it cannot be edited, even after it’s uploaded — to a secure third-party site.
There, the video is available to Allen County Attorney Wade Bowie, or the video can be downloaded for defense attorneys.
That’s where the cost benefit is most evident, Williams said.
“We’ve had a few attorneys take one look at the video, which has led them to recommend to their clients to enter guilty pleas,” the sheriff said, rather than force costly trials in magistrate or district court.
“Just as importantly, if we screw up, it’s there for everyone to see,” Williams continued. “But that’s important. That’s why we have a constitution and legal process.”
In the hundreds of hours of videos he’s watched, Williams has yet to see a single instance of unprofessionalism by any of the deputies.
“I’m amazed at the professionalism of the officers,” he said, particularly in volatile situations.
Undersheriff Bryan Murphy and Deputy Tim Beckham both praised the system, noting that the data allows them to file more precise reports.
“Being able to show a video like this would have a much bigger impact on a jury than if you showed them a drawing of a crime scene,” Beckham said. “The jury would be able to see exactly what we see.”
“It’s become so valuable that I won’t go out on duty without mine,” Murphy added.
Data collected while the system is in operation also can be used for general reports, such as mapping every traffic accident or traffic dispute in the county, or reviewing every call for assistance a particular deputy responded to in a given time.
ALLEN COUNTY acquired the system at the suggestion of Bowie, who had an extended conversation with Williams about difficulties in prosecuting domestic abuse cases, in large part becase the victims, for whatever reason, would change their testimony from one day to the next.
Bowie suggested officers be supplied hand-held video cameras. Williams thought that would be unwieldy, that officers had their hands full (literally) when refereeing and dealing with domestic disturbances.
That’s when Williams found information about the AXON system, through TASER International, the same company that manufactures the TASERs carried by officers.
Bowie signed on and made available money from fees collected in diversion cases and Williams fleshed out funding for the $38,000 system with fees collected by his office for confirming vehicle identification numbers (VIN) and money from the jail inmate fund. The only tax-generated funding involved is $5,000 from the Sheriff’s Department budget.
BOWIE SPOKE about the system Tuesday with Allen County commissioners. He found a potential hiccup, one he hopes to have rectified.
The Internet speed in Bowie’s office is less than ideal, and downloading a single video can take up to 40 minutes, Bowie said.
Bowie told commissioners he is looking to upgrading the office’s Internet access so the videos can be acquired more quickly.
ONE MINOR issue has led to light-hearted chiding among the deputies when they forget to turn their cameras off.
“I’ve heard them chatting to themselves, singing along to the radio, things like that,” Williams said with a smile. “Silly stuff.”
