Facewatch Ltd, the crime reporting company started by wine bar owner Simon Gordon, has appointed Richard Thompson OBE as Chief Executive Officer with immediate effect.
Facewatch is a fully integrated online reporting system used by police forces and businesses across the UK.
Thompson was most recently the chief constable of the Civil Nuclear Constabulary and has extensive experience gained internationally during his time at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Simon Gordon, chairman, Facewatch Ltd, described Thompson’s appointment as an important step up for the company. “Richard will be instrumental in taking Facewatch to the next level and establishing the brand as a trusted crime prevention and detection platform,” Gordon said.
“Online and mobile tools such as Facewatch Crime Reporter and Facewatch ID are still in their infancy but as the proliferation of camera technology moves online towards central monitoring we can all look forward to a significant reduction in low level crime by working together and I am hopeful that Facewatch will help to be a catalyst for positive change,” he said.
Thompson said he is looking forward to helping Facewatch grow. “A practical need led Simon to invent Facewatch,” he said. “Facewatch is now, after just four years, already highly respected in the UK policing arena and is ready to take advantage of the rise of ‘mobile’ as the default device for police, consumers and businesses for every type of communications. My goal is to ensure Facewatch is fully established as the leading business crime prevention and reporting platform in the UK and internationally”.
Facewatch Crime Reporting has signed protocols in place with nine police forces and has a further eight in the pipeline in the UK, covering over 50 per cent of the population.
Facewatch ID, the mobile crime identification app has just been re-launched with significant enhancements and has been providing police forces with an unprecedented 20 per cent rate of feedback from the public on identifying subjects of interest.
Internationally, Facewatch is shortly beginning pilots with police forces in the USA and Australia, with further high level negotiations ongoing in Brazil and Africa as well as opportunities opening up in India and many other countries.
Biography: Richard Thompson OBE LLB
In 2012, Richard completed thirty-three years Government service during which time he had extensive policy and operational experience in the security, intelligence and defence world. He was Commissioned into the Royal Green Jackets (1978 – 88), served in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (1989 – 2007), and was the Chief Constable of the Civil Nuclear Constabulary (2007 – 12). His postings overseas included Hong Kong, France, Oman, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Kosovo, and Iraq. He held a number of senior domestic appointments as well as geographic operational commands for Central and Eastern Europe within the FCO before becoming the first civilian to become a Chief Constable since 1947, when he took up the responsibility for providing the armed police protection for all British civil nuclear sites and the transhipment of fissile material both inside the UK and internationally.
In 2012, he founded Elvaston Global Limited, an international consultancy service; and in 2013 he co-founded and is a Director of Advanced Laser Imaging. He has been a lay member of the Bar Standards Board since 2009 and is the Chairman of their Supervision Committee; he is an Honorary Fellow at King’s College London; an Honorary Fellow of the Strategic Studies Institute at Exeter University; and a visiting lecturer at the US Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey.
He was educated at St Paul’s School, London; Exeter University and Harvard Business School.
Link
www.facewatch.co.uk
