GPS Tracking

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. – The GPS tracking feature of a victim’s cell phone helped police in Sioux Falls foil a robbery and kidnapping in progress. A former professional football player is behind bars, accused of the crimes.

A spokesperson for the Sioux Falls Police reported that the accused is Alvin Richard Robinson, 26, who calls that city his home. His charges include aggravated assault, second degree robbery and first degree kidnapping.

According to accounts pieced together from the victim and police, the incident spanned an overnight, Feb. 10-11, 2010, and was essentially a night of drinking that drew progressively more violent. (more…)

ESCONDIDO, CA – Police in a southern California city are becoming quite the experts at collecting artwork. But their intent is not to display it on a wall for all to admire. It’s to send the artists to jail.

Escondido, Calif., near San Diego and the Mexican border, has one of the highest rates of property crimes per capita in California. It has a population of about 130,000 residents and a real problem with graffiti, also known as tagging.

Last year the police department started a new GPS tracking program. A special camera, equipped with GPS tracking and location technology, was purchased and put to work catching graffiti artists. The digital camera documents the vandalism in an image, then records its time, date and exact location on a computer mapping system. All the GPS tracking data can be downloaded to computer.

Over time, hundreds of vandalism incidents are recorded into the common database and patterns begin to emerge. Art experts with street smarts identify artwork by the same artist. Police say graffiti artists usually strike near their own homes. When a young vandal is located, he is charged with a series of his graffiti crimes instead of just one.

One of the latest tagging arrests was 19-year-old Isaiah Gastumel, who is charged with six felony and 146 misdemeanor counts of vandalism.

A measure of the GPS tracking program success, one police Lieutenant Bob Benton said annual restitution paid to local businesses increased nearly 10 times this year over last. Before the GPS tracking system was instituted young taggers’ crimes amounted to about $20,000 in fines. This year the figure multiplied to almost $200,000.

Much of the money goes to the shop owners. Some business owners in downtown Escondido say they pay about $300 a week to crews to clean their walls of graffiti.

Within a few days, the scrawl returns.

-          Source: Channel 10 News, San Diego, Calif.

SANTA CRUZ, CA – A vehicle tracking device in a stolen Mercedes was instrumental in uncovering a holiday burglary ring in affluent central California.

A young couple, Timothy Staley, 27 and Katrina Adamich, 21, were arrested in tourist hotspot Santa Cruz, CA, after police tracked the stolen vehicle to the parking lot of a beachside motel, with the aid of its GPS tracking system.

A Santa Clara County family reported to police that their home was burglarized and their vehicle was missing on Thanksgiving, after they arrived home following a holiday celebration with family. In addition to the brand new Mercedes, a digital camera, computers, jewelry and clothing were taken by unknown persons.

Luckily the sedan came from a car dealership that provides live GPS tracking as standard equipment. A live or real-time GPS tracking system calculates its exact position on earth with the signals from orbiting satellites. Those regular position readings are then transmitted over a wireless network to the Internet. The user can access data about the vehicle’s GPS tracking location at any time, from any Web-enabled computer or smartphone.

Vehicle tracking devices are known for their incredible accuracy. GPS tracking coordinates are usually within a few feet of the object’s actual location.

Within hours of the reported burglary, police used GPS tracking to find the swiped Mercedes. It was parked in the lot of the Paradise Motel at 300 Second St. The motel surveillance camera fingered Staley as the thief. He gave no resistance as police approached him. Staley allowed the authorities into his rented room, where they found his accomplice Adamich and numerous pieces of expensive electronics, jewelry and clothing.

Santa Cruz police said they believe the couple was responsible for a series of break-ins in the area.

Methamphetamine was also found in the rented room. The couple, who were transients, now have a permanent address in local jail. The GPS tracking system in the stolen car gets credit for the bust.

Police say the holidays are a time when burglaries, muggings and shoplifting are at their peak. Shoppers and retailers, wrapped up in the busy season, are easy targets, because their guards are down.

