Gunshot Detection Systems: The Price of Policing?

Gunshot detections systems work.  No, gunshot detection systems don’t work.  Can we have it both ways?  It’s kind of like the first line in A Tale of Two Cities: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”  Well?  Which is it?   This week we’ll be discussing Gunshot Detection Systems and the impact on evidence collection and crime.  Dr. Eric Piza, the Lipman Family Professor of Criminology & Criminal Justice and Director of Crime Analysis Initiatives at Northeastern University, joins the podcast to discuss his 2024 study, “Gunshot detection technology effect on gun violence in Kansas City, Missouri: A microsynthetic control evaluation, coauthored by David N. Hatten, George O. Mohler, Jeremy G. Carter, and Jisoo Cho.

Main Topics

• The price tag for a gunshot detection system (GDS) can get very expensive very quickly.
• The use of a gunshot detection system was associated with higher levels of ballistic evidence collection in the GDS target area and surrounding location. 
• The GDS did not influence any of the gun violence categories involving confirmed victims (i.e., fatal and non-fatal, shootings, aggravated assaults).
• We also get into the political aspects of research, and the role of an academic in policy debates.

Don't forget to like, FOLLOW, and share.  Sharing this podcast or an episode is one of the best complements I can receive, which will help grow the show.

And don't forget to provide a review.  Giving five stars is never a bad idea.

Feel free to email me your comments using the "send us a text" option (above), or at the following email address: policeinservicetrainingpodcast@gmail.com 

You can also contact me at: Bluesky: @policeinservice.bsky.social

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:13

Welcome to the Police in Service Training Podcast. This podcast is dedicated to providing research evidence to street-level police officers and command staff alike. The program is intended to help the police and law enforcement community create better programs, understand challenging policies, and dispel the myths of police officer behavior. I'm your host, Scott Phillips. In a past podcast, I discussed the increased use of technology in policing. We've covered AI and unfortunately I've only touched slightly on the use of body worn cameras in policing. I also mentioned that I'm a skeptic on the widespread use of a new anything, unless there is some supporting evidence telling me that the new thing is actually worth it. Another piece of technology that seems to be growing in the policing world is the gunshot detection systems. This technology is promoted as a means of preventing crime and increasing case clearance numbers for violent gun crimes. While looking into this, I was a little surprised to learn that these systems had been around for a few decades. But the question remains: are they worth it? Do gunshot detection systems provide any benefit of any kind for a city? Joining the podcast today is Dr. Eric Pisa, Lippmann Family Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice, and the Director of Crime Analysis Initiatives at Northeastern University. Before entering academia, Dr. Pisa served as the GIS Specialist in the Newark, New Jersey Police Department. He was responsible for the day-to-day crime analysis and program evaluation activities of the agency. Eric is going to discuss his 2024 study titled Gunshot Detection Technology: Effect on Gun Violence in Kansas City, Missouri, a microsynthetic control evaluation. Thanks for coming on the podcast today. Thank you for having me, Scott. Okay, so your research, other than this, focuses on spatial analysis of crime patterns and crime control technology. What drew you to this from your crime analysis world?

SPEAKER_01 2:17

So essentially, my academic research agenda is very much an extension of the work I did while I was the GIS specialist at the New York, New Jersey Police Department. I gained an appreciation in that role of several things. Most specifically, perhaps, is the power that data can have for policy and practice, and how spatial analysis in particular can take large problems that at times can feel insurmountable and package them in a way that communicates that most public safety issues are really tightly concentrated in space. And when you're able to operationalize data in that way, you start to take big problems that again can feel overwhelming and insurmountable and present them to police leadership in a way that allows them to think a little bit more about how to intervene, not everywhere, but within the small number of micro places that are driving any given crime problem.

SPEAKER_00 3:20

Yeah, I did some uh work. It was uh Andy Wheeler, and he brought the he brought it to my attention, and we used some data from Buffalo to uh examine uh uh buildings when you destroy the building, bring it down, abandon buildings. And this was that was my first exposure to the idea of uh spatial analysis. I just found it fascinating. I I can't do the math, but it's still really, really interesting stuff.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

That's a very that's a very interesting study. I'm familiar with that study.

SPEAKER_00 3:43

Oh, very good. Don't uh give me no credit, that was Andy all the way. No, I I kind of hinted this at in the uh intro, but why is this particular area of inquiry important or relevant to the police?

