Crime-busting goes private

Izak Pretorius is on the look out for crime in a shopping complex in downtown Auckland.

A couple of prolific burglars were caught last week in downtown Auckland. Not by the police, though. Security guards trained to be alert to body language and suspicious activity detected them.

"It was a couple, a guy and a girl, who had been responsible for a number of burglaries around the city that night," says Mike Rutherford, general manager of First Security, the company which patrols the central business district on busy Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights.

It also looks after security for many high-rise buildings in the central city and for commercial organisations around Auckland.

That's not all. First Security guards some crime scenes for the police, patrols railway stations and puts guards on trains.

It has a contract with the American Embassy, ranging from scanning people going in to checking cars for bombs. And it takes care of security for cruise ships.

Guards for this and other security companies keep an eye on shopping malls. And that concierge you see wearing a suit may actually be a security guard.

The guards regularly foil potential bank robbers and burglars. During Monday night's incident, a kind of "sixth sense" kicked in for First Security staff, who noticed the young couple acting strangely. The police were called, and tens of thousands of dollars of camera equipment recovered. The two were led away in handcuffs.

It is a sign of the times. As debate continued this week about how overworked police were struggling, Weekend Review found that private policing is already with us and is more widespread than you probably realise.

Auckland City is the classic example. A couple of years ago, Heart of the City, which represents central Auckland businesses, was concerned about a general perception that the city was not safe.

Police presence was low and chief executive Alex Swney wanted to set up a private police force.

It didn't come off exactly as Swney suggested, but Heart of the City did hire First Security to provide foot patrols on key nights, augmenting the stretched police.

Six guards constantly walk the city, backed by patrols in cars. This, combined with a 24-hour liquor ban on the streets, has seen crime reduced.

First Security is not trying to be the police, although their city offices have similarities to police stations.

There is a control room with whiteboards, maps with key spots marked, and a separate room with surveillance computers. A row of walkie-talkies awaits the next shift.

Guards are sometimes referred to as officers and wear uniforms similar to those of the police, some with three pips on the shoulder for a co-ordinator, their equivalent of a sergeant.

Rutherford, a 30-year veteran of the security industry, says the guards cannot make arrests as police do, but that is not really their purpose.

They are there to be seen, to prevent crime, to help if needed and to call in the police if trouble escalates.

"There are no more bobbies on the beat. We're the bobbies on the beat at the moment and that's the whole thing. It's a visible presence.

"Every night we would be in a situation where we were face to face with a bad guy."

Many of the 300 staff came from the military and all are trained in reading body language and giving the right signals. And they know how to look after themselves.

Although they are licensed under the Private Investigators and Security Guards Act, they have no more powers than a private citizen.

But Rutherford points out that private citizens can arrest people in certain circumstances.

In the eastern suburbs, the posher parts of town, another company patrols the streets day and night.

Matrix Security Group has been around for 10 years and - unusually for a security company that looks after people's homes - it not only responds to alarms but goes on patrol.

Matrix head Scott Carter, who is also chairman of the Security Association, says clients often regard the company as the first line of defence.

"It's a situation where customers, if they see something odd happening in their street or hear a noise in the night, will call us and have one of our patrol cars come and check it out for them rather than bother the police."

That is not to say the police are forgotten, he says. But if people are paying a private security firm to look after them then the firm is there to serve.

He says it is common for the police helicopter to direct Matrix units on the ground to help apprehend offenders, or for Matrix patrol cars to work with a police dog unit to track offenders.

Like many in the private security industry, Carter was in the police force.

He considers that no matter how many new police are promised, New Zealand will never match the comparative numbers in overseas countries.

New Zealand has the equivalent of 19 police for each 10,000 people. Australia has 23, England 24, the United States 29 (New York City has 48) and Italy 57.

"New Zealand has about 7200 sworn police officers, excluding dedicated highway patrols," Carter says. "There is an equivalent number of licensed security officers.

"Note that at any time, a quarter of the New Zealand police force is on leave."

"To match the British police force we would need another 2800 police. To match New York we would have to grow our police force two and a half times."

Carter considers that the solution is increasing police numbers, plus other ways of supporting them - such as contracting out some functions, which would enable the police to focus on what they are best equipped to do. This already happens in some areas.

In forensics, for example, ESR scientists - who are not part of the police force - help to solve crimes.

"They are providing the ingredients of a crime, just as an accountant could prove the ingredients of a crime of fraud."

The days are long gone when the police were all things to all people.

Carter was still in the police when, more than a decade ago, it was decided not to always respond when alarms went off because most were false. It was a big time-waster for police.

That decision was a huge boost to a fledgling security industry.

These days, security firms run private prisons, escort prisoners and put anklets on home detention prisoners and monitor them.

Private investigators have also seen exponential growth over the past 10 to 15 years.

A decade or so ago there were about 20. Now there are more than 300.

One of the biggest companies is Paragon Risk, which carries out many investigations which once would have been handled by police.

The company's strategic manager, Bruce Couper, was formerly with the CIB in Auckland, and investigations manager Mike Crawford, was a detective inspector.

The company investigates theft, fraud, drugs and dishonesty in business, including government departments.

Paragon Risk, under its original name of the Investigation Bureau, investigated claims by former Lake Alice Hospital patients. It also looked into anomalies at the Waipareira Trust, then handed the information to the Serious Fraud Office.

As Couper sees it, such agencies will be used more and more.

Paragon and two similar companies even put a proposal to the police about approving a move that reputable security firms could investigate crimes for which the police lacked the time, in exchange for a guarantee that police would look at any evidence.

"The only reason that hasn't flown is because they couldn't guarantee that, even if we had done all the work, they could actually then respond within a realistic timeframe."

Couper can see a time when the police will call in agencies like his, leaving the force to concentrate more on crimes of violence, sexual assault and drug offending. Police Association president Greg O'Connor, however, hopes the private sector does not take over too much.

He has no concerns about the industry itself, but is concerned about who will pay and that experienced police may leave to join security firms.

At present, if you are hit by serious crime - such as murder or robbery - the state pays.

But when it comes to keeping order at a sports match, for example, you will pay - by way of your ticket - for the private security guards doing a job once done by police.

O'Connor also says that where fraud is suspected, most financial institutions now have their own investigators or hire a private company.

The donkeywork is done by the private firm, which charges the client. The file is then given to the police.

When it comes to minor crimes, even when there is a suspect they are unlikely to be investigated, O'Connor says, even though research shows minor crime leads to major crime. "There were never any conscious decisions, this has just happened."

Another worry is that the bigger the private security industry gets, the more lucrative it becomes. Already good detectives are being enticed to work at agencies, government departments and corporations.

"This is not good for New Zealand at all,"Connor says. "It should be the other way around, we [the police] are the ones who should be plucking the eyes out of the best investigators out there."