The video unit mounted on the windshield below the rear view mirror records forward and back and stores the video for this patrol vehicle of Rancho Santa Fe Protective Services, Encinitas, Calif.

Mobile video is used to document prisoner transfers, record guard patrol incidents and improve the guards’ driving techniques by Rancho Santa Fe Protective Services, Encinitas, Calif.

“We transport prisoners for the Oceanside police,” explains Denise Mueller, CEO, who also is CEO of Rancho Santa Fe Security Systems. “We have a contract where we’ll pick them up from a holding cell and transport them.

“We have had situations where we have the cameras in the custody transport vehicles, and we’ll have a female or male in the back pounding their head against the cage saying, ‘I’m going to say you were beating me, and I’m going to sue you,’” she relates.

With the video system installed on the windshield seeing both forward and back, in this type of situation the guard can start the system recording manually. It automatically includes the prior 10 seconds. When the prisoners are informed of the recording, they usually quiet down, she reports.

No DVR is needed with the system. It stores all the video inside the unit on flash memory and can record up to 16 incidents in order of priority.

Downloading with Mueller’s early version of the system is from a lengthy cable extended to the vehicle. More recent versions use Wi-Fi to automatically download video clips when the vehicle is within range of its base station or yard, points out David Callison, area sales manager for DriveCam Inc., San Diego, which manufactures the system being used by Mueller.

 If a person tries to disable the system, a special key is needed to disconnect it from power, and it records the date and time when it was disconnected.

Any force exceeding 0.6 Gs triggers the recording mechanism. The video record has been used to establish fault in accident investigations involving patrol vehicles.

“People look at our vehicles marked up and see a lottery ticket, and purposely lie or change their story just a bit to make it where it’s our fault,” Mueller says of accidents with patrol vehicles. “The proof is here on the video.”

In one incident, the lack of recorded G forces demonstrated that a broken drive-shaft on the patrol vehicle had caused an accident.

Another new DriveCam system can download clips through cellular communications. This one can be used on transit systems in emergencies. The company’s systems are used nationally on transit and school buses, taxicabs, fire and waste trucks, long-haul trucking, other types of vehicle fleets and even golf carts, Callison reports.

Sidebar: Do Leapin’ Dogs Set off Motion Detectors?

Although the following information usually would fall into the category of a letter to the editor, because it covers a technical topic, SDM decided to feature it here in Kinks & Hints.

John Edwards, a technician at Best Security, Shaw, Calif., disputes the notion that motion detectors do not react to pets.

“Two animals jumping in the air while playing will trip a motion,” Edwards maintains. “So will pets running on a staircase that is covered. Dogs that go ballistic when the mailman arrives will trip a motion detector.

“As proof of my claim, I ask you to read the installation instructions packaged with known brands of ‘pet-immune’ motion detectors, and look for the disclaimers or hints that prove that they are only ‘pet-resistant’ and misleading in their advertising,” Edwards continues.

“The honest makers state on the box that their motion detector is ‘pet-resistant’ and spell out in the installation instructions that their product will perform as claimed if the pet moves horizontally,” he claims. “But should the animals’ travel be vertical, the motion detector will not tolerate this and will go into alarm.

“Less straight-forward makers print ‘immune’ on the box and then qualify in the installation instructions by usually saying that the motion detector should not be pointed at stairs,” Edwards insists.

What experiences have you had installing pet-immune motion detectors? E-mail Russ Gager, SDM Senior Editor, at gagerr@sdmmag.com.