El Paso Police Dept. want company hired to help with booking arrestees

The El Paso Police Department is asking City Council to sign a contract with G4S Secure Solutions to provide prisoner booking, transportation and watch services for the police department.

The item will be discussed at the Tuesday, Aug. 14 City Council meeting.
If approved, El Paso Police officials said G4S will provide highly trained and vetted guards to assist the department with the entire booking process.

Currently, an officer who makes an arrest must, process, transport and book the arrestee into the El Paso County Detention Facility (jail). G4S’s personnel, if approved, will assume the responsibility of processing (i.e. fingerprinting), and transport to and booking into the jail. Also, if for any reason the arrestee needs a medical release before booking, G4S will take him or her to a hospital for the release and then onto the jail.

Police officials said the processing, transporting and booking process can be very time consuming and prevents officers who make an arrest from returning to the field in a timely manner. One of the findings by a recent study of the police department by MGT of America (MGT) was how much time officers spend booking prisoners and how this significantly contributes to the low percentage of time police officers have for pro-active policing. MGT recommended contracting for these services.