News and Information

School Scanner Nabs Sex Offender
By RONNIE BLAIR, rblair@tampatrib.com

Sep 24, 2005 – NEW PORT RICHEY – An electronic scanning system designed to detect sexual offenders coming on campuses paid off this week at Seven Springs Elementary, school and sheriff's officials said Friday.

A man helping his girlfriend drop off her son's lunchbox was arrested Thursday after a computer scan of his identification revealed he was a sexual offender in Illinois, officials said.

Seven Springs Elementary is one of two schools in Pasco where the sexual-offender tracking system is in operation, and this is the first time either school reported a hit after scanning a visitor's identification, said Lori Yusko, a school district spokeswoman.

David Bryson Rutherford, 26, of 5200 Behms Court in Port Richey, was charged with failure to register as a sex offender and booked into the Land O' Lakes jail, with bail set at $10,000.

When Rutherford and his girlfriend came to the school, the child's teacher happened to be in the office and took the lunchbox from them, said Kevin Doll, a spokesman for the Pasco County Sheriff's Office.

The couple left, but the identification check already was being run. When the computer listed Rutherford as a sexual offender in Illinois, the school resource officer was notified, Doll said.

The officer contacted the sheriff's sexual offender unit, and Rutherford later was arrested at his home, according to an arrest report.

The report said Rutherford moved to Florida in February and obtained a state identification card July 26 but had not registered as a sexual offender, as required.

Rutherford's criminal record in Illinois includes a charge of aggravated criminal sexual assault of a victim younger than 13, according to the Illinois State Police Web site. No details were available.

The computer software that checks for sex offenders was installed recently at Seven Springs Elementary after the principal and the school advisory council heard about its use at Lake Myrtle Elementary in Land O' Lakes, Yusko said.

Lake Myrtle, the first Pasco school to install the system, began using it in March.

Here's how the system works: When a visitor comes into the school office and wants to go elsewhere on campus, the person's driver's license or other photo identification is scanned into a computer.

Software on the computer then checks sexual offender databases for 42 states to determine whether the person is listed, Yusko said.

The software used by Lake Myrtle and Seven Springs elementary schools is produced by Raptor Technologies of Houston.

More Pasco schools plan to take advantage of the technology. Sanders Memorial Elementary in Land O' Lakes is in the process of installing the system, and Woodland Elementary in Zephyrhills just purchased it, Yusko said.

Schools Superintendent Heather Fiorentino has asked district staff to explore installing the system districtwide, Yusko said. There are other companies with similar systems, she said, and the district will determine which is the most cost-effective.