SPEAKER_01 3:56

So gunshot detection technology is the latest, perhaps in a long line of technological innovations that have been adopted at a very large scale in American policing. Right. In a lot of ways, American policing has always been very, very quick to adopt technology, um, going back to, if we want to go back several decades, just the adoption of motor vehicle to keep up with um criminals who offer who are also rather utilizing motor vehicles in their pursuits, um, to organizing patrol around the 911 system once telephones became ubiquitous in American society, thinking a little bit more contemporary, the spread of video surveillance cameras, the spread of body cameras. So the adoption of technology in policing is not new. And these gunshot detection technology systems are again another manifestation of police committing to a technological solution in an attempt to improve public safety. So we think that my co-authors and I, we thought that this was an area that needed to be researched a little bit more than it had been up until recently. Um, and by recently I mean literally in the last two to three years, there really wasn't much empirical research examining the benefits that gunshot detection technology delivered to police agencies. Um, so we thought that that was very out of step with the pace of adoption, and we thought and and we tried to contribute a little bit more to the knowledge base so that police can have a little bit more scientific evidence to go off of when considering whether or not to invest in these systems.

SPEAKER_00 5:44

Yeah, these these things really seem to be you know interesting in you know technology to make policing more efficient, that that's usually the goal of these things, but again, whether they work or not, that's the the question. And again, I the idea of these things being around for decades, but only having you know any number of research studies being done in the past, you know, as you say, a couple of years, it's really surprising. I would imagine maybe it's because there's no funding for it or it's just not easy to do. But we we'll get into that probably as well. Uh I suspect most listeners understand how gunshot detection systems work, but could you give us a quick overview?

SPEAKER_01 6:19

So gunshot detection technology essentially works by deploying a network of acoustic sensors, essentially small microphones uh with some GPS capabilities throughout a city, and those sensors are able to pick up automatically the sound of gunfire. So when a loud noise occurs in an urban environment that may be gunfire, as long as it's picked up, to my understanding, by three of those acoustic sensors, an alert gets sent over to the vendor's headquarters, um, depending on the vendor, um, that could be different places. An analyst listens to the snippet of audio that is delivered to their system and they make a determination of whether or not the sound indeed was the sound of a gun being fired. If they determine that the answer is yes, this is indeed a legitimate sound of gunfire, that gets reported over to the police department in question. That sounds like a lot, but that process, um, the the preeminent vendors in this space kind of advertise that that process takes less than a minute. And from what I've seen, it's actually closer to about 30 seconds or so from detection of the sound, human verification, relaying over to the police department. So it doesn't take very long in practice.

SPEAKER_00 7:46

Okay, fair fair enough. Now, I I also mentioned in in a recent episode that technology, as you mentioned a few mo moments ago, is flooding policing. And some companies uh they make the claim that um that these things are the you know greatest things since sliced bread, but there's usually not that much evidence to support it. What can you tell us about some of the claims with respect to gunshot detection systems and their application to policing? Let's face it, you mentioned this in the article. Kansas City's paying quite a bit of money every year for these things.

SPEAKER_01 8:16

Yeah, certainly. So, first of all, speaking to vendor claims that their systems are the greatest thing since sliced bread, uh perhaps this is a controversial opinion, but I don't know, slice bread isn't that great. Grab a knife, slice the bread yourself, not that big of a deal. I actually prefer a bread like that sometimes. Uh, but more seriously, uh with vendor claims, with any technology, I think it's important to realize that it's obviously in the best interest of the vendor to highlight the potential benefits. So police departments are going to get, in whatever sales pitch, the best case scenario for any any technology out there, right? Be it gunshot detection, be it video surveillance cameras, be it something a little bit more basic, like uh the Microsoft suite of products that agencies have to purchase. They're always going to get a best case scenario. So that's why I think it's so important for researchers in in the science community to step up to engage and establish the necessary relationships with police departments to analyze and evaluate which of the promised benefits are actually delivered by a given technology. Police departments don't work with infinite budgets, right? In every in every city I'm uh familiar with, the budget is quite finite. So, therefore, I think answering the question of is a given product worth the monetary investment, that's one of the most important things that we can do in the scientific community.

