INC NEWS - More fingerprinting gets support (N&O)

[Newman Aguiar]

More fingerprinting gets support
Durham groups sound call again

By MICHAEL BIESECKER, Staff Writer


DURHAM -- Since before Durham's downtown jail opened in 1996, local leaders
have talked about the need to fingerprint those booked on misdemeanor
charges.

County Manager Mike Ruffin says this year he will make every effort to pay
for the measure, which could help nab those who provide false names and
crack cases by greatly expanding the digital database investigators use to
identify prints collected at crime scenes. Now, only those charged with
felonies are fingerprinted.

Past estimates by the Sheriff's Office have said the expanded effort could
require $1.4 million to cover new equipment, a sizable addition onto the
jail and up to 14 additional jailers and technicians. A consulting firm
recently hired to study operations at the Durham County jail said the job
could be accomplished for much less.

Ruffin intends to ask county commissioners to add about $250,000 to the
jail's annual operating budget to pay for five added positions, but he said
that might not be possible when weighed against the county's other pressing
needs.

"I may do fingerprinting, but I might not be able to do all five," Ruffin
said Thursday as he was ensconced in his office, crunching numbers. He is
set to present his budget recommendations to the commissioners May 23.

The measure would not include everyone charged with misdemeanors in Durham
County, only those brought to the jail to appear before a magistrate. Last
year, 8,592 of the 12,747 bookings at the detention center were for
misdemeanor offenses -- about 67 percent.

North Carolina's largest counties -- Wake, Mecklenburg, Guilford and Forsyth
-- already fingerprint everyone processed in their jails. Funding the
measure was a top priority for the Durham Roundtable's Committee on Crime, a
group of Bull City business and community leaders. The leaders have proposed
a battery of measures long championed by local law enforcement officers and
told county officials they would support a tax increase if the improvements
could not be paid for any other way.

"We'll see if it happens," said Barker French, the chairman of the crime
committee. "We feel strongly that if in their wisdom the commissioners can't
do it in the current budget, that they would increase the tax rate up to a
penny to implement some of these measures."

A penny on the county tax rate, now 79 cents per $100 in assessed property
value, would generate an estimated $2 million.

Beyond the $250,000 Ruffin could propose, fingerprinting everyone booked at
the jail would likely require the county to fork out much more.

Though the idea has been floated of using a surplus school classroom trailer
to provide the extra space needed for the program, the deputy who runs the
jail said such a setup might not meet the state's minimum requirements for
handling detainees.

In addition to extra jailers, expanding the fingerprinting operation would
likely require additional holding cells, toilets and electronic networking.
There would also be security concerns with shuffling inmates to and from a
trailer parked outside the jail.

"As a practical matter, I don't know," said Lt. Col. George Naylor, when
asked whether a trailer would work. "This has been discussed for years, but
it always gets to the point of how much it will cost and falls through. ...
They must have had some conversation with somebody that knows what it will
take."



Staff writer Michael Biesecker can be reached at 956-2421 or
mbieseck at newsobserver.com. <mailto:mbieseck at newsobserver.com> 

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