NCIC Proves its Continued Value in Fighting Crime – After 50 Years
Volume 10
Feb 2017 Edition
NCIC Proves its Continued Value in Fighting Crime – After 50 Years
By the FBI
The information in the NCIC database can also help law enforcement officers perform their duties more safely — for instance , notifying them if the person in the car they are about
to approach might be armed and dangerous .
NCIC Turns 50
Last month , a Tennessee state trooper arrested an Illinois man wanted for questioning in a Kentucky murder .
The FBI ’ s National Crime Information Center , or NCIC , had a key assist in the arrest — the state trooper , after spotting a suspicious vehicle at a rest stop , ran the license plate through the NCIC database and received word back quickly that the car had been stolen by a suspect in a Kentucky homicide .
A chase ensued , but ultimately the suspect in this case with connections to three different states was taken into custody .
In the beginning , 15 state and city computers were tied into the Bureau ’ s host computer in Washington , D . C . At the time , NCIC contained just over 350,000 criminal justice records across five different files — wanted persons , stolen articles , stolen vehicles , stolen license plates , and stolen / missing guns .
The very first NCIC hit came in May 1967 , when a New York City officer radioed in a request for a search of a license plate . Within 90 seconds , he was informed that the car had been stolen the previous month in Boston .
By 1971 , all 50 states were connected to NCIC and began making inroads in combating crimes that crossed state lines . And over the next three decades , the database expanded and adapted as new technology and new information needs emerged . For example , in 1975 , a new file was added to record the details of missing persons cases .
Today , the FBI ’ s NCIC system — created to give our law enforcement partners access to a computerized index of documented criminal justice information whenever and wherever they need it — celebrates its 50th anniversary .
Launched on January 27 , 1967 , the NCIC database , according to Assistant Director Stephen Morris of the Criminal Justice Information Services ( CJIS ) Division , is “ a cornerstone of the CJIS Division ’ s information-sharing efforts , providing a lifeline to our local , state , federal , and tribal partners 24 hours a day .”
( It ’ s been called the lifeline of law enforcement — an electronic clearinghouse of crime data that can be tapped into by vir-
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