SPEAKER_00 9:51

When I was when I was reading your paper, you mentioned something, and again, when I read these things, very often other things come to mind, which is how I function, and then it leads me down other roads, hopefully, when I read or do research. But you had mentioned something about how technology may be a mechanism that increases police response to crime, thus increasing the risk of someone getting arrested. Now, wouldn't that with the gunshot detection system, wouldn't that eventually get to a point where the officers are decreasing their activity in that area? And in other words, the gunshot detection system is keying officers in on those areas. They're more likely to go to those areas, thus it's almost like a hotspot patrol. And is that maybe like a side effect that might be going on?

SPEAKER_01 10:34

That's a great question, right? And I think I should take a step back and talk about a little bit more detail what the expected benefits of these technological systems are. Sure. Because there's a lot, right? Because I I think it could sound simple, but when you start to take a critical look at it, you see that there's a lot of kind of interacting processes that are expected to take place. So the response that I described before, microphone hears noise, human being verifies whether or not it's a gunshot. So that's essentially providing the benefit of police not having to wait for someone to pick up the phone and call 911 to report gunfire. And we know from decades of research at this point that certain communities, particularly underserved, underprivileged, high crime communities, don't always bother to report things like sounds of gunfire to the police. So they may also provide the added benefit of reporting crime that may have not been reported otherwise. The second benefit that we're anticipating is that gives quicker detection and quicker deployment of officers to shooting scenes. But I mentioned before that in addition to picking up the sound of gunfire, these detectors or these sensors are able to pinpoint the exact location of the noise. That could lead police a little bit more directly to where the gunfire actually occurred. So anyone familiar with crime reporting knows that that is very difficult sometimes to achieve via the 911 system. What a lot of police receive in terms of reports of gunfire are very vague pieces of information about where gunfire occurred. Right. Someone could call and say, hey, I live at 100 Main Street. I heard a sound of a gunshot outside. That doesn't mean the gunshot happened at 100 Main Street. Someone could call and say, hey, I heard a gunshot somewhere in the vicinity of the intersection of Central Avenue and Main Street. Again, very imprecise address information. So that's another benefit that the gunshot detection systems are providing. So now we get to the question of like, all right, what does all of this mean for public safety? So there are a few assumptions that are being made following that. We're getting cops there quicker, they're pinpointing the location, so we could assume that maybe they're going to find evidence more often. If they're getting there quicker, maybe they're going to find offenders a little bit more often. Right. If those things are true, then maybe we start to get into crime reductions. Maybe all of that leads to crime reduction. Maybe, given all of this increased attention to shooting scenes, maybe we're going to collect more evidence and solve more cases. So asking a question as simple as does gunshot detect detection technology work requires us to take each one of those steps in the causal mechanism and peel back the layers of the onion and determine whether or not that's happening. So when you say the increased responses may essentially lead to hotspots policing, that might be the case, right? But despite the fact that research shows that hotspots policing can be effective, we have to ask irrespectively, or or separately, rather, whether or not this process put in place by gunshot detection technology leads to crime reduction on its own.

SPEAKER_00 14:08

Right. And like I say, that's not that's not a bad thing. I'm not criticizing it. It would just, it struck me that it's almost like you wouldn't need an analyst to determine where the shots are occurring. You wouldn't need a pin map from like 40 years ago because the gunshot detection system is doing all that work for you. I just thought that was kind of interesting.

SPEAKER_01 14:26

That's correct, but we have to be sensitive to the fact that most cities do not cover the entirety of their jurisdiction in gunshot detection centers.

SPEAKER_00 14:37

Fair enough, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:38

So what we're getting is an increased measurement of gunfire in just that area, right? So if an analyst wanted to ask the question of where are the hotspots for gunfire through the entire city, the gunshot detection data, while it's rich, right, and it's very helpful for analytical purposes, it's not going to help answer that question for the simple fact that the system doesn't reach the entire city.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

So let's get into your study. What were your basic research questions and how did you study this in Kansas City to get your answers?

SPEAKER_01 15:16

So we were interested in a number of research questions. Um at the state of at the risk rather of oversimplifying, we broke up our research questions into two different buckets, right? First, we were interested in process type research questions. So essentially the process that I described, did the gunshot detection technology system deliver those processes? And then we were interested in outcome questions, right? So what exactly does all of this mean for public safety? So in the specific article that that you contacted me about, the process questions had to do with the collection of ballistic evidence. So essentially shell casings, um, gun cartridges, and the seizure of firearms. And what we found there was that those actually did increase. So in the I'm I'm trying not to say the vendor name where because I I don't want the um you haven't said it yet.

