XENIA — A new body scanner is being installed in the Greene County Jail today.
The US manufactured system — called SOTER RS — is a low-energy, low-dose technological system, according to Lukas Richter, OD Security North America, who is installing the body scanner in the sally port of the jail.
These specific systems have been used in the United States since 2006, but are relatively new in Ohio. The first unit in Ohio was installed in 2014. The Greene County Jail’s SOTER RS is the fifth machine that Richter has installed in Ohio.
Richter said the spike of these scanners being installed in the state is directly related to the heroin epidemic.
“Contraband finds its way into the jails,” he said.
According to Sheriff Gene Fischer, inmates will be escorted to the sally port area, step on the machine for a scan, and once they are cleared, will enter the jail.
The scan will show anything hidden on or inside the body, including weapons, drugs and cell phones. They will appear on the touch-screen as “densities or abnormalities,” Richter said.
“The heroin epidemic is so bad that we’ve got to protect the people in the jail,” Fischer said.
The installation of the body scanner comes after several recent overdoses in the jail and one inmate death, although the Sheriff has pushed for the scanner for several years.
Training for the new machine will begin tomorrow morning for jail staff.
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