Assessing The Impact Of Information Technology On The Gathering Of Crime Intelligence By DCI Investigators

Abstract

The 21st century is fraught with innumerable challenges to policing emanating from emergent and mutating forms of criminal acts ranging from terrorism to organized crime and entrepreneurial crime. While traditionally, the predominant strategy employed by law enforcement agencies especially in regard to crime prevention and crime response has been centered on motorized preventive patrol and response to calls for service, recent technological developments as well as the evolution of crime and contemporary concerns over new and mutating forms of crime have created new technological problems and demands for police, as has the growth of cyber-crime. Against this background therefore, this study sought to assess the impact of information technology on policing using the case of intelligence gathering on crime in the Directorate of Criminal Investigations in Kenya’s National Police Service by examining the extent to which information technology has impacted on crime intelligence gathering, mapping and analysis, crime prevention, improved quantity and quality of evidence and security of police officers. The study used stratified sampling technique. The choice of stratified sampling was informed by the fact that there was a need to identify officers involved in crime intelligence gathering and/or those who have information on the study as well as their ranking within the DCI. The study employed the broken window theory to examine the impact of information technology on policing owing to its emphasis on the fact that crime and all its negative consequences can be prevented and if one of the factors leading to crime, that of the policing end, can be addressed by the adoption of information technology. The study adopted a case study approach and data was collected using both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods. The data was collected, coded and analyzed using the statistical packages for the social sciences (SPSS) programme. The key findings were that information technology has enabled DCI to use information systems to sieve out useful and non-useful intelligence, that it has enabled law enforcement agents to source crime intelligence more effectively; made their crime intelligence collection work easier and helped them cope with the amount of intelligence police need to do their work effectively. Lastly information technology has increased crime intelligence mapping and analysis within the Directorate of Criminal Investigations