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Confidentiality and Williamson County Crime Stoppers - Austin American-Statesman

Editor’s note: This is the third in a five-part series on the Williamson County Crime Stoppers.

Williamson County Crime Stoppers provides two methods of receiving anonymous information from callers: a toll-free phone number (1-800-253-7867) and a website, wilcocrimetips.org, to submit tips.

When contacting Crime Stoppers, citizens are asked questions relating to the crime they are reporting and how they are aware of the crime. They are never asked any questions that may reveal their identity. A tip number is assigned to the caller in order to identify the person during a follow-up call by the Crime Stoppers, which determines whether the information has been valuable in solving the crime. The tip number also allows Crime Stoppers to identify the correct person when rewards are collected.

Crime Stoppers respects your right to privacy and does not collect any personal information concerning you or your use of our website or our toll-free number. We do not use or disclose your personal information to anyone, and we cannot sell your personal information since we do not collect it.

Your anonymity is safeguarded legislatively and administratively by procedures implemented to ensure its protection. Guarantying a tipster’s anonymity is Crime Stoppers’ first priority. Anonymity is not a Crime Stoppers’ promise — it is the law.

In Texas any person, including a law enforcement officer, may commit a crime if the person intentionally or knowingly divulges the identity of a Crime Stoppers tipster. The information you have regarding crimes and criminals is extremely important to us, not your name.

To further ensure a tipster’s identity is never known, Crime Stoppers pays rewards only for anonymous tips that lead to an arrest. Tipsters who identify themselves are not eligible for payment.

All tips must go through the Crime Stoppers system and not be submitted directly to police. The importance of anonymity cannot be overemphasized. A tipster will be anonymous unless the tipster tells someone that they submitted a tip to Crime Stoppers.

A tipster who reports criminal activity to a Crime Stoppers organization is immune from civil liability except if that tipster acts intentionally, willfully or wantonly negligent, or acts with conscious indifference or reckless disregard for the safety of others.

As an extra added protection, Chapter 414 of the Texas Government Code also provides legal protection for all tip records. They are not subject to the Public Information Act, discovery, the Michael Morton Act, or a subpoena.

Crime Stoppers and the state of Texas will always protect the identity of anyone who is willing to share information on criminals or criminal activity with law enforcement and help keep Williamson County a safe place.

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