In yesterday's Toronto Star newspaper, an article was written about YouTube video posted by Toronto police and Crime Stoppers regarding the three missing Toronto teens that are involved in a police investigation of the slaying of Phillip Ho Sing Sit.
According to the King Township Sentinel, Phillip Sit's remains were found in August of 2006 on a rural property in King, how he was murdered was not disclosed.
Toronto police want the three teens, Eve Ho, also known as Yee Wah Ho, 17; her boyfriend Jackie Li, 18; and Kevin Lim, 18 , who disappeared shortly after the death of Phillip Sit, are considered witnesses in the case.
The video posted on YouTube (and below) was posted by Toronto police and Crime Stoppers on January 30 and can be found at their YouTube profile page 1800222TIPS.
The efforts by Crime Stoppers are interesting to see in video format. The metal sculpture of Eve Ho was made by Andre Nilm and his "personal" message to Eve Ho was recorded with good intentions. However, like user MisterQuebec's comments on the police's efforts suggest, they may be too direct and push too hard to get "anonymous tips" from these individuals.
Although the article in yesterday's Star suggests the police have been informed of enough sightings to believe all three are still alive, they have had no concrete leads in over a month.
It is good to see the community of online YouTube users providing suggestions and tips to the police to effectively tap into this new media. When it was first posted, user taavo420 commented that the police should show more pictures of the witnesses. On February 2, 2007 the police posted this slide show of photos.
The Toronto police service are on the right track by using the online video audience to spread its community service announcements. However, more investment should be made in spreading word of their online endeavors. They rely on local newspapers and television stations to announce these initiatives, when they should also be doing some more on-the-street endorsements to get the word out.
The most effective of these endeavors are their re-enacted crime videos. On February 1, 2007 the police posted a re-enactment of the unsolved November 2004shooting on a Toronto TTC bus where a 24-year-old man and a 11-year-old girl was seriously injured.
Two weeks ago, on March 6, 2007 the police posted a re-enactment of two unsolved sexual assault incidents near the Keele campus of York University in November 2006.
The Toronto police hope to have the same success as Hamilton police in December of last year. A 24-year-old George Gallo turned himself in for murder after police posted a 72-second video clip of a surveillance camera of the nightclub on YouTube. The clip reached over 34,000 views, which may have pressured the man to come forward, police say.
The video has since been taken off the YouTube archive.
1 comment:
Anonymous
said...
I think the internet is a great tool now for the police. I am currently a student at Georgian College in the Police Studies Degree program find it that using the internet whether by forms of blogs to videos on youtube is a great benefit to society. As technology progresses we will see faster reaction times by police and public. A good example of that is the Amber alert. The only downside is that there will always be a victim first before the technology is adapted. Time will only tell how far the technology will go and who knows maybe one day will have the minority report shit going on so that while your walking in a mall, street, or even in your car you will be singled out.
1 comment:
I think the internet is a great tool now for the police. I am currently a student at Georgian College in the Police Studies Degree program find it that using the internet whether by forms of blogs to videos on youtube is a great benefit to society. As technology progresses we will see faster reaction times by police and public. A good example of that is the Amber alert. The only downside is that there will always be a victim first before the technology is adapted. Time will only tell how far the technology will go and who knows maybe one day will have the minority report shit going on so that while your walking in a mall, street, or even in your car you will be singled out.
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