ONE POLICE PLAZA — The city will roll out a program that lets the NYPD pinpoint the origin of gunshots, even if there wasn't a 911 call, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Monday.
The ShotSpotter program — which uses audio sensors to pinpoint gunshots and sends notifications to police — will roll out to areas in The Bronx starting Monday and in Brooklyn next week, de Blasio said.
"This new gunshot detection system is going to do a world of good in terms of going after the bad guys in this town, going after people who fire their weapons and who we need to identify immediately," de Blasio said. "The shots fired system is going to allow us to decrease response time getting to the site of a shooting."
The NYPD plans to install 300 audio sensors in 10 Brooklyn precincts and seven in The Bronx with the highest numbers of shootings as part of the one-year pilot program.
When the sensors pick up a sound, the system triangulates the location. Technicians at a separate site will determine if it is a gunshot, a car backfire or other loud noise and then feed into an NYPD system that monitors security cameras throughout the city, Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said.
Officers at the NYPD's Joint Operations Center can see available video in the area and who's nearby to dispatch them, sometimes minutes before the first 911 call, Bratton said.
ShotSpotter has been put in place in several cities around the country, including Camden, N.J., and Pittsburg, Pa,, and has proven to decrease shootings there, Bratton said.
