Not all BART security cameras actually work

Last Saturday’s fatal shooting aboard a BART train at the West Oakland Station is raising questions about the transit system’s security cameras. It turns out some of them aren’t even real.

KTVU’s Tom Vacar also reports that some of the real cameras don’t always work.

On Wednesday, BART released a photo of the suspect in Saturday’s shooting and has repeatedly insisted that the transit security system is working well.

“You can tell that our system works because of the photos we released last night. You can clearly see who this guy is,” said BART Police Chief Kenton Rainey.

However, BART has also admitted that not all the cameras work all the time and not all of them are real.

“I'm not going to go into how many of our cameras are videoing or not videoing, or decoys as you say,” said Rainey.“

Beyond video cameras, the chief says that the “layered” security system includes eyewitness passengers, BART employees, 300 BART police including 210 sworn officers, and other police departments BART passes through.

On Thursday, BART General Manager Grace Crunican talked about these security issues directly to the BART Board of Directors who employ her.

“When you compare 2015 over 2014, we have 10 percent fewer serious crimes on BART, so we have a good trend in that direction,” she said.

Chief Rainey said it was the second year in a row where violent crime dropped on BART.

“As time goes on, we will be bringing additional requests to the board to make additional investments in security,” said Rainey.

As for the Super Bowl, the chief said they’ll have adequate extra personnel working in conjunction with working with all the law enforcement in the Bay Area will have extra people working with the influx of tourists and visitors.