COUNTYWIDE : Links Between Police Radar Radiation, Cancers Debated

Although dozens of police officers across the country claim to have developed cancer from exposure to radiation from hand-held traffic radar guns, officials from Ventura County’s law enforcement agencies say they have no plans to stop using the devices.

Radar is used to catch speeders in the county by sheriff’s deputies, Ventura and Oxnard police, and California Highway Patrol officers.

A nationwide debate about the device’s safety was sparked last year when an Ohio state trooper published an article in a law enforcement publication linking cancer and traffic radar.

Gary Poynter said his research showed patterns of cancer in officers who used traffic radar, especially the hand-held devices, for long periods.

One officer who kept the device on his lap when not pointing it at cars developed testicular cancer, the article says. Others who sat directly in line with the antenna that records a radar beam’s speed also developed a variety of cancers.

The article prompted police departments across the country to consider whether the speed-checking devices were worth the potential risks. The Connecticut State Police and at least 20 other municipal departments in that state have stopped using traffic radar, as have departments in Florida.

The Ventura County Sheriff’s Department has concluded that there is not enough evidence to prove any link between the type of traffic radar it uses and cancer, Assistant Sheriff Oscar Fuller said.

Sgt. Jeff Allaire, a Sheriff’s Department radar instructor based in Thousand Oaks, said he volunteers information about the possible cancer risks during training sessions.

“I’m certainly not saying that it is 100% safe,” he said. “We’re not here to keep anyone in the dark.”

Allaire, who uses traffic radar himself, said he cautions officers to turn the devices off when they are not in use. The possibility that radar could cause cancer persuaded the CHP to add a special chapter to its radar safety manual, CHP academy instructor Steve Foulds said.