Automated equipment management supports safe prison operations

Precision matters in correctional facilities. Vague administrative processes and tracking create unnecessary risk. In equipment distribution, that translates to unnecessary delays in provisioning officers and incomplete audit trails. That was the exact challenge Zweibrücken Prison faced. Equipment handoffs for walkie-talkies and firearms during shift changes clearly needed centralized control.

Additionally, the facility needed a storage solution to communicate with their existing alarm software. They wanted any equipment-related security alerts to be registered immediately on their central monitoring system. Facility managers also needed a way to guarantee that their walkie-talkies would have sufficient battery life when staff checked them out for a shift.

To address these requirements, ecos systems installed a self-managed network of equipment management lockers for Zweibrücken Prison. ecos installed 405 Depot-M lockers with customized cabinets built to hold the institution’s specific equipment inventory.

These lockers use wireless RFID scanners to log exactly when staff remove an item and when they return it. For the walkie-talkies, the system also monitors the charging status of docked devices in the locker compartments. The system releases only the most-charged radios when an officer signs one out from inventory. And as required, ecos integrated the entire locker network directly into the prison's existing alarm infrastructure.

The ecos lockers rollout quickly standardized equipment distribution for the prison. The RFID tracking now provides administrators with an automated electronic ledger of equipment usage updated in real time. They have complete visibility into signouts and use of their firearms and walkie-talkies.

Thanks to the lockers’ charge recognition functionality, officers now start their shifts with fully charged radios every single time. No more accidentally taking a radio with a depleted battery by mistake. And the direct integration with the facility's alarm software also provides management with immediate alerts when there’s an irregular sign-out attempt or when firearms aren’t returned on time. Prison staff no longer spend excessive time tracking down and managing equipment just to keep basic operations running. The ecos system handles the busy work for them so staff can focus on more important duties.