Inside a Raleigh bank in March, hearts were racing as a man allegedly came in demanding money with a gun.
According to police, Christopher Gilmore entered the First Citizens Bank on Capital Boulevard and allegedly fired a single shot into the air inside the business. He left the bank with an undetermined amount of cash and vanished.
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Or not.
Within 10 minutes, Raleigh police knew exactly where he was and arrested him. They found the gun they believe he used and all of the cash. It's a case one step closer to being closed thanks to the virtual eyes on the street helping police in real time.
“We were able to watch the suspect and walk officers directly into the suspect and watch the apprehension and provide overwatch,” Lt. Alex Johnson said. “Within 10 minutes of the bank robbery being dispatched over by the emergency communications center, we had the subject in custody.”
Johnson said if the robbery had happened five to 10 years ago, he believes police would have made an arrest, but not as quickly.
“It could have been days, weeks, months,” Johnson said. “But it wouldn’t have been 10 minutes. That’s a really solid case example where a dangerous offender with a firearm was apprehended.”
Crimes like these are getting solved faster and with more efficiency because of Connect Raleigh, It’s a program that started in 2024, putting citizens and police hand in hand to fight crime.
Through the program, people can register their cameras with the department so, if a crime occurs in their neighborhood, RPD will reach out to them to take a look at their surveillance camera feeds for anything valuable.
“With two clicks of a mouse, we can geo-fence an area and send a blast notification to everybody within that geo-fence that has registered their camera,” Johnson said. “And say, 'Hey, something happened in your neighborhood around this time frame. Would you mind reviewing your camera footage?'”
So far, 976 people have registered their cameras with the department. These are your everyday, run-of-the-mill types of doorbell surveillance cameras or other household outdoor surveillance cameras. Raleigh police doesn’t have direct live access to these cameras, it just helps the department identify who has valuable video footage that can help them solve the cases faster.
“If you were to calculate the hours spent by a half dozen officers on a major scene, you can easily find yourself upwards of 12 to 15 hours just walking the area, looking for cameras, knocking on doors,” Johnson said. “So to be able to take 12 to 15 hours out of the equation, reapply those hours to another facet of the investigation, it’s invaluable.”
But there is an enhanced version of the program. There are 1,353 cameras in the integrated cameras. For a small fee, businesses or residents can purchase a fususCORE device that plugs into the camera system. This gives Raleigh police live access to those cameras on an as-needed basis.
It’s how they found Gilmore at his home back in March. The integrated system allowed the officers in Raleigh’s Real Time Crime Center to stay on his tail without putting officers or the community at further risk.
If this sounds a bit, "1984" and Big Brother, Johnson says it’s not. He hears questions about it constantly but says there are checks and balances in place to ensure accountability by Raleigh police so the systems are not abused.
“All of that information is completely CJIS [Criminal Justice Information Services] compliant to the highest levels,” Johnson said. “Every single keystroke that any operator inside the Real Time Crime Center, or in the Raleigh Police Department, is audited. It’s tracked. From a citizen's concern about how this technology is being used, we can go back and we can look at every single keystroke.”
Even inside the Real Time Crime Center, Raleigh police won’t allow media to film what happens there. But inside, there is a massive wall of television screens with GPS aerial maps of the city and they can punch up the different integrated cameras they would need during an active crime being followed. It’s a room that feels very much like a NASA space center operations center, but with the group following operations here on Earth.
Between the 976 registered cameras and the 1,353 integrated cameras, RPD is using the software daily to keep the streets safer. While it’s impossible to know how many total cameras there are throughout the city, Johnson is hopeful they can continue expanding the program and getting more people involved.
Helping the community join in the fight against crime.
“I would love to get to the point wherever we need a camera, there is a camera,” Johnson said. “That requires us to grow the camera infrastructure. We can have priorities on where we want that camera infrastructure to run but just across the board, we would like to see additional availability, additional community partners come meet with us and we’re more than happy to answer any and all of their questions.”
Helping the community join the fight against crime.
“We’re all in this together,” Johnson said. “This is a no-risk situation where the community can really benefit from what we’re doing and supplement the police department to increase operational efficiency. I can unequivocally say, every single day, we are solving crimes using this program. We’ve only had this technology [for] less than 18 months, and we’re already at this point.”