"For us, it's aggravating when you're trying to do a job and the tools are there, but they're not working."
Police spokesman Lt. Ray Evers empathizes.
"We know from working with social media that publicizing video images can really help solve crimes," he said. "So it can be frustrating when the cameras aren't working properly."
Case in point: Last month, Rosemary Fernandez-Rivera, eyewitness to a homicide, was killed at Westmoreland and Mutter streets, in North Philadelphia. The shooter fled east on Westmoreland - right toward the surveillance camera at A and Westmoreland.
Unfortunately, that camera has been broken for more than two years.
Tenacious detective work, thankfully, led to four arrests last week in connection with the murder. Still, that's no reason, says the insider, to dismiss the problems of the surveillance system.
Sounds shocking, right? But here's where one insider's shocker is another's ho-hummer.
"That system has been a white elephant from day one," snorts a veteran detective. "The cameras are so high up, they can't focus on faces. At night, all you see are dark images that don't help in identification."
Besides, he said, those who monitor the cameras aren't catching crimes in progress; there are too many screens to watch at once. So even the ability to tilt the unit or zoom in on an image is dependent on someone seeing the crime occur in the first place.
But what about the camera's ability to record an image that can later be accessed by investigators? Isn't that helpful?
"If a crime [occurs] behind the camera, the recording doesn't matter," the detective said. "The cameras focus only in one direction."
