Fort Myers Police going high-tech with some new policing tools

The Fort Myers police department wants to buy 2D and 3D traffic mapping equipment to reconstruct deadly crashes. They hope the new tech will help them stop drivers who have broken the law.

From the start of 2024 until July 15th, 2024, the department shared with Fox 4 that there were 19 deadly crashes. In 2023, there were 18.

Fort Myers police traffic homicide investigator Kyle Martins showed us how he manually gathers details from a car crash.

The department uses tape measures and gains access to the car's black boxes that host data.

"The old way, so to speak, was taking two-dimensional coordinates, so x and y, and we would then plot those on a two-dimensional map in a later time; it doesn't show you pictures," says Martins.

He says they aren't able to gather any graphics that can animate a crash or car movement in real-time.

But now, the department plans to go high-tech.

Once the city council approves it, Fort Myers Police will buy a 2D/3D scanner and software from a company called Faro.

"You actually have a scan of a car that can give you information, such as how far the car has been crushed in the locations of where damage is on the side of a car, on top of a car, and those sorts of things," says Martins.

Martins says the department only needs one scanner.

"It'll actually take the actions observed by the vehicle and plots them and animates them in real-time," says Martin.

Some of the money to pay for this more than $70,000 investment will come from the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program.

Martin says they will keep their standard ways of getting data, using all of this equipment, but this new way will enable them to open roadways faster.

"You can then produce models of these things, which can be used to aid in prosecution," says Martin.

The time frame in which this new technology will be used is undetermined, but Martin says soon.