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DuPage County's sex offender registry coordinator receives national award

If they knew who she was, or what she does, every parent in DuPage County would be lining up to befriend Kristen Jordan.

Jordan, a 17-year employee of the DuPage County Sheriff's office, has spent the past 11 years tracking the movement of the county's roughly 370 sex offenders. She knows where they live, what cars they drive and how they ended up on the registry.

"Yeah, My friends with kids) all want to know," she said. "They all do."

She was honored Thursday by the OffenderWatch Network as one of the country's leading users of the software the department and 3,700 others across 38 states use to monitor registered sex offenders.

"(Jordan) is, by far, one of most proficient users of all aspects of the system," said OffenderWatch representative Kevin Krews. "I call on her for help so much. She probably regrets giving me her cell number."

Sheriff James Mendrick said he was proud to see Jordan get the recognition for keeping DuPage County safe from sexual offenders and predators.

From managing the new offender registrations and tracking of sex offenders, along with leading the department's SPEAR (Sexual Predator Enforcement and Registration) unit, he said she assures that every patrol deputy has all the information they need on the location and status of offenders at all times.

"As a longtime patrol commander, I counted on Kristen and her work a lot," Mendrick said. "So I'm confident now that every patrol commander and deputy goes on the street with the most up-to-date information on all of our offenders every day."

Jordan, who also serves as the Forensics Investigations Unit's administrative assistant, said she was honored to be nationally recognized.

"I'm just doing my job and trying to keep us all safe," she said. "And I couldn't do it without everyone else in the unit helping me."

Mendrick said the honor led to her entire unit nominating Jordan for Employee of the Month, which, if she wins, puts her in the running for Employee of the Year.

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