LPRC - Episode 26 – Exploring the Relationship between Law Enforcement and LP/AP ft. Detectives Ryan McCazzio and Nick Ferrara

Episode Date: June 24, 2019

This week, co-hosts Dr. Read Hayes (LPRC) and Tom Meehan (CONTROLTEK) review the intersection of law enforcement and LP by identifying common crime issues, reviewing how to map and pattern those problems, and exploring the platforms to utilize with our featured guests, Detectives Ryan McCazzio and Nicholas Ferrara. The post Episode 26 – Exploring the Relationship between Law Enforcement and LP/AP ft. Detectives Ryan McCazzio and Nick Ferrara appeared first on Loss Prevention Research Council.

Hi everyone, welcome to Crime Science. In this podcast, we aim to explore the science of crime and the practical application of this science for loss prevention and asset protection practitioners, as well as other professionals. Co-host Dr. Reid Hayes of the Loss Prevention Research Council and Tom Meehan of ControlTech discuss a wide range of topics with industry experts, thought leaders, solution providers, and many more. In this episode, we review the intersection of law enforcement and LPAP by identifying common crime issues, how best to map and pattern those problems, and the most effective platforms to utilize with our featured guests, detectives Ryan Macazio and Nicholas Ferrara. We would like to thank Bosch for making this episode possible. Take advantage of the advanced video capabilities offered by Bosch to help reduce your shrink risk. Integrate video recordings with point-of-sale data for visual verification of transactions and exception reporting. Use video analytics for immediate notification of important AP-related All right. Welcome, everybody, to another episode of the Crime Science Podcast. Today we're joined by two special guests from the Gainesville Police Department,

from Investigations, from CID, Detective Sergeant Nick Ferrara and Detective Ryan MacCasio. And these two gentlemen we've had the pleasure to work with quite a bit here in Gainesville, Florida, doing research, getting to know what they're up to, how they work, but always having a resource of experts that we can go to and ask them about, ask them questions. What do you think of this? What's going on there? Have you seen this? What are we missing? So, because as you all know, we're always trying to stay grounded. While we are trying to conduct the most rigorous research we can, we want to make sure that it's grounded in LP principles. But I'm also, of course, joined as always by my co-host, Tom Meehan, the Chief Strategy Officer from Control Tech.

Chief Strategy Officer from Control Tech. So today what we thought we'd talk about is a little bit about the public-private interface and how law enforcement and loss prevention and asset protection can work together to understand what's going on, who, what, when, where, why, and how, but most importantly, do something about it. And I think we've all learned that loss prevention can't do it by themselves, and neither can law enforcement. We've got to work together. So I thought, you know, right now, as we speak, in the last six months,

what are some of the biggest theft and fraud issues that we're dealing with here in north central Florida? And I'll go to you, Sergeant Nick, first. Well, number one, I'd say thanks for having us. It's always a pleasure to work with you guys. But as far as the answer to that question, for a university town, we get a taste of pretty much everything you see at a national level. We have organized retail crime groups that hit us. We have, I mean, you name it, whether it's skimmers, you know, credit card fraud, just anything as far as just major theft groups.

We've had people with South American origins, Romanian origins. We've had people with South American origins, Romanian origins. So, you know, international groups are hitting us locally. Plus, you know, all the stuff that we have to deal with that originates online, over the phone, you name it. You know, whether it's email compromise with businesses, it runs a gamut with us and it keeps us very, very busy. it runs a gamut with us, and it keeps us very, very busy. So let's talk about on-the-ground crime. And you mentioned from out of country and out of state and out of city, you know, what's a major pathway and reason that Gainesville would be hit,

say, compared to another location? You know, I would say we have a pretty diverse community here. You know, we are obviously home to the University of Florida, so we do have a lot of young people that are susceptible to being victimized. You know, I don't know the exact figures on our senior citizen population, but for whatever reason, it just seems like we probably run consistent with national averages. I mean, I can't really say if we're above national average with certain offenses, but they, I mean, they definitely target us, particularly the students. But, you know, as far as the scams and stuff like that, where people feel like, oh, it's just the young people that are targeted or it's, it's, you know, some of the younger or actually older folks

