The Radio Patrol

Radio Record, Volume I, Issue 47, 8 June 1928, Page 2

The Radio Patrol

SYDNEY POLICE SYSTEM -_---- RAPID ACTION ACCORDING to the New South Wales Commissioner of Police, Mr, James Mitchell, radio has increased the efficiency of the force by a hundred per cent. "f could not do without it now," says Mr. Mitchell. In the detection of crime everything depends on speed, _ And, with the widespread use of radio by the New South Wales police, their speed in getting immediately to the scene of a crime has resulted, times without number, in the arrest of an offender himerelf staggered by such efficiency. Take this instance, in which,,. though there was no arrest, it will be seen that had burglars been at work they would have had no chance. — At 10.10 p.m. two of the wireless patrol cars received word over the air that the burglar alarm was ringing at a big departmental store in Oxford Street, Sydney. At 10.12 p.m. the crews of both patrols had surrounded. the building, while a third was on its way to the home of the proprietor to bring him to the scene. , Before he got there the place had been searched from cellar to roof, and there was no sign of burglars. It was ascertained that an accident to the wiring had set off the alarm. , Wireless patrol reports, supplied each morning to the executive officials | of the police, are eloquent witnesses to the efficiency of the scheme, At least 12 calls are attended each night, and on these rare occasions when there is "nothing doing’ test calls are sent out regularly from the headquarters installation to ascertain that reception is O.K. | Caught in the Act. At 1.15 o’clock on a recent morning the alarm was given that a suspicious character had gone into the yard of a shop at Daceyville. Tapped out to the police patrol, the message reached one car at Rose Bay. Within 10 minutes the police were on the spot and had arrested a young man in the act of breaking into the store. Before the use of radio it might have been half an hour ere a patrol was informed, since they telephoned only at half-hourly intervals. Scores of criminals caught on the job-and every criminal hates to be apprehended thus, since he can offer no defence -will testify, not politely, to the swiftness of action which characterises the use of radio by police. And with the proposed establshment of transmitting sets in each Australian capital city capable: of interchanging criminal information on a special wavelength, the life of a criminal will be more hazardous than ever. As in all things, there is a humorous side to the work of the wireless patrol. At 12,80 on a morning of last week the police received a hurry call to a place in Darlinghurst, a woman haying complained that two men were prowling about her backyard. Tnvestigation showed that actually the noise which had frightened her was caused by & marauding cat’s efforts to reach the canary cage left hanging on the wall of a shed. With scores of meritorious captures to their credit, their wonderfui efficiency through the use of radio and their powerful influence on criminals contemplating night crime, little wonder that the Commissiioner says he wouldn’t be without his wireless patrols,