FLAGLER COUNTY, Fla. – Less than 24 hours after the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office’s Intelligence Unit shared pictures of two suspected car thieves wanted for burglaries across Florida, patrol deputies had them in custody.
Deputies said they found 29 stolen identification cards and social security cards in the suspects’ car.
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The Patrol Unit and the Fugitive Unit, together, hunted down Jerrad Moore almost immediately after he was accused of pointing a shotgun at a woman and threatening to kill her.
Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly said the successes are because the units - patrol, fugitive, probation, courts, intelligence, and juvenile justice - all gather weekly at the Flagler County Emergency Operations Center and share suspects, trends, tips and leads.
“Crooks go wherever they want to, they don’t have rules and regulations and boundaries that we have,” Staly said.
Staly calls the meeting “Crimemaps,” which stands for crime reduction, intelligence monitoring employee management, agency performance summary.
Staly said leaders from the two police departments patrolling Bunnell and Palm Coast in Flagler County also attend the weekly Wednesday meetings, along with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
They show faces of domestic violence suspects who are out on bond wearing ankle monitors and pinpoint all burglaries and discuss possible suspects.
After witnesses had spotted U-Haul trucks leaving the scene of burglaries, deputies shared that information at Crimemaps and the patrol unit stopped a U-Haul in the area and made two arrests of wanted fugitives, Staly said.
And Crimemaps, Staly said, also gives patrol deputies a playbook, detailing exactly where to go and when.
“So that now they know where to focus their time when they’re not handling calls service,” Staly said.
Staly credits in part the Crimemaps meetings with the continued reduction in crime in Flagler County for a third straight year. He said crime dropped by 22% in 2018, 17% in 2019 and 18.4% in 2020 for a total of 48% since Staly took over.
In 2019 the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office cleared 33% of all cases and 37.68% in 2020.