Dutch prisoners given cold-case calendars in hope of solving crimes

dotr

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/20/dutch-prisoners-cold-case-calendars-solving-crimes
Police received 160 tipoffs after trial run of calendars featuring unsolved murder

Prisoners across the Netherlands are to be issued with calendars for their cells featuring unsolved murders or disappearances as part of a drive by the Dutch police to crack unsolved cases.

The so-called cold case calendars will be handed to all 30,000 prisoners in the country after a trial run in five jails in the north resulted in 160 tips to the police.
Each week of the year in the brightly coloured 2018-19 calendars will be illustrated with a photograph of a missing person and details of the case. The hope is that many of those in jail will know details of some of the crimes or may have heard other criminals chatting about them.

Announcing the national rollout of the calendar, a police spokesman said: “The experience of the police and judiciary shows that prisoners have relatively high levels of knowledge about committed crimes.”

On their website the Dutch police said advances in forensic technology had made acting on tipoffs even in very old cases significantly easier. There are around 1,500 unsolved crimes classified as cold cases in the Netherlands.
“There are two important factors that play a role in this,” the police said. “On the one hand there are developments in forensics, which offer the teams more opportunities, such as DNA. On the other hand, witnesses can play a crucial role. Witnesses who had seen something at the time, but did not dare to come forward, sometimes dare to do so over time

The idea of the calendars was borrowed from the United States, where every year several states distribute a deck of cards containing information about cold cases among prisoners.
 
http://www.thesundaily.my/news/2017/07/19/two-dutch-cold-cases-reopened-thanks-prison-calendars
"Thanks to serious and concrete information from prisoners, we have been to reopen two of the cases featured in the calendar," national police spokesman Robbert Salome told AFP, adding he could not divulge more details yet in order not to compromise investigations.

He said a pilot project, launched in Jan, had proved so successful that the calendars will now be distributed in all Dutch prisons.

A reward is offered for each case featured on the 52-week calendar, with a total of €800,000 up for grabs. Prisoners who can remain anonymous, are urged to contact police by mail, email or telephone, in the hope they will be able to make progress in cases involving murder, aggravated robbery or even arson
 
This is a fantastic idea! Hopefully if either (or both) of the two cases they have received information about since distributing the calendar are solved then the idea will be taken up by penitentiaries in other countries.

It seems like a great, relatively inexpensive way of having a large number of people with pertinent knowledge of the drug deals, prostitution and other illegal activities occurring in their local area. Even a small tip like "person number 37 on the calendar used to buy drugs from the same dealer I did" might provide some useful leads for the police to follow.
 

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