‘It scared them off’, Kansas City shoppers report less crime thanks to security robot patrolling strip mall
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - A sight previously thought to be science fiction is very real at a southeast Kansas City shopping center. Instead of a police officer, a security robot has been patrolling sidewalks and shoppers are taking notice.
Since Marshall the robot has been on the job, shoppers say the experiences have completely changed when they come to these stores. The robot can spend 23 hours a day monitoring the parking lot from all angles which gives people a new sense of protection and ease they don’t always have when out.
Marshall took over security at Brywood Centre in April. Before that, Karen White noticed a lot of trouble outside the shopping center.
“Sometimes it’d be concerning for your car like someone could take it or something,” White said.
Knowing now that Marshall is always watching, the risk of crime does not worry her or others as much.
“It made it very better, like you can’t be in the parking lot without seeing the robot,” White continued. “So, I think it scared them off.”
“It can continuously monitor, as human beings we need to stop and go eat,” Larry Denman added. “Versus the monitor capturing the traffic flow, capturing people, among other things.”
Marshall not only has cameras on every side of him always rolling, but he’s also programmed to share all suspicious activity he captured with the Kansas City, Missouri, Police Department.
“He has a license plate reader, he has facial recognition, he can read IP addresses from your cell phone or watch,” Amanda Bellemere, owner of Brywood Shopping Centre, explained. “He knows who you are basically.”
That includes if a suspect is already wanted for a crime committed off the property.
“If there is an Amber Alert, Marshall knows that license plate because it is input into his system,” Bellemere said. “And if that car does show up on our property it does report back to the police. He has captured a couple of criminals that have been on the property.”
We hear every week these days about more businesses being vandalized or robbed in Kansas City, but when you look at the latest crime map by KD, it shows no illegal activity reported at this shopping center. Everyone we spoke with agreed more places in the city should invest in a security system like Marshall.
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