While many tip lines and crime watch organizations offer rewards for information, there is one service that is quietly assisting in local crime prevention. Silent Partner, an Internet-based crime prevention alert system used by the Herndon Police Department, has led to arrests without the enticement of cash and without much notice.
“It is what it’s called — Silent Partner,” said Darcy Burns, a spokeswoman with the Herndon Police Department. “It’s been pretty useful to us because it can get anyone involved.”
The service allows police and other municipal agencies to send out alerts to subscribers via e-mail, text pager or cell phone e-mail on such topics as missing persons, crime notifications, wanted people, weather warnings and information about road closures and traffic delays.
Though Herndon hasn’t tracked the number of tips that have come in since the service was launched in 2002, police have received a possible lead on a fraud case that had seemed to hit a dead end.
“We got a call from someone who said they recognized a picture we posted,” Burns said. “We don’t know if it will lead to an arrest, but any tip we get, we’ll certainly follow up on.”
Herndon was the first police department nationwide to use the high-tech system — which has since spread to more than six states, said Charles Manning, president of Manning Systems Engineering, the company that created Silent Partner.
Chief Toussaint Summers Jr. said that instead of simply serving as a clearing-house for getting information out, the system has helped open up the lines of communication between the police and community.
While departments must pay for the program, with the cost dependent upon the size of the municipality, Herndon received the system free of charge as the first department in the nation to give it a try.
