Sheriff To Use Iris Scan System To Find Missing Children
The Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office is only the fourth law enforcement agency nationwide to use iris scanning technology in hopes of identifying missing people. Eventually, roughly 1,200 agencies in 46 states will participate in the Child Project, which will be able to assist investigators by providing a similar identification method as fingerprinting.
Citizens must voluntarily register to have their iris scanned by digital video camera for potential comparison to scans stored in the Child Identification and Location Database.
Col. Greg Brown of the sheriff’s office said the technology will enhance the performance of law enforcement agencies handling missing persons cases. He also promised that DNA matching and fingerprinting will still be important crimesolving tools.
The sheriff’s office purchased two mobile scanning units, one which will reside at the sheriff’s operations center in Ybor City and one that will be shared between the four district offices.
Abstracted by the National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center(NLECTC) from the Tampa Tribune (07/20/05) P. 1; Pace, Julie.