Countywide : Fingerprint ID System Seen Cutting Burglaries
A new computerized identification system that matches fingerprints to names in seconds may bring a significant drop in burglaries in the county, said Frank Fitzpatrick, chief criminalist of the Sheriff-Coroner Department.
The California Identification system, or Cal-ID, will be in operation starting Dec. 8. The $2.1-million system will be hooked into the California Department of Justice’s statewide fingerprint database, with terminals in Santa Ana, Anaheim, Garden Grove and Costa Mesa. It will be available for use by all county law enforcement agencies.
“I think you’ll see a significant drop in the burglary rate,” Fitzpatrick said. He said that San Francisco, which launched a similar system two years ago, has experienced a 15% decrease in burglaries.
The Sheriff’s Department is preparing to run fingerprints in about 2,500 unsolved burglary, rape and homicide cases through the computer. Currently, fingerprints are filed and compared manually, and police often are unable to make a match.
“Even if you’re good, it’s taking you a long time,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s just like having a library. Somebody tells you there’s a book in the library, but it’s been moved.”
With the new system, “what we want to be able to do is have people identified before they are released from jail,” Fitzpatrick said.
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