CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. (CLARKSVILLENOW) – The Montgomery County Jail may soon be purchasing $10,383 in riot gear, including six riot suits, six spiked vests, an electrified riot shield and a “generated low-output voltage emitter” (G.L.O.V.E) system.
The purchase was originally part of the county’s 2020-21 budget, but it was removed in June 2020, along with dozens of other items, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. County Mayor Jim Durrett reintroduced the item at January’s Budget Committee meeting, calling the gear a needed upgrade for the protection of officers.
“Really, the line of defense that a deputy inside the jail has is pepper spray,” Durrett said at the meeting. “This just provides, hopefully, a whole lot more protection.”
The budget committee approved adding the purchase back into the 2020-21 budget, which will be voted on at the County Commission’s February meeting.
The G.L.O.V.E
The G.L.O.V.E system, made by Compliant Technologies, is a pair of gloves capable of delivering up to 320 volts of electricity. According to the company, the glove device is made to enhance a user’s hand-to-hand combat capabilities.
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At the Budget Committee meeting, Deputy Chief John Smith said the gear would allow for the creation of a six-officer team on each shift capable of using the new gear to respond to emergency situations.
Compliant Technologies also sells an electronic shield matching Smith’s description at the meeting.
Like the G.L.O.V.E, the electronic shield is capable of delivering an electric shock to a person touching its front. One model also includes a disorienting strobe light in the center of the shield.
“Instead of having to strike somebody or pepper spray them, you can sort of corral them up into a corner, get them into compliance and take them where you need to. It’s an intermediate level of force to use on inmates to get them under control and protects the deputies at the same time,” Smith said.
Growing city, growing jail
In an interview with Clarksville Now, County Sheriff John Fuson compared the creation of a new emergency response unit in the jail to units like the bomb squad or K-9 unit.
“We don’t have an element inside the jail to deal with emergency situations,” Fuson said. “So we’ve created that, and this is just part of the equipment that is used to do that task. If you have a jail uprising, a fight, or a riot or something going on, or if you have to do a cell extraction, this equipment allows us to use as little force as possible to deal with that.”
Fuson said that while no major incidents have occurred at the jail to motivate the creation of such a unit, Clarksville’s explosive growth has created new needs for law enforcement.
“As our population starts to grow, and you get more and more folks that are in there for more and more violent crimes, the ingredients start to become readily available for things like that to happen,” said Fuson. “You just have to prepare yourself for those things as you seen them. It’s not primarily misdemeanors that are housed back here now until their court time. Most of them are major felons now.”