MODESTO, Calif. — Videos and photos coming from Ring video doorbells across the Modesto may be released more frequently from the Modesto Police Department.
They've formed a new partnership with a free app called 'Neighbors' by Ring to help share videos faster.
All over the northern California area, they've caught porch pirates, mountain lions, assaults, and even an attempted arson. All the crimes were captured through video doorbell cameras.
"This is just one more tool to help solve crimes," Sharon Bear, a spokesperson for the Modesto Police Department said.
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Now, Modesto police have instant access to any video from Ring that is publicly shared on the free app called 'Neighbors.'
"The app allows them to upload text, video, photo and share it with everyone else on the app, and that's how we can spread the videos around to get more visibility and try to identify people in the videos," Bear said.
Phil Swearingen, who has lived in the La Loma neighborhood for more than four decades, got his Ring camera two years ago after having a package stolen right off his doorstep. He's happy to hear that he'll now have a faster and easier way to share his video with the community.
"I think it's a great idea, we need all the eyes and ears that we can get just to keep the place safe," he said.
Police said this is something that's already been working here in the La Loma neighborhood, an area where a porch pirate was caught on video stealing a package and flipping off the camera back in November.
"The victim shared images from that video with us. We put it out on social media. He was identified, and, within a couple days, our officers located him and arrested him," Bear said.
The Ring partnership will work the same way, but it is expected to speed up the process by taking out some of the legwork.
"Instead of waiting for someone to download the video, bring it to us, or try to figure out a way to put it in a zip file and send it to us, we can just go right into the app and access it immediately," she said.
Anyone can access these videos and crime alerts for free even if you don't have a Ring camera, however, you do have to download the 'Neighbors' app to opt-in to this program.
For link to the app, text modestoCA to 555888 for a download link for the app.