License plate readers, artificial intelligence and new technology led police to the crew believed to be responsible for a series of robberies of Ulta cosmetics stores in Maryland and Virginia, Fairfax County police said.
At least three people worked together smashing display cases at stores in Northern Virginia and Montgomery and Anne Arundel counties in Maryland, police believe. They got away with almost a quarter million dollars in luxury brands since November.
About 5 p.m. Monday, officers working in the Fairfax County police real-time crime center got an alert on a vehicle they were looking for. It was at the Annapolis Mall, and within minutes, Anne Arundel County police moved in.
“It was giving us an opportunity to narrow down a location, and then my platoon team – three officers – able to swarm that area, find the car and then set up on it,” Anne Arundel County police Capt. Scott Macallair said. “So, it was a coordinated rapid event.”
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Officers arrested a teenage boy, 21-year-old Damari Cousar and 28-year-old Rasaan Washington.
The key to the case was a new system that combines license plates, descriptions of vehicles and artificial intelligence, police said.
“License plate readers are instrumental, and today’s license plate readers are not the license plate readers you and I were introduced to years ago,” Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis said.
“When we are looking for a car, even if we don’t have the tag number, we might have just the make, just the model, just the color. We might have a front left fender that’s damaged,” Davis said. “We are now able to enter in those particulars into a sophisticated license plate reader platform.”
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On March 16 at an Ulta store in Tysons Corner, police got a 911 call saying several men were using a hammer to break into the display cases. They got away with almost $7,000 in merchandise, but police got a detailed description of the getaway car.
“These guys are oddsmakers, and you would think they would quickly realize that the odds are against them,” Davis said. “We are gonna catch these serial groups whether it’s Ulta or whether it’s the gun store, whether it’s an ABC liquor store. We have seen crews that are increasingly organized.”
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