SPEAKER_00 16:19

And if you do, I'll I'll take it take it out. Don't even worry about it. Yeah, we don't want to get into the noise.

SPEAKER_01 16:23

Yeah, because too often uh this technology is incredibly politically charged.

SPEAKER_00 16:29

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 16:30

And people on both sides of the debate have used my research to argue their cause and to say that the uh the people on the other side of the debate are idiots. So I'm trying to not frame that in terms of vendors, right? Because I think we unfairly talk about these things in terms of specific people and specific vendors rather than technology that can be applied in policing kind of generally.

SPEAKER_00 16:54

Very well said. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

So with that said, with that said, so what we found both in this study and and other related studies that we conducted in partnership with the Kansas City Police Department, we found that the technology does deliver the procedural benefits that it promises. So in this study, we found that the collection of ballistic evidence significantly increased in the gunshot detection technology target area compared to the control area.

SPEAKER_00 17:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 17:23

We also found that the recovery of illegal firearms also significantly increased in the target area as compared to the control area. In related studies, we also found that the gunshot detection technology system identified the sounds of gunfire on average about 93 seconds before the first 911 call comes in. So essentially, that we we interpreted that to mean that this technology gave police in Kansas City essentially a 93-second head start in responding to shooting scenes. So we found lots of evidence that the process questions that we were interested in were answered in support of the technology. It seemed that the technology provided those benefits. But then we have to ask about outcomes, right? So what all what does all of this mean for public safety? What we found was that crime confirmed crime events did not decrease following the introduction of this technology. So essentially, shooting victims, um, victimization in robberies and aggravated assaults committed with firearms, none of those significantly changed in the target area compared to the control area. We did find about a 22% reduction of citizen calls regarding sounds of shots fired. However, those did not relate at all to victimization. So those were literally just sounds of gunfire that were not committed, that were not connected rather to any reported crime. So those went down, but no categories that involved an actual verified victim of gunfire were impacted by the technology. In tangential related studies, we also found that despite the increase in the collection of ballistic evidence and the increase of firearm seizures, shootings occurring in the gunshot detection technology target area were and not were not any more likely to be solved than shootings in other areas. So we're seeing a lot of good news in terms of the process measures that the vendor promises to customers. We're seeing less evidence in favor of the technology when it comes to what many people argue as the bottom line of are less people being shot, are less people being victimized with firearms, and are we solving shootings more often than we used to?

SPEAKER_00 20:09

Yeah, I'm reminded of a conversation I had a couple of podcast episodes ago, and uh essentially I asked the question, did it work? And the the person was really hesitant to say yes or no because of the complexity of the topic. And the as you're saying here, you you're you're going after two two different um you know dependent variables, as it were, two different outcomes of the process. Yes, they're getting more shell casings, which is good, particularly in a larger agency which might have access to Nibans. And I know Nibans has been pretty successful at linking these different crimes together, whether they result in in convictions later on. I honestly don't know what the research says on that, but in in a sense, Nibans work, so that component of your study tells us, yeah, you you're gonna get more of those kinds of casings, that kind of evidence. But in the long run, are you seeing uh a sizable reduction in in the uh the crimes that are occurring and not so much, and which again we're being polite about it, and then you have to throw in, okay, how much money is this costing? Which and then that's a that's an issue for the police agency or police chief to consider.

SPEAKER_01 21:16

Yeah, and and you've mentioned cost a couple times, so I think maybe it'd be helpful for the listeners to for us to put an actual value on the cost. Sure. So by the estimates provided by Sound Thinking, who is the predominant vendor in this space, um, on the figures they provide on their own website, state that the technology costs between $65,000 and $95,000 per square mile per year. Um so cities have a tendency to kind of expand their coverage areas as time goes on. So it's very easy for the price tag of these technologies. To get into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions of dollars per year. So going back to your your point, Scott, right? I mean, you've alluded to this a number of times. I mean, I think we have to ask for any police leader or city manager responsible for managing a budget, a question is what exactly are you getting for that financial investment?

