Law officers upload a new data partner. A security network soon will allow 58 agencies in nine counties
to search each other's information.

By SHANNON COLAVECCHIO-VAN SICKLER, Times Staff Writer
06/01/05

TAMPA - Call it Google for cops.

Internet surfers use Google's search engine to find particular Web sites or long-lost friends. Now area law enforcement officers are using a $2.3-million searchable database to identify suspects and solve crimes.

The Tampa Bay Security Network is a one-stop cyber spot where area police officers, sheriff's deputies and detectives can pull up neighboring law enforcement agencies' booking mugs, arrest reports, witness interviews, traffic citations and dispatch reports.

The system was brought online last month, and by next year it will link the computer systems of 58 law enforcement agencies in nine counties from Citrus County south to Manatee. For now, the Security Network links five Pinellas and Hillsborough County agencies and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

"No longer will criminals be able to avoid detection by pulling up stakes and moving from one municipality to another," Hillsborough Sheriff David Gee said during a news conference Tuesday at FDLE's Tampa office.

"Within a few minutes, investigators can conduct research or pursue leads that otherwise would have taken days or weeks."

Before the Security Network, a detective chasing a tip had to call his counterparts in other counties, or check several different sources for information about a person's background.

"That is very cumbersome, very labor-intensive," said Pinellas Sheriff Jim Coats. "And up until now, law enforcement has been very reluctant about sharing that information. After Sept. 11, we realize how important it is to share."

The network, funded through state and federal domestic security grants, was created in the spirit of antiterrorism.

Terrorists rely on vast networks of support and on anonymity, said FDLE Special Agent Supervisor Mark Dubina.

The Security Network cracks into those networks by finding relationships between bits of information that, taken alone, might seem insignificant or unrelated, he said.

That capability will help officers deal with all kinds of crime, not just terrorism, said Tampa police Chief Steve Hogue.

If officers in Tampa get reports of a dark four-door sedan trolling slowly around a school, that might seem like an isolated and minor incident, Hogue said.

"But if this network tells us five other Tampa Bay agencies have reported the same thing in the past week, then we're going to handle that differently," he said.

Tampa police recently used the network to identify two armed robbery suspects, for whom they now have arrest warrants. With little more than the male suspect's first name and the female suspect's nickname, investigators used the Security Network to come up with two suspects, said Tampa police spokeswoman Laura McElroy.

Detectives showed the duo's pictures to the robbery victim, who confirmed they were the attackers, McElroy said.

"Within a matter of hours, we went from having no leads to having our suspects," she said. "That just shows you the power of this."

Eventually, the bay area's network will be linked to six similar ones throughout Florida.

The Security Network is based on a technology called COPLINK, which is used in more than 100 U.S. jurisdictions from San Diego to Boston.

In Tucson, investigators used it to find a girl who had been kidnapped, said Lorelei Bowden, project manager of the Tampa Bay Security Network.

The girl's friend could tell police only that one man was white, the other Hispanic, and that the girl was taken in a two-door red sedan. One of the men called the other by a nickname that sounded like "Waydo," the friend said.

Within a few hours, the COPLINK system steered officers toward the house of a man who was known to drive a two-door red sedan and whose known alias was "Waydo."

The girl was inside his house, still alive, when police arrived, Bowden said.