But a WUSA9 investigation revealed just how many of those crime cameras break down. And it can take days, weeks or even months for the city to repair them. That could rob detectives of vital clues they need to solve violent crimes.
On June 15, 2023, a pregnant 22-year-old woman, Samya Gill, was shot and killed in the 300 block of 37th Street, Southeast. And just 528 feet away was a Metropolitan Police Department crime camera.
But MPD records obtained by WUSA9 through an open records request reveal one day earlier, on June 14, 2023, that camera malfunctioned. And it was not brought back online until a day after Samya’s death.
Roughly three and a half months later, Nathaniel Limes and James Cooper, Jr. were shot and killed in the 2500 block of 14th Street, Northeast. Less than three hours before those homicides, a repair ticket was opened by MPD for a crime camera on that same corner. According to MPD records, service was not restored to that camera for another seven days.
Overall, MPD records revealed the District’s closed circuit crime cameras malfunctioned 508 times over the 17 month period studied, January 2023 through May 2024.
And documents show some of those cameras were out of service for a while.
According to department records, the malfunctioning crime camera near the scene of Samya Gill’s death malfunctioned nine times over the time period WUSA9 studied, at one point malfunctioning for eight consecutive days.
Some don’t operate properly for even longer than that. A crime camera at the corner of 16th and Lewis streets in Northeast malfunctioned for more than four months.
Catholic University student Angus Chase lives across the street from a crime camera in Brookland that wasn’t working right for almost three months.
“There’s certainly, you know, a lot of people hanging out at late hours of the night in the summer here, stuff like that,” he said, referencing the need for a working crime camera at that corner.
Records show some of MPD’s most problematic crime cameras are mounted on portable trailers parked around the District. MPD records revealing a half dozen trailer crime cameras were listed as malfunctioning from a month and more than three months.
MPD declined to be interviewed for this report, and the department took two months to respond to WUSA9’s questions in a statement.
When they did, MPD told us: A repair ticket does not always indicate a camera outage.
Repairs can be requested for things like loss of internet connection, which prevents investigators from pulling the footage back at the Command center, but not from recovering the video from the camera unit itself.
“MPD’s CCTV team routinely performs manual checks of MPD crime cameras,” a spokesperson wrote in a statement. “Additionally, MPD uses integrated software’s that remotely monitors crime cameras functioning capabilities. A detected malfunction would initiate the process for a repair ticket.”
“Normally, a repair ticket is addressed in two-to-three days. MPD’s mobile trailers equipped with crime cameras may experience a longer repair time frame largely due to part shortages or significant damage caused to trailers by unforeseen events. Other causes for increased repair timeframes include long-term power outages due to nearby construction or a DDOT operation.”
But in looking at its own data, MPD told us between October 2022 and October 2023, they admitted finding 275 different repair tickets for malfunctions where the camera was unable to record.
The reasons ranged from power and onboard computer issues to vandalism.
Over that same time period, MPD found roughly the same number of repair tickets (296) for malfunctions where a camera could have still been recording.
MPD declined to answer if they recovered any video from the crime cameras with repair ticket requests at the homicide scenes of Nathaniel Limes and James Cooper, Jr. and the death of Samya Gill. They said they did recover video from at least one MPD camera related to each investigation without specifying how close those cameras were to the crime scenes.
All three homicides remain unsolved. And miraculously, Samya Gill’s baby girl survived. She was delivered by emergency c-section after her mother was shot.
In addressing WUSA9's questions, MPD hailed the start of CameraConnectDC, MPD’s new community camera sharing program in which residents, business owners and institutions opt in to the program to supplement MPD’s crime cameras.
“It is clear that video footage helps MPD investigators effectively solve cases, so increasing our awareness and ability to obtain footage from more locations increases our ability to combat and solve crime,” a spokesperson wrote.
The spokesperson said with the approval for new crime cameras in the city, MPD has made efforts to increase the number of full-time staff in the CCTV team and increase the inventory of spare parts and expand our maintenance contracts.