Cape CopCast
Welcome to "The Cape CopCast," the official podcast of the Cape Coral Police Department.
Hosted by Officer Mercedes Simonds, and Lisa Greenberg from our Public Affairs team, this podcast dives into the heart of Cape Coral PD's public safety, community initiatives, and the inner workings of our police department. Each episode brings you insightful discussions, interviews with key community figures, and expert advice on safety.
Cape CopCast
Chief's Chat #14: How We Use Money Seized from Criminal Investigations
Have you ever wondered what we do with money seized from criminal investigations?
Join us as we reveal some of the cutting-edge innovations coming to the Cape Coral Police Department, funded entirely by forfeiture money. Hosts Lisa Greenberg and Officer Mercedes Simonds chat with Chief Anthony Sizemore about how new high water vehicles and advanced AI-powered forensic accounting software are changing the game. These strategic investments, made through forfeiture money, promise to enhance emergency responses during flooding and revolutionize financial crime investigations, all while keeping the department's budget intact. We talk about how these advancements are set to better protect and serve our community.
Welcome back to another episode of the Cape Cop cast Chiefs Chat edition. I'm Lisa Greenberg. I'm one of your hosts.
Speaker 2:And I'm Officer Mercedes Simons. Together we make up the Public Affairs Office. Obviously we have Chief again here today.
Speaker 1:Good morning ladies.
Speaker 2:Welcome back, it's good to see you. Good to see you.
Speaker 1:So I can actually see you How's it going, how's your week been Good? Good Been busy, like you guys too. Yeah, absolutely it has been busy. A couple of things we did want to talk about, though. We are seeing some successes, some wins with our department in different types of technology that we're getting to better our work here, and a lot of that is coming from forfeiture money, so we thought it'd be a good opportunity to kind of let the public know what is that and how we're using it.
Speaker 3:Sure. Well, two nights ago, wednesday night, at the city council meeting, I had an item on the agenda where I asked to be able to use some forfeiture money to buy just what you said equipment for the agency to make us better and it was approved better and it was approved. And we are. We talked about it on an earlier podcast, but we are acquiring four high water vehicles to be able to respond during emergency response um with up to three feet of water, so that replicates um storm surge that we had on burnstall road in the northwest precinct or uh south of cape core parkway in the southeast. We shut down emergency services when winds are sustained at a certain threshold. However, when winds die down or it's not a wind event, it's just a rising water event people still have an expectation that we're going to be able to respond to them and we partner with the fire department to do that. But their mission is different than our mission. They do more extraction and rescue and they can provide us a ride to get in there. But there are certain circumstances that are police only and we need to go in there because there's a life safety battery situation or hostage situation. You never know what might come and that's police all day. So we have to be able to respond. We can't wait for other agencies to help us. We need to be equipped and ready to go.
Speaker 3:So we identified a funding source and that funding source is forfeiture money. And what forfeiture money is is when we work a criminal case and there's money or assets attached in the commission of that crime, we are entitled to seize either the cash or the equipment or cars or merchandise and we auction it and get the proceeds. And the proceeds go into an account called the Law Enforcement Trust Fund, l-e-t-f, and statutorily you are allowed to use that money for equipment, for anything to help in a protracted, long investigation, drug prevention and youth programs. That's on the state side. So if it's a state case and you have asset forfeiture or seizure, then it falls under the laws of state Federal forfeiture. On a federal case there's a little bit more leeway, but we utilize the same parameters. So if we need equipment and it's not in the budget, or if we do budget it, that's a long process that can take upwards of a year.
Speaker 3:So if we need something now, an early case would be if we didn't already have it baked in, like one of the software platforms I'm going to talk about. It wouldn't be until at least next October before we would get it, and we need it now. So the second piece of equipment that we got Wednesday night was a forensics accounting program and basically what it is is an AI version of a forensic accountant firm. So our financial crimes unit, which is a growing unit and a growing segment of criminal activity these days, is very subpoena driven. So if you have information on transactions between banks or between people and banks, or people and people, you do a subpoena and you get a lot of documents. One subpoena could net upwards of 300 documents. We have hundreds of financial crimes cases. Our detectives that work in that section of our detective bureau are working them nonstop. So in one particular case, one subpoena could generate hundreds of documents that you have to pour through and you need some expertise in that, and we've actually explored contracting out a forensic accountant.
Speaker 2:Very expensive to do that.
Speaker 3:There are some software options available now, one of which we got the funding to purchase through federal forfeiture, and what this is going to do is allow us to take all of those documents, you scan them in and, through AI, artificial intelligence, it will act as a forensic accountant and break down everything that a human could do in a long period of time.
Speaker 3:So the AI will process the data and actually do a storyboard of all of that information and it will link participants. It'll track money, it'll do exactly what a firm of forensic accountants will do in very rapid time, and what it does is it increases the efficiency and the speed of our unit that can work more cases. So if you picture a case that was recently in the news where a local contractor had many victims and each one of those victims had a bank information and one subpoena could be hundreds of pages, multiply that times several within one case and then dozens of cases like that, when you're a victim waiting for information, that that speed is is so valuable and we were able to do that and we purchased that software and and those high water vehicles through criminal forfeiture seizures.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of the public doesn't realize. They think we just take that money and it goes in someone's pocket or something. You know the naysayers might think that but it's really put to good use to help better serve our community.
