PHOTO COURTESY OF FBI California resident Tony Job Nkemululam, caught on tape by a security camera, was charged with a federal offense after he opened accounts at Bank of Hawaii with forged and stolen checks.

Surveillance cameras
pivotal in crime fight

Authorities credit taped images
with capturing suspects
in 3 recent incidents

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By Rosemarie Bernardo
rbernardo@starbulletin.com

In January, two men clad in ski masks and brandishing semiautomatic weapons robbed two convenience stores.

Three years ago, a California man opened several bank accounts in Hawaii with forged checks.

A year earlier, a man made a drug deal in front of a Hotel Street bar.

Though these were three different crimes, committed in three different locations, they all had one thing in common: They were captured on videotape.

Law enforcement officials used surveillance camera footage from each case to arrest and charge the suspects and, in two cases, to get convictions.

Surveillance cameras offer an "extra set of eyes and ears," said Jim Fulton, spokesman for the Honolulu city prosecutor's office. Images from these cameras have been instrumental in helping authorities solve crimes, according to Hawaii attorneys and law enforcement officials.

Patrick O'Brien, president of Security Resources, said Hawaii's banks, commercial companies and stores have been switching to digital cameras from analog cameras within the last six years because of the enhanced images they provide.

O'Brien, who helped design a surveillance video camera system in Chinatown, said digital cameras have the capability of running about 60 to 120 frames per second, compared with analog cameras that run about 2 frames per second. A gap between frames can occur with analog cameras, whereas digital cameras offer a continuous flow in surveillance.

Photographic images of two Kaneohe Marines, Antwain Salters and William H. Linwood, helped police identify and charge them with the alleged armed robbery of two convenience stores and a video store.

Not only do surveillance cameras help identify suspects, "you can't lie about the behavior when a good surveillance is in place," said Detective Letha DeCaires, coordinator of CrimeStoppers Honolulu.

DeCaires pointed out how police used tape from video surveillance cameras at Chevron Food Mart on Salt Lake Boulevard to determine that Salters and Linwood robbed the store.

"It gives a clean rendition of what actually happened," DeCaires said.

Police said Salters and Linwood also robbed a 7-Eleven store in Waipahu and Aaxtion Adult Video on Kapiolani Boulevard on Jan. 18.

The Chinatown cameras help authorities target criminal activity such as drug trafficking and prostitution. At the community's request, the video monitoring program was installed in Chinatown five years ago.

Not only do the visible cameras help curb crime, the photo images they generate have been submitted as evidence in court, said Fulton.

A police officer arrested Felix Augafa after he sold rock cocaine in front of a bar on Hotel Street on Feb. 28, 1997. Surveillance video cameras captured the deal on tape.

Augafa argued that the cameras amounted to an invasion of privacy and that his constitutional right against unreasonable searches and seizures was violated.

However, the Intermediate Court of Appeals ruled against him, determining the "defendant cannot transform the 'public street' into a 'private sphere' by arguing that a right of expected privacy is invoked by his 'unilateral action' of engaging in a drug deal."

Augafa was convicted of promoting a dangerous drug in the third degree and was sentenced to five years' probation and nearly five months in jail.

Community prosecutor Cecelia Chang said winning the Augafa case sets a precedent for future use of video evidence.

Cameras are an excellent preventive tool. They are irrefutable, Chang said.

Currently, 26 surveillance cameras have been installed in Chinatown. Seventeen cameras are functional and operated by citizen volunteers trained by police officers.

The FBI also has used evidence from surveillance cameras to prosecute suspects.

California resident Tony Job Nkemululam was charged with a federal offense after he opened bank accounts in Hawaii with forged and stolen checks.

FBI special agent and media coordinator James Van Pelt said surveillance cameras helped identify Nkemululam, who had about 28 aliases while opening up bank accounts with forged checks at branches of Bank of Hawaii and First Hawaiian Bank.

"He was juggling half a dozen accounts at a time," Van Pelt said.

Sometime between May 1999 and February 2000, Nkemululam occasionally flew from California to Honolulu and opened an account under Timothy Burns at Bank of Hawaii, Van Pelt said. Nkemululam then would visit another branch and open another account under another alias, Christopher Harris.

A surveillance camera recorded Nkemululam while he made a withdrawal at a Bank of Hawaii branch.

"The pictures were so clear," said Van Pelt.

Police and FBI agents arrested Nkemululam after someone recognized a photo of him that was posted at all banks, post offices and rental car companies.

Authorities recovered about a half-dozen false identification cards.

Nkemululam was convicted, sentenced to 36 months in federal prison and required to pay restitution of $487,117.41, Van Pelt said.

Van Pelt said the surveillance cameras "were critical" in subduing Nkemululam.

"Because the pictures were so clear, we determined it was an individual and not a gang. He ended up pleading guilty. They (cameras) were critical in his apprehension," he added.