Washington DC might become London, England!

[aerius]

Let me put it to you this way since you still don't seem to understand. The only effective video surveillance systems are the ones found in large casinos such as the ones in Las Vegas.

<SNIP!>

That's funny, cause they're effective in London. Or do you have proof that their not?

It works? Buhahahaha!!! You're kidding right? Here's some proof for you to chew on before making those fantastic claims. Read the rest of the articles through before you spout anymore of that "England's better, it works in London" crap.

Armed Crime on the Rise

Excerpt from article

Between April and November 2001, the number of murders in the Metropolitan Police area committed with a firearm soared by almost 90% over the same period a year earlier.

Armed street robberies rose, in the same period, from 435 to 667 in 2001 - an increase of 53% - while overall in the capital there were 45,255 street robberies and snatches last year, against 32,497 in 2000.


Here's another article for you, if it works so well why do they have the highest crime rates?

England has highest Crime rate among the World's leading economies

Excerpt from Article

England and Wales have the highest crime rate among the world's leading economies, according to a new report by the United Nations.

The survey, which is likely to prove embarrassing to David Blunkett, the Home Secretary. shows that people are more likely to be mugged, burgled, robbed or assaulted here than in America, Germany, Russia, South Africa or any other of the world's 20 largest nations. Only the Dominican Republic, New Zealand and Finland have higher crime rates than England and Wales.

Get your facts straight before blabbering your unsubstantiated claims. You're sounding like a Darkstar clone.

[C.S.Strowbridge]

Get your facts straight before blabbering your unsubstantiated claims. You're sounding like a Darkstar clone.

Ok, here's a tip that Darkstar never figured out. When you are comparing two situations you must give data on both sides. You can't just give one and say you've won.

For example:

If you are claiming the 1998 Porsche Ruf Turbo R is faster than the '03 Dodge Viper RT/10, you can't just say, 'The Porsche can do 0-60 in 3.5 seconds.' and expect to win. You must give the Viper's 0-60 and compare them. You must also look at other speed related factors.

So, you must not just look at crime stastics, you must compare CCTV to Non-CCTV. Look at long term crimes rates before and after CCTV is put in place. You must do some actual work.

[aerius]

Strangely crime figures aren't available for London from before '98, which was when their new stats gathering procedures were put into place. There's only a year of data to go by so far. Incidentally this is around the time that CCTV started coming into widespread use there. I could likely pull up older stats but that's gonna take some time and searching, stay tuned.

London Crime Stats

I do have overall stats for crime in the UK going back quite a while.

Overall Crime Numbers

Crime per 100,000 people

Note the upwards trend in both tables.

[The Yosemite Bear]

Bada-Bing (Huston we have a problem, if the CSS ego is sufficiantly deflated by dissilionment, it could collapse forming a quontum singularity)

[C.S.Strowbridge]

Bada-Bing (Huston we have a problem, if the CSS ego is sufficiantly deflated by dissilionment, it could collapse forming a quontum singularity)

Oh please, the UK has had a rising crime rate since before Thatcher. That can hardly be blamed on CCTVs. It's part of their youth culture. Why do you think Punk was so big there?

[aerius]

Oh please, the UK has had a rising crime rate since before Thatcher. That can hardly be blamed on CCTVs. It's part of their youth culture. Why do you think Punk was so big there?

Are you trying to play word games here? I've never said that CCTV causes crime, what I've said is that CCTV is ineffective at preventing crime. Upon further research what I've found is this. CCTV use started in the UK in the mid '80s with some small trial projects after a series of riots they had. By the early to mid '90s they were being used in select "hotspots" which are known to be trouble areas. In the last 3 years or so the government has been handing out contracts for large scale CCTV systems in major cities. These systems have been installed and are operational. The government is now close to finishing Phase 2 of the bids to install yet more cameras.

If CCTV works at preventing crime, we should be seeing a downward trend in the crime numbers as the number of CCTV cameras in service goes up. Looking at the charts for Overall crime and Crime per 100,000 people which I've already posted, there's little indication of this correlation.

[C.S.Strowbridge]

If CCTV works at preventing crime, we should be seeing a downward trend in the crime numbers as the number of CCTV cameras in service goes up.

Or you'd see there's more complex cause for crime. While CCTVs are effective, they can not combat the root causes.

[aerius]

If CCTV works at preventing crime, we should be seeing a downward trend in the crime numbers as the number of CCTV cameras in service goes up.

Or you'd see there's more complex cause for crime. While CCTVs are effective, they can not combat the root causes.

Right, so you still say that CCTV is effective in preventing crimes, care to pull out some proof that it is? Personal stories and those "caught on camera" TV specials don't count, I want some nice hard numbers with links and references like the ones I've provided.

[Malecoda]

My point is that CCTV is next to worthless WITHOUT a proper law enforcement system backing it up. The problem isn't with the police, the problem is a fucked up legal system that doesn't allow the cops to go in, make the bust, and put the fucking perps away for a good long time. What we have is lots of criminals running around that are KNOWN to police, but the cops can't bust them or put them away because of some stupid legal technicalities.

