COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Federal officials this week oversaw the examination at a South Carolina jail of a cellphone signal jamming technique that some wish will assist war the danger posed by inmates with smuggled cellphones, officials told The Associated Press.
The examination took lay at the degree of five days at a housing unit at broad river Correctional Institution, a maximum-security jail at Columbia, South Carolina, according to conserve of honesty officials. Assistant lawyer mutual Beth Williams told AP it's the first time federal officials consume collaborated with officials at a status jail because such a test.
Officials did no free the results of the test, which will exist included at a afterward illustrate to exist done by the National Telecommunications and news Administration.
The examination marks further at the state-level quest to stamp out contraband cellphone use, which officials consume desire said represents the peak security danger within their institutions. Micro-jamming technique was tested final year at a federal jail - where officials said they were able to full down phone signals inside a jail cell, still devices approximately 20 feet (6 meters) away worked normally - cottage during a decades-old regulation says status or local agencies don't consume the authority to compress the public airwaves.
South Carolina Corrections Director Bryan Stirling, who because years has spoken out at the dangers posed by the devices smuggled into institutions by the thousands, told AP he was recently deputized because a especial delegate U.S. Marshal, therefore giving him the federal condition needed to accompany the jamming test.
"I'm equal encouraged by what we witnessed at broad river this week," Stirling told AP at Friday, adding that he's optimistic approximately federal legislation, introduced final month, that used to award status jail officials the ability to compress signals.
In 2008, South Carolina officials received a waiver from the Federal Communications committee to accompany a jamming examination at a different maximum-security prison, at a demonstration because media and other officials cottage during no at a jail dorm.
Stirling and other status jail directors avail other measures - although perimeter netting, monitoring by drone, and scanners - to find cellphones cottage during lawyer a jamming technique that used to full down complete signals because the best possible defense.
In 2017, Stirling testified at a FCC hearing at Washington alongside Robert Johnson, a previous South Carolina corrections officer approximately killed at 2010 at a hit orchestrated by an inmate using an illegal phone.
Also that year, an inmate escaped from a maximum-security jail at South Carolina, thanks at isolate to a smuggled cellphone. at 2018, seven inmates at a maximum-security South Carolina jail were killed at what officials consume said was a crowd campaign at sphere and contraband including cellphones.
The FCC has shown willingness to profession at the issue, holding a sphere hearing at South Carolina and hosting meetings with members of Congress, prisons officials and stakeholders from the wireless industry.
On Friday, Williams said officials are working to ensure prisons consume technological options to assist them war the smuggled devices.
"It is equal difficult to pattern definite that no contraband gets in," Williams told AP. "We test because difficult because we can, cottage during it's really difficult to soothe everything."
___
Meg Kinnard can exist reached at http://twitter.com/MegKinnardAP
