LAKELAND, Fla. — Every Lakeland Police Officer is now wearing brand new technology that activates their body cameras, and that new technology was designed by a student and fabrication specialist at Florida Polytechnic University.
When the Lakeland Police Department purchased new firearms for officers, they ran into a problem. The vendor hadn’t created a bracket for the holsters for it yet that would work with the body cameras, so they turned to Florida Poly for help.
Mike Kalman, a fabrication specialist at the university, says within hours he and a student came up with a unique invention.
It’s a carbon-fiber mount that holds a sensor that detects when a firearm’s metal is no longer present in the holster, meaning the officer has drawn the weapon.
This movement would trigger the bodycam to begin recording if it hasn’t done so already.
“When I draw, that right there activates the body-worn camera,” said Lieutenant Frank Fitzgerald with the Lakeland Police Department, demonstrating how the bracket works.
Students used 3D printers to make enough for everyone on the force, and Kalman says creating something actually being used by law enforcement was a great experience for students.
“A lot of what I do is in university, it’s for classroom use, or maybe it’s for learning use of some kind, but a lot of what I do is not actually out in the real world,” he said. “So this being out in the real world, and on top of that, it’s saving lives, and helping police, helping citizens, that’s really cool.”
Back at Lakeland PD, Fitzgerald says thanks to Florida Poly, officers can focus on the task at hand in stressful situations, knowing all evidence is preserved.
“When a Lakeland Police Officer, or any officer, responds with a body-worn camera on their person, it’s a tool for investigative means, it preserves best evidence, and it’s for transparency and accountability so the public can see what we do, and what we don’t do,” he said.
The department is also using the brackets in their taser holsters.
Right now, the patent is pending for the brackets.
Florida Polytechnic officials say prior to producing the brackets for Lakeland PD, they tested them for about six months for safety and durability.
It took almost three months to print all of them.