As early as 1978, when I was director of the Maryland Department of Juvenile Services, we were among the first juvenile justice agencies in the nation to begin the use of electronic monitoring of youthful offenders as an alternative to detention for nonviolent youth. The technology then was in its embryonic stages. Even in those days - before advances such as the GPS monitoring technology that has been much discussed recently - the benefits of home detention were clear. It permitted increased community supervision (surveillance), continuance of schooling, treatment and family/community continuity - plus much lower cost.
I have since been involved, as a consultant, in the early development and continuing refinement of GPS technology as applied to juvenile and adult offenders and have closely observed its growth in programs throughout the country. Many states began these programs in the past two decades and, with little exception, the technology has proven efficient and useful for tracking parolees.
According to the Journal of Offender Monitoring, more than 100 state and local jurisdictions use GPS monitoring of offenders to track approximately 120,000 people. The ability of GPS to pinpoint a person's location in real time makes it far easier for law enforcement to ensure parolees are adhering to the terms and conditions of their release. Authorities can now keep track of potentially dangerous or at-risk offenders whose prison terms are completed but who remain on parole. And such a level of surveillance may reduce further incarceration, again saving taxpayer money.
Is the technology perfect? Of course not. Even the best technology is inherently fallible. Such was the case in July when, authorities believe, a teenager under the supervision of the Department of Juvenile Services, on home detention and being monitored under the department's GPS program, shot and severely wounded a 5-year old girl and another youth in Baltimore. This is a horrific and tragic set of circumstances that should never have occurred. (There remain questions as to whether the suspect was wearing his ankle bracelet at the time of the shooting.)
Notwithstanding these heartbreaking events, we must place the blame where it belongs: not on the technology but on the offender and the choices (his and others') that led to his involvement in this tragedy.
