The Marion County Board has agreed to let the Marion County Sheriff’s Department buy a new body scanner that can find hidden contraband in clothing or hidden in body cavities.
Most of the cost will be paid by the $120,000 the sheriff’s department has received for housing Illinois Department of Corrections prisoners during COVID when the state would not take new prisoners.
Sheriff Andy Garden feels the scanner can help avoid problems other jails have faced with overdose deaths with drugs slipped into the county jail.
“Our biggest problem and we’re going to have to go back to it is what they call weekend and work release for inmates. So if you get sentenced to a minimum sentence like 30 days, a lot of times it is work release so you don’t lose your job or it’s weekends. That is when we have the biggest problem with contraband because the other inmates that are incarcerated talk them into bringing drugs in. They’ll hide it, swallow it. With this no more, we’ll catch it all.”
Garden says he has found money in his budget to pay for the remaining $19,000 cost of finding a setup location for the scanner.
The board agreed to allow the probation office to use the first-floor space on the public service building being vacated by the regional office of schools. The Administrative Officer for the Probation Department, Renee Pride, says that will put all of the offices on one floor. Only the drug testing program will remain in the basement.
The chair of the website committee Wes Gozia is hopeful for approval soon of the county’s dot gov web address so the county’s website can go live.
The board approved Richard Day to the Kinmundy-Alma Fire Trustees and reappointed Roger Myers to another three years on the board.
