HALO cameras help track Halloween crime

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Those who venture out to Sixth Street on Halloween night are rarely disappointed. The street started to get crowded with people dressed in costume around 8:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Kris Peruchi made quite a splash. He arrived on stilts dressed as Jack Skellington from "The Nightmare Before Christmas." He always starts designing his costume about a month out.

"This is all made out of masking tape, duct sealant and just some old glasses," said Peruchi, pointing to his mask with his fake slender, skeleton-shaped fingers.

While he spends a lot of time posing for pictures, Joe Cook will be busy checking identification cards at the Bat Bar.

"We ask a lot of questions," said Cook. "One of the big things is to make sure if they have a mask we have to ask them to remove it. We do what we can to keep things safe out here."

Austin police are hoping their eyes in the sky -- HALO, or High Activity Location Observation cameras -- will help, too. Officer Michael Taylor is manning the crime cameras in the real-time crime center all night.

View the HALO camera map

He was also working Saturday night when a lot of people hit Sixth Street dressed in costumes. Those disguises provided some challenges when it came to searching for suspects.

"We had an assault and [officers] were looking for a particular person in an all-red costume and of course that's all you see -- you may see 30 people in all red costumes," said Taylor.

Another situation that same night proved the costumes can work against a criminal, too.

"I was able to point a guy out pretty quick because of his unique costume," said Taylor.

Officers watching the cameras can coordinate with officers on the ground when crimes occur.

If officers watching the cameras do not catch a crime in action, they can go back and look at the footage hours, days and even weeks later.