or the elderly population. No, I've seen PhD students and I've seen 95-year-old people hit with the same scam. So it doesn't matter. Now, there's a lot there too, and that the bad guys are always, always, always, always trolling for opportunities. And it sounds like young people, people that are relying on their parents' money or some kind of loan money, and then of course, the elderly that may be vulnerable for a lot of reasons. So that makes sense. And let me go over to you, Detective Macazio, to Ryan and ask you from your standpoint, what is something that pops out right now that's happening that you feel like it's on an upward trend? Once again, I want to mirror

what Sergeant Farrar, thank you, Dr. Hayes, for having us here. It's a great opportunity for us. Always love working with you guys. What we're seeing is, you know, with it being a college town, like Sergeant Farrar said, we're seeing such an increase in retail space, period. You have the whole Butler Plaza area and such like that here

where retail businesses are coming in hand over fist here in Gainesville. And all that retail space that we're seeing is right off I-75, which is an easy on-off for these out-of-state groups, out-of-country groups, just to get right into Gainesville and get off right before we even get called. into Gainesville and get off right before we even get called. But one of the major things we're seeing lately is the cell phone thefts of the display phones. Over the past two months, we've had four or five cases of three or four individuals coming in and literally snatching thousands of dollars worth of display phones out of our various stores. And they're so quick that when you watch the video, they're in and out within a minute and a half, two minutes. And it's a very organized, very planned out operation that these bad guys are carrying out.

It's unreal and surreal when you see them. They're mapping out the areas. They're parking away from the areas. They're doing surveillance, counter surveillance. It's quite interesting. And it's a trend that we're seeing upward. And, you know, a couple of videos we've seen from other agencies, these people are starting to get violent too when a clerk or somebody goes to stop them. So it's a disturbing trend we're seeing here in Gainesville. So maybe describe, if you would, Ryan, what you've seen on video or heard from witnesses.

What's that theft look like when it goes down? They may be scouted. They're doing counter surveillance. They're parking a little bit away. But let's say once they hit the door going in and then they hit the door going out, what are they doing? What are their tactics? So what we're seeing from most agencies, you know, I've been working hand-in-hand with Sumner County because we can actually tell when they're coming up this way. I'll typically get an email from other agencies.

But it's usually a group of two to three to four people that will come in. They'll be dressed very oddly. This last group that hit us, it was 98 degrees here, and they were all wearing hooded sweatshirts and hats. They all go. They do a quick scout of the store to see where the staff is. Then the party will go to mostly iPhone displays, and they'll sit there and pretend they're playing with the iPhones, and then they'll give each other a signal, and they'll just yank as hard as they can all the display phones.

They'll grab four or five each at a time and yank them all and then run right out the door into an awaiting car. Okay. And I know one of our members, we have Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon, and so on that are our members. And one of them sent us a picture the other day of a guy running out with the entire display. It almost looked like he was carrying a surfboard, but the entire display rack full of phones. I'm not surprised by that at all. We haven't had that yet. What we're seeing is mostly them damaging the displays, ripping the cords right out of the walls. And it's funny because, you know,

you figure they're running with these handful of phones and they would drop something, but they're so professional at this and so on point with this that we haven't been able to get anything to follow up on with these guys. Interesting. Let me just add to that, you know, what I've noticed,

and I think a lot of these groups were hitting them, let's say, after hours, where they smash out a window, run in, just grab whatever they want. You know, there's no protection there. But, you know, I think a lot of these businesses are catching on, particularly like the Verizon right by the interstate. They have the roll-down doors. So now that they're doing target hardening, they're not doing the late-night burglaries. They're going in during the normal hours now.

