There’s a pay phone a couple hundred feet from the window where I work, and I see state troopers there all the time! And this isn’t unique to the pay phone near my place of employment; I’m always seeing cops at pay phones.
First of all, WTF are they talking about? Seems to me that any communication regarding the execution of their job would be done over the radio. Which brings me to my second question…
Why are they using a public pay phone and not their radios? Isn’t this the whole reason police have radios in the first place? How much money is my city pouring into the phone company’s accounts by having cops communicate at pay phones rather than on the airwaves, for which they’ve also (presumably) paid?
The dispatchers very frequently get calls from citizens requesting to speak to an officer…either for legal advice, or to report a problem, or to fill out a victim report and such. It is much easier for the officer to telephone the subject, rather than go from here to there to each individual’s house. So the cops are probably using the telephones for the same reason most people use them…to place calls. I would say that they may even pay with their own money to make the calls.
When listening to a police scanner was one of my geek-like hobbies, I would regularly hear requests by one party or the other to resume the conversation over a land-line. They’re most likely just having conversations which may contain personal or sensitive information.
And why would you consider your former scanner listening as geek-like? I live in a small town and listening to the local police transmissions is the hottest thing in town. I wouldn’t recommend it in a big city, but here we know almost everyone. Do I need a life or what?
I know for a fact scanners are not illegal in Kentucky. They are illegal to have in your vehicle, or in public…but they are quite legal if you use them on private property.
The scanners are legal. There are some transmissions which are illegal to eavesdrop upon, such as cellular phone calls. Scanners sold in the US have to have the cellular range blocked out IIRC. Until a few years ago, many of the legal scanners could be easily modified to restore the cellular range. I’ve heard that lawmakers have insisted on making it more difficult to modify the scanners these days. Listening to public servant radio transmissions, such as police or fire, is perfectly legal though.
Mammie, listening to scanners in and of itself isn’t geek-like, but with me, it was simply a further manifestation of gadgetitis. It was fun to listen in to what was going on around town. Maybe I’ll dig my old Radio Shack 4006 out of the closet this weekend and see what’s going on.
The radios are mainly for cop to cop connections. The radio can only handle so much traffic. If the conversation is taking a while, they switch to a phone.
The radio is not intended for cop to non-cop use; which can still be business.
Cops can be involved in cases. The people involved have the cops pager number, and page him when they want to talk to him.
The same for cops assigned to a neighborhood. People living there may want to talk to that cop informally to discuss problems in the neighborhood, point out a suspect, etc. They can page the cop or contact the cop through the non-emergency police phone number and leave a message which the dispacher will pass on.
But when you do anything to “try and help out” for things, fire, police, medical, whatever usually gets pretty god-damned pissed off, regardless of how much or little you interfere. For that reason, just knowing that people in general can listen in bugs them to some extent, prompting them to change to 800 mHz digital systems with keys that are not typically worth the effort to evesdrop. This also allows them to transmit a lot more information over “data” channel banks without worrying about privacy of those they come into contact with, lessening the time it takes to transmit info by stopping to carry out a conversation over land.
Some departments around here are on a wireless syestem. They just email the reports in. It is pretty cool because they can just take the laptop into the complaintants house and fill in the info as they get it. then by the time the interview is over, the report is done
A lot of cops use the Panasonic CF-27 or CF-25 (older model) both of which have an optional CDPD model which while slow for internet use is a great way to both send in reports and also run VIN numbers. If you see a cop with a dash mounted laptop bet that it is a Panasonic CF model. The 25 and 27 are both full magnesium cases and have taken 9MM rounds and remained functional (although needing an external monitor.). The price is a bit steep considering that you only get a PII 300 with 128 meg or RAM even though you get a bunch of other options like DVD drive (no MARGI card, just a drive) and the CDPD modem (9,600 baud. like I said it’s SLOW) and you pay over 8K American for the unit but the cops seems to like them.
In Portland OR most cops get cell phones but there was a recent problem with some cops making a LOT (to the tune of about 5 grand in once case in one month) of personal calls.
I personally don’t think cops should have to pay for cell phones. I think cell companies should donate the time at least. Hell, mostp people get to make personal calls at work as long as it does not interfere with duties I see no problem with cops doing the same.
This isn’t quite what the OP probably concerns, but a few years back in East St. Louis IL the city was so broke that the police had to use pay phones to communicate; all the police radios broke and there was no money to pay for repairing them. At one point the mayor asked officers to use their own cars for patrol duty, to which they refused.
Those of you who didn’t live nearby missed it: during the (Mayor) Carl Officer years, East St. Louis was a continuous joke, if you didn’t have to live there. Carl didn’t even live there, but that’s one of the stories. Someday I’ll write a book. - MC
rastahomie, why not get a tiny recorder & attach it nearby (under the phone?) so you can listen in. I would love to know what they are talking about too.
All you need to do if you really want to try to listen to the cellular band is order a Canadian scanner (I remember finding a website recently that sold completely unblocked ones.).
'Course, heres the thing: not many people use analog cellular anymore (well, its at least becoming less popular). Analog is often more expensive than its digital counterpart, and you can’t eavesdrop on the digital ones. I even question how much you can listen in on the analog phones; I wouldn’t be surprised if they employ some form of scrambling between the phone and the tower.
If someone in the neighborhood is on a cordless, and you have a scanner, you can hear it.
My friends and I did it all the time, over at her house. She heard her neighbor making prank calls and her sister’s friend plotting to trash her sister’s bike while they were fighting.
