How the Lathrop Police Department uses integrated video data to solve crimes

KEY IDEAS:

• The Lathrop Police Department needed a way to integrate video from CCTV, traffic cameras, and residential sources.
• Video evidence is often stored in disconnected systems, creating data silos that slow investigations.
• Data integration platforms unify video and other police data, enabling investigators to search and analyze information in one place.
• With integrated data, Lathrop PD increased investigative efficiency, helping detectives identify suspects and solve cases faster.

💡 LATHROP POLICE DEPARTMENT (LPD) AT A GLANCE:

Location: Lathrop, California

Established: 2022

Population: 40,860

Sworn count: More than 30

Total personnel: More than 40

Sources: City of Lathrop, LPD, U.S. Census

LATHROP, Calif. — Cameras serve as an indispensable investigative tool for law enforcement. Video footage from sources like CCTV, home cameras, and traffic cameras plays a pivotal role in identifying suspects and their vehicles, often serving as critical evidence in criminal prosecutions.

However, video footage typically exists in siloed police systems, whether it's evidence collected by officers or captured from a vendor's cameras. For the Lathrop Police Department in California, the inability to access and compare diverse data types slowed down investigations.

To solve this problem, Lathrop PD invested in Peregrine, a data integration solution that ingests the agency’s legacy systems, real-time video sources, and external data sources. Peregrine cleans, clarifies, and harmonizes all of the agency’s data, enabling personnel to explore all of the agency’s data in one unified search. Read on to discover how data integration allowed Lathrop PD to reduce manual analysis, speed up investigations, and solve crimes more efficiently.

Why siloed video footage slows police investigations

Traffic cameras, home cameras, and CCTV cameras capture vast amounts of footage, but that data is often trapped in tech solutions that weren’t designed to communicate. These systems catalog and store data in incompatible formats, meaning investigators have to manually search through individual systems to find critical information.

💡 HOW DOES VIDEO FOOTAGE HELP POLICE INVESTIGATIONS? Video footage is often a critical component in finding evidence, clarifying leads, and solving cases. Law enforcement investigators use CCTV footage, license plate recognition (LPR) system data, traffic cameras, and other real-time intelligence sources to identify:

• Suspects
• Vehicles
• Routes
• Incident timelines

Traditionally, identifying a suspect’s vehicle would be a tedious process for police personnel:

• A detective would start with a general description, like a “gray SUV.”
• The investigator would either enlist a crime analyst or manually comb through all footage from each camera and review individual automated license plate recognition (ALPR) system hits.
• They’d manually write out vehicle locations that match the description and try to find the suspect’s vehicle based on its proximity to the incident, direction traveled, and other factors.

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This process is not only laborious but also time-consuming. When investigators need to solve a homicide or burglary, every second matters. Detectives and victims alike deserve better.

🔑 KEY TAKEAWAY: Siloed video systems slow investigations and limit visibility because…

• Data from CCTV cameras, ALPR systems, and real-time video feeds are stored in systems that don’t communicate.
• Investigators must manually find, review, and draw connections between video sources.
• Time-consuming analysis delays suspect identification and slows investigations.

Disconnected video systems created challenges for Lathrop PD

Ashlyn Howard, a detective with the Lathrop Police Department, was very familiar with the manual rigors of identifying suspect vehicles using siloed systems. Lathrop PD uses four tools that don’t readily talk to each other:

• CCTV footage from Avigilon
• Axon fleet 3
• Vigilant
• InsightLPR for their ALPR scans

To bring these disconnected systems into a single pane of glass, Lathrop PD looked to data integration solutions.

Unifying video footage with data integration for faster investigations

“I use Peregrine every day, for all my cases. Having one place to do everything makes my investigations more thorough.” —Detective Ashlyn Howard, Lathrop Police Department

Lathrop PD onboarded Peregrine to integrate the agency’s disparate data sources and unify its information in one platform, turning hours or days of work into minutes. Data integration solutions automatically surface relevant information — like linking a case file connected to a partial plate and vehicle description — so everyone in a department can make better, data-driven decisions.

Lathrop PD uses Peregrine to integrate CCTV video footage and ALPR scans into one common operating picture. Howard uses Peregrine’s precise, geography-based search capabilities to be more intentional with the camera feeds and ALPR scans she reviews, eliminating the manual drudgery of looking at every camera and ALPR scan and plotting hits on a map.

💡 HOW DOES DATA INTEGRATION IMPROVE VIDEO ANALYSIS FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT? Data integration solutions enable personnel to search across diverse data types in a unified platform. Investigators can analyze video data against information from other video sources, including computer-aided dispatch (CAD) and records management systems (RMS) data, and visualize that data to clarify connections.

“I use Peregrine every day, for all my cases,” she explained. “Having one place to do everything makes my investigations more thorough.”

Using Peregrine, Howard can:

• Efficiently filter through relevant footage based on vehicle descriptions and key locations
• Zero in on license plate information
• Identify suspects' routes

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With access to unified data, Howard is able to answer critical investigative questions, such as:

• Are the suspects residents or just passing through our city?
• Is this their first offense?
• Do they regularly visit the same location?
• Are they potentially involved in other crimes?

Peregrine makes it simpler and faster for Howard to ask and answer these vital questions, driving her investigations forward. This increase in speed and simplicity is crucial when managing large caseloads to ensure victims receive the justice they deserve.

🔑 KEY TAKEAWAY: Data integration creates a unified view of video and investigative data by…

• Harmonizing data from CCTV cameras, ALPR systems, body-worn cameras, and other sources
• Enabling investigators to search across all data sources in a single platform.
• Powering faster, more accurate analysis to identify leads and suspects

How Lathrop PD used integrated video data to solve investigations

Since onboarding Peregrine, Lathrop PD personnel have increased investigative efficiency. Howard said integrated video data was extremely useful in:

• Identifying patterns
• Obtaining information
• Tying suspects to crimes

📖 CASE STUDY: HOW LATHROP PD SOLVED A HOMICIDE USING VIDEO DATA

• Lathrop investigators obtained a video of the incident, a fight outside a bar.
• Lathrop PD used Peregrine to track the suspect’s vehicle across camera systems.
• The platform helped identify the suspect’s vehicle’s license plate and route.
• Detectives used unified data to understand the victim’s movements after leaving the bar, before the homicide.
• Those insights were critical in solving the case.

Howard shared how Peregrine helped her solve a burglary case at a construction site: “I had a vague vehicle description and located it on camera heading toward the crime scene,” she explained. “Using Peregrine to cross reference ALPR scans, I learned that the vehicle had previously been in our city and was able to connect the suspect with a prior burglary.”

Why data integration is essential for modern police investigations

Data integration enables police agencies to make full use of their data sources, easily drawing connections between video footage, CAD and RMS data, and external databases.

After implementing Peregrine, Lathrop PD personnel were able to quickly filter video footage to find key information, identify patterns, and take informed actions to solve crimes more efficiently.

“Peregrine has multiple tools and features in one platform, which allows me to save time and work on more cases,” Howard said.

To discover how Peregrine can empower your law enforcement agency to make data-driven decisions, streamline investigations, and enhance operational efficiency, connect with our experts today.

Peregrine is built on AWS GovCloud.