‘Enough is enough:’ Canyon Sheriff’s Office eyes body scanner for jail after overdoses

Canyon County officials are in the process of purchasing a body scanner for the jail in Caldwell following several overdoses in recent months, including one that resulted in a woman’s death.

On June 1, members of the Canyon County Sheriff’s Office met with county commissioners to discuss six bids received to obtain the scanner, which law enforcement says can address safety and health concerns at the jail. Body scanners allow officials to detect whether a person has ingested contraband or hid something in a body cavity.

No final decisions on the bids were made during the meeting, but the Sheriff’s Office said it will notify bidders on next steps in the process. Officials said they did narrow the search based on different criteria, mainly in terms of cost to taxpayers and the size of the machine, which will go in a fairly small room at the aging facility.

As of early this week, a date had not been set for another discussion on the body scanner purchase.

Sheriff’s Office Capt. Harold Patchett told the Idaho Statesman that the body scanner would be placed in a room with a limited amount of space near a port entrance to the jail. Someone being processed into the jail would go through the scanner so deputies could determine whether they have any substances or materials before going on to the intake area.

The process of purchasing a body scanner began earlier this year when Sheriff Kieran Donahue wrote a memo on March 24 to jail staff saying he would make an “executive decision” to pursue one. On April 29, the county’s Board of Commissioners approved a legal notice to accept bids, setting up the discussion on June 1.

Donahue wrote in the March memo that there were multiple drug overdoses that required major medical attention, including a fatal overdose in December 2020 and an overdose in March in which a woman narrowly survived. He stressed the need to address the jail’s drug issues immediately.

“This may seem like an aggressive endeavor and it is,” Donahue wrote. “However, we have a direct need to address this issue sooner rather than later.”

On Dec. 17, Georgina Laws, a Caldwell woman, died after she “swallowed an extremely dangerous amount of methamphetamine in baggies,” according to Donahue’s memo.

Jail staff noticed that Laws was “struggling to walk” after she was led out of a shower room by deputies, according to records from the Sheriff’s Office provided to the Statesman. Laws reportedly slid off a bench in the jail’s booking area, and a nurse later found that Laws had a low oxygen level. She was taken to the West Valley Medical Center in Caldwell, where she died.

Donahue also described a close call on March 5, when a woman became unresponsive and needed immediate medical attention. While en route to a hospital, the woman needed Narcan to revive her. Narcan is a nasal spray that is administered to someone who is overdosing on opioids.

According to Donahue, the woman later told medical staff that she ingested an “extreme” number of pills while at the jail and that she smuggled the pills into the facility by putting them in one of her body cavities.

Though his memo was sent out in March, Donahue told the Statesman during a phone interview in May that the Sheriff’s Office has wanted to purchase a body scanner for the past several years, but money and a lack of space were concerns. He said the overdoses were the last straw.

“Enough is enough,” Donahue said. “As the sheriff, I am responsible for the care and custody of those individuals ... and I take that very seriously. They are in my care and custody, and we should, as sheriffs, and as a society do everything we can to protect those people in our care and custody. That is our responsibility.”

Though he acknowledged that he doesn’t set the county’s budget, Donahue said money needs to be allocated to address this issue. He said history shows the extremes to which people will go to smuggle things into the jail.

“We have to do better ... both for the inmates that we are in the care and custody of, and for my staff,” Donahue said.

He said another reason for the delay in pursuing a scanner was the ongoing hope of getting a new jail built in Canyon County, something officials have been looking to do for some time. Voters have rejected four bond votes in about a decade. Most recently, voters said no to a $187 million bond in May 2019. Just over 34% of voters were in favor of that jail bond initiative.

Currently the old jail in Caldwell can house about 523 people, though it consists of makeshift facilities to expand its capacity. A tent facility was built in 2005 and is still in use today, despite a history of escapes and attempts to flee. Officials made improvements to the tent facility in 2017. In 2020, the jail began housing women in a series of trailer beds welded together in the jail’s parking lot. Up to 122 inmates can be accommodated there.