New Body Scanner Is A ‘Game Changer’ For Kosciusko County Jail

Loaded with artificial intelligence that continues to learn the more it’s used, the new body scanner at the Kosciusko County Jail is a game changer, according to Sheriff Jim Smith.
The Soter RS full-body security X-ray scanner, developed by OD Security, was part of Smith’s commitment to upgrade the jail’s scanner from the one it had since 2018.
“Technology just kind of surpassed its capabilities. It was tough for the staff, without truly studying - probably even going to college maybe - the human anatomy and what’s normal and what’s not, where this new one is more modernized and with the A.I. features. It just takes a lot of the thinking out of it for them and allows them to be able to just scan it,” Smith stated.
“With this new feature, it’s changed the game.”
He said inmates, especially those who come in and out of the jail, knew what the limitations of the old scanner were. Jail staff found some inmates would attempt to sneak in contraband by ingesting it, tucking it into their waistbands and other methods, knowing it likely would not be found.
“But that game eventually changed with these features,” Smith said.
Contraband includes drugs, weapons, chewing tobacco, alcohol, vapes, razors, money and anything that is deemed to not be allowed in the jail.
Before the first body scanner was purchased back in 2018, inmates had to be patted down for contraband, but there were rules that had to be followed.
“So prior to 2018, it would be next to impossible to know if somebody swallowed a bag of narcotics or something,” Smith said. “Having a dog certainly helps. We implemented that one when I came into office, but this (scanner) is just another really good tool.”
He said Jail Commander Kevin Gelbaugh has done a great job on taking a few of his jail officers and getting them trained on the Soter RS body scanner so that they could then can train the other staff.
Gelbaugh said day shift Sgt. Mariah Rumple is the lead. “She and another officer will be our X-ray officers. We have to have one of those, we’re going to have two on staff. The machine had to be tested. It’s already passed through the state, to the certification. And then, they will do training and actually get these guys proficient on it, and there’s a training module in it that can assist, which the other one did not have.”
Training on the Soter RS took up to two hours, which provided explanations on everything from anatomy, how the scanner works, why it works to rules and regulations.
“Then they went back and actually did hands-on and registered into the system. When I go back to run someone, I just lay my thumb on it and it IDs me as who I am by my thumbprint, and then it puts all my information in there,” Gelbaugh said. “So it tracks every person who has been booked, and it tracks who the one providing the scan is.”
Smith said that will come in handy with repeat offenders. “If you have one on file, you can use it as a comparison,” so that if a person is arrested again the new scan can be compared to the previous one to determine if something may be hidden. All the scans are stored securely in the Cloud.
“Everyone that gets booked in, it’s part of the booking process that they go through that,” Smith stated.
No one can opt out of the body scan, though Jail Officer Kyle Blocher said they don’t scan pregnant women or people with pacemakers.
The Soter RS comes with THEIA, an integrated A.I.-driven digital assistant that automatically detects anomalies and contraband in real time. Smith reiterated the A.I. feature has “just changed the game.” Jail officers are trained on the scanner without the A.I. first so they can just see what they see on their own. They then are trained on the A.I. features.
Blocher said a person’s body is the same on both sides, so if a person’s hands are positioned differently or if the arms are flaired out differently, the scanner will highlight that or “anything that’s not the same.”
Gelbaugh said the scanner is looking for straight lines. “There are no straight lines in the human body. Period. That’s what it’s looking for,” he said. “And when you eat something, it’s 12 to 16 hours for it to travel the body. So if I do an X-ray on him right now and he just ate a granola bar, you’re going to see it in his stomach. In two hours, you should be able to progressively watch that move through his abdomen and through his entire intestinal system.
“If you think that he swallowed something, and you see an abnormality - it doesn’t mean it’s drugs automatically, it could just be a gas bubble or something, but there’s ways to determine that. You go back two hours later and take it again, and if that has not moved or it has changed or something, you can determine that there’s something else there and then we’d have to take them to a hospital to get them checked by a doctor,” Gelbaugh explained.
The sheriff’s office put about a third of the cost of the scanner down using commissary funds at the end of last year to secure the scanner’s 2025 price before the cost went up this year. The county’s opioid settlement committee recommended $115,000 of the unrestricted opioid funds be used toward the remainder of the cost, with the county commissioners approving the recommendation at their meeting Monday.
There is an annual fee for upgrades.
“The system will update yearly. It’s learning all the time, with A.I. So, they take the information and the data and it updates yearly, unless they find something substantial that would upgrade the system, then we would get that prior to that one year,” Gelbaugh stated.
Before it was decided to go with the Soter RS, Gelbaugh and his staff traveled to Boone County where it already was in use.
“Something that helped sell me on it was, again to Kevin’s point, it’s always learning,” Smith said, and if it learns something in Boone County, then all the users of Soter RS scanners get the benefit of what it learned.
“It’s always learning, it’s always updating,” Gelbaugh said.
Smith said once they got the scanner, they had to wait a little bit before the jail started using it because it had to be legally certified through the state. The certification process took almost two weeks, Gelbaugh estimated.
“It goes through the same process that your X-ray machines (do), from my understanding, because it’s technically considered that,” Gelbaugh said.
Chief Deputy Chris McKeand said the body scanner goes through a similar safeguard process that a medical device would go through, though he didn’t know if it was considered a medical device or not. The certificate hangs on the wall next to the scanner.
Blocher said there’s also print-outs on the wall next to the scanner that explain “how much radiation it puts off, compared to stuff like the dentist or getting an X-ray from the doctor. It’s substantially less.” While demonstrating the scanner later, he showed the print-out that indicated the dose of radiation from the scanner was minimal.
As of Wednesday’s interview, Gelbaugh said he’s not been told of anything interesting found yet by the scanner and he didn’t know of any charges that have been filed for anybody.
“Most people will give up whatever it is prior to,” Gelbaugh said, and Blocher agreed. “They pretty much let us know.”
“Because they see that and know what’s about to happen,” Smith said.
Blocher said they do have signs posted informing people that if they do come to the jail with contraband, once they hit a certain point they will be charged with trafficking.
“So, almost in a way, it’s like the dog. It’s a really good deterrent, if nothing else. But it certainly has the capabilities of finding things that aren’t supposed to be in you or on you,” Smith said.
He said the sheriff’s office and jail are happy to have the new scanner.
“It’s just another example of us just trying to not become stagnant, continue to advance. Technology’s kind of forced us to advance, a lot faster than maybe sometimes you’d like, but it’s no different than if you buy a computer today and there’s already one that’s more advanced. That’s just the way it is anymore,” Smith said.
He said the scanner is a necessary precaution in terms of keeping the jail safe, “and we’re committed to the safety of all the staff and the inmates inside the Kosciusko County Jail.”
Gelbaugh said the jail staff was just thankful that the sheriff saw that the scanner was worth all the time and effort, as well as the commissioners and council agreeing and stepping up, with the opioid committee jumping in and providing the funds to get the scanner.
“Because it’s a huge game changer for the jail staff,” he said.
McKeand said, “Another key aspect to it is, we have KCRP operating in the jail, and we have JCAP operating in the jail, and we’ve had great success with what’s going on with both of those programs and we’ve seen a very positive trend as far as what it’s been able to do for the inmate population. And for us to do everything we can to keep those substances out of the jail, to continue the success of those programs, I think is huge. And this is one of those steps.”