Kellie Clayton, a Yuma, Arizona Police Identification Technician, got a worried feeling when she was called to a pizza restaurant to recover video of an armed robbery. Restaurants are infamous for keeping DVRs too close to their ovens, constantly putting the evidence in jeopardy. But when she arrived, she saw she had completely different problem: the DVR was not connected to a PC.
“I couldn’t find any way to collect the video from the DVR.” says Clayton, “No USB connections, no disc drive, NO NOTHING.”
She consulted another technician at the agency who suggested recording the evidence from the monitor with her smart phone. The images from the phone video just did not move them any closer to an identification. She could feel time ticking away, hours being lost.
Day Two
The owner of the restaurant’s security company offered to help Officer Clayton recover the video. They both arrived at the establishment, the security-company owner with his laptop in tow. After two hours and four tries of turning the DVR on and off (Clayton winced each time he turned the DVR off, worried all the evidence hiding there would be lost), he informed the officer that there was an “interface connection problem.” He would not be able to retrieve the video for her.
Day Three
A sergeant from another local agency met Officer Clayton at the restaurant with a StarWitness Field Agent recovery kit.
“This blew me away! Within 30 minutes, he was handing me a disc with my video in better quality than what was being seen on the monitor. In my experience, better than what is seen on the monitor is unusual.”
“I couldn’t find any way to collect the video from the DVR.” says Clayton, “No USB connections, no disc drive, NO NOTHING.”
She consulted another technician at the agency who suggested recording the evidence from the monitor with her smart phone. The images from the phone video just did not move them any closer to an identification. She could feel time ticking away, hours being lost.
Day Two
The owner of the restaurant’s security company offered to help Officer Clayton recover the video. They both arrived at the establishment, the security-company owner with his laptop in tow. After two hours and four tries of turning the DVR on and off (Clayton winced each time he turned the DVR off, worried all the evidence hiding there would be lost), he informed the officer that there was an “interface connection problem.” He would not be able to retrieve the video for her.
Day Three
A sergeant from another local agency met Officer Clayton at the restaurant with a StarWitness Field Agent recovery kit.
“This blew me away! Within 30 minutes, he was handing me a disc with my video in better quality than what was being seen on the monitor. In my experience, better than what is seen on the monitor is unusual.”