An online tool to generate statistical crime data for Uganda Police

Abstract

Crime is a human experience and it has to be controlled. In order to control crime effectively, it has to be analyzed. Crime analysis is attainable with the help of an effective information management system. In an effort to improve their services, Uganda Police in particular Wandegeya Police station have embarked on computerizing and improving their information management systems. The overall aim of the research is to develop an online tool to generate statistical crime data that can be used to analyze, manage and present statistics of different crimes committed in different locations to support police operations in Wandegeya Police stations. To achieve the stated objectives, relevant literature about the topic was reviewed so as to get an in-depth understanding of the concepts and terminologies used in statistics generation. The analysis of the existing system in Wandegeya police station was done by visiting the study area during fieldwork. The aim was to identify the main stakeholders of the system, their information requirements and any bottlenecks existing in the system. The system was manual and lacked resources both human and non human. An information management system to help conceptualize the various components of crime statistics was therefore developed to serve as the basis for developing the database to store and manage relevant information. The functions and data requirements of the system developed are detailed. The specific objectives where to study and analyze the current systems so has to identify the weaknesses associated with it and determine the system requirements, to design the system that analyses, manages and presents the relevant statistical data of crimes committed, the study methods involved an interview with the records officer at Wandegeya police station. Implementation of the database was done using Postgres, the system interfaces were developed using HTML programming languages, and Xajax and PHP were also used as the scripting languages, the server used to run this in Apache2. To come up with the graphs, a graph library was used to generate them. The findings revealed excellent security for the system by enabling password login for the system users and it is recommended that the system users should first get training on how to use the system and those other institution in Uganda.