GPS tracking systems can be used for all sorts of asset protection, not just vehicle tracking. Tiny GPS tracking units can be attached to major electronics, appliances, furniture, Christmas decorations and even clothing. If the items are stolen, GPS tracking will lead to their recovery, just as it did the Mercedes; a common vehicle in California perhaps, but unique because of its vehicle tracking system.

-          Source: Contra Costa Times

NAIROBI, KENYA, Africa  – Government officials in Nairobi Province are hoping a high-tech tracking system will help them get a handle on a kidnapping spree that has stretched over the past few years.

A local security firm has offered a solution to criminals running rampant and literally snatching people off the streets. It proposes a universal GPS tracking system in Kenya’s capital.

People in high-risk sections of the city would be issued highly sensitive, yet relatively inexpensive GPS tracking systems. Children could put the main hardware of the tracking device in a pocket or backpack; adults in a purse or briefcase. Each system has a remote handheld with a panic button that the victim could activate when threatened by a kidnapper. The accompanying GPS tracking device would be tripped and a monitor at a main control center could find the individual’s location by Global Positioning System coordinates.

Kenya is a lush land, popular with tourists for safaris. But the U.S. government has issued a travel warning for the country because, for the last decade, it has had a reputation as a volatile and crime-riddled city. Nairobi is notorious for car jackings, armed robberies, burglaries and now kidnappings. Most houses have security measures in place, including burglar gates, guard dogs and sometimes armed guards. Now GPS tracking could be added to the arsenal of defensive tools.

In this poverty-stricken city, where a typical middle- to lower-class citizen earns only a few dollars a day, many are turning to illegal pursuits. Kidnappings are considered easy money. People, especially children are being grabbed at gunpoint. Their families are notified usually by cell phone text message and threatened with a ransom ranging from $500 to $800. (more…)

A young woman’s joy ride with a stolen car was cut short by police, who found her with the help of a vehicle tracking device.

Sherice Johnson, a 21-year-old Chicago resident, was charged on Sept. 22 with vehicular hijacking by Oak Park police. Law officials were able to track down the stolen vehicle by the GPS tracking locater attached to the car. The victim was a woman, who said she was carjacked in the business district of Oak Park, a western suburb of Chicago. Police did not identify the victim by name.

The car owner told police that her car, a 2004 Audi, was parked outside a business on the 800 block of South Boulevard Sept. 21. Two women approached her about 5 p.m. and grabbed her at the shoulders as she approached the car. The two criminals grabbed the car keys and the woman’s cell phone, jumped in the car and drove away, according to police.

The woman saw no weapon and she was not injured in the incident, Oak Park Police Commander Len Jorgensen said.

The Audi was equipped with a real-time vehicle tracking system. A real-time GPS tracking device catches satellite radio signals at regular increments, usually every few seconds or minutes. The vehicle tracking receiver’s location is determined by a mathematical calculation called triangulation. Those position updates are transmitted over a wireless network. The vehicle tracking system user can see the vehicle moving along a map on a remote computer.

In this case, police monitored the stolen vehicle on a computer map. GPS tracking led them right to the Audi and the carjacker.

Johnson was later identified by the victim in a lineup.

Source: Pioneer Press

A northwest Ohio woman returned to a grave site one too many times, to pilfer mementos. A vehicle tracking device tucked neatly inside a toy car and placed near a tombstone led police to her stash of stolen goods.

Sandra Lilly discovered that items she placed on the grave of her 18-year-old son in Williamstown Cemetery had been taken, so she called police. Police took the report, commenting that the same crime had apparently occurred to other grieving families.

Grant County Sheriff Chuck Dills gave the mother a vehicle tracking device. Vehicle tracking devices are GPS tracking receivers, usually placed in cars and trucks. Real-time vehicle tracking systems allow a user to pinpoint an object’s exact location, from a remote computer.

