Digital video enhances police image
ClearView Communications have recently equipped ten UK police forces with Digital CCTV Custody systems including Derbyshire, Cambridgeshire, Surrey, Northamptonshire and the Metropolitan Police. Some of the systems designed and installed comprise other electronic security systems including cell-call, affray alarm, fire alarm, access control and vehicle/pedestrian gates and barriers.
The systems have been designed to comply with the Home Office guidance “The safer detention and handling of persons in custody”. They have created a safer environment for detainees and provided custody staff with greater protection, as well as ensuring a high degree of transparency with regard to police procedures. The digital CCTV systems were able to satisfy all aspects of the police forces’ demanding specifications – including the requirement for multi-channel, lip-synch audio, image authentication watermarking and an operator interface that could be used with little training.
The systems record and display images from cameras throughout the custody suites, including in the charge area, corridors, several of the cells and the intoximeter room. At the charge desks and in the intoximeter rooms there is also audio recording, with true lip synchronisation. If needed, audio can be provided on any or all of the other video channels.
ClearView’s CVH series of ligature free colour/mono cell cameras, supported by covert “black” infrared illumination, are installed in some cells. These can enable early intervention in self-harm attempts; allow for monitoring of vulnerable detainees; ensure the safety of staff by viewing the detainee without entering the cell; provide an opportunity to view the behaviour of an individual and enable a more accurate risk assessment and permit custody staff to perform other duties while maintaining general and intermittent observation; provide an additional management tool, for example, checking that visits have been carried out as stated on the custody record or checking the standard of rousing visits.
The privacy of the detainee is preserved in the WC area of the cell using ClearView’s video masking system which masks relevant areas of the camera’s view.
All corridors, exercise yards, vehicle docks and air-locks are protected by cameras. In addition each individual charge desk and intoximeter room has real-time lip-synchronised audio.
The systems have been configured to apply recording regimes that are appropriate to the different areas. At the charge desk, for example, the motion detection facility will automatically trigger audio and real-time (25 images per second) video recording whenever movement is registered, returning it to a lower image rate once activity has ceased. Movement also initiates faster recording rates of images from the cameras in the cells. In the room housing the intoximeter, audio/video capture is activated (via a relay) when the cover of the machine is opened.
Because all the systems have watermarking and a time/date stamp sychronised to the GPS atomic clock, recordings can be admitted as evidence in court. This might prove necessary if a custody officer was to be assaulted or a detainee lodges a complaint.
Through the graphical user interface (GUI) and a number of separate system monitors, staff are able to keep a close eye on the condition of prisoners in the cells. This facility, together with a range of other measures has helped to produce a safer custody environment, a key aim of which is to reduce incidents of self-harm, and deaths in custody.
The digital systems produce higher quality images than the previous analogue tape systems, and also reduce staff workload. With the analogue recorder, tapes had to be changed several times a day and retrieving particular images was very time-consuming. Using the new systems, a month of data can be recorded onto RAID5 hard disk and the search and retrieval process only takes a few seconds, even for someone who is not technically minded. Exporting recordings to DVD is very easily accomplished as well.
As Paul Main, ClearView’s joint managing director points out, system user friendliness is crucially important: “You can have the best recording system money can buy, but you’ll never get the best from it if the graphical user interface is difficult to get to grips with. The police needed a GUI that anyone would be capable of operating with a minimum of training and without having to constantly refer to a user manual. The ClearView systems provide this. Indeed, learning how to use it comes almost intuitively.”
To provide the extended audio and image storage time required, the systems have been equipped with RAID high-density disk arrays. The system’s video motion detection feature and the event triggered recording strategies that this permits, does of course conserve disk storage space.
The systems at each force’s sites can be networked together to allow monitoring and data management from a central terminal. In addition, it is possible for ClearView, to remotely interrogate the equipment should any problems occur.
Essex-based ClearView Communications has considerable experience as a designer and supplier of CCTV systems, particularly to government and the police, and is widely recognised for its expertise in video analysis. ClearView equipment has been installed by all 43 police forces in England and Wales.