Surveillance may have caught homicides

Aerial view data could include areas where shootings occurred

The aerial surveillance plane used in recent months by the Baltimore Police Department was likely flying above the city when at least nine homicides and 21 shootings occurred on the streets below, according to an analysis of flight and crime data by The Baltimore Sun.

The exact coverage area of the plane at any given moment is unclear in the data — which only states whether the plane was flying an “east” or “west” pattern — but it’s likely that some of the incidents were caught on film given the plane’s ability to capture 32 square miles of city streetscape at a time.

One example: a quintuple shooting about 6:30 p.m. on July 11, when shots rang out at a candlelight vigil for 24-year-old Jermaine Scofield, who had been killed the day before. The shooting, which police said created “pandemonium” among a crowd of 20 to 30 people in West Baltimore, occurred in the middle of one of two western surveillance flights that day, according to The Sun’s analysis.

Other incidents that occurred while the plane was in the air may not have been caught on film. For instance, when popular rapper Lor Scoota was gunned down in what police called a targeted killing at a busy intersection in Northeast Baltimore on June 25, the plane was in the air — but flying its western pattern across town.

Other shootings and killings appear to have occurred just before or after the plane was in the air, or in between two flight patterns on the same day, according to The Sun’s analysis.

For instance, on Feb. 20, police responded about 1:40 p.m. to a West Baltimore corner and found two fatal shooting victims: 20-year-old Anthony Daniels and 15-year-old Quindell Ford. The plane flew two western flights that day, but before and after the double shooting — between 8:57 a.m. and 12:36 p.m. and between 2:38 p.m. and 6:25 p.m.

The cameras do not provide highresolution images but allow for analysts — employed by the program’s private operator, Persistent Surveillance Systems — to track individuals and vehicles coming into and leaving crime scenes. If the plane was filming a certain location at the time a shooting occurred, the analysts could go back in time to track any identified suspects through the city.

Police have declined to say which violent crimes were captured on film.

The Sun conducted its analysis by comparing the flight data obtained from the Office of the Public Defender to police dispatch times for shootings and homicides, which reflect when officers first responded to the incidents.

Some of the incidents included in The Sun’s count may have occurred before the plane was in the air, particularly if officers were dispatched to a scene long after a shooting or homicide actually occurred. For the same reason, other shootings not included in The Sun’s count may have been captured.

The flight data also identifies a small portion of flight time as “non-mission flight hours,” but does not specify those hours, possibly the flight time to and from Martin State Airport in Middle River.

The program was not initially disclosed to the public or to most public officials — including Mayor Stephanie RawlingsBlake, the City Council, prosecutors and public defenders — and has prompted privacy concerns from civil liberties advocates. Police, meanwhile, have touted it as contributing critical intelligence to their crime fight.

Police have only disclosed one shooting incident in which the plane’s surveillance has been used to make an arrest. That incident involved two elderly siblings who were shot on Feb. 22 in Southwest Baltimore, when the plane was flying in its western pattern.

It is unclear whether surveillance footage has been used to investigate any of the other shootings or homicides identified by The Sun. Most have not been solved.

Ross McNutt, president of Ohio-based Persistent Surveillance Systems, which owns all of the footage, declined to comment.

Police plan to fly the plane again this week, to conduct event surveillance for the Maryland Fleet Week and Air Show and the Baltimore Running Festival.