FARMINGTON -- The possibility of releasing the wrong inmate from jail is a daily nightmare for one Davis County sheriff's officer.
That is why adding a biometric system to identify inmates is a blessing, said Chief Deputy Bob Yeaman.
"It has only happened once in my 20 years here, but that's one time too many," he said about releasing the wrong inmate a year ago. Inmates are released because they either post bail or are released by a court order.
A miscommunication between the Board of Pardons and the jail allowed the inmate to be released, but the man was rearrested two days later.
Because Yeaman was worried the situation could happen again, he welcomes technology that confirms a person's identification.
Until now, jail staff compared inmates to be released with their booking mugs. The jail usually has about 700 inmates.
Sheriff Bud Cox announced at a news conference Monday that his office is the first in the nation to receive a $10,000 grant from the National Sheriffs' Association to implement an innovative biometric technology system that will take high-resolution digital photographs of both eyes of an inmate so that mistaken releases won't occur.
Retired Salt Lake County Sheriff Aaron D. Kennard, executive director of the National Sheriffs' Association, was at the news conference.
"Daily, the challenges sheriffs face include doing more with less," he said, "and we have to find ways to quickly and effectively share data across the nation."
Sean Mullin, president and chief executive officer of Biometric Intelligence & Identification Technologies, said the grant is part of $500,000 that will be divided among 45 states. He will be in Los Angeles today and Las Vegas on Wednesday to introduce the program in those cities.
"The iris has 235 unique features in each eye," Mullin said.
Mullin used his own eyes to demonstrate how fast the photos are taken, then how fast the computer system can look up matching records.
Cox said the records are sent to a database in Texas, so the county does not need to increase its computer memory to run the system.
Yeaman said he plans to start inputting as many inmates' irises into the system as possible within the next few weeks.
About 192 other agencies in 42 states have already installed an older version of the technology, Mullin said.
The system can also be used to input irises of adults who may be at risk for wandering off and not remembering who they are, Mullin said.
And, Cox said, the program will be in booths at county fairs and other celebrations so parents can put their children into the system.
It is better than a fingerprint card that parents have because the system keeps the child's identification in a database that can be accessed 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, until the child is 18 or is reported as missing or a runaway before then, he said.
"Fingerprint cards get lost in kitchen drawers."
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