A look inside Columbia County Sheriff’s Office’s ‘Real Time Crime Center’

APPLING, Ga. (WJBF) – It’s been more than a year since the Columbia County Sheriff’s Office opened its Real Time Crime Center.

Stocked with state-of-the-art technology, the real time crime center allows the agency to essentially catch criminals in the act.

Operators can track people down quickly using tools like license plate readers, research databases and high-tech phone systems.

“We are seeing instances where people from outside of Columbia County are coming here to commit crimes, and they’re doing things like covering their tag or taking their tags off their vehicles before committing a crime,” said Lt. Jamey Moss. “But, thanks to this technology we have, even if they remove their tag from their car, we can still find them.”

They also have about a thousand cameras spread throughout the county – including inside every single school.

“In the initial moments of an emergency, there’s a lot of uncertainty, there’s a lot of misinformation that can come in,” Lt. Moss said. “So, for us to be able to turn a camera and actually see what’s going on, gives us the clarity that we need a lot of times. Just like our traffic network, we can virtually respond to those incidents within seconds. As you look here, this is actually Grovetown High School.”

It helps that the 911 call center and crime center are connected, making communication more efficient.

“When there is an incident going on, they are very good at communicating with each other and making sure that they share information, which in turn allows us to use the technology to update deputies and responders as to what’s going on,” Lt. Moss said.

And it’s not just crime they track. I was at the center when a public safety incident happened in the county, and the Sheriff’s Office was able to respond almost instantly.

“Virtually being able to respond to incidents such as what’s going on behind us, which is a large gas leak that happened today on Furys Ferry Road,” Lt. Moss said. “Within second of us getting the 911 calls about the gas main being hit, we were able to utilize the closest camera we had and actually turn and monitor the scene before anyone even got there.”

The crime center and the 911 call center are hiring. To apply, click here.

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