David Solet featured in Contrarian Boston

Solet, who is now running for Middlesex County DA against incumbent Marian Ryan in the Democratic primary, noted that ShotSpotter saves lives by speeding up response times of police and EMS crews, with a few minutes a matter of life or death for a shooting victim who is bleeding to death.

“Everyone who is a victim of violent crime deserves a rapid medical response and an effective police investigation,” Solet told Contrarian Boston.

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Cambridge pols are touting their decision to ditch a gunfire detection system that police and law enforcement say solves crimes and saves lives

Next time there is a shooting near the public housing projects in The Port, neighborhood residents should call that crack detective and crime-fighting unit better known as the Cambridge City Council.

After all, the Cambridge pols showed they clearly believe they know a thing or two about police work when they voted on Monday to pull the plug on ShotSpotter, brushing aside objections from the city’s acting police chief.

The Cambridge councilors voted 5-2 on Wednesday to end the city’s use of the gunfire detection system, capping a years-long campaign by various activist groups against the technology.

In comments to Contrarian Boston, one local prosecutor with years of experience handling gun cases was aghast, calling the vote “horrific” and “appalling.”

Opponents have pointed to the heavier concentration of ShotSpotter microphones in or around minority neighborhoods, while hyping fears that the Trump administration could somehow use the system for surveillance.

But police contend they place the gunfire detection devices in locations based on historical patterns of gun violence, not race - a view seconded by the prosecutor.

Cambridge officers are already barred from cooperating with ICE on civil immigration matters.

The prosecutor and a colleague both noted that ShotSpotter can be a big help to police in Cambridge, Boston, Somerville, and other local communities when investigating shootings in neighborhoods where witnesses are wary of retaliation if they cooperate with law enforcement.

Cambridge Police would not have even known about 11 different shooting cases were it not for the gunfire being picked up by the ShotSpotter system, Acting Police Chief Pauline Wells testified before Monday’s Cambridge City Council vote.

And that’s not even getting into the issue of human memory, which is far, far from perfect.

District attorneys in both Middlesex and Suffolk counties frequently use ShotSpotter data when investigating and building gun violence cases.

The technology can help pinpoint the time of a shooting and how many shots were fired, potentially crucial details on a case that get to intent and other key issues, law enforcement sources say.

ShotSpotter “helps a lot,” the prosecutor said, adding, “it takes it out of the responsibility of innocent civilians testifying to where they live and what they heard. Absolutely appalling not to consider that by a city council that likely does not live where shootings happen.”

E. Denise Simmons, one of just two Cambridge councilors who voted against dismantling the ShotSpotter system, made just that point during the debate before the vote.

Simmons asked the crowd of ShotSpotter opponents for a show of hands if any happened to live in a pair of public housing projects in The Port neighborhood.

When none popped up, Simmons, who in 2008 became first Black, openly lesbian mayor in the country, added simply, “as I thought,” per the Cambridge Somerville Independent.

Simmons, who lost her son Anthony to gun violence in 1995, offered up a stinging critique of the city councilors pushing to ban the use of the ShotSpotter technology.

Simmons blasted her colleagues for playing to the crowd and exuding what she characterized as a “sense of performative [allyship] and saviorism of marginalized people,” per the Cambridge Day.

“Have you had your son shot down in the street? I have,” Simmons said, adding that she “couldn’t sit through another evening of this,” according to the news site.

Critics have also pointed to the significant number of false alarms by the ShotSpotter system.

Supporters have countered by making the analogy to smoke alarms, which no sensible homeowner would dismantle because they tend to go off when something burns on the stove, for example.

But the system is not just helpful in catching criminals, David Solet, former head of the Middlesex County Cold Case Homicide Unit and a prosecutor for 24 years, told Contrarian Boston.

Solet, who is now running for Middlesex County DA against incumbent Marian Ryan in the Democratic primary, noted that ShotSpotter saves lives by speeding up response times of police and EMS crews, with a few minutes a matter of life or death for a shooting victim who is bleeding to death.

“Everyone who is a victim of violent crime deserves a rapid medical response and an effective police investigation,” Solet told Contrarian Boston.