County to Update C3I Interview Cameras
Kathy Cornwell has spent over 40 years in local media, starting her career with an internship at WCBC in the late 1980s. After graduating from Frostburg State University, she worked extensively in cable television advertising and programming with Comcast. From 2002 to 2005, she was married to WCBC's Jim Robey. Kathy returned to the News Department at WCBC in 2023. She lives in Cumberland with her husband, retired radio station manager Rich Cornwell.
Allegany County is updating their Combined Criminal Investigation Unit (C3I) interview room cameras and recording systems. The upgrade totals to just over $34,000. A Police Accountability, Community, and Transparency (PACT) grant will cover almost $24,000, the City of Cumberland is paying $8,650, and the remaining amount just shy of $1,400 will be covered by the County. The county’s State’s Attorney James Elliott says the upgrade ensures interviews can be conducted without worrying about reoccurring networking issues…
“Currently when investigators interview someone, the investigator actually has to take a secondary recording device just as a backup in case the other fails. While that certainly has worked for us, in the technology age and having to present very serious criminal cases all the time, trying to explain that to a jury—that we can’t get our cameras to work—usually doesn’t go over so well. This is a very good solution that I think benefits everybody and the fact that we have the money to pay for it.”