Crime Stoppers

Help Cape Girardeau and the area continue to be a great place to live, work and visit - call the Crime Stoppers hotline to report information that would help solve a crime in our area.
All calls are confidential.

Telephone hotline:
573-332-0500
or *500 cellular

Southeast Missouri Crime Stoppers, Inc.
P.O. Box 775  Cape Girardeau, MO  63702-1065

The Crime Stoppers Program is a citizen, media, and police endeavor, designed to involve the public in our fight against crime. The program provides citizens with a vehicle to anonymously provide police with information about a crime or potential crime. Cash rewards are offered to people who provide information that leads to an arrest.

Crime Stoppers was started in Albuquerque, New Mexico, when an Albuquerque Police Department Detective reached a dead-end in a homicide investigation. Frustrated by a lack of clues, he appealed to a local television station and enlisted the station’s cooperation in a reenactment of the crime. The reenactment was televised on a local newscast. The Detective offered a reward out of his own pocket and a caller contacted the police the next day after seeing the reenactment. The tip information was enough to lead the police to the two men who were responsible. Within 72 hours of the reenactment being aired the police had solved the murder. This was the beginning of Crime Stoppers . So successful was the first effort, the program continued and expanded.  It has become internationally known as "Crime Stoppers."  Since the program started, there are now more than 950 Crime Stoppers programs worldwide.  More than 425,000 crimes have been solved since its inception and over $3 billion worth of stolen property and narcotics have been seized.

Crime Stoppers is a community project supported by donations of money, goods or services. Contributions from individuals, private sources, corporations, clubs, professional associates, retailers, civic and social groups, keep the Crime Stoppers Program functional. All donations to the Crime Stoppers Society are tax deductible.

The Crime Stoppers telephone line does not go through the switchboard with other calls and it is not recorded. When a Crime Stoppers call is received, the call is assigned a unique number and this number becomes vital to the anonymous caller - providing the only means of identifying the caller for possible reward money. The Crime Stoppers information is then entered into a database purchased by the Crime Stoppers Program.

Currently the Cape Girardeau program offers a reward of up to $1,000 to anyone providing information which leads to the arrest and charge of anyone who commits a crime or who leads authorities to the recovery of stolen property or the seizure of illegal drugs or an arrest on an outstanding warrant.