NYPD Installs Gunfire Detection System in East New York, Brooklyn

Pictured, right to left: NYPD Deputy Commissioner Jessica Tisch, NYC Police Commissioner Bill Bratton and NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio. Photo by John V. Santore

EAST NEW YORK, BROOKLYN — The NYPD has expanded its Shot Spotter gunshot detection system to cover all of East New York, department officials announced Monday.

Shot Spotter uses a network of audio sensors to record the sound of gunfire, using the data to quickly calculate the likely location of a shooter.

Jessica Tisch, the NYPD’s deputy commissioner for information technology, said the city recently finished installing 300 new sensors in northern Manhattan, the Bronx and northern Brooklyn, bringing the system’s total coverage area to 24 square miles.

Shot Spotter launched in New York in March 2015. Since that date, Tisch said, the system has helped the department seize 43 firearms, including 12 so far this year.

The department says the technology dramatically enhances its awareness of gun crime. For example, Tisch estimated that between 75 and 80 percent of all shootings in New York City over the past year weren’t called into 911.

After the program's recent expansion, Shot Spotter is now monitoring all of the NYPD’s 75th Precinct, Tisch said — which covers East New York, Cypress Hills, City Line, New Lots, Spring Creek and Starrett City.

Tisch said that since going live on April 1, the newly expanded system has alerted police to three Brooklyn shootings.

Borough-wide, shootings are up slightly this year compared to 2015. According to official NYPD numbers, through March 20, 41 people were shot in North Brooklyn, compared to 40 during the same period last year. In South Brooklyn, 37 people were shot through March 20, compared to 35 last year.

Also starting this month, NYPD officers will automatically receive Shot Spotter alerts from their home precinct on their department-issued smartphones, Tisch said — instead of the alerts having to go through a dispatcher first. (Dispatchers will still alert officers to shootings, she added.)

That change should decrease response times and increase gun-related arrests, she said.

And, Tisch said — just as police leaders in Park Slope announced last week — officers' phones can be programmed to receive any type of 911 alert, not just those from Shot Spotter.