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Other than Prison, Electronic Monitoring is 'the Most Restrictive Form' of Control, Research Finds (nbcnews.com) 50

Posted by msmash from the closer-look dept.
An anonymous reader shares a report: In the past 18 months, as the judicial system has increasingly used electronic monitoring instead of prisons to monitor inmates through the coronavirus pandemic, newly released data confirm what activists and advocates have long argued: Ankle monitors are onerous, and they often subject wearers to vague rules, like avoiding people of "disreputable character." The ankle monitoring business, the research found, is also dominated by four profit-seeking companies, and it ultimately could drive more people back to prison.

The new, comprehensive collection of hundreds of electronic monitoring-related rules, policies and contracts, obtained through public records requests across 44 states, demonstrates that four companies that make millions of dollars a year account for 64 percent of the contracts examined in the study. The companies -- Attenti, BI Inc., Satellite Tracking of People and Sentinel Offender Services LLC, according to the report -- also keep location data indefinitely, even after monitoring is completed, which is within the law. Governments also often require family members or employers to act as agents of the government and report potential violations, putting them in an awkward position in which they must be both supportive and supervisory.

Crucially, wearers must pay both one-time and ongoing fees for the monitors, which can be $25 to over $8,000 a year. The report argues that such costs "undermine financial security when it is needed most." By comparison, the Justice Department's Bureau of Prisons said in 2018 that it costs just under $100 per day to incarcerate a federal inmate, or over $36,000 a year. Put another way, wearers in Los Angeles and Sacramento counties in California, which impose the highest annual costs, according to the new findings, pay $22 a day -- still considerably less than what taxpayers would otherwise pay.
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Other than Prison, Electronic Monitoring is 'the Most Restrictive Form' of Control, Research Finds More

Other than Prison, Electronic Monitoring is 'the Most Restrictive Form' of Control, Research Finds

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  • Software as a Service was the most insidious form of control.
    What? Wrong topic? Sorry, I'll go away now.

  • Way too many complex discussions here... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by eepok ( 545733 ) on Friday September 24, 2021 @02:11PM (#61829245) Homepage

    There are only so many types of restricting someone's movements:

    1. Imprisonment - Jail, Prison, etc.
    2. Active Monitoring - Electronic anklet/bracelet
    3. Passive Monitoring - Required check-ins to confirm that you're still in a certain area

    Vague Rules

    Yes, vague rules are required within parole because the discrete and exact rules would be too many. Imagine listing out ALL the types of people one should not associate if they want to continue their rehabilitation successfully.

    four companies that make millions of dollars a year account for 64 percent of the contracts examined in the study.

    They "make millions", sure, but how much of that is profit? How much would it cost if the service was provided by public employees?

    also keep location data indefinitely, even after monitoring is completed, which is within the law.

    Because recidivism is a thing and you tend to want to have a record of movement to evaluate claims of criminal involvement or innocence. Of course, there should be a time limit to expunge the data-- like 5 years after no criminal activity.

    wearers must pay both one-time and ongoing fees for the monitors, which can be $25 to over $8,000 a year.

    Now this is stupid. I don't think any criminal should have to pay for the cost of their punishment. Restitution is one thing ("You stole $5,000 and thus must pay back $5,000), but philosophically, the cost should be born by the society or else the society doesn't have sufficient incentive to decrease the probability of punishment. Functionally, putting the expense on the criminal puts further strain on rehabilitation process thereby increasing the probability of recidivism.

    • Prison isn't about rehabilitation, it's about revenge and abuse. Abuse because of revenge, and honestly, simply because we can. Sadly.

      Yes, I know, they claim otherwise.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        Prison is about incapacitation. Prison exists keep people who have proven themselves to be a danger to the person or property of others, be that a physical danger or something like fraud.

        The other aspect is deterrence. It might look like revenge or abuse but its about sending a message to other would be law breakers.

        Generally speaking if someone is in prison they are not able to do much harm to those on the outside. Prison is good we actually need A WHOLE LOT MORE PRISONS. All of those illegal boarder cros

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Ichijo ( 607641 )

          Prison is about incapacitation. Prison exists keep people who have proven themselves to be a danger to the person or property of others, be that a physical danger or something like fraud.