Obviously, they can walk in now where everything's accessible, and they have to deal with other customers, the other employees there. But like you said, the last one we watched, it was very well coordinated. They all stood, you know, at what they wanted, and it was almost simultaneous. They all snatched at the same time and ran out as opposed to, you know, one was keying off another. I mean, it was pretty well coordinated. Well, and this kind of leads us to the reason we're even having this particular episode, and that is, all right, you describe crime displacement, the one store that's close to the interstate, easy in and out, and then they target harden. So they don't abandon the store. Maybe they do a little while, but now they're going to use a different tactic, right? They're going to hit by day and so forth, that crime displacement. But that's why it seems like this ORCA here and others are

critical, and we'll talk about that in a little bit, to share that. Okay, guys, here's what we're seeing this now. Here's what's happening in much more real time, so the guys can get on it and get ahead of it even from time to time. And one real quickly, you mentioned I-75. Can you guys describe to the listeners what felony lane people are, who they are, and why the name felony lane? So this, I don't know how long this group's been around, but I've been in law enforcement now for 15 years. Nick's been in 22, 23 years. But over the past few years, these felony lane groups is basically, it's an gang, and that's why they named it Felony Lane Gang, FLG. What they'll do, typically, they'll come into a town, college town or any other town. They'll go to easy targets, gyms, parks, places where people, you know, are just running in and out of the store or going like that,

where they'll leave maybe a book bag or something in the car, they'll usually typically take rental cars, newer rental cars. They'll tint the windows. And what they do is after that, they'll smash out the window of a target car. They'll just grab the credit cards and checks and stuff like that out of the car. grab the credit cards and checks and stuff like that out of the car. And what they'll do is why they're called the felony land gang is they'll go to a bank immediately to do some type of check withdrawal, ATM withdrawal, but they typically go to the furthest line away from the teller to make that deposit. And what they'll do is they'll maybe go pick up a homeless person or a you know a drug abuser they'll dress them in a wig they'll make them look like the individual

on a driver's license so with them being so far away from the clerk the clerk has a hard time seeing out there and they'll go cash a check or they'll do an atm withdrawal they'll do uh just a basic bank withdrawal and drive away um And after that, they'll go and meet their other people that they're giving them the money, and they'll maybe give the person $50 out of a $3,000 withdrawal that they just made from a person's bank account. I know it's a rough, rough estimate, but what percent of, say, felony lane gang or others that you're seeing up here this far north are maybe from Dade County 99.9% the 305 yeah the majority of them are from the South Florida area we and typically you know I know Nick does too and I follow or certain for we follow the felony lane gang stuff on Facebook and other areas and you, they're making arrests in Montana

and that far up north of people from South Florida. And it's ironic our street address here is 305. So let me go to my co-host, Tom. Tom, what are some questions and comments? Yeah, I guess my first question is specific to cell phones because that seems to be a trend throughout the United States. Where are you seeing these phones going? Do you see them going overseas? Are they being sold individually?

Is it a mix? Is there some sort of trend that you're actually seeing? So from what I understand, I haven't had the luxury of interviewing any of these suspects yet. understand, you know, I haven't had the luxury of interviewing any of these suspects yet. But from what I understand and what I've heard is that a lot of these phones are going overseas. They'll bring them back down to wherever. They'll have a fence down wherever they're from, usually Orlando, Tampa, Miami area. And that fence will then send them overseas. I don't know the whole workings of that. I wish I had more on that. But typically they're going overseas because these companies are pretty good about getting us the CRO numbers and IMI numbers and such like that.

So we can put them into our crime database so they won't be able to be activated. So they have to be doing something with them from there. From my experience, you know, a lot of these, let's say a snatch and grab involving a juvenile or young adult, isolated incidents, some of those may show up at a pawn shop. But these organized groups that take thousands, several thousands of dollars worth, like Ryan said, a lot of them will show up or get sent overseas because they're worth more over there. Plus, nobody's going to show up at a pawn shop knowing that we're going to enter all those serial numbers into the system and they're going to hit off of

the FCIC, NCIC as stolen. So they're smart. They know how to maximize their profits. Interesting. So let me ask you, what are some tools to help establish control, let's say, in the city of Gainesville? You know, we mostly talk about establishing some kind of control in your parking lot and store. And I know that you all are looking at different tech and sharing. And one thing that comes to mind is LPL, you know, license plate lookup, license plate recognition. Can you guys tell me about what are some things that we should know about that technology, the strengths and benefits, and maybe some things, some opportunities to improve it?

