Body Scanner Helps Officers In LaPorte County
CHICAGO (CBS) -- The LaPorte County Sheriff's Office says a new body-scanner that inmates have to walk through has already caught people trying to smuggle in contraband.
The decision to put the pricey equipment in the jail - it cost $200,000 - was made after an inmate died of an overdose of Fentanyl that had been smuggled in.
Training for deputies had barely been completed when the scanner caught an inmate trying to smuggle pills in her bra.
Captain Mike Kellems says another female inmate brought in from another jail was found with tattooing equipment hidden in a place that even a strip search would not detect.
"People have body cavities that they can secrete things that we can't look into," says Kellems. "This SecurPASS body scanner provides us now the opportunity to do that."
Kellems says it's not just for inmates.
Deputies working the jail may be scanned as well.