          If that were true, then why do we let people out of prison without rehabilitating them?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by eepok ( 545733 )

            Because we have an ongoing conflict between the philosophy/ideal of the corrections process and the amount of money that we as a society are willing to spend on the corrections process.

            Prison is definitely about incapacitation and, depending on the prison, it can be a source of genuine rehabilitation. Unfortunately, the vast majority of prisons put nearly the entirety of the burden of rehabilitation on the will of the imprisoned. We *could* put in the requisite effort to actually improve people, but we're n

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by cusco ( 717999 )

          A very large percentage of people in prison are there for committing 'victimless' crimes, like smoking a joint 499 feet from a grade school or feeding the homeless without a permit. Yep, they sure sound like dangerous criminals that society needs to be protected from.

        • I agree with most of this, but there is a harm from prison and that's the formation of prison culture, which can drag people into further crime via gangs. It's probably impossible to concentrate prisoners into one place and avoid this.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by djinn6 ( 1868030 )

            The problem is letting them have unfettered interactions with other inmates. Restrict interactions to neutral or positive behaviors and you can form a prison culture that is more cooperative than antagonistic. Or failing that, put them in individual sound-proof cells and only allow contact with non-prisoners by video call. Then they would not be able to form prison culture at all.

    • I think every convicted criminal with the means should be charged for his punishment, they're fucking criminals. Usually monitoring will be done so they can keep their job, in which case they will generally have the means.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by sjames ( 1099 )

        The kind of job they're going to get or keep with an ankle bracelet on is not the sort that's going to pay enough to live and pay for the ankle bracelet. It may not even pay enough to live. That could even be a contributing factor to the crime that now calls for the bracelet.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      wearers must pay both one-time and ongoing fees for the monitors, which can be $25 to over $8,000 a year.

      Now this is stupid. I don't think any criminal should have to pay for the cost of their punishment. Restitution is one thing ("You stole $5,000 and thus must pay back $5,000), but philosophically, the cost should be born by the society or else the society doesn't have sufficient incentive to decrease the probability of punishment. Functionally, putting the expense on the criminal puts further strain on r

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      > the cost should be born by the society or else the society doesn't have sufficient incentive to decrease the probability of punishment

      This is the United States we are talking about here. This country hasn't been incentivized to reduce crime for as long as I can remember. It's quite the opposite infact. Punishing criminals is PROFITABLE. so why solve crime when you can punish it instead?

      In America, recidivism is a desirable outcome

    • ... but philosophically, the cost should be born by the society or else the society doesn't have sufficient incentive to decrease the probability of punishment.

      Thank you, very insightful. Despite the comments saying that it doesn't work that way in the USA, you clearly lead with the statement "philosophically".

    • Why would society be responsible for the care and feeding of any criminals? They did the crime, they should pay accordingly, if that costs money, then they should be responsible for it. If they canâ(TM)t pay, make them work. If their crime is so severe, they should not function in society, then bring back the death penalty.

  • $3000 or -$660/month, smart or dumb? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 24, 2021 @02:29PM (#61829319)

    By comparison, the Justice Department's Bureau of Prisons said in 2018 that it costs just under $100 per day to incarcerate a federal inmate, or over $36,000 a year. Put another way, wearers in Los Angeles and Sacramento counties in California, which impose the highest annual costs, according to the new findings, pay $22 a day -- still considerably less than what taxpayers would otherwise pay.

    How are these two figures comparable? One is paid by federal taxpayers, one is paid by the wearer.

    For someone with resources $22/day ($660/month or $8000/year) isn't much to pay not to be kept in a cell. On the other hand, if you're a convict or out on bail with only a minimum wage job, this can be half of your pretax earnings and make it impossible to pay for rent, food, and transportation.

    If we're trying to save taxpayer money ($3000/month), does it make sense to preferentially keep just the poor detainees incarcerated? And is it fair to punish the poor prisoners more?

  • The Taliban...

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • $22 a day for pre trail is an joke as it bail bonds
    For some people they may better off with the 3 hots and cot + an free doctor while waiting for court.

  • Don't be a criminal. Don't commit petty crimes and this won't be an issue.

    Or is this too simple a solution?

    • Don't bill people pre trail!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sjames ( 1099 )

      Don't get wrongly accused and railroaded...