Well, I'm the one that is tasked with moving our single trailer right now. We're working on getting additional trailers. I've heard, I don't know if it's St. John's County supposedly has upwards of a hundred different tag readers. And just the amount of information you get from them is just unbelievable. You know, you'll get notifications. I mean, if nobody's or if people are not too familiar with them, it looks like a speed trailer to where it's just showing your radar speed and people slow down, but at the same time it's also capturing your tag and just using that information and where it's recorded. And then it could be shared amongst all agencies that are on the same system.

I mean, it's great for being reactive immediately, I guess, if, like, let's say somebody has their computer on and the program is loaded properly to where let's say a stolen car whips by it and they know that tag reader is close by they can immediately respond and that's happened a few times with us even we would just one we've gotten a pretty good amount of stolen vehicles uh expired tags which are not expired tags but like let's say a stolen tag that usually shows up on a stolen car. But historically, I think that the data is probably more important there because, you know, just for example, you find out that, you know, a certain vehicle was involved in, let's say,

skimming or credit card fraud or check fraud. And then, you know, that vehicle, even if it's a rental maybe traveling you can research that tag and you can pretty much see you know as long as it's hitting off a reader and like if it's out in the rural area there's no readers you're not going to get anything but if it's hitting an area that has a good amount of tag readers you can track exactly where that car's been i mean then you can set you can set it up to where you you can be notified once that car you put it like set a geo fence to where like all right i know this car is going to eventually make it into the area and do crimes next time it comes in i want to be notified and when it comes in to that area that geo fence that you set you can get notified like all right

you can put everybody on high alert that's there so i mean it's it's a fantastic tool and just to kind of build on what Sergeant Farrar said, you know, if we enter a tag in what they call a hot plate, it'll notify other agencies too. So with this last cell phone grab, I entered the vehicle and it was a hot plate. And lo and behold, I get information from out of Tampa that this vehicle was found out in Tampa, but it was returned already. But the vehicle, of course, was rented under fraudulent pretenses. So things like that, it's data sharing. It's getting that information out there, letting other people know, hey, you know,

this vehicle was used in this crime and the city of Gainesville, please be on the lookout for it. You know, get what we can out of it. But you give, you know, our resident wizard wizard here sergeant ferrara tag with all the programs and stuff we have now we have a very very very high likelihood of of coming to some type of case resolution with that that's interesting and we were up at nypd a while back and they were showing what they're doing of course with tag readers across bridges and tunnels at first initially and then now you see patrol vehicles everywhere with these cameras mounted on them on top of the stationary ones that are all over the place so

that they, like you say, have a lot more situational awareness. And even now when an officer pulls a vehicle over, that comes up on their screen, everything that they know about that vehicle, who all's owned it, who's maybe been spotted in it, where all it's been, you know, whatever. A lot of things that could be mission critical for officer safety. And so there's some interesting things that can be done. But it's exciting what's going on so that we have that situational understanding. Yeah.

And I mean, just even to add on to that, you know, because I'm all about tools in your toolbox and making connections and networking. And I would say the SunPass data is fantastic. You know, it's one thing to read a tag. But in order to get those, I guess, face shots of the windshield, even at night, we've gotten pictures back to where you can actually make an ID off of who's in the front seat on how clear it is. So, I mean, technology is helping us out big time. So turnpike cameras. Oh, yeah.

Absolutely. Okay. I see intersection cameras, things like that, coming into play. Tom, any questions or comments around technology? Yeah, I think probably the reverse is, so with all of the rapid changes in technology, what are some of the technologies that the bad guys are using that are making life difficult for you as law enforcement? I know Reid and I talk about that regularly. We talk heavily about what technologies out there that can help deter or help catch people but we also talk a lot about countermeasures because

the folks out there today are more advanced than ever so I know that's a long-winded question but if you could put a finger on either one of you what's the technology today that makes your job more difficult and maybe it's a hybrid maybe it makes your more job more difficult sometimes and easier other times. Besides, you know, like retail theft and whatnot, you know, we deal with a lot of these scams that are either, you know, start out over the phone, whether it's phishing emails, and technology is doing nothing but help these guys, you know, as far as create layers between us and them. You know, they're using proxy servers to where you think

