In response to the shooting of a Family Court judge in Washoe County, the Clark County Courts (Eighth Judicial District Court and the Las Vegas Township Justice Court) have increased security at the Regional Justice Center and the Family Court and Services Center. This increased security includes perimeter patrols, increased scanning of customers and scans of nearby buildings. This increased security will last indefinitely.
Earlier this week Channel 3 reported that a knife had entered the Regional Justice Center (RJC) and made it to a courtroom in the Las Vegas Township Justice Court. The knife had passed by the security screeners and was discovered later when an attorney identified it in a man’s pocket and alerted a bailiff.
The story featured comments by Justice of the Peace Doug Smith, who correctly was upset that a knife had entered his courtroom. The individual who brought the knife into court was cited for having a concealed weapon. Currently Nevada statues specifically prevent people from bringing knives into buildings such as schools, but no statue exists for Nevada courtrooms or courthouses. Judge Smith suggested that the law should be changed to include banning knives from entering courthouses across the state.
After the knife was confiscated, it was brought down to the screening equipment to find out why it had not been detected. During this test screening, the equipment only identified the knife two out of four attempts. This meant the equipment needed to be recalibrated, which it was, and the knife was then detected each time it was passed through the screener. All security screening equipment was recalibrated to the new setting and now the equipment has been alerting on many small metal items, such as pen caps and jewelry.
District Court is responsible for security in the building and the court takes this responsibility very seriously. Whenever a problem is identified, it is viewed as an opportunity to find out what went wrong and to find ways to correct the problem. New procedures are being considered to further improve security at the Regional Justice Center, based on these recent events and an audit recently completed by the U.S. Marshals Service.
Since the building opened in October 2005, nearly 500,000 visitors have passed through the screening equipment. That equals nearly 6,000 people per day. Since October, this is the first known incident where a knife has passed through the security scanners undetected.
