SCARBOROUGH, Maine -- Richard Peterson awoke to the telephone ringing. The clock next to his bed read 3:20 a.m.
He was groggy as his wife grabbed the phone, but both were instantly on alert when they heard the recorded warning message from police: Lock the doors, turn on the lights and be prepared for a door-to-door search by officers.Hours later, Peterson saw a teenager dart out of the nearby woods. He dialed 911, and within minutes the suspect was in custody.
The episode this month is a success story for Scarborough's "Reverse 911," an automated telephoning system that allows police to quickly alert whole neighborhoods about potential problems.
"The public loved it," said Joe Giacomantonio, community resources officer for the Scarborough Police Department.
Scarborough is the only community in Maine that provides the service, but the technology is catching on across the country. Scores of agencies have put similar systems to use over the past five years, and police are using the tool in novel ways.
Last month, police in Arlington, Va., alerted residents to be on the lookout for a man with Alzheimer's who wandered away from an adult day-care program. Based on a caller's tip, the search was expanded, and the man was found seven hours later in the District of Columbia.
In Bowling Green, Ky., police sent an automated message to banks in September after learning of a counterfeit check-cashing scam. Seconds after getting the notice, a teller dialed 911 when a woman tried to pass a $14,000 check, resulting in an arrest on the spot.
In Maine, the episode unfolded after a violent burglary attempt in Portland in which a family was terrorized by five bandits. It ended when the father was shot while being forced to lie on the floor.
The incident moved from Maine's largest city into this bedroom community of 15,000 after a getaway car wrecked a half-mile from Peterson's house and three suspects fled into the woods.
That's when Giacomantonio went to work, grabbing his mouse and firing up his "Reverse 911" computer program.
Looking at a map on his computer screen, he used the mouse to outline a four-square-mile area were the suspects were loose. Then he recorded the message, and the computer did the rest.
The phone calls started going out to 400 homes at 3 a.m., even as police prepared to go door-to-door.
Two of the suspects were found hiding in a hunting trailer, but a third remained on the lam at daybreak.
A couple of hours later Peterson saw a teenager fitting the message's description dart from the woods wearing only boxer shorts and a sweatshirt on a cold morning. He dialed 911.
"Before I was off the phone with the dispatcher, they had him," Peterson said.
It was a happy ending. The shooting victim survived, and the suspects were arrested.
When it was over, Giacomantonio sent another message saying the suspects were in custody.
Although sometimes referred to as "Reverse 911," the notification system has nothing to do with the 911 system that people in the United States rely on for emergencies.
"Reverse 911" is a registered trademark of Sygma Micro Corp., which installed Scarborough's system for $23,000. It is sophisticated enough to indicate whether a call was received or whether a message was left on an answering machine. It also can be programmed to keep trying.
It has other tricks, as well.
During a hurricane, for example, police could send an evacuation notice to coastal residents, asking recipients of the message to press "1" if they intend to comply, "2" if they need help, or "3" if they intend to ride out the storm.
Using a printout, police and firefighters would know whom to check on when going door-to-door.
There are three major companies marketing the systems. Sygma Micro Corp. and Avtex, based in Edina, Minn., have targeted law enforcement agencies. Sygma says it has about 100 systems in the field, and Avtex says it has installed 280.
Dialogic Corp. of Franklin, Tenn., targets emergency agencies and operators of chemical and nuclear plants and has installed roughly 1,100 systems, said David Krikac, the company's marketing director.