Stephen Morris, assistant director of the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division, welcomes people to Tuesday’s dedication of the Biometrics Technology Center in Clarksburg. Behind him are Amy Hess, executive assistant director of the FBI’s science and technology branch in Washington, D.C.; U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.; Brig. Gen. Mark Inch, who oversees the U.S. Army’s criminal investigation command; Don Salo, director of the U.S. Army’s Defense Forensics and Biometrics Agency; and the Rev. Hilarion Cann, CJIS chaplain.
CLARKSBURG,W.Va. — FBI and Department of Defense officials dedicated a new facility Tuesday that will combine the two agencies’ cutting-edge research into identifying and catching criminals and terrorists.
About 200 people gathered under cloudy skies for the ribbon-cutting at the Biometric Technology Center on the sprawling campus of the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division in Clarksburg.
“The partnership embodied by this facility will ultimately strengthen the country’s ability to combat crime and terrorism in the country and around the world,” Assistant CJIS Director Stephen Morris told those attending the ceremony.
Biometrics is the science of identifying individuals through physical or behavioral traits such as facial or voice recognition, palm prints and iris scans.
FBI employees who work in biometrics and personnel with the U.S. Army’s Defense Forensics and Biometrics Agency in Clarksburg will move into the four-story, 360,000-square-foot facility by the end of the year.
The ceremony featured several speakers at a tent-covered podium on the facility’s plaza. In addition to the speakers, the FBI Police Honor Guard presented colors, and the CJIS Choir sang the national anthem.
Dan Salo, director of the Defense Forensics and Biometrics Agency, likened the partnership between the FBI and Defense Department to a courtship that has evolved into a marriage arranged by the late Sen. Robert C. Byrd…
