ESRI CrimeAnalyst 1.5 for intelligence-led policing

ESRI (UK), the market leader in Geographic Information Systems (GIS), has launched CrimeAnalyst version 1.5, a GIS software solution for mapping, analysing and sharing crime data, with quicker “hotspotting” analysis and large dataset workflow.

Widely used by UK police forces, including South Yorkshire and Leicestershire Police, CrimeAnalyst is built on ESRI ArcGIS Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology, helping police forces collect, combine, visualise, analyse, and share crime information in real-time, and goes beyond traditional crime “hotspotting” software to deliver in-depth, live location-based intelligence.

The software enables South Yorkshire police force analysts to produce the latest neighbourhood specific crime trends against high level resource allocation data for example, while also updating its mapping data every two weeks in line with the UK’s National Intelligence Model (NIM) framework.

CrimeAnalyst 1.5 has been released to further improve ease of use including:

* Faster hotspot analysis -Processing speed has been improved substantially by streamlining the number of processing tasks run simultaneously to focus on the most common used - saving time for more in-depth data interrogation
* More accurate and reliable temporal analysis – CrimeAnalyst now automatically works through all the Police time formats it supports for each record, and now indicates the number of records (if any) that were excluded because their date and/or time values could not be interpreted using any of the configured formats. This ensures the maximum number of records is included in the process for higher statistical accuracy and by knowing what was excluded, allowing easier assessment of the validity of the sample.
* Full support for file-based geodatabases - for individual users, this allows large databases generated from the many functions within CrimeAnalyst to be saved and accessed more easily at desktop level, speeding up workflows
* Automatic installation for all users - for greater speed and ease of loading by IT departments, meaning it’s now easier for the administrator to install CrimeAnalyst in environments with multiple users
* Additional support for international users - CrimeAnalyst can now adopt the mapping projections of different countries at the touch of a button (Note: this applies to international version of the release)

In a recent CrimeAnalyst user survey, over 75 per cent of respondents estimated they were saving up to five hours per week on crime data analysis using the system – a potential time saving of up to 6 weeks per analyst per year.

Detective Chief Inspector Simon Jones from the Leicestershire Constabulary said: “Because we have good quality, reliable information at our fingertips, we can direct our police resources to precisely the areas where they are most needed. This enables us to save valuable time and improve our overall effectiveness in disrupting the activities of crime networks and preventing crime.”

Rick Naylor, specialist consultant in Policing and Community Safety, commented: “Tools such as CrimeAnalyst are helping forces make better use of the wide range of disparate, real time data now at their disposal, more quickly and easily than before. It all counts towards meeting their objectives for reducing risk, fear and harm”

International users of CrimeAnalyst include police forces in Switzerland, Canada and Guatemala.

Further information on ESRI (UK) GIS in policing can be found at www.joiningforces.info