City aims at shooters

CAPE TOWN: CCTV CAMERAS TO COVER 7KM2 AREA IN THE CAPE FLATS

Technology detects gunshots and conveys location to law enforcement.

The City of Cape Town is to use CCTV cameras – in conjunction with its ShotSpotter technology – in a bid to identify shooters in areas where the system is installed.

“It is hoped that the beady electronic eyes could help identify and locate suspects involved in shooting incidents in areas where ShotSpotter is deployed,” the city said yesterday in a statement.

The statement said the city had spent R12 million in this financial year to expand the technology, which detects gunshots and conveys the location to law enforcement, to cover a seven square kilometre area in Hanover Park and Manenberg, hotspot crime areas.

“ShotSpotter assists staff to respond to gun violence incidents. Its use has led to the successful apprehension of suspects and the confiscation of firearms and drugs.

“The system identifies areas where gun violence is active and assists with the planning of operations as it provides valuable information on prominent times and days when these shootings occur.”

In recent months, the city’s Strategic Surveillance Unit has started using CCTV as an additional intelligence-gathering tool. ShotSpotter provides the coordinates for shooting incidents that are fed into the CCTV system.

Cape Town mayoral committee member for safety and security JP Smith said there had been an unprecedented increase in the number of shooting incidents in the past two weeks.

“One of our challenges has been getting officers to the scene of shooting incidents detected by ShotSpotter,” said Smith. “We said at the outset that the efficacy of the system would rely heavily on cooperation from Saps. While there is certainly support for the ShotSpotter concept, the limited Saps resources and response to alerts remains a challenge.

“With the increased use of CCTV to help identify shooters, we’re hoping that Saps can use that footage to track down the suspects and bolster the odds of a conviction. Everything is about convictions and unless there are convictions, we will not improve the gang situation.”

Between April 1 to 9, ShotSpotter detected 176 shooting incidents with a total of 505 rounds fired. Ninety percent of these were in Manenberg. The Strategic Surveillance Unit has handed over nearly 10 gigabytes of video footage to Saps detectives to aid their investigations.

Yet another firearm was confiscated in the latest ShotSpotter success on Wednesday. – ANA