VANDERBURGH COUNTY PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE AWARDED NEARLY $700,000 FEDERAL GRANT TO ESTABLISH CRIME GUN INTELLIGENCE CENTER

My office is proud to announce our successful application for a nearly $700,000 federal grant to establish a local law enforcement crime gun intelligence center in Vanderburgh County. The federal funds will be utilized over the next three years and will be used for the creation of a new Crime Gun Intelligence Center (CGIC). The goal of the Evansville-Vanderburgh Crime Gun Intelligence Center is to quickly identify and reduce the amount of gun crime in the Evansville- Vanderburgh County area by providing intelligence, analysis, and resources between agencies for the swift identification and apprehension of suspected criminals.

As the Prosecutor, I felt it was important to apply for this grant because of the precipitous increase in violent crime and specifically gun-related crime in recent years in Vanderburgh and surrounding counties in Southern Indiana.
The crime rate in Vanderburgh County is unacceptable—particularly as it relates to shots fired—and my office got to work right away to do something about it.
The CGIC planning is still underway but will be an expansion of an existing joint task force which is comprised of the Prosecutor’s Office, the Evansville Police Department and the Vanderburgh County Sheriff’s Office and is tasked with working and prosecuting drug and gun cases. We are very lucky in Vanderburgh County to have excellent collaboration between all law enforcement—evidenced by the great work of our joint task force which has been in place for many years. The CGIC will be a reimagining of that same group and collaboration: which will now be infused with the latest tools, technology, and training to get us ahead of the crime in Vanderburgh County. Those that commit gun crimes in our community are not making a wise decision.

Evansville Police Chief Billy Bolin, Sheriff Noah Robinson, and I are dedicated to working together to provide the tools and intelligence that will be available with the crime gun intelligence center for use by all law enforcement in Southern Indiana- including our local, state, and federal partners. This will undoubtedly have a huge impact on crime in our area.
Crime gun intelligence centers look different for each community, but their effectiveness is staggering. We look forward to sharing details as we begin implementing our own.
I am thankful to my staff, especially my Chief Deputy Winston Lin and our Outreach Coordinator and Assistant, Ellora Daily, for their efforts in writing the grant and collecting data to make our application successful. It is my honor to serve the people in Vanderburgh County in this way—and to be able to work on this project with our top-notch law enforcement partners. We will not rest in the fight to make our community safer.