CODY Systems is donating the use of its C.O.B.R.A. real-time records sharing system for police officers within Bucks County, Pa. This gift is in honor of Officer Brian Gregg, a fallen officer from the Newtown Borough (Pa.) Police Department, and allows police officers across the county to look up critical information on persons, vehicles, and incidents from across seven participating police departments in real-time from their mobile units.

C.O.B.R.A. provides real-time access to all connected agencies' records databases, regardless of the RMS vendor each uses, from within an officer's mobile unit, allowing officers to search for persons, incidents, and vehicles from across the network, with real-time officer safety alerts.

Gregg, who had been employed with the Newtown Borough police force for just over a year, was killed in the line of duty on Sept. 29, 2005. The gunman also shot Gregg's partner and one other person during the altercation. 

CODY Systems, based out of Pottstown, Pa., has had long-standing relationships with many police departments within Bucks County and across the region for up to 15 years. The company knew of the incident involving Officer Gregg, but did not know at the time that critical officer safety information regarding the subject who attacked Officer Gregg and the others, while not in Newtown Borough's records database, was in the records databases of at least two neighboring jurisdictions-databases provided by CODY.

This information could have averted the incident by providing Officer Gregg with critical officer safety alerts about the individual who committed the attack.

At the latest Bucks County Chiefs' meeting, after discussions with their clients in Bucks County, conducting a pilot program which CODY funded, and doing considerable financial evaluation in this difficult economic climate, the company announced its intention to donate a C.O.B.R.A. system with the following elements:

• 1 license of the C.O.B.R.A. Center-Point Server.

• Connections for the seven local participating CODY RMS clients in order to allow each of them to synchronize their records information in real-time with the Center-Point Server.

• 75 licenses of the C.tac tactical search application, to be used in mobile units across the police departments in the county. C.tac will allow officers in equipped mobile units to search the records databases of the seven participating agencies.

• Web-based training sessions on the use of C.tac.

• Installation, set-up, technical and project management services

CODY is also funding the ongoing support and maintenance of the system.

"Critical information on suspects should always be at the fingertips of the officers on the street so that incidents like this do not occur," says Fran Heffner, CEO of CODY Systems. "I cannot say that our system would have prevented the struggle that ensued, or spared the life of Officer Gregg and the injury to the others, but that's why we produce these systems.