At last week's Maryland Technology Showcase, most of the displays featured products intended for businesses and individual consumers, as one might expect. However, clustered in a distant corner of the Baltimore Convention Center's vast exhibition floor was a group of booths showing off technological goodies for an entirely different market: law enforcement agencies.
One booth was dedicated to the Arrest Booking System, a state pilot program to automate and streamline the booking process. Suspects are fitted with a bracelet bearing a bar code for identification. All information on the suspect, ranging from arrest records to digitally scanned fingerprints, are stored in a computer and transferred to a central record repository.
Regina Shock, manager of the Arrest Booking System, said the program makes booking faster and more efficient. "In the past, police made ink prints and got them back in two weeks. Now we can identify [suspects] in two hours."
Around the corner from the Arrest Booking System kiosk was a Ford Bronco emblazoned with the seal of the Maryland State Police. Its open rear door revealed an array of computers and cameras.
If you've ever been driving on the Capital Beltway and seen signs warning that "aggressive driver imaging" is in effect, that means this vehicle is sitting somewhere along the shoulder, monitoring the traffic for tailgaters, lane weavers and speed demons.
"There's never been a day we've been out there that we haven't had violations," said Sgt. Janet Harrison.
The Bronco is part of the Aggressive Driver Imaging and Enforcement program, a state and federal pilot project that started in November 1997 and has been extended to September 1999.
Police say the purpose of the program is to punish unsafe drivers without embarking on dangerous, traffic-snarling chases.
Tfc. Mike Allmond said even one traffic stop can add considerable congestion on a busy stretch of highway. "Other than when it's so blatant you need to be stopped we keep a free flow of traffic going."
The Bronco reads the speed of passing cars, trucks and motorcycles by honing in on them with a laser. The police officer inside the Bronco sets a threshold speed based on the normal flow of traffic at a given spot. When a vehicle breaks that threshold, on-board computers command the Bronco's rear and side cameras to take pictures of it.
The photographs, including a brief video of the vehicle, are stored in the Bronco's computers. The officer in the Bronco will call ahead to troopers to pull the motorist over, or will make the stop himself if the driver's behavior is especially dangerous.
Police said that while speed is a major factor in aggressive driving, an officer in the Bronco can override the automatic system to take pictures of drivers who do not break the speed threshold but are still driving too aggressively.
Since there is not yet a separate aggressive driving law in Maryland, drivers caught in such behavior are simply sent a warning, along with the picture taken by the Bronco.
Harrison said the aggressive-driver signs and the parked Bronco haven't seemed to cure Beltway drivers of hot heads and lead feet. "I don't think they're affected one way or another," she said. "I don't think a lot of people even read signs, to be honest with you."
Across the hall from the Bronco, state police Sgt. Mitchell Dinterman was creating composite sketches on a computer. In Maryland, drawings of crime suspects are now done not by a human artist but by software that contains an archive of specific facial attributes.
For example, under "hair," the officer can choose from categories ranging from "bushy" and "punky" to "wet look" and "layered."
As features and accessories -- eyeglasses, hats, earrings -- are added or changed, a new face takes shape. Dinterman was quick to point out that composite sketching is an inexact science; the aim is not perfect portraiture. "It's a generalized face," he said. "It's not going to be the right one, obviously, but it gives you a starting point."
"It's only as reliable as the witness or victim doing the identifying," Dinterman said.
He said the software, called E-Fit for Windows, has made life a bit easier for police. "You basically don't have to be an artist to make this work," he said.
Pub Date: 12/13/98