In this case, the GPS tracking unit worked on a mini version of a car. The mother hid it inside the box of a toy muscle car Camaro, then placed it on her son Josh’s grave. The thief took the bait, not knowing that there was a vehicle tracking device attached. The police chief got the report and found out where the stolen toy car was, following it on a map from his laptop.

The GPS tracking device was found inside a minivan owned by 48-year-old Kimberly Goodrich. The vehicle was full of other items that appeared to be stolen from the cemetery. Goodrich was on probation from a theft in Boone County, Ohio.

GPS tracking devices come in two versions: passive vehicle tracking logs an object’s movements for later download and review; and real-time vehicle tracking lets the viewer see where the receiver is minute by minute, almost as it happens. Real-Time GPS tracking is best for theft recovery.

As GPS tracking hardware is becoming smaller, lighter and less costly, consumers are thinking of new ways to use them besides vehicle tracking. Protecting assets other than cars and trucks from theft, is a quickly growing application. Vehicle tracking products have been placed on cargo shipments, furniture, artwork and all sorts of recreational vehicles.

GPS tracking systems are really becoming quite common, said Sheriff Dills. He said that if a thief takes something that doesn’t belong to him, there’s a good chance someone will be sitting at a desk on their computer, or a Web-enabled cell phone, trying to find it with GPS tracking.

Source: Breitbart.tv

Real-Time Tracking System

Real-time tracking system information aided authorities in the recovery of a stolen backhoe in the Blandford-Blenheim region. The real-time tracking system data was used by local authorities to accurately determine the backhoe’s location and eventual to the arrest of an unidentified man for possession of stolen equipment over $5000.

Bruce Weeger of Ebersole Excavating went online to view his real-time tracking system to check and verify his equipment was in the appropriate location. Weeger installed real-time tracking systems, a form of GPS tracking system technology, as additional security for his expensive construction equipment. When the GPS tracking system showed that the backhoe was missing from Weeger’s property he quickly called authorities and provided him the real-time tracking system data. The real-time tracking system data was then used by authorities to determine the location of the backhoe and led them to the suspected thief’s home. GPS tracking systems have been widely used by companies to monitor vehicles and other assets.

Staff Sergeant Shelton, who was involved in the case, was surprised how easily it was for the authorities to locate the vehicle and suspect thanks to the GPS tracking data provided by the real-time tracking system. The real-time tracking system provided exact longitude and latitude coordinates. When asked about the crime, Shelton expressed how much easier police work would be if all stolen items were equipped with GPS tracking systems.

TORONTO, CAN. – It’s not easy being a thief.

Due to the growing sophistication and widespread use of vehicle tracking systems, it’s become more difficult to steal someone else’s car, truck or cargo. But leave it to the bad guys to keep giving it the old college try.

In Toronto, Canada, seven members of a known cargo theft gang were recently arrested when a GPS tracking device led police to a stolen shipment of tobacco products.

The men, who were armed and masked, attacked a truck driver who was waiting to unload at a Toronto distribution facility, said the Ontario Trucking Association. They locked him in the sleeper cab.

Knowing that many cars – and certainly most commercial trucks – are now monitored with GPS vehicle tracking systems, the thieves hesitated in their escape, and found and disabled the truck’s vehicle tracking device. Confident they could make a clean getaway, they took off in the tractor/trailer. The driver was released a short time later. He called police.

What the suspects didn’t know was that a second vehicle tracking device was embedded in the stolen tobacco shipment. Basic vehicle tracking devices have been adapted to work for the protection of other assets. Many companies now put GPS tracking devices on their loads so someone from home base can follow where they are and if they get to their destinations on time.

With the owner’s permission, the police used the GPS tracking device to nab the thieves. They were found, along with the truck and its contents, at a nearby loading dock. Goods from several other heists were found in an adjacent warehouse. The products recovered were estimated at a value of $2 million.

Thefts of products in transit are up 300 percent this year, according to a professional trucker trade organization, despite a sharp increase also in use of vehicle tracking and surveillance systems. Police agencies believe organized crime rings are getting bolder in their pursuits of goods, even in secured or semi-secured facilities. When these shipments are recovered, it is usually with the aid of GPS tracking systems.