Until the police can start putting those perps away, all CCTV does is let them see MORE criminals running around. For example about 2 blocks from where I live is an area of high crime subsidized housing. They have cameras everywhere, and yet drug deals, gang fights, and other activities happen right in front of the damn cameras. In fact a fatal stabbing happened there a few days ago. Cameras aren't going to deter anyone UNLESS there's something backing them up, which there isn't.

Yeah, we need more prisons. Isn't it every night that some talking head on TV blabs abt how we have all these overcrowded prisons? Who the hell cares if there's a camera in the 7-11 parking lot, other than criminals and teenagers?

[HemlockGrey]

-shoots a camera-

-snips a wire-

-wears a mask-

-goes in at night-

-spends an hour figuring out camera's blindspots-

[Malecoda]

No, but they can be used to send a ambulence before the fighting starts. Cuts down on the deathes. Also lowers the number of criminals that can escape.

Wow, so how are you going to pay people to look at every fucking TV
screen 24 x 7?

Shep, you mean all this time, you thought someone was getting paid to watch you live every time you went to the grocery store? Get over yourself, genius. IF something happens, THEN look at tape. I don't know what makes that other guy think that either, that someone is watching so closely that they can send an ambulance. "Sarge, some people are talking and waving in the street in sector V-87! I can't make it out... That guy's yelling. Yeah, he's definitely raising his voice--are those other people with him? Better send an ambulance, just in case."

[Malecoda]

Let me put it to you this way since you still don't seem to understand. The only effective video surveillance systems are the ones found in large casinos such as the ones in Las Vegas.

...and department stores.

To duplicate this level of effectiveness on a city sized scale would be impossible. You'd need millions of cameras and police/security officers on the streets, and a few tens of thousands of people to watch the TV screens at the very least. Unless you do something like this CCTV will be ineffective at best, and merely gives a false sense of security to the citizens and is a waste of resources.

I suppose the clerks who get shot and live (or their families if they die) to see their attacker go to trial bec a camera caught their faces might feel the same way too. Hell, if Seattle put up one camera in Pioneer Square and left it at that, and it helped catch a mugger, then that just doesn't do any good at all, huh. When we see something go down on America's Most Wanted, then there's an example there. People get caught by cameras, it's a fact, you can't use emotion to rule the argument, and I believe that all Strow had to say was "it works" and obviously (albeit not to Shep and those others crying for hard statistics without providing any of their own to counter the claim) cameras work.

[aerius]

Let me put it to you this way since you still don't seem to understand. The only effective video surveillance systems are the ones found in large casinos such as the ones in Las Vegas.

...and department stores.

They ain't that good at a department store. Those cameras are used in conjunction with the anti-shoplifting tags and alarms to prevent merchandise theft. They do a decent job of that. However I could mug or blow someone's brains out in the same store and they won't notice anything wrong until I'm long gone. If they're lucky they might get to air a fuzzy picture of my face on TV before the cameras tape over the footage, that is if the cameras see anything in the first place.

Hell, if Seattle put up one camera in Pioneer Square and left it at that, and it helped catch a mugger, then that just doesn't do any good at all, huh. When we see something go down on America's Most Wanted, then there's an example there.

If Seattle put a few cops in uniform in that square the mugging likely won't happen in the first place. That's crime *prevention*. It's a proven fact that visible uniformed police officers are the best crime deterrent available. Cameras *may* catch a perp after the fact if they're lucky, and then they *might* be able to put the perp in jail so he doesn't re-offend. It still does little to nothing to prevent a crime from happening in the first place. With the millions that these cameras cost to install and operate every year, you could easily put a lot more uniformed cops on the streets. If the perps can't go anywhere without being near a cop, they'll have far fewer oppertunitys to commit crimes.

BTW, America's most wanted has a 40% success rate which is the highest success rate of any such show, they have 269 perps caught out of about 620 profiled to date. That's not even making a dent in the overall American crime rate considering that roughly 12,000,000 crimes happen every year there. With the production budget for that show I can hire enough cops to prevent at least 10 times that number of crimes from occuring every year.

People get caught by cameras, it's a fact, you can't use emotion to rule the argument, and I believe that all Strow had to say was "it works" and obviously (albeit not to Shep and those others crying for hard statistics without providing any of their own to counter the claim) cameras work.

People get caught by cameras so it works, right. People get caught speeding by radar guns and photo radar too, does that do anything in reducing the number of speeders? It doesn't. Just because you're catching people doesn't mean you're preventing anything, especially with the pitiful success rates.

BTW, have you looked at the stats I've provided? Right now I have a hell of a lot of stats backing me up all you have is "It works, it's obvious" and 'I believe that all Strow had to say was "it works"', and you haven't offered up a thing to back up your arguments. Everything you've said so far comes down to "it works because I think/say it does".