SPEAKER_00 22:21

Yeah, uh, and Kansas City, if I remember, it didn't uh do you remember how big Kansas City was? I don't recall from your you probably said it in your article. It's it's big. Put it this way, but I I live not too far from Buffalo, and Buffalo is 42 square miles. So if you're looking at 65 to what'd you say, 95 per square mile, you're looking at a large amount of money to cover the entire city, which makes sense that that an agency would only put it in the areas where gunshots are more prevalent.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

Yeah, so in Kansas City, Kansas City installed the system in a three-square mile area. And and that's all they they did. I mean they kind of kept it refined. This was part of a larger effort, however, that included the city of Chicago. So the city of Chicago did something very different. They started, like Kansas City, with a three-square mile area, but after several years, they expanded out to where over 130 square miles of the city was covered. So 65,000 times to 95,000 times that many square miles. We're talking a price tag of upwards of 12 million dollars per year.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

Well, that's a whole lot of money. And now I want to hit on something really quick. Um, you had mentioned gun recoveries, and when I read it in the article, I thought to myself, this is truly weird. Now, again, you're only going to get shell casings from semi-automatic weapons. You're not going to get them from revolvers. And I joke with somebody on a prior podcast, is anybody even still using revolvers? But okay, fine. I'm just showing my age. Uh, and I'm I'm probably asking you to speculate on this one, but why would more guns be recovered? Are people just ditching their guns? Are they dropping them? Or you know what's going on that there are more guns on the street being found? I don't get it.

SPEAKER_01 24:08

That's a really good question. So, in our data, the gun recoveries came from a few different sources. Um, so gun recoveries came from situations like where you said, where they were discovered on crime scenes.

SPEAKER_00 24:21

Right.

SPEAKER_01 24:21

So perhaps um after the shooting happens, the shooter drops the firearm and then it could be recovered by police. Also, though, I think we have to remember that the target areas obviously experienced things other than gunshot detection alerts. So it just may be also that officers patrolling the areas or maybe responding to the alerts are engaging in things that are not directly related to the event.

SPEAKER_00 24:51

Well, fair enough.

SPEAKER_01 24:51

So perhaps while in a target area, they pull a car over and find a firearm in the car.

SPEAKER_00 24:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 24:58

Perhaps when they arrive, they do uh a stop question first that technically speaking may not be related to the call, but they discover a firearm that way. So there's a number of different ways where firearms in our study could come to the attention of the police.

SPEAKER_00 25:13

So it's not necessarily the necessarily that the alert system led to the gun in a more direct manner, there might have been an indirect connection. That's correct. Fair enough. Okay. So a couple of implications. Do you have two or three implications for police agencies, the personnel, the leaders?

SPEAKER_01 25:30

So the question I get all of the time, as you could probably guess. Well, two questions I get all of the time. One is, does this work? And then I have to go into the spiel that I gave before where it depends on what you mean by work. And seeing the response to my research is always very, very interesting. As I mentioned, this technology is incredibly politically charged. Um, so it's it's really interesting to see individuals cherry-pick the research that I described to fit their argument. So people who are very in support of this technology point to the fact that we detected an increase in the collection of ballistic evidence and firearms and quicker response time to say that this technology works. People who are very against this technology use the same exact studies to say that since we did not find a reduction in gunshot victimization or an increase in case clearance, that this is definitive proof that the technology doesn't work. So that's the the one question I always get. The second question I get, which which more directly answers the question that you asked, is so is this technology worth it? And really, it depends on the problem that the agency investing in the technology is trying to solve. To be perfectly clear, I think we have enough evidence, both from my individual research, but also the larger literature on this technology, that it does not consistently reduce crime. There are examples where cities have seen crime reductions following the installation of this technology, but if we consider the entire body of research, there isn't overwhelming evidence that anyone should expect shootings to go down or gun violence generally to go down after investing in this technology. So if that's what you're buying the technology for, then perhaps your money is best spent elsewhere. However, I also noted some benefits. I had some people say to me that getting more guns off the street, collecting more shell casings by themselves are important outcomes. So if that's important for you, and if you wanted to increase the number of shell casings you import into your NIBEM system, for example, then maybe the technology is a little bit more worth the investment. But you have to kind of stay in that mind frame. Um if you're expecting again, if you're spending this money to see people shot less often in your city, then the research just is not on your side. If you think your city can benefit from collecting more ballistic evidence than or for getting officers on the scene more quickly than they would otherwise, then perhaps it is more worth the investment.