Speaker 3:Right. You cannot use it to supplement a failure in your own budgeting. You cannot use it for salaries. You can't use it for frivolous purchases. What you use it for is exactly what we use it for, which is to help with long-term investigations, for equipment to facilitate better investigations, and we also use it for youth programs, to enhance our explorer post, our police athletic league. We purchase equipment for our school resource officer program to make sure that they're safe and the kids are safe. So it's really a big win and it's not something that we actively seek out. We don't generate cases to do asset forfeiture. We do cases to recover property for victims, to put the bad guy in jail, and if they happen to utilize vehicles or cash during the commission of those crimes, then the laws are set up that we're able to do that. We take advantage of it and we absolutely, one for one, put it right back into the business to enhance our end product.
Speaker 1:And do we have a timeline when it comes to those high water vehicles? You know, I hate to say it, hurricane season's almost here. I'm going to knock. What a million times, but you know it comes quick, june comes quick, so I'm just curious.
Speaker 3:We should be in business before the first tropical raindrops. Good, good, good, that's the plan.
Speaker 1:May wait is hurricane season May or June.
Speaker 3:June 1st.
Speaker 1:June 1st. Okay, I was right.
Speaker 3:I was right, but May the reason you say, may is we start beating the drum in May, that this is what you need to be prepared for, because that's a nice little dovetail that.
Speaker 3:We have so 60 people in our organization who have never gone through a tropical system as a member of the police department. You might've gone through it and you might've lived here, but you haven't gone through it. Here, where there is no evacuation, there is no expectation that you can avoid it, you're you're part of the front line. So absolutely that's part of our resiliency as a city and, in particular, at the police department is to have the equipment and be ready to respond when needed. And the clock is ticking on hurricane season 2025.
Speaker 1:Hopefully we don't need the vehicles this season. That's what I'm going to hope for.
Speaker 3:I hope there's show and tell at events.
Speaker 2:We had a rough enough year last year that I don't really feel like we need to do a whole repeat of of that whole season.
Speaker 3:Be prepared for anything and you'll be ready, exactly, exactly.
Speaker 1:Well, we always like to end our episode on a positive note, and we did have a situation this past week where we had a tactical de-escalation that ended in a positive result.
Speaker 3:The seeds of training are starting to bear fruit right and we've really worked hard to instill a culture of de-escalation and valuing human life. And unfortunately there are a lot of mental illness calls.
Speaker 3:You know, we're still the front lines for for mental health crisis in America, and particularly here in Cape Coral. So a few of our officers responded to someone in crisis that was armed with a knife. There was another family member in the home. We arrived, they safely extracted the non-involved family member and then began to engage with the individual that was armed with a knife, clearly exhibiting signs of a mental illness distress, and I'm proud to say that we were able to successfully deescalate the situation. And it's something that really doesn't make the papers, it doesn't make the legacy media. I understand it. Really, what cells would be if it was a tragic ending? But fortunately our training came through and we were able to do that successfully and we like to celebrate those. Those are wins Somebody's alive to to seek treatment, get better and live to fight another day.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we have so many tools on our tool belt, literally, but then the best tool that we have is communication. So having effective communicators on the job is so important because, looking at the video footage from it obviously we have body cam footage the officers were very calm. They explained exactly what they needed to happen, what would happen if he didn't put down the knife. And it wasn't kind of getting stuck in like yelling the same commands over and over and over again. That don't make sense. Kind of getting stuck in like yelling the same commands over and over and over again. That don't make sense. It was really getting down, staying calm and effectively communicating what you need to have a successful outcome, and that's what we're going for.
Speaker 3:On that point. If you don't have training, you're going to do what you think should be done and say it more, say it louder, say it more stern, and that really doesn't work when you have somebody experiencing a mental health crisis. And where do you learn that? You learn that in training. We have CIT, or crisis intervention training, and a shameless plug for NAMI. Cit is run through NAMI, the National Alliance of Mental Illness, of which I am a board member, and this situation right here is exactly why I'm proud to be a part of NAMI, because we beat the drum to make sure that CIT is still trained and our officers have the training for these types of experiences. So you don't do what you think you should do, you fall back to what you know you should do, and the successes far outweigh the negative outcomes. And NAMI's biggest fundraiser, the NAMI Walk, is coming up in March.
Speaker 1:March 8th, and I think it's important for people to realize too. If we don't de-escalate these situations, the endings can be absolutely tragic. It can be a situation where an officer is injured or, worse, it could be a situation where the person in crisis uses that weapon on themselves and takes their own life. So that's why it's so important to have that crisis intervention training to be able to communicate with the person, so that it doesn't end up in that type of situation.
Speaker 3:And it's important to talk about these cases and talk about these wins and talk about CIT, because if you're a family member that's living with someone that has a mental illness, that has the propensity to get violent or have these types of episodes, I can't think of a more nightmare scenario that you have no other option but to call 911 and need help and then worry that the people that you have called are going to come make it worse or, god forbid, it's going to end and you facilitated the death of your loved one in this crisis.
Speaker 3:Forbid, it's going to end and you facilitated the death of your loved one in this crisis. So what happens? If people believe that they don't call and then they live with it or you know worse, they can be hurt in their own home. What we want people to do, by talking about it in these podcasts and in every opportunity, is that we are trained and our number one goal is a successful de-escalation and peaceful resolution so that you, as the family member living in that situation, can feel comfortable and confident to call us, to know that that help is coming, not an agitator or God forbid an executor.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Anything else you want to add, Chief.
Speaker 3:No, I want everybody to have a great weekend.
Speaker 1:Have a great weekend, thank, you so much again for joining us, anything else?
Speaker 2:Tomorrow, saturday, from 10 to noon or until supplies last. We actually have the Grill and Chill at Four Freedoms Park. If anybody would like to join us, we'll have a bunch of police officers out there. We'll bring you know footballs and stuff like that to play with. So it's a free event If you want to bring you and your kids over we.
