{"id":53468,"date":"2025-01-16T21:15:52","date_gmt":"2025-01-17T02:15:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=53468"},"modified":"2025-01-16T21:45:40","modified_gmt":"2025-01-17T02:45:40","slug":"florida-poly-engineers-design-lifesaving-bodycam-tool-for-lakeland-police","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2025\/01\/16\/florida-poly-engineers-design-lifesaving-bodycam-tool-for-lakeland-police\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida Poly engineers design lifesaving bodycam tool for Lakeland police"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Officers with the Lakeland Police Department are now all equipped with a simple but lifesaving tool that was developed by mechanical engineers at Florida Polytechnic University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If a Lakeland police officer is responding to a call, their body camera will already be rolling, but if a sudden situation arises, double-clicking the camera to activate it may not be possible.<\/p>\n\n\n

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New Lifesaving Tool<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What we know:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a solution, the department upgraded their firearms and purchased specially designed holsters that are fitted with a bracket device. A Bluetooth-activated sensor within the holster triggers when a weapon is pulled out and alerts the cameras to begin recording. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It will also activate the dash camera in the officer’s nearby police vehicle as well as other officers’ body cameras within a 200-foot range simultaneously.<\/p>\n\n\n

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“This allows an officer who has been trained since the police academy how to deploy their weapons, how to escalate or de-escalate situations and still be able to do what they are trained to do without having to stop, pause, and worry if it’s not running,” said Lt. Frank Fitzgerald with LPD. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Engineers Who Designed it<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mechanical Engineers at Florida Polytechnic University designed the brackets to work with the department’s upgraded equipment. It’s designed on the computer and then 3D printed with carbon fiber-infused filament. It wasn’t a normal project for Mike Kalman, a fabrication specialist, but it sure was a rewarding one.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

“We don’t normally help the police. They’re supposed to help you. It’s a device that can save their lives and other lives too, so it’s just kind of cool,” said Kalman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Believe it or not, there are people who want to take these firearms away from us and do bad things,” said Fitzgerald. “This holster allows us to safely and securely maintain possession of our firearm and, in the token, quickly disengage the safety features to get the weapon out and unfortunately do what may need to be done.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What’s next:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The hope is other law enforcement agencies across the state can use the patent-pending brackets for the upgraded firearms and holsters as well.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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The Lakeland Police Department partnered with Florida Polytechnic University engineers when it needed a custom-designed holster bracket to ensure officers\u2019 body camera systems worked as they should. Mike Kalman, Florida Poly mechanical engineering fabrication specialist, and mechanical engineering graduate Matthew DeCicco \u201924 designed and produced the patent-pending bracket now in use. <\/em>
From left, Lt. Frank Fitzgerald, Capt. Ron Bowling, Jr., Kalman, and Chief Sammy Taylor.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Officers with the Lakeland Police Department are now all equipped with a simple but lifesaving tool that was developed by mechanical engineers at Florida Polytechnic University. If a Lakeland police officer is responding to… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53469,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"12","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNVwvMDFcL1NjcmVlbnNob3QtNzUtMTgtcG5nLndlYnA_Zml0PTQxNyUyQzI5MCZzc2w9MSIsInR4dCI6IkZsb3JpZGEgUG9seSBlbmdpbmVlcnMgZGVzaWduIGxpZmVzYXZpbmcgYm9keWNhbSB0b29sIGZvciBMYWtlbGFuZCBwb2xpY2UiLCJ0ZW1wbGF0ZSI6ImhpZ2h3YXkiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.pNFftfLTe_WFOp6W99KDfxZ1p6hr8h1JrC2NOcosymgMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":53469,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Screenshot-75-18-png.webp","type":"image\/png"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[10789],"class_list":["post-53468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-florida-poly-engineers-design-lifesaving-bodycam-tool-for-lakeland-police"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53468"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53481,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53468\/revisions\/53481"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}