This article explores Crime Stoppers’ use of CCTV images as a node of a surveillant assemblage via analysis of a sample of Crime Stoppers advertisements deploying CCTV images supplemented by interviews and other qualitative procedures. Advertisements using images are becoming more prevalent and rely on complex textual narratives and the CCTV image format to construct crime for public consumption to generate ‘tips’. The advertisements capture a narrow range of ‘street crime’ to the benefit of private business and to the neglect of pervasive and serious conduct affecting the less powerful. The convergence of Crime Stoppers and CCTV surveillance is found to have unanticipated and ironic consequences regarding deterrence and identification, to befit a form of ‘counter-law’, and to demonstrate potential to harm individuals and visible minorities. Theoretical implications of this analysis for understanding assumptions about the relation between image and the Truth of crime, governance, and surveillance are discussed.
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