CASTLE ROCK — Some visitors to the Douglas County’s justice center on Monday thought they were being screened at the security checkpoint by a snazzy, new metal detector.
Instead, the facility is the first in the country to use a combination of a whole-body imager and metal detector to screen for a wide array of weapons and contraband, said Scott Ortolani, a manager with L-3 Communications, which makes the device.
The $250,000 millimeter-wave machine uses rotating antennas to produce an electronically stripped-down, 360-degree holographic image of the body.
“They should tell you before you go through. I didn’t know they strip you down,” said JoAnne Hicks of Castle Rock as she left the building with her 17-year-old daughter, Allison.
The two hadn’t seen brochures explaining the technology and the methods taken to protect privacy.
Denver International Airport and a handful of other airports are using L-3 whole-body scanners in pilot programs, but the machine that started operating at the justice center Monday is the first to combine metal detecting and body imaging, Ortolani said.
The body image appears on a shielded computer screen nearby, where a security officer verifies that the person is not carrying anything suspicious.
“The technology instantly discriminates between your body and virtually anything else, including plastic, ceramic, metal, paper, rubber and explosives,” the county says. “Your scan is deleted immediately after analysis. At no time is your identity or privacy compromised.”
Valerie Jones of Castle Rock stepped out of the imager Monday and said that the technology doesn’t trouble her.
“In this day and age, you have to do everything you can to protect U.S. citizens and government agencies,” she said. “They are looking for particular things and not attempting to invade privacy.”
Douglas County’s contract with L-3 calls for the face and groin area of each person to be blurred.
But there were some bugs to work out Monday because, in some cases, faces and groins were showing up on the screen being reviewed by a private security officer.
Ortolani explained that the machine still was programmed for administrators, who can override the privacy function that blurs body parts.
In addition, officers still are learning how to instruct people to properly position their hands above their heads as they stand in the machine. If hands are not placed correctly, the computer might not blur the correct parts of the body, Ortolani said.
Douglas County bought the machine, in part, because judges have been asking for improved screening technology, said Lt. Laurie Anderson of the county sheriff’s office, which oversees security at the facility. “We are always looking at new technology.”
The device also should speed the screening process by largely eliminating secondary searches that have created lines at the checkpoint in the past, said Victoria Starkey, facilities manager in the county’s public works department.
Jeffrey Leib: 303-954-1645 or jleib@denverpost.com
