3M to distribute AMS' portable breathalyzers for law enforcement

3M Co. is upping its game when it comes to monitoring parolees and criminal defendants for alcohol use.

Last month, 3M agreed to distribute the portable SCRAM Remote Breath breathalyzers made by Colorado-based Alcohol Monitoring Systems. The device is expected to be a hit with 3M's state and county customers, which have long sought a way to test parolees for alcohol use when they are away from the home.

For more than 10 years, 3M sold and leased stationary devices to county correction departments that tested the alcohol levels of parolees and defendants while they were inside their home. But the devices could not test alcohol use when the subjects were at work, school or elsewhere.

AMS' new handheld and portable alcohol testing device costs roughly $1,000 and features industry-changing automated facial recognition software. It also offers GPS tracking, and verbal instructions on when to take the test. Results are downloaded wirelessly and accessed by clients.

Three weeks ago, 3M officials began demonstrating the device to law enforcement customers in California, Florida, Virginia, Ohio, Rhode Island and Pennsylvania. It has yet to win its first order, but that's coming, officials insist.

"We will be the national distributor for this," said Paul Drews, 3M's vice president for strategic partnerships. The target pool of customers is large. "Each year, there are close to a million and a half people arrested for DWI and 750,000 of them are convicted of DWI. Those are all potential candidates [for the product] as we look at our market."

Angela Dreis, president of 3M Electronic Monitoring U.S., said the SCRAM Remote solves a problem for 3M customers. "Our corrections and law enforcement customers were asking for a portable breath alcohol testing solution from 3M," she said. "We believe the SCRAM device is the best on the market today and a great addition to our portfolio of industry leading electronic monitoring solutions."

3M's key to making its AMS partnership a success may lie in its relationships with law enforcement and judicial systems. 3M already sells offender monitoring equipment products in 40 countries and helps monitor more than 200,000 offenders around the world.

3M's electronic monitoring products include radio-frequency ID and GPS location tracking wrist and ankle bracelets, as well as its line of stationary alcohol testing systems. In September, New Zealand's Department of Corrections awarded 3M a five-year contract to supply all its offender monitoring equipment.

With AMS's pager-sized SCRAM device, 3M will have one more tool to sell to law enforcement departments across the world.

AMS, with 136 employees, has been making various types of alcohol-monitoring systems for offenders for 17 years. It introduced its "transdermal" sweat/alcohol monitoring anklet in 2003 for high-risk and hard-core alcoholics that needed to be monitored around the clock. Since then, the anklets have monitored 380,000 offenders across the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom.

AMS's new SCRAM Remote Breath device is designed for low-risk offenders who may have had just one DWI, explained AMS spokeswoman Kathleen Brown. AMS spent 18 months designing the breathalyzer and face recognition capabilities before introducing the product to the marketplace one year ago, she said.

That feature reduces the time that officers must spend verifying identities, she said. Previously, low-level offenders either went to the police station to get tested or used a stationary test at home that required officers to match photos with offender profiles. The new system cuts police monitoring time by 90 percent.

When 3M learned about it, officials called AMS and asked about possibly distributing the device, Drews said.

3M and AMS had worked together on the anklet product a decade ago. This summer, they began collaborating again. "We are very excited about this 3M partnership. They are a fantastic company and are in lock step with what our goals are," Brown said. To date, 2,400 of the units have been sold. With 3M's distribution might on board, that number is expected to multiply rapidly, she said.