PASSENGERS: SMILE, YOU'RE ON VERY CANDID CAMERA

Hidden behind gray-and-pink carpeted barricades in the customs area of
Miami International Airport lies a piece of the latest technology in the
fight against international drug trafficking.

The tall gray box sees through clothing and produces images that U.S.
Customs Service agents say will help reveal drugs that smugglers are hiding
in increasingly sophisticated ways.

On Thursday, Customs Commissioner Raymond Kelly inspected the body-imaging
machine that officials said had revealed 3 pounds of marijuana in a bicycle
tire strapped around a man's waist two days earlier.

In that case, the machine produced a pixelated image that distorted the
physique of the thin male suspect, making him appear stocky and round, but
clearly showed bulges around his middle.

That was enough, though, to provide the first seizure attributed to the
machine, which has been used on 23 people at the airport since Feb. 1.

"It's as effective as a pat down, but it doesn't look into the body," Kelly
said. "We're pretty well committed to using this type of technology. It's a
question of getting funding and where we go from here."

The Customs Service has only one other such device in use - in New York
City's Kennedy International Airport. Soon other airports may offer
travelers who are suspected of carrying drugs, but decline to let
inspectors pat them down, the option of being scanned.

It's part of a plan to improve the image and accountability of an agency
facing 12 lawsuits nationwide over body searches of airline passengers.

Kelly is convinced of the safety of the body-imaging machines.

"The radiation is less than somebody would be exposed to on (a) flight," he
said.

A decision should be made by June on which manufacturer to use for the
body-imaging machine and airports in Chicago and Los Angeles probably would
get them next if Congress provides the money, Kelly said.

Also coming soon for Miami's airport - if funding and space are available -
would be an in-house X-ray area, so suspects would not have to be
transported in handcuffs to hospitals for examinations, Kelly said.

Miami's airport also is sporting new signs explaining what the U.S. Customs
Service does. Only English signs are posted now, but signs soon will come
Spanish and other languages, Kelly said.

"We've got to do, are doing, a more effective job of communicating what
people may be faced with," Kelly said.