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COPLINK Helps Nab
Suspected Serial Robbers
by
Rachel Uranga, Staff Writer
LA Daily News
04/05/07
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For months, two men drove around the San
Fernando Valley, scoping out banks and recycling centers for people
walking out with cash.
As they hit more than a half-dozen victims, frustrated LAPD detectives
could do little more than compile unreliable witness statements and hope
for the best.
But last month, they turned to COPLINK, a new $1.3 million database that
links Southern California law enforcement agencies.
That system gave detectives the information they needed to identify the
suspects, who were arrested as one of them roughed up a 63-year-old
woman walking with a cane outside a Roscoe Boulevard bank.
"Information has become the lifeline of policing," LAPD Chief William
Bratton told reporters Thursday during his monthly media briefing. "This
new system is going to allow us to one, input information, and for all
of us to access the shared information."
COPLINK has been quietly rolled out over the last few months, and will
soon be in all Los Angeles Police Department patrol cars.
It pulls together clues from arrest reports, jails, citations and crime
records and makes them all available with just a few key strokes.
Investigators can tap into databases from Los Angeles to San Diego and
across the country and gather information, from a suspect's description
to license plate information to other agencies' crime reports, jail
information and other surveillance.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department already uses the
crime-analysis technology developed by Knowledge Computing Corp., in
Tucson, Ariz.
In the case of the suspected serial Valley robbers, investigators
tracked them through three letters from one of their license plates -
TNV - and a report from the Sheriff's Department.
"We gave (investigators) three letters of the license plate and by the
end of the day they had called back," said John Dunlop, a detective at
the LAPD's Van Nuys Division.
A system query for the license plate pulled up a series of suspects and
possible leads, including the name of the owner of the personalized
plate "TNV." The car, along with the plate, fit a similar description of
a robbery in Palmdale.
The new leads sent undercover investigators after Ricky Marshall, 20, of
Los Angeles, who they began to trail. Shortly after they began to follow
him, Marshall picked up Angelo Newsome, 23, of Pacoima.
Over the next few hours, they drove around the Valley casing banks,
police said. When they spotted the woman with a cane leaving a Bank of
America in the 20200 block of Roscoe, they made their move.
Marshall dropped off Newsome in front of the bank as investigators
watched. Newsome then grabbed the woman from behind, lifting her off her
feet, and threw her to the ground, police said.
She struggled as blood trickled from her temple. But Newsome finally
snatched the bag filled with checks and a $100 bill before he took off
running. Undercover police and bystanders went after him, and he and
Marshall were arrested.
Newsome is charged with three counts of robbery, two counts of assault
with a firearm and possession of rock cocaine. Marshall is charged with
one count of robbery. Both have pleaded not guilty.
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