Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Cashing In On Crime? What Phone Companies Charge To Help Police

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2003 00:33:49 -0500

FROM 2/7/03

Cashing In On Crime? What Phone Companies Charge To Help Police

The State Police are helping the Montclairs find Sean. They thought they had a break when
Sean and another runaway made a collect call to a friend in Central Square from Santa
Cruz, California. A phone trace may help them locate Sean and bring him back home, but as
Jeannette found, the biggest obstacle to the search for Sean was Verizon.

The company demanded not only a subpoena, but also $500 to perform what police call a
"phone dump," in which they access billing records to trace the call. Montclair was
shocked.

"Five hundred dollars they wanted...I'm appalled. I don't understand why they need 500
dollars. My son is missing," she says.
Believe it or not, State Police could not justify spending the money to pay Verizon to
trace the call. And believe it or not, it happens everyday.

Police and prosecutors say the payments phone companies charge for so-called phone dumps
are so high they have to pick and choose which cases warrant the costs to taxpayers. It's
so bad that last year, the Onondaga County District Attorney's Office overspent its
$25,000 budget to pay phone companies for such traces and had to transfer money from other
accounts to make up the difference.

A phone dump paid off in the case against Remus Mathis, accused of attempted murder in the
shootings of Crystal Hathaway and her mother. Detectives traced calls he was making from
Georgia and knew he had returned to Syracuse, where he was arrested last year.

But authorities had to get a subpoena and pay Cricket $2,400 to get the information. Plus
D.A. investigator Dean Decker says the phone companies take their time.

"I can't control what they do within their companies," Decker. Assistant Prosecutor Ed
McQuat is fed up with having to pay ever increasing costs to phone companies to locate
killers, drug dealers and missing children.

"Most police agencies in this area will come to us to try to get a subpoena and if we find
out it's going to cost a certain amount of money, we have to go back and say how much are
we gonna split this because the cost becomes prohibitive," says McQuat.
The I-Team contacted various phone companies and police sources to find out how much some
of these companies charge. Cricket charges $650 according to the D.A.'s office. Sprint
Spectrum charges $250 but adds fees that increases the costs. Cingular's spokesperson says
the company refuses to disclose such information. U.S.A. Datanet claims such information
is confidential. Verizon's office in New York City charges a thousand dollars, but outside
New York it's $500.
"We're trying to recoup just a fraction of this cost," says Verizon's Clifford Lee.

Lee says the process involves shutting down mainframe computers in the middle of a billing
cycle, having their people retreive data, transcribe the data into a form police will
understand and restart their computers. He claims it costs Verizon $1,500, but they only
charge $500.

But Nextel only charges $50 bucks when police request a phone dump. When asked to respond
to law enforcrers who say the charges are unreasonable, Lee says: "We've heard that
argument before but I think it comes from people who don't understand our systems."

Assistant D.A. McQuat says, "It's gonna come to the point where law enforcement is going
to have to bring somebody accountable into court and say, by order of show cause or
however it's done, show us what this fee justifies."
As Police struggle with these costs and phone companies struggle with their public image,
plenty of people are caught in the middle. All Montclair wants is to see her son again.

"Don't they want to help? Do they just want to hinder people like me finding their kids?"
she asks
Montclair met with the State Police and the Oswego County D.A. The county has decided to
pay Verizon the $500 dollars afterall. State Attorney General Elliot Spitzer is keenly
aware of the situation and is working quietly behind the scenes to convince the phone
companies to charge less.

If Spitzer fails, law enforcement may turn to the legislature to regulate the cost of
tracing phone calls.

http://www.wstm.com/Global/story.asp?S=1118209&nav=2aKDDuew

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From: Rick Parrish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2003 01:10:23 -0600

Marcel wrote:

>The company demanded not only a subpoena, but also $500 to perform what police call a "phone dump," in which they access billing records to trace the call. Montclair was shocked. "Five hundred dollars they wanted...I'm appalled. I don't understand why they need 500 dollars. My son is missing," she says.
>
Here's a good example of an emotional arguement being used to justify a 
big brother reach into business and personal records.

The article does not mention the run away's age. This is going to sound 
cold-hearted but as a parent I can appreciate both sides to any story.

To the mother: How old is Sean? 19? 29? And why did Sean leave home? 
Might the other runaway be his girlfriend? If he's a minor, what plans 
have you made so that this won't happen again? Finally, why don't you 
come up with the five hundred bucks to get the phone records you're seeking.

Ouch!

-rick