Transcript for the Piece Audio version of Police Stakeout Facebook

Fifteen Pennsylvania police officers from across the state are gathered in a hotel meeting room. They sit at long tables arranged in a U-shape. Each has a laptop and permission to stake out social networking sites while on the job. For some, it’s their first time.

I was familiar with the MySpace sites, the Facebook sites, but not hands-on, so to speak. (:08)

Tom Winters is a Corporal with the Lock Haven police department. He’s been in law enforcement for 26 years. In the past he says he’s left the internet sleuthing to others.

I generally went to the younger officers because they already had sites set up for themselves. Whereas I’m not much of a social networker as they’re telling me they should be. (:13)

MacDonald - When I talk to cops in say Chicago who have been detectives longer than I’ve been alive, and they look at me and say why should we get involved in this? I say, think of it as a 10 block area in your town where only kids go. And cops don’t go because they don’t have time for it and parents don’t go because they’re too intimidated. What would be going on in that area? Well, not a lot of good things. (:21)

Corey MacDonald is leading today’s training session. He’s a Captain at a police department in New Hampshire, but he came up with the idea to use social networking in this way when he held a different position.

It started back in 2006. I was a school resource officer. And I wound up finding that to be effective in the school I was going to have to figure out MySpace and Facebook and all this stuff. (:11)

MacDonald has led this training at police departments across the country, but this is the first time he’s done a “train the trainers” session. Winters and the other officers will spread out across Pennsylvania to teach police departments the intricacies of Facebook and Craig’s List. MacDonald says many departments already use these sites to collect evidence after a crime takes place, but this training also focuses on prevention.

You get the email blast or the Facebook message that says, “Hey, big party at my house this weekend. Parents are away.” What’s better than a couple cops showing up before the party saying, “Hey, we heard you’re having a party. Didn’t know if we were invited. We’re going to be around.” (:12)

MacDonald says police also talk to the parents to stop the party from happening.

So maybe there is no car accident or there is no alcohol-related sexual assault. None of the other things that happen at these underage drinking parties. (:09)

One of the main goals of this training is to stop underage drinking. This two-day workshop is funded by a grant from the National Alcohol Beverage Control Association. But MacDonald has also seen good results cracking down on drug sales.

For me, when I did it, we had about 22 drug arrests in a four month period. Seven would have been felony drug dealers. (:08)

Educating kids and parents about the dangers of the internet is another part of the training. MacDonald says Chatroullette is one especially dangerous site. It randomly pairs up people with webcams to talk.

I interviewed a nine-year-old about it and he said, “usually it’s cool because we talk about baseball, but sometimes guys want to take their pants off.” (:09)

MacDonald is the task force commander for internet crimes against children in New Hampshire. Even for older kids and young adults, MacDonald says the internet is full of dangers.

When I talk to young adults I say, “if you picture taking all your personal information, everything you’ve ever posted online, every picture you’ve ever put, and put it on a little billboard and carry it around with you.” And they look and say what’s the big deal? I put it on there and I say, “No you have to take it everywhere. You have to take it to church and grandma’s house and your college interview and your job interview.” And they go, “oh, maybe I want to eliminate this piece and this piece.” (:24)

And if they’re from Lock Haven and doing something illegal they might get a friend request from Corporal Winters.

We may want to set up a false site, and I’m not going to explain how to do that. But we’d set up a false site that might lead someone to believe we’re a party-goer or maybe we’re part of some criminal activity. Next thing you know we’re getting all their information. (:21)

Police are also setting up real sites for teens and young adults who might hesitate to call, but who wouldn’t think twice about dropping police a tip on Facebook. I’m Emily Reddy, WPSU.