COPLINK now poised to go global

12/04/03
by L. Anne Newell

An innovative crime-fighting program that began in Tucson and gained national attention when used in the D.C. sniper case has continued its spread across the country - and is poised to move internationally.

Officials with Knowledge Computing Corp., which markets COPLINK, will announce today that they have partnered with a software development and systems-integration company in the United Kingdom to market the database-sharing program in Europe. It's one of the highlights of 2003 for COPLINK, which links information from disparate databases, allowing officers with only partial information to successfully search for suspects.

Following a string of national awards and national growth, officials with the program and Knowledge Computing are more than optimistic.

"It's been a great year," said President and CEO Bob Griffin. "Our business is really starting to explode."

The people working on the project at the Tucson Police Department agree. "I feel great and proud," said Detective Tim Petersen. "I just get more excited every day with all the new things we're doing."

Petersen and several others received a concrete reminder of the importance of COPLINK on Tuesday, when police held a small ceremony to laud the group's finalist finish for the Webber Seavey Award from the International Association of Chiefs of Police.

Finishing in the top 10 of 144 entries - which included FBI and other federal programs - showed the importance of their work, Chief Richard Miranda told the group. "It's made me very proud," he said.

From a small room at the University of Arizona's Artificial Intelligence Lab, the program has grown significantly since its original technology was developed in 1996. In fact, Griffin expects COPLINK to be in place in about 30 agencies by the end of the year. It's already in Phoenix; Ann Arbor, Mich.; Boston; and the entire state of Alaska, among other areas.

There are plans to work with the entire San Diego area and the U.S. Border Patrol as well as to create a larger Pima County system by uniting TPD records with those from the Marana Police Department and the Pima County Sheriff's Department. Officials hope to create a unified Southwest Border system and even have plans to work with national security agencies.

Then There's Europe

Working with Orbitron Technologies, officials hope to impress people the way they did with the sniper investigation in the Washington, D.C., area, Griffin said, even though they arrived just as John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo were taken into custody.

"Even though we got in at the end of the investigation, we were able to show them we would have been able to identify the suspects even faster," Griffin said. He explained that the software would have shown officials that the same blue car from New Jersey was stopped near all the shootings but was let go because police were searching for a white van.

In addition to the International Association of Chiefs of Police award, COPLINK has been honored by the Center for Digital Government and several other agencies. In the Tuesday presentation - in which medals were given to Petersen, Daniel Casey, Officer Linda Ridgeway, Sgt. Chuck Violette, Lt. Jennifer Schroeder and Capt. David Neri - officials said the honors have enhanced the reputation of Tucson and the Police Department.

"What this means is that Tucson, given the size of the community, is as innovative, progressive and forward-looking as any department worldwide," said Paul Punske, with Motorola, co-sponsor of the Webber Seavey award.