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The behaviour of cars

Dr Craig Donald

Vehicles play a prominent role in creating opportunities, assisting and providing an escape method when an incident is committed. Although cars themselves have no intrinsic behaviour, the people who use them create variations in movement and use that can directly indicate that an incident is in the process of occurring or will occur. A car with random movement patterns, driving slowly, tinted windows, number plate issues and occupied by three or more personnel create an awareness among any surveillance person that something suspicious is occurring. By being sensitive to these signs, operators have a good chance of spotting and responding to incident conditions.

Some time ago I was having some discussions with an associate in the UK who was discussing how intelligence could be used to assist in crime detection. While we use, or should use intelligence extensively in South Africa to assist us in target identification and crime pattern analysis and interrogation, he gave an example with the police that was slightly different in perspective. He discussed how police had used a number plate recognition system to identify vehicles which were not up to date on their registration, or where the number plates were inconsistent with the vehicles involved.

Police a few kilometres up the road would then pull the vehicles over for a stop and search, speak to the drivers and check the vehicles. It was found in a sizable percentage, illegal or stolen goods were found in the vehicles or that the drivers themselves were wanted in connection with some crime incident. The important point here is that psychological behaviour associated with law breaking while driving without a valid registration was associated with law breaking in other areas.

The importance of procedures

The violation of procedures or law in one area has a great deal of relevance. If we have a look at mining sites for example, breaking of safety procedures by not wearing safety equipment is often associated with theft of precious minerals – for example, not wearing safety gloves allows a criminal to more easily access and remove gold or diamonds. Similarly, casinos institute procedures at gaming tables to control the actions and reduce the chance of personnel or guests doing something that could actively lead to cheats, scams or theft. It is not just these industries, however. Procedures are an essential way of controlling and reducing the potential for theft in many other industries as well. In addition to this, they cost very little although they may introduce some slowdown or process due to checking. Of major concern at times is that management do not understand or appreciate the importance of procedures and the cost of violations.

It is quite understandable, therefore, that behaviours of cars in terms of road traffic transgressions could identify a consistent trend of other illegal activities. Those who bear no regard for road rules are likely to have little concern for other legal requirements. It seems that traffic departments are missing out on an important part of this principle. While roadblocks do contribute to identifying people with unpaid speeding fines and at times more serious offences, they are more or less random in nature.

Equally, although I was taught that when setting up a roadblock, one should always have representatives hidden well before the roadblock to detect vehicles turning around when they see the road block, I have seen a number of such vehicles turn around without any consequence before arriving at the stopping point in South Africa. These kinds of actions identify immediate suspects and just stopping them alone may have made the process worthwhile, yet such behaviour is not anticipated and acted on in the majority of cases I have seen.

Effective policing

However, a more important concept is that if police resources were used to identify transgressions or moving violations on the road, they would likely find far more criminals and have far more success in catching wanted people than random stopping at roadblocks. I cannot feel that somehow they are missing an important area in both crime prevention (apprehension of offenders of moving violations sends a message to other road users) as well as suspect detection. The use of number plate recognition or toll plaza records show a whole potential side to identifying vehicles associated with being in an area where crimes have been committed around certain times.

Whether police act on car behaviour or not, there is a range of indicators that show surveillance operators that something is wrong. Placement of cars near an entrance of a bank or a casino, particularly if this in on the kerb or in a no parking area show potential for an armed robbery. Cars stopped for prolonged times with no people getting in and out shows possible intent, or people approach such a vehicle for a short time and moving away shows potential deals associated with drug dealing.

Car thieves will often park their vehicle next to the one being stolen, and where this occurs with lots of available parking in other areas it should raise immediate questions. Things like thermal signatures on cars indicating recent movement can also assist in detection and investigations. People’s behaviour therefore makes for an interesting perspective on the criminally inclined behaviour of cars.

Dr Craig Donald is a human factors specialist in security and CCTV. He is a director of Leaderware which provides instruments for the selection of CCTV operators, X-ray screeners and other security personnel in major operations around the world. He also runs CCTV Surveillance Skills and Body Language, and Advanced Surveillance Body Language courses for CCTV operators, supervisors and managers internationally, and consults on CCTV management. He can be contacted on +27 (0)11 787 7811 or [email protected]

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