okay you know we finally got the ip address back on somebody and the next you know it hit one server and then goes to another server and another you know so they're distancing themselves you know we've talked to our icac people that there's actually businesses out there that will you pay for a service to mask your IP address and it's it's just insane that this goes on but that a lot of our suspects are using burner phones using fake information to start the phones voice over IP phones I mean so it's there and a lot of these numbers you know you'll see them that they're being shared or host wholesale you know between different services to where it's like a rabbit hole

to try to eventually get to the actual owner of the phone and then a lot of times you hit a dead end to where you're not getting a real person who owned this so they're doing quite a bit just to conceal who they are and just to build on that too

social media has kind of been one of our best friends and worst enemies when it comes to combating crime. Back in the day, you used to have your fences or what used to be your brick and mortar stores. Not so much anymore. You're not seeing much of them. You know, you can go online, set up a false profile on any of these swip swap sites. And lo and behold, here you are, mule and stolen goods, fencing stolen goods. And, you know, it's a complete mystery of who that person is because you can go on there, grab a Gmail

or any type of email account you want to set up this profile, and then start selling. And then once that profile gets hot, as we'll call it, just close down that profile, and it's a ghost person. You know, we never's a ghost person. You know, we never know who that person is because you can just pull any picture you want off the Internet and put it as your profile pic. But we do have a lot of companies, OfferUp being one of them, that is combating that type of illegal fencing on their websites,

and they're probably one of the easiest ones to work with. But there's just so many of them out there, and, you know, instant messages and stuff like that. It's just, it's getting, it's getting a little tougher to find the, where all this, all this supply is going when, when it's stolen from this area. And it's interesting you mentioned, by the way, OfferUp, they're an LPRC member, as are Amazon and eBay and some others, but they are very active with us. They get on the Organized Retail Crime Working Group calls and, they're very supportive in that way as well. Yeah, I was definitely hoping to give them a plug during this interview. Yeah, I mean, I appreciate everything they're doing.

They're at the conferences we go to. They built a partnership with Leads Online to where not only can we go through the OfferUp portal, but we actually just do things right through Leads Online, which is the pawn system that we use. But, you know, plus the Safe Space program that they have and, you know, all the efforts that they're making to prevent, you know, crime through their site. So I got to hand it to them. They do a great job. So, um, you mentioned skimmers earlier. Um, and I know you all work with the university of Florida's college of engineering. They're fixed the Florida, um,

cybersecurity team here. And, uh, of course they're, they've come up with their skim Reaper technology. They keep improving that we get emails and calls all the time, requests for it. I know they've spun off a company and they're starting to manufacture them now. But maybe if you could tell us a little bit about skimmers and shimmers that you all have come across and what those dynamics look like. I would say we do have a skimmer problem. You know, just from experience, looking at some of the national fraud networks that we're a part of, these people that are hitting all over the country are hitting here in Gainesville. So, you know, we'll get them on the ATMs.

We recently had actually a pretty significant arrest, and he's actually sitting in jail right now. I won't throw his name out there but he was from a Brazilian group that was just hitting all over Florida and Southeast United States for probably up over a million dollars but they were targeting I want to say it was SunTrust but you know we get the skimmers in the gas pumps, most of those. I mean, we've pulled off, I would say on average, maybe five to seven per year, but we've been doing pretty good the last couple of years. But Florida is, particularly South Florida, is huge as far as the number of skimmers that have been pulling off of gas pumps down there.

Not to throw a certain group under the bus, but apparently, number of skimmers that have been pulling off of gas pumps down there. Not to throw a certain group under the bus, but apparently, from what I've been told by the Department of Agriculture, a lot of it has to do with this Cuban crime wave, and a lot of it has to do with just the purchase of diesel gasoline in South Florida. Are some of those numbers sold online on the dark web? Possibly, but I think a lot of it is to acquire diesel gas that they'll buy in bladder trucks and whatnot.

It's a huge industry here and in Texas, from what I've been told. But, you know, building off what Sergeant said, it's funny. You see a skimmer one day, and then you're like, okay, we have the technology to defeat this.