FRAMINGHAM, MA – Three men are facing long prison sentences after Massachusetts police seized a massive marijuana shipment with the aid of a GPS tracking system.

The drugs were in a 360-pound crate that had been moved about 24 miles, from Framingham to Norwood. Police believe it has a street value of about $700,000.

Charged with marijuana trafficking on August 17 were: Peter Bryson, 24, of Roxbury, Boston; Paul Bryson, 36, of Dorchester, Boston; and Richardson Rhau, 35, of Milton.

Police had suspected a drug deal was pending and had a business on Beaver Street in Framingham under surveillance. Framingham Police and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration got a search warrant and entered the building about 1 a.m. to find a large crate with what appeared to be marijuana in it. The crate was further divided into a dozen bricks of alleged drugs.

With the consent of the Framingham District Court, authorities placed a real-time GPS tracking device – very similar to those used in vehicle tracking – in the crate and repackaged it.

It didn’t take long before GPS tracking indicated the stash was on the move. Later that morning, police returned to the business and found a man driving away, with the crate in tow.

GPS tracking led police to a warehouse on Kerry Place in Norwood. Surveillance officers observed the three men putting boxes in a van on the loading dock. The men fled, but were later arrested.

GPS tracking technology is heavily used by police. Time and again, vehicle tracking has helped police not only find a suspect, but prove exactly where he is or was at any particular time. Some defendants have challenged vehicle tracking in the courts. The legal system has concluded that placing a vehicle tracking device on the outside of a car does not constitute an invasion of privacy. However the courts in different states have different opinions about whether a warrant is needed prior to placing the vehicle tracking device.

MANHATTAN, N.Y. – GPS vehicle tracking technology and a quick-thinking cop reunited a violinist with the half-million dollar instrument he left in a New York City cab on Monday.

Hahn-Bin Yoo, a classically-trained violinist and protégé of Israeli-American violin virtuoso Itzhak Perlman, got out of a cab in front of his apartment in Chinatown and minutes later realized he had left his borrowed violin on the back seat. The violin was made in the 1820s by Giovanni Francesco Pressenda and it is valued at about $500,000.

Yoo, 22, from South Korea, had been practicing late into the evening at Lincoln Center in uptown Manhattan, then took an $18 cab ride about six miles to his home on the lower east side. He blamed the oversight on exhaustion.

The musician called police, exasperated because he could remember neither the cabbie’s name nor the vehicle’s identifying numbers. A detective quickly realized that most cabs today have vehicle tracking systems installed for fleet management.

Vehicle tracking of fleets is well established in many cities with concentrated populations, because they help business owners monitor the location and progression of every vehicle they own. GPS tracking receivers are placed in every vehicle, and position updates are sent every few seconds via a wireless network to the Internet. A manager at headquarters “watches” the drivers in real time.

The police officer called the Taxi and Limousine Commission, a government agency that oversees the city’s 13,000 taxis. The addresses and times (pickup and drop-off) of Yoo’s trip were fed into the GPS tracking system computer and up popped Dalbir Singh’s cab. The driver was phoned and Singh quickly returned the precious cargo.

The violin was tracked down in minutes with the help of the city’s GPS vehicle tracking system.

The cab driver said Yoo was lucky that he was the last fare of the cabbie’s night, because the next occupant would likely have walked off with the violin as a “finders keepers.”

While this story involves a vehicle tracking system in a traditional use: fleet tracking, a similar outcome could have occurred if GPS tracking were used in a different application: asset management and protection.

Vehicle tracking technology has become so advanced that GPS tracking receivers have become quite small. Often they are attached to valuable objects so that if they are lost or stolen, they can be located from the GPS tracking data they transmit.

Yoo or the instrument’s owner could hide a tiny GPS vehicle tracking receiver on the violin’s case.