Profiteers versus public safety
Shame on you Wal-Mart and big box retailers as well as other stores who focus solely on profits and forsake the safety of their customers. Recently on a local Chicago news station customers of the no. 1 Fortune 500 company (Wal-Mart) had a rash of theft in their parking lots, and when the victims tried to get evidence from the video cameras, many were said to not be working, or never working at all. Check it out at http://video.nbc5.com/player/?id=247256
Wal-Mart is not alone. There are other companies like Target and K-Mart that perhaps love those signs that announce the presence of video, but are they just a guise? Are dummy cameras still around and being used in these instances and many more around the country?
No cameras at Lane Bryant
Surely they have the money to install some modicum of security. Same with the Lane Bryant murders of several store associates and shoppers in February in Tinley Park, Ill. In this instance, they didn’t have security cameras at all. The police used surveillance tapes from surrounding stores in a two-mile radius, but without results. There are still no details in those murders in which five women were shot execution style.
A sixth woman, shot in the neck, escaped death by playing dead, according to news reports. She is currently in protective custody. She was the one who provided some details about the gunman so police artists could create a sketch and there were others who tried to provide identification. But that provided a rendition only and not the truth, which is what a security camera brings to these incidents.
Come on retailers. Get with it! Technology doesn’t come cheap, but if your customers are dead, they obviously can’t shop anymore. By the way, if you can help the Tinley Park Police Department in Illinois solve the Lane Bryant crimes contact them. You might make someone’s Mother’s Day a bit more bearable.
–Deborah L. O’Mara, editor, Security Dealer & Integrator magazine
Deb-
There is a growing legislative force that is requireing certain businesss to post surveillance cameras on their premises. Examples include Chicago and Milwaukee where if proposed ordinances are approved bars and nightclubs will be required to install CCTV. Minneapolis has an ordinance requireing video surveillance at convenience stores and a court has denied a legal challenge to an ordinance in Garden Grove, CA requiring CCTV at all cyber cafes. Stay tuned - it’s coming to a city near you.
In regards to the part of your post regarding WalMart. WalMart, Target, KMart and others all use a ’sprinkle’ of fake cameras amongst their live cameras. The problem is if there is no activity companies only save video for X amount of days, policies for saving video vary from company to company. There is no legislative requirement regarding the saving of video. There is no requirement that CCTV systems be monitored.
-Curt