ARKANSAS COMPUTERS STOLEN FROM CORRECTIONAL FACILITY Pine Bluff Commercial Online Edition: "INVESTIGATION ON IN COMPUTER THEFT

By The Commercial Staff
Wednesday, November 22, 2006 8:29 AM CST

A State Police investigation is continuing after 42 new laptop computers were reported missing from a Department of Correction office at Pine Bluff.

Prison spokeswoman Dina Tyler said the computers were discovered missing in October and had last been seen on Aug. 23 in a storage closet in the department’s Administrative Annex East building on East Harding Avenue.

“Obviously they didn’t sprout legs and walk out,” Tyler said. “We have no idea at this point if it was employees or inmates.”

Tyler said the computers, valued at $59,000, were to be used to record inmate medical information so the data could be put into a prison computer system. No state records had been stored on the computers, which were still in boxes.

No arrests have been made and state police would not discuss the investigation.

Tyler said 17 employees had keys to the storage area, but it also could have been left unlocked.

In addition, several inmates work in the building on a daily basis.

Tyler said the computers could have been disguised as trash to get them out of the building.

“Trash is supposed to be checked, but that’s a possibility,” she said.