And then lo and behold, the very next day, there's now a new technology that the bad people are using to implement these skimmers or install these skimmers. We've gone to a couple of conferences, sort of for R&I, where you talk to have the live offender interviews, and they're saying it takes them a matter of minutes to put a skimmer on a pump. And their technology is outpacing our technology vastly. And it's just to the point now where it's we know it is and we're trying to keep up the best we can as a not not in the games of police, but law enforcement community in general. But it's just from the generation one skimmers to whatever generation we're up to now, it's just we're always seems to be one step behind on those. Yeah, I mean, old days, you know, everything was stored on a flash drive on the actual skimmer that was internally mounted. You know, the next generation comes out, all right, Bluetooth, so they don't even have to go back and get it. They can be within 100 feet from it and download all the information. Now it's, you know, they have a SIM card installed on it. And as soon as

the information's skimmed, it's texted anywhere in the world. So it's just unbelievable how much the technology for them has progressed over the years. And, I mean, it's to the point to where these guys are writing their own programs, creating their own phone apps. I mean, they've got smart people working for them, and it's just amazing. So I'll go back over to you, Tom, for your questions. Yeah, I mean, you guys, I have so many questions, but I want to kind of narrow it down with, especially related around technology and the technology service providers.

You mentioned Leeds Online and you mentioned how people are cooperating. Overwhelmingly, I travel quite a bit and I work in a little bit more of a consulting field than I did years ago. And I'm hearing kind of an overarching comment of technology service providers not cooperating with retails because of privacy concerns. And similarly, also not cooperating with law enforcement, even with subpoenas, sometimes trying to quash them. Are you seeing that? Is that more driven by media, or is that actually, are you seeing that

in your investigations today? I haven't run into much of an issue with that, but there are hoops, and some of these companies are making us jump through, that don't need to be there. I understand it's a protection thing for their company. But, you know, certain companies, I won't say any in particular, but there are certain companies when, say, you,

I don't know if this kind of goes along with your question, but if they're a victim of a crime, it takes them two weeks to get us the video because their camera system is stored off-site somewhere and has to be accessed by an IT person off-site somewhere, and then they get that information back to us. So that's kind of a challenge because now you're working on a case that was hot, now it's two weeks cold, and now you're backtracking for two weeks instead of having something immediate. And then there's other places that, you know, are a victim of a crime. And even though that company is the victim of a crime, they want you to give them a subpoena for their own in-house video, which is challenging for us, too, because now, you know, it takes a couple hours now to get a subpoena, which back in the day was a lot longer than that but still you know it stuff like that hoops like that makes it harder for us when we have a hot lead to keep that lead hot and have it go cold in two weeks yeah i mean just to echo what he said um yeah i've seen it there we have with the collaboration that we have between a lot of the local retailers

and businesses you know i would say the ones that are very between a lot of the local retailers and businesses, you know, I would say the ones that are very cooperative and, you know, shoot an email to like, hey, we're working this case that obviously you guys reported to us, or even if it's something that's, you know, they don't even know they're involved, but we'll ask for assistance, like, hey, can you look up this case report number, try to, or this credit card number, try to find a transaction for us and send us photos of the person that was standing at the register. You know, it means a lot to us that they can shoot us a picture, you know, within whether it's a couple hours or a day, as opposed

to you have to fill out this seven page corporate form that's going to get sent off and you may get something back in two months. It's like, like well the chance of that latter example getting solved quickly or even at all is much lower than you know you got something in your email i mean we have some of our lps cell phone numbers that they'll shoot us stuff on our you know text message so i mean the quicker that information the easier that information comes to us the the better chance and the faster those incidents or crimes are going to be solved. So let's talk about the ORCA, the Organized Retail Crime Groups, anti-ORC groups like we've got here in Gainesville. And, you know, as you know, we work all around the U.S., even outside the U.S., but I've seen different ORCcas that are different sizes,

but I don't think I've ever seen one that's more collaborative and cooperative than this one that you all have going on. What are some secrets, you think? How do you guys work? And any tips you could give somebody else that's looking at making one or making one better? So we do have a very great, strong orca group here. It is probably one of the most collaborative efforts I've ever seen between a retailer and law enforcement. Like Sergeant Farrar was saying, we can literally have a theft from a store that's part of an orca group. They'll immediately send us a picture.

