An unnerving coincidence for a Fort Worth dad who went to visit his child's school in Fort Worth. A new computerized security system alerted staff that he might be a sex offender.
A promotional video from Raptor Technologies shows how it's supposed to work. Parents entering schools have their id's scanned, usually a driver's license, and a printer spits out a pass.
But when Jose Jimenez turned over his Texas driver's license, he got a shocking response. "When they put it into the computer, they say he could not be there because he was a sex offender," said his neighbor, Maria Miranda, who acted as interpreter.
He's not a sex offender. But when the computer searched a nationwide database, it found a close match. A Jose Jimenez listed as an absconder on Arizona's list of registered sex offenders. The Fort Worth Jose Jimenez says he's never even been to Arizona.
The middle names are different, but the height and weight are similar. The CEO of Raptor said the mix-up is partly due to the fact that Arizona does not list dates of birth on the registry. The principal compared the photos, and let Jimenez into the school.
"The system did work," said Fort Worth ISD spokesman Clint Bond. "We got a potential alert. We checked it out. It proved to be false."
Jimenez told us he's not worried, because he knows he's not the person on the list. But he did file a police report, just to make sure his identity had not been stolen by a sex offender -- and to have something on the record should the issue come up again.
Reached by phone Wednesday afternoon, the CEO of Raptor Technologies said that although the system is new to Fort Worth, it is in 12,000 schools in 45 states. Jim Vesterman said Raptor has flagged 15,000 registered sex offenders trying to enter schools. ..Source.. by Delaney Bentley
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