Crime Stoppers – The Inside Story

by Greg Macaleese (Author),‎
Cal Millar (Author)

In 1976, Detective Greg MacAleese came up with a concept to combat crime. He called the program Crime Stoppers and today it is cited along with fingerprinting and DNA as the top three innovations in modern day policing. The Albuquerque Police Department, which embraced the idea and brought it to fruition, continues to hail Crime Stoppers as the most successful anti-crime program in the history of law enforcement. For MacAleese, who was born in Canada but spent his high school and college years in the United States, Crime Stoppers was like a roller coaster ride, and the book reveals a story, that until now hasn’t been told. Assigned as an investigator to the Violent Crimes Unit only three years after becoming a police officer, MacAleese was in a hospital emergency room watching the life ebb from a 20-year-old victim who was callously shot during a robbery at a gas station. A short time later he promised the mother of Michael Carmen that he would solve the slaying and it was that vow which became the catalyst to launch Crime Stoppers. From an idea to curb lawlessness in what at the time was one of the most crime-ridden and dangerous cities in the United States, Crime Stoppers has grown to a worldwide network of more than 1,600 programs. Accumulatively since 1976, Crime Stoppers has solved 1.5 million crimes, seized $10 billion in illicit drugs and recovered more than $2 billion in stolen property. Most people believe Crime Stoppers is run by law enforcement, but this book explains how programs in various cities are charitable organizations with volunteer boards and operate in partnership with the police, the media and the community.

What is Crime Stoppers?

by Cal Millar (Author),‎
Greg Macaleese (Author)

This book provides an explanation of Crime Stoppers and tells how programs operate around the world. Created in 1976 by Greg MacAleese, an Albuquerque, New Mexico detective, to solve the slaying of a 19-year-old college student, the concept has grown to a global network of independent Crime Stoppers programs dedicated to improving security in communities and keeping streets safe. These volunteer grass root organizations maintain telephone tiplines where callers can anonymously report information that will help police solve crime. Rewards, raised through donations from the public, are available if a tip leads to an arrest. The book also outlines the value of School Crime Stoppers programs and reveals what world leaders and top law enforcement officials have said about the crime solving network. In addition to highlighting crimes that have been cleared through tips to Crime Stoppers, the book incorporates several cases that police agencies around the world are anxious to solve. Among them the strangulation slaying of 16-year-old Chanel Petro-Nixon who vanished from her family’s Brooklyn, New York apartment on Father’s Day in 2006; the June 2011 mysterious disappearance of 19-year-old Shizelle Hernandez while on basic training with the Air Guard in Trinidad; the abduction and murder of 14-year-old Aielah Saric-Auger in Prince George, British Columbia, one of several hundred aboriginal females who have gone missing in Canada through the years and the 13 victims of what police in South Australia call the Child Murder Cases occurring between 1966 and 2000. Also highlighted is the effort by Crime Stoppers to track down poachers in South Africa and prevent the slaughter of rhinos, one of the world’s most endangered species.