Once they send us a picture, Sergeant Farrar and I will go to work on that picture or whatever they have. And we have a very high clearance rate in our retail side of crimes. But we do it in reverse. If we have something, if we're investigating something, we can send that information out to our ORCA group, and they'll get us that information within hours or a day or so and it just makes our job that much easier. But, you know, I don't, to me, it's just building that relationship. You know, we're out here, we're combating the same thing. I know as a consumer, as a personal consumer that, you know, I have a guy out here stealing stuff. Most retailers aren't going to eat that cost.

The cost is going to drive up for the consumers and that's kind of what drives me. I'm a cop with two kids and a wife. You know what I mean? I don't want to spend any extra money than I have to. But it really helps because it's kind of a symbiotic relationship between us and them because they're helping us get our job done and we're helping them clear cases. But it's just, you know, we meet quarterly. We talk to each other on the phone. If they have a problem, they can call either Mayor Sergeant Ferraro. We can, you know, work out some details to try to maybe resolve a crime or a crime trend they're seeing.

You know, we do have a lot of leeway when it comes to that, which is good too. And it's just one of those things that with in Gainesville here, we're seeing such a vast increase of retail is that a group like this is needed because, you know, we have all these different groups coming from out of town. And, you know, it's only a matter of time before, you know, we'll see an increase in violence or something. And we want to take the steps to prevent that from happening. And I think that's kind of a real good reason why we have this close worker group here. Yeah, I mean, we're on your feed, you know, we're in that listserv scenario with you all. And so myself and the other researchers here, and it's amazing. I mean, you know, all day, every day through the weekend at night,

somebody will, hey, this just happened, boom, you guys jump on it. Other guys are jumping. The retailers are jumping on it. It's a thing of beauty. I mean, it's amazing how collaborative everybody is. Yeah, I mean, one thing that I've kind of gathered from talking to some of the LPs that, you know, let's say are over other stores that have to work with other law enforcement, and they're always so complimentary of how receptive, open how quick we are we don't just like ass is just retail theft we don't we don't care you know we both know a lot of

these offenders are involved in robberies burglaries drugs you know so it's not just a matter of somebody stealing a pack of gum we know there's a much bigger issue here so you, you know, my heart was always in retail because I worked for Burdine's growing up, going to college here at UF. So LP has always been, you know, near and dear to me. But again, I work with these guys. I love the chase. You know, I like using the tools that we have. Every picture I get or report that comes across my desk, I see it as a challenge. And, you know, it's like I want to get this guy.

I want to outsmart them. And the other thing I guess, you know, I wanted to say was a lot of this stuff, because of the collaboration we have, we'll get information that they'll give to us first. And it's not even a report that's taken. You know, we'll get something from whether it's Kohl's or Walmart, like, hey, I'm not exactly sure what this is, but here's the information that we got.

If you guys, you know, have seen these people or whatnot. And, you know, a lot of times it starts out with just starting running tags and looking at faces and like, all right, this person's involved in passing stolen card or stolen cash, sorry, counterfeit cash. They're involved in credit card fraud. I mean, so a lot of these things grow from nothing into something pretty big. So, I mean, I can't get over just how pleased I am with how things are running with our ORCAC group.

Yeah, we've had small things where the LP will have that feeling in their stomach, like something's not right here. This guy's come in and cashed $15,000 worth of gift cards in the past month. We're not losing any money, but this might be something you guys might want to look into. And then lo and behold, it's a big case that here we are, and the FBI's involved, and and the Secret Service and everything else. But just that cooperation we get with these retailers is irreplaceable. Fantastic.

