“This is a game changer” | Dallas police say new technology helps them catch violent criminals

DALLAS. Dallas police say that most violent crimes involve cars.

And that’s why they say that these cameras, called Flock cameras, mounted on poles throughout the city, help them solve crimes and catch violent suspects.

“This is a game changer for us. This is a game-changer,” said Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia.

There are 165 Flock cameras installed throughout the city. They read license tags 24 hours a day.

Pictures taken by Flock cameras are sent to the Dallas Fusion Center and then sent to officers in real time.

“We can identify suspicious vehicles that were recently involved in a shootout or were used for kidnapping. The information has entered the system and we can identify these vehicles if they pass through these areas of the city,” said DPD Major Stephen Williams.

Since the cameras were installed and put into service in June 2022, Dallas police say they have recovered 221 stolen vehicles and made 130 arrests, and police found drugs and weapons in many of those arrests.

“We have to let people know it’s out there somewhere, and the criminal element knows it’s out there. That it won’t be easy to commit acts of violence in the city of Dallas if the men and women of the Dallas Police Department don’t hunt you down, Garcia said.

And now this technology is installed on every patrol car, so the patrolmen receive information about all the vehicles that they encounter.

Officers no longer have to call the license plate to find out if the car is stolen or wanted. It just pops up on their screens.

“We have limited resources and we have hardware that does it a lot faster than a human can do it and does it a lot faster for us,” Williams said.

Dallas police say they’re only looking for violent criminals and stolen cars, not people with things like traffic warrants, and information is only kept for 30 days before being deleted.

The cameras do not capture images of people in vehicles, only tags.

They say these cameras are designed to catch violent criminals and keep Dallas safe.