Don't Forget About the Human Element!

With technology progressing and expanding at such an incredible rate, specifically where security and surveillance are concerned, one thing that I have had to remind myself of in my role as a Surveillance Director is that the human element is still the most important part of our function, no matter how exciting and useful our new tools are. A recent request from our local law enforcement that turned into a lengthy investigation reminded me of just that!

I am a huge proponent of EVERYTHING and ANYTHING that successfully assists in the safety of our patron’s, team members and community; however, I firmly believe that it must be used as a tool, not a crutch. Let me be more specific. A few months ago, local law enforcement approached my team to help identify an armed robbery suspect. The suspect had walked into a convenience store, fired his weapon and successfully robbed a lone cashier at gunpoint. The photos that law enforcement and local media released from the convenience store CCTV system gave us some insight into the suspect’s vehicle that was used. He had removed the plates and had a mask on. These actions rendered our facial recognition system and our license plate recognition system less effective. If you find yourself in a similar situation it would be tempting to give up, but I urge you not to!

Without the new technology’s assistance, I took the information that we were provided and went “old school”. I depended on surveillance skills that I have relied upon for the last 20 years. I grabbed identifiable characteristics from the CCTV photos at the scene of the crime and started reviewing the coverage at our entrances. I looked for anyone remotely matching the suspect’s description, specifically the unique clothing the suspect wore during the robbery. I started to review footage at our entrances two hours prior to the time of the robbery. After almost an hour and a half of fast forwarding and coming up empty handed, I had several thoughts of whether or not I was wasting my time, and then something caught my eye. A male walked into camera view who matched the description of the suspect. He was wearing the exact and very unique clothing in the photos that was provided to us. Having determined the suspect was in fact on property by using our surveillance skills, we could now utilize our technology with greater success.

By taking the clear face shot of the suspect captured on our facial recognition system without a mask, we were able to research that face in eConnect. In doing so, we determined that the suspect was on property on several other occasions. These dates matched those of multiple robberies by someone matching his physical and clothing description.

In total we assisted in the identification and capture of the suspect responsible for more than 50 armed robberies across the region. Would this have been possible without the use of technology and facial recognition? No! Would this have been possible without the use of human surveillance skills? No! Both were vital in the success of this investigation.

The one thing that I would want others to take away from this is to use the skills that you have developed before solely relying on the technology you have available to you. The technology of facial recognition software, weapons detection, and license plate recognition are highly useful, and encouraged, but never forget about the human element that makes surveillance an incredible asset to the casino industry and across the community.