Wichita police bureaus add analysts to look for crime trends

An addition to local crime-fighting efforts is already paying noteworthy dividends, law enforcement officials say.

Two months ago, crime analysts were assigned to each of the city’s four police bureaus. They study crime data, looking for trends.

“Where is the latest trend?” said Capt. Hassan Ramzah of the Patrol East Bureau. “They’re looking to identify the potential emerging crime wave.”

One recent example: a rash of thefts from vehicles in church parking lots in east Wichita, Lt. Doug Nolte said. Crime analysts quickly picked up on the fact that the thefts were happening at churches close to each other on the same day.

That information was relayed to officers, who notified residents and churches on their beats.

“It helps us get a real picture of what’s going on,” Ramzah said. “The hopes are that this will be very innovative for us and pay big dividends for us and prevent crime in the community.”

Officers with a demonstrated interest in and aptitude for crunching data have been chosen for the new posts, Ramzah said.

Catching on quickly to a trend allows police to focus resources on an area and, they hope, catch those responsible before more crimes are committed.

“The time is right for us because of where technology is,” Nolte said.

For years, police used the “interwatch” system to share information between shifts. But not all crimes, such as burglaries, made it onto the interwatch reports.

Thanks to computers in patrol cars and electronic data collection and storage, he said, beat officers can now download information about cases they’re working. That information can be posted to electronic “intelligence hubs,” which officers on other shifts can check.

When officers filled out reports on paper and the files were then moved up to investigations, it might take a couple of weeks for trends to emerge. Now, Nolte said, those trends can be spotted within a few days — sometimes even sooner.

“What you have is that confluence of technology,” Nolte said.

A few years ago, having a crime analyst would not have been an efficient use of resources. But times — and technology — have changed.

“There’s so much information available now that you could drown in all the data,” Nolte said. “The real key is to unpack that information.”

This story was originally published February 19, 2012 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Wichita police bureaus add analysts to look for crime trends."