      That bit may be a little harder to control.

    • Or is this too simple a solution?

      It is both too simple, and not a viable solution. Watch the, "Why You Should Never Talk to The Police" YouTube video to understand why. Here's the recap:

      1) There are over 50,000 Federal laws. And that was back when the video was released. Laws don't get rescinded, but grow more and more. How far over 50,000? No one knows, because it's around that point where the counting stopped. It's not that the counters ran out of laws, either. It's just where the job ended (for whatever reason). And that's JUST Federal

    • These are mostly pretrial detainees accused of a crime, awaiting trial.

      Though, I'll be honest, at least 95% of us pretrial detainees are guilty of some crime, though often something less serious than what they have been charged with.

      The reality is, though, that most people are in jail for some issue related to mental illness. I'm not saying they didn't know what they were doing was a crime, but they ended up committing a crime because their mental health issues were untreated and they ended up in a situ

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Here in the US, someone who lost their job and defaults on a debt can be hauled into court at a courtroom many states away. Because they can't make it, they get a default judgement, and a bench warrant of failure to appear. Once the rap sheet starts, the chance of finding a job is zero. It is trivial to run a NICS check, and there is software that does that on resumes, so one doesn't even have to formally do a "background check." To boot, many employers look at arrest records, because they feel people

  • More Info ... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Posted as Anon because I work at one of the four companies.
    Most of the money charged goes to that state or county Dept of Corrections.
    The data is kept as much as contractually specified - storage is not free, the margins are very thin with 4 competing companies.
    The "vague rules" are set by each customer.

  • When I read the headline I immediately thought college "anti cheating" software. I'm suprised no slashdotters mentioned this. My how it has changed. Criminals aside, students and low level work-from-home employees are increasingly required to install monitoring software on their personal devices. This is an injustice that should not be tolerated. Sadly it will be because students are young, naive, and don't want to rock the boat on their way to "success". Employees of low financial status will not obj
  • "restrictive"? Um, yeah, that's the point. That's the whole, entire, firkin point of electronic monitoring. If it's not "restrictive", it's not working properly.

    True story - there's a local guy in my community, well known to the cops. Every so often, he gets in some sort of bad mood, and goes down a street, from business to business, physically threatens the employees at each business, and hammers on the hoods of several cars before the cops arrest him. He resists arrest. The businesses press charges, t

  • I'm on Electronic Monitoring now, AMA (Score:3, Interesting)

    by kingcharles ( 8749733 ) on Friday September 24, 2021 @09:57PM (#61830369)
    I just spent 8 years in a county jail awaiting trial for a probational felony - probably a world record - simply because I was too poor to pay the bail amount. My family recently scraped together enough so I could bond out, but only on monitoring.

    My monitoring restrictions are so severe that when I arrived to my home the sheriff's officers told me I could never leave my bedroom for any reason.

    That makes it impossible to get non-online employment, buy groceries, go to the laundromat, go to the drug store in an emergency, go to the vet, walk my dog, get exercise, etc.

    If it wasn't for the fact I have Internet it would be more restrictive than jail. And when the prosecutor found out I had Internet access they went nuts and tried to take it away, but I'd just been bitching to the judge that I couldn't buy groceries and he'd told me to order whatever I need from Amazon, so he couldn't take away my Internet as it would mean he would have to let me out of my bedroom.

    Also, it's really hard to order from Amazon when you have no ID and can't get a credit or debit card.

    p.s. getting back on the Internet after 8 years, only two of my accounts were accessible, Wikipedia and eSnipe. I was locked out of all the others (including my very ancient Slashdot account) since security had changed so much in the time I was gone. I've been on the 'Net since '94, so it was strange to be away for so long, especially being a web developer, as I used to spend about 12 hours a day online.
  • I guess we also need to update parenting as well. It too requires one to be supportive and supervisory. Apparently, an impossible task for ordinary humans.
  • This is the first step towards legislated morality, morality decrees from government enforced by electronic devices. Congress decides people are ruining beaches, creates a law that no one can go to the beach, and the new rules are pushed to the bracelet everyone is required by law to wear. Now anyone approaching the beach gets a warning and anyone who actually goes there is fined. Push button control of people. Everyone's location is recorded all the time. No more theft, no more infidelity, no more ill

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