Drug deals happen everywhere, even in public, right under our cameras.
According to the Drug Policy Alliance, there were over $1.6 million arrests in the U.S. for drug law violations in 2017. The prior year there were more than 2 million people imprisoned for drug-related incidents. That’s the highest incarceration rate in the world.
The illegal distribution of drugs can have devastating results to your shopping center. When crime and fear plague your property, you can lose employees, customers and tenants. So, what can you do?
Drug Dealer Arrested
In the video above, some individuals were dealing drugs in front of a store at a Dallas, Texas shopping center. Unfortunately for them, they were standing right under a Stealth Monitoring security camera that was being watched by one of our trained security operators. Our operating monitor immediately alerted the Dallas police who arrived and made an arrest.
This particular property hasn’t been immune to criminal activity. It is located in one of the city’s hottest crime spots and lowest-income neighborhoods. Crimes were a daily occurrence here. Vandalism, loitering, theft and damage cost the property owner more than $800 a month. To combat their issues, they hired security guards to watch the property 24/7 at a cost of $14,000 a month.
Deterring Crime at Shopping Centers with Live Video Monitoring
That’s a lot of money to spend on a security solution that has many failure points. Guards, while giving you a human presence on-site, have limitations. They can only be in one place at a time, so they can miss criminal activity. Not to mention, they are expensive.
Enter live video monitoring. Trained security operators watch surveillance cameras in real time to catch activity in progress. If they see something suspicious, they can activate an on-site speaker warning to deter the suspects or, as you saw in the video, call police. Because we are watching live activity, this increases the chances of an arrest on property.
In the case of the Dallas shopping center, live video monitoring decreased property damage by 80% and increased net operating income by $120,000 through guard expense and damage savings.
Drug dealers, loiterers, trespassers and other unwanted activity can be detrimental to a shopping center. Live video monitoring can help keep crime off your property.
To learn more about how Stealth deterred crime and increased the property value and this Dallas retail center, read our case study. For information about our proactive security solution for shopping centers, contact us.
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