Crime & Safety

MPD to Join Info-Sharing Network

The Marblehead Police Department is preparing to join a program aimed at sharing crime information with other police departments across the state.

The Marblehead Police Department will soon be part of an information-sharing program aimed at making the details gathered by police departments across the Commonwealth available to local officers in an instant.

At their meeting at Abbot Hall last week, the Board of Selectmen unanimously approved a request from Police Chief Robert Picariello to pursue Community Innovation Challenge Grant funding and approved getting Marblehead signed up to participate in a new state-of-the-art information sharing network.

The board's decision means Marblehead will soon join the 20 other Massachusetts municipalities who have agreed to have their records automatically pooled together at the end of the day and safely stored in a readily-available trove of information.

Find out what's happening in Marbleheadwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"What we find through our police work is that the people who are committing crimes in Marblehead are doing them elsewhere," Picariello said. "So if I can get the information about people in Lynn and Salem and Swampscott and all over the place, it will help us close some cases."

The first year of the program will be paid for with grant funding and there will be no cost to the town. If town officials decide to continue participating the program beyond the first 12 months, Picariello said each additional year is expected to cost an annual fee.

Find out what's happening in Marbleheadwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

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