SPEAKER_00 28:27

Yeah, I see your research as I see most of the research that um for the people who have been on the podcast, even my own research, it's like, okay, here's what we have found from a scientific controlled perspective on this particular topic. We provide that information like an analyst does. We provide it to a decision maker. Then the decision maker has to, you know, balance out in their own calculation what do I want out of this? And you're right, can people can use it politically and they're always going to do that, but then we that's where we back away. Here's the best evidence we have. And if you have a large body of it, which it sounds like there's a growing body in this in this world, the large body tells us that for the most part this part of it works, this part of it not so much. And if you want to spend the money, uh it it's almost like a gun buyback program. But if you want to spend the money for good for good public relations, gun buyback programs tend to do those kinds of things. But if you're doing it to reduce crime, gun buyback programs, the evidence doesn't support that. So your research is just one of those pieces of evidence. Here, use it, you know. I guess how you will.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

And and people certainly do use the research how they will, I'll tell you that much.

SPEAKER_00 29:40

Yeah, yeah, I I I can I can imagine what's the what's what's the phrase? I don't remember who said it. Uh I've looked them up, but uh uh politicians use uh social science or use statistics like a drunk uses a lamppost for support, not illumination.

SPEAKER_01 29:55

Yeah, so the the number of uh people who have reached out to me over the years to say something of the effect of um I want the city I live in to get rid of this technology, uh, and I see your research says it doesn't reduce crime. How do I convince my police department to get rid of this technology? And I have to explain to these people like as a researcher, that's I that's not what I'm in the business of. Right. I'm not in the business of advancing anyone's political cause. I'm not in the business of letting people know what my politics are. I'm an objective social scientist. If anyone knows too much about my politics, I personally believe that I have failed at my job. Now, there's plenty of criminologists who disagree with me on that, but that's how I was trained. So I have to explain to these individuals, like, hey, like, that's that's not my job. I'm happy to speak with you about what my research found. I could give you advice about if you wanted to advocate for your police agency to perhaps do their own study to see whether or not they're getting benefits. I'm happy to do that, but I'm not here to advance any individual political causes.

SPEAKER_00 31:01

Right. If you were an expert witness, you'd give them to both sides and let the jury make a decision.

SPEAKER_01 31:06

That's that's a great analogy, Scott, right? And I think that social scientists, researchers, that's our job. I never thought of the expert and witness analogy, but that's that's a great analogy. Our job is to do as strong of a possible research study that we can, and to communicate the scientific findings out to the public and policymakers. It's the policymakers' job to act on any information. Um, again, it's not necessarily our job to try to influence any political debates. But again, I mean the downside to me saying this is this is perhaps the most politically charged technology in the policing space, though it looks like the automated license plate reader cameras are having a moment, and perhaps they're gonna take over the most politically charged spot from gunshot detection technology, but it it is still very much used uh politically on both sides.

SPEAKER_00 32:05

Well, it's almost like the flavor of the month. I don't want to get off track here, but this is still good conversation. The the uh body more cameras with with ice, let's just say with ice or with policing from the past you know decade or two. And then you've got uh the licensed plate readers and the flock cameras. And I I could walk to a flock camera where I live. I don't know why it's there, but somebody about a month or two ago, somebody cut it down. And I'm I'm driving by. Boom, down on the ground. And uh sheriff was pretty pissed about it, which is understandable, they're not free. But back to your point, politically charged will depend on what's going on, what comes out in the news. And and your your topic here is important. It might not be most politically charged anymore, which is fine. If if I were you, I'd say, great, I can step away from it. But uh you're right, the technology brings in a political component that uh we have to consider in our research, if only to avoid it.

SPEAKER_01 33:02

Yeah, certainly. Um I kind of half-jokingly tell people that uh I I used to I used to say at least I've already lied to myself on this that I was looking forward to not working on this technology anymore because I could like remove myself from the political debate. Yeah. Uh, but as of a few months ago, myself and my colleague John Scharback at Roan University, we've partnered with the city of Patterson, New Jersey to evaluate their gunshot detection technology system. So I'm doing it to myself at this point.

SPEAKER_00 33:31

Well, good luck with your research. This was really enjoyable. I appreciate your time. Scott, thank you for having me. This was a lot of fun. Great, have a great day.