All right. So, Tom, any other questions or comments or suggestions? Yeah. I mean, we always talk about partnership. And I think, Reed, you and I talk, every time we're in an ORC conversation, partnership comes up and the importance of information sharing, you know, for the listeners and our listeners are broad. We have law enforcement, we have academic, we have loss prevention. Is there one thing that cripples you guys? If you could say to someone listening right

now, if you do this one thing, we're guaranteed to not be able to help you. What would that be? And maybe it's two things. I mean, often when I go to law enforcement conferences, people talk about partnership and talk about, you know, some of the privacy concerns and some of the subpoena issues. But for you in Gainesville, I can tell just by talking to you guys that you're extremely engaged in the community and are willing to help but is there is there advice that you give folks out there that hey if you do this one thing you're guaranteed to damage the relationship or cripple an investigation so it's funny you know because sorry for and i talk about this quite often um you know these cases come down to one thing most of the time it's not what you know it's's who you know. Networking is probably our most, our number one

way of coming to a case resolution. You know, we go to different conferences. We go to Impact. We go to conferences around the state. And when we're there, we're handing out cards. We're talking to people. We're getting to know people. Oh, you work for this company. Oh, you work for this company. talking to people, where getting to know people, oh, you work for this company, oh, you work for this company. And if I can go directly to that person to get something I need, I have such a higher percent of solving this case where if you just want to, you know, go to a conference and learn, not network, not talk to anybody, you're going to hinder not only the LP's chance of resolving a crime, but you're, as a law enforcement officer,

your chance of resolving a crime as well because you may not know what you, you don't know what you don't know until you don't know it, if that makes sense. Huge point. Huge point about contacts. And I know at Flea Pru, you know, I went one time and made an incredible amount of contacts and met two detectives from Ocala police department. And within 60 days, a guy, and I won't name the college, had a person who was living in Ocala and was stalking, cyber stalking, and now threatening an employee's life out of state.

I mean, across the entire country. And so he said, do you know anybody? And I was like, actually, I know two people. And it was because of networking at Fleet Proof. I mean, just to piggyback on what Ryan was saying, I mean, there's so many different levels that would hinder our investigation. But, you know, what's crucial is that just the basic cooperation, you know, whether it's, hey, you know what, you guys may want to put a jam cam up. It may help your chances of, you know, getting an ID on somebody because God knows I love using facial technology. And if I can see, you know, a weakness somewhere, I'll make a recommendation.

Yeah, I understand money is sometimes an issue when it comes to doing this stuff, particularly if it's a small mom and pop store. But, you know, just any time that, you know, we need something crucial in order to solve the crime and you're offering some type of resistance, which, you know, to me, it's just I don't understand it. Because do you want us to solve it? You reported this't understand it because do you want us to solve it? You reported this crime, Des. Do you want us to solve it for you? Because I love the fact that, you know, there's times that we can solve something pretty major within a matter of a couple of hours, if not even just a few phone calls. But if, you know, because of resistance and I understand legal issues because you're following what your legal department does. And I'm not asking anybody to do anything illegal or to violate their policy but you know not returning phone calls not

you know responding to emails it's like once you make things become protracted like we got to move you know that the rate cases are coming in we got to move on the next one i can't sit around for six weeks for your video to come in from your store. You know, we got to move on. So, and like you said, you know, you got to strike while the iron's hot. And, you know, the sooner the better when it comes to getting information. So, and by the way, I'm thinking I might have got those two guys' names because I lost them from you. But, so, all right. So I want to thank both of you all for joining us today on Crime Science.

And, you know, public, private is mission critical. The tips and ideas you were just talking about. Look, hey, collect as much information as you can, especially photographs and jam cams, which, of course, for those that don't know, I mean a door jam cam, something that can get their face on the outbound journey. And many of you know we're working on outside cams that will get their face on the outbound journey. And many of you know we're working on outside cams that will get their face, if they're masked up inside, that will get them when they unmask with an X amount of feet. So, but huge amount of tips.

We really appreciate you guys, everything you do all the time, and then for coming on to Crime Science today. So thank you, Ryan. Thank you, Nick. And for Tom, for our producer, Kevin Tran. I want to thank everybody for listening to Crime Science. Thank you guys for having us. Thank you very much.

Thanks for listening to the Crime Science Podcast presented by the Loss Prevention Research Council and sponsored by Bosch Security. If you enjoyed today's episode, you can find more Crime Science episodes and valuable information at lpresearch.org. The content provided in the Crime Science Podcast is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for legal,

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