Sheriff Jimmy Riffle said computers placed within deputies' cruisers will be able to check license plates and criminal records of the licensed driver of the vehicle. He is looking to install scanners more throughout the county. The ones currently in place have proven useful in solving burglaries, a parental kidnapping out of Kentucky and helped track drug-related suspects across the county.
"It's impressive," Riffle said. "It really is."
The subject came up after Marion County Commission passed a resolution creating a fund for money from the Byrne Discretionary Community Project Grant program to go into. The program is from the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs, and supports projects that improve the functioning of the criminal justice system, prevent or combat juvenile delinquency and assist victims of crime.
The sheriff's department applied for the grant with the scanners in mind. It's been approved and the sheriff is waiting for the setup of the fund so they can begin receiving the funds and putting them to use. Riffle said the main purpose of the grant was technological in scope.
"The world's moving a lot faster than we are, it seems," he said.
However, Riffle's request does not come without a brief history of public scrutiny. License plate cameras were the subject of a federal lawsuit against the Illinois State Police. The lawsuit accused state law enforcement agencies of operating an unconstitutional system of dragnet surveillance.
"Defendants are tracking anyone who drives to work in Cook County [Chicago] — or to school, or a grocery store, or a doctor's office, or a pharmacy, or a political rally, or a romantic encounter, or family gathering — every day, without any reason to suspect anyone of anything, and are holding onto those whereabouts just in case they decide in the future that some citizen might be an appropriate target of law enforcement," the filing states. It adds information on drivers is collected without obtaining a warrant or suspicion of wrongdoing.
ACLU Senior Policy Analyst Jay Stanley was questioned in an article published by the ACLU about whether communities are appropriately considering whether they are comfortable with police deploying new technology. One problem Stanley identified is private companies refusing to allow independent review of the surveillance devices they push into American communities and are tied into a centralized national network. Deep consideration of the role of technology in law enforcement is especially important as AI products become more and more widespread, Stanley wrote.
The sheriff's department is also short two patrol vehicles. Two cruisers were wrecked in recent accidents in which the sheriff's department was not at fault, Riffle said. For one of the vehicles, a high speed chase on Aug. 31 ended when the driver of a stolen vehicle hit a deputy's cruiser. The deputy had no injuries. Commissioners approved Riffle's request to place an emergency item on the agenda so he could replace the vehicles. One of his deputies has no vehicle to drive at the moment.
County Clerk Julie Kincaid also straightened out an issue with one of the county's polling precincts. First Baptist Church, which had been planned to be the polling location for precinct 30, will no longer be used. Instead, Kincaid said the polling location has been moved to West Fairmont Middle School.
"First Baptist Church through no fault of our own became not available," Kincaid said. "It was purchased by an individual, they are currently doing some construction in there, so obviously we can no longer use it."
West Fairmont Middle is spacious and accessible enough to fit the need of a polling station, Kincaid said. Voters have been notified.
Commission also approved a roughly $103,000 funding request from Monongah. The town is trying to fix ongoing issues with its water system.
Commission also appointed Garrett Mock to the Marion County Solid Waste Authority board. He gave commissioners a report on a program the City of Mannington uses to collect old tires.
"Mannington has it every other week," Mock said. "Continuously, every other Saturday. Whenever we get any requests for tire disposal, we refer them to the town of Mannington."
Mock said the program takes 10 tires per household.
The next commission meeting is scheduled for Sept. 18.
©2024 the Times West Virginian, Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
