Last night at approximately 9:07 p.m., February 16, , Eugene Police assisted Keizer Police Department to locate and apprehend a wanted, possibly armed suspect. During the assist, at 8:49 p.m., Central Lane 911 issued a Community Emergency Notification System (CENS) warning to people in the area of Barger and Terry.
There were about 1,105 phones reached with a message that “Eugene Police are pursuing a possibly armed subject in the area. Stay in your home until further advised.” About 20 minutes later at 9:08 p.m., Central Lane was able to update the recipients of the first message with the following: “Eugene police has apprehended the possibly armed subject referred to in the previous message you received and the situation is now resolved.” (see below for signing up for CENS cell notifications)
Eugene Police officers were able to take the suspect into custody with the aid of EPD K9 Blek after a traffic stop, followed by a foot pursuit.
Because this was an outside agency assist, we are not able to provide further information about the case.
Any questions about the case will be handled by Keizer Police Department.
CENS AND SIGNING UP (OPTING IN) FOR CELL PHONES
This incident, with the use of CENS provides opportunity to remind everyone about CENS and how to sign up to get alerts on cell phones, not just landlines.
Public safety agencies in Lane County expanded their Community Emergency Notification System, known as CENS, with the "Alert Me" registration for cell phone voice and texting in 2011. By registering on the CENS Alert Me website, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) or cellular phone owners may receive the same emergency message and critical information about emergency situations as those with land-line phones – but only if they register.
CENS allows public safety agencies in Lane County to identify an affected area and, if necessary, send a message and/or text that describe the situation and recommend protective actions residents should take. The CENS system will automatically call out to all land-line and opt-in telephone numbers within that geographic area and deliver the recorded message once a voice is heard. If the phone line is busy, the system will attempt to redial the number three times to make contact. If an answering machine picks up the call, the emergency message will be left on the machine.
Opting-In
Community members may register up to five numbers at an address. Land-line telephone numbers are already included in the CENS database. Go to www.lcog.org/alertme to register your VoIP or cell phone number. If you register as a cell phone number, you will also receive notification as a text message.
It takes approximately 2-3 weeks once a number has been registered for it to be validated and entered into the database. If an incident occurs in your neighborhood within that time period it is unlikely you will receive the notification.
All of the information you enter will feed directly into the CENS secure database. This information can only be accessed by system administrators and the data will never be sold or distributed to third parties.