The 'Armadillo,' a former Brink's truck with video cameras patrolling Peoria.
Posted on 08/19/2009 2:55:58 PM PDT by Responsibility2nd
PEORIA, Ill. -- This industrial city, hard hit by the recession, has found a new, low-budget way to fight crime: Park an unmanned, former Brink's truck bristling with video cameras in front of the dwellings of troublemakers.
Police here call it the Armadillo. They say it has restored quiet to some formerly rowdy streets. Neighbors' calls for help have dropped sharply. About half of the truck's targets have fled the neighborhood.
"The truck is meant to be obnoxious and to cause shame," says Peoria Police Chief Steven Settingsgaard.
The Armadillo has helped alleviate problems like drug dealing that can make neighborhoods unlivable.
Police got a call at 2:30 one morning from Mary Smith, a 58-year-old computer operator at a Butternut Bread Bakery. Fighting back tears, she asked for relief from her neighbors' incessant yelling.
She and her husband, Terry, 61, a Butternut baker, have lived in their home on North Wisconsin Avenue for 30 years, and have seen the neighborhood fall into drug trafficking. The police suggested using the Armadillo.
That weekend, the truck pulled up to the offending neighbor's house. A police officer knocked on the door and told the residents a nuisance report had been filed. Within 24 hours, the Smiths say, the house was quiet. The occupants moved out soon thereafter.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
The 'Armadillo,' a former Brink's truck with video cameras patrolling Peoria.
Over the next year, the 12,000 pounds of heavy metal got an extensive makeover, including about $10,000 in new equipment and repairs. It was outfitted with five infrared surveillance cameras, a padlocked hood, a locked gas cap, and protective screens over the head and tail lights.
A Peoria tire company installed foam-filled tires that can't go flat. Decals that say "PEORIA POLICE Nuisance Property Surveillance Vehicle" were pasted on all four sides of the white truck.
>>>>>>>>>>>> More at link.
I don't quite understand why this works, but glad it does.
“I don’t quite understand why this works, but glad it does.”
Trojan Horse...maybe it is deadly, maybe not...its why you don’t need an alarm system as much as plenty of stickers...or don’t need a dog as much as a food dish and house...the vermin will keep moving looking for a softer target...
....that’s funny!....I love it when the cops strike back.
Just don’t tell Obama.
He will see this as another sign of racial profiling and cops ‘acting stupidly’.
It works like a scarecrow, but the vermin it chases away are nastier then crows.
I want one! For the neighborhood teenagers,,,,,,,,
I love this thing!
“I don’t quite understand why this works, but glad it does.”
Do you remember your parents saying don’t do things in private that you would be ashamed of in public?
This is one of those things that sounds great when it’s used against a drug den, then like everything else, it will inevitably get used against someone that all of us would consider “normal” and then it doesn’t sound so good. Equal protection under the law, if they can park it in front of a scumbag’s place they can and will park it in front of yours. Don’t think it could happen, just wait until you have a spat with a neighbor. I don’t want us to become England and have 300,000,000 CCTV cameras on every light pole. You boil a frog by incremental steps.
They should park it in front of the White House and politely tell Obama a nuisance complaint has been filed.
This will work just fine until some bright perp puts on a ski mask, dumps five gallons of gas down over one tire, and lights it up with his Zippo.
where can I get one of these for a dollar? You could make a fortune just by recycling the thing.
Hey, Obie’ll give you $4,500 for it toward the purchase of a new crackerbox.
}:-)4
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