JAMES KILGORE 0

Electronic Monitoring Is Not the Answer
Critical reflections on a flawed alternative

James Kilgore
October 2015

Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center
A part of the Media Action Grassroots Network (MAG-Net)

JAMES KILGORE 1

Table of Contents:

Electronic Monitoring Is Not the Answer
James Kilgore
Executive Summary……………………………………….……….1
Introduction……………………………………………….………..4
Section One: History of EM in the Criminal Justice System……8
Section Two: Electronic Monitoring as an Alternative to
Incarceration...………………………………….....10
Section Three: Human Rights and Electronic Monitoring……..17
Section Four: EM and the Architecture of Surveillance………..23
Section Five: Responding to Electronic Monitoring:
The Struggle for Alternatives and Rights……..…30
This report is issued through the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center
(UCIMC), part of the Media Action Grassroots Network (MAG-Net).
The Center for Media Justice assisted in distribution.

Research funded in part by a grant from the Media Democracy Fund.

JAMES KILGORE 1

Executive Summary
This report offers a critical assessment of electronic monitoring (EM) in the criminal
justice system. The author, who spent a year on an ankle bracelet as a condition of his own
parole, draws on his in-depth study of legislation, policies, contracts, and academic literature
related to electronic monitoring. In addition to this research, he interviewed people directly
impacted by EM in four states. Interviewees included those who had been on the monitor, their
family members, corrections officials, and the CEO of a monitoring company. The report rejects
any simplistic rush to deploy electronic monitors as an alternative to incarceration. Instead, the
document sets out two critical conditions for EM to be a genuine alternative: (1) it must be used
instead of incarceration in prison or jail, not as an additional condition of parole, probation, or
pre-trial release; (2) it must be implemented with an alternative mindset that rejects the punitive
philosophy that has dominated criminal justice since the rise of mass incarceration. A genuine
alternative mindset as applied to EM must ensure the person on the monitor has a full set of
rights and guarantees, including the rights to seek and attend work, to access education and
medical treatment, and to participate in community, family and religious activities Without these
rights, the person on the monitor remains less than a full human being, a captive of the punitive,
“tough on crime” mentality that has been at the heart of more than three decades of mass
incarceration.
Moreover, the author asserts that electronic monitoring is more than just a tool of the
criminal justice system. With the rise of GPS-based electronic monitors capable of tracking
location, EM devices have become part of the arsenal of surveillance, a technology that enables
both the state and business to profile people’s movements and behavior. In the present situation,
this surveillance component of EM has completely escaped the view of policy makers and even
social justice advocates. EM as a tool of surveillance requires regulation.

2

| EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
In making his arguments, the author puts forward fourteen guiding principles to inform

the use of electronic monitors in the future. Without careful consideration of these guiding
principles, EM runs the risk of becoming a punitive, virtual incarceration, the costs of which will
be borne by the persons on the monitor and their loved ones. In addition, from the surveillance
angle, EM data can potentially be used to restrict people’s movement to certain geographical
areas, becoming part of a process of race- and class-based technological gentrification.
The author’s fourteen guiding principles are:
1. Electronic monitoring with house arrest must be seen as a form of incarceration.
People who spend time on a monitor should be given credit for time served.
2. Electronic monitoring should not be added onto a term of parole or probation after
a person has served their time. As a former Michigan corrections official states in the
report, “it is just another burdensome condition of extending . . . incarceration.”
3. The net of who is placed on an electronic monitor must not be widened, especially
not in ways that capture people who have not been convicted of any crime.
4. Regulations regarding both access and archiving of data collected from GPS-based
electronic monitors must be put in place. These regulations must respect the right of
privacy and outline time frames for deleting such data from official archives.
5. The treatment of people with sex offense histories or any other sub-category of
criminal convictions should conform to the same standards of privacy and human rights
accorded everyone else in the criminal justice system.
6. Exclusion zones should only be used in rare instances and applied on a case by case
basis. Present practice leads to restrictions that often make it unreasonably difficult for a
person on a monitor to find housing or employment. Moreover, the zones create the
potential for technological segregation of urban areas, and the creation of race- and classbased skid rows and gated communities, with the boundaries policed by tracking devices
and other forms of technological surveillance.
7. Lifetime GPS should be abolished. Whether it be incarceration or tracking via
electronic monitor, no carceral status should be beyond review.
8. Enhancing the surveillance power of electronic monitors should be opposed,
particularly adding the capacity to monitor biometrics or brain activity, to audio or video

JAMES KILGORE 3
record, or to administer pharmaceuticals remotely. Any moves to initiate chip implants
should also be opposed.
9. Electronic monitors should not be technological mechanisms for reinforcing
economic and racial disparity. In the past, ankle bracelets have often been used as a
means of helping the well-to-do avoid incarceration for their transgressions. By contrast,
strict EM regimes have been disproportionately applied to poor people as an add-on to an
already burdensome condition of parole or probation.
10. The rules for EM regimes should not be punitive. They should be transparent and
informed by the rights of the person on the monitor and their loved ones. These rules
should facilitate, not unduly restrict, the successful participation of the person on the
monitor in the economic and social life of the community.
11. User fees for people on electronic monitors as a result of involvement in the criminal
justice system should be banned. Such fees become yet another source of criminal
justice debt, which contributes to recidivism and the perpetuation of poverty.
12. The companies that provide electronic monitoring services need to be strictly
regulated by government authorities. The biggest players in the industry are two of the
most unscrupulous prison profiteering companies: The GEO Group, the second largest
private prison company in the US, and Securus Technologies, a firm which made $114
million in 2014 by overcharging people in prisons and jails for phone calls to their loved
ones.
13. Practitioners and providers of electronic monitoring in the US have established no
best practice models which acknowledge the human rights of people on the monitor.
Therefore, those involved in electronic monitoring in this country must look to the
extensive experience of European countries, specifically the Confederation of European
Probation (CEP), for guidance and support in transforming the present punitive,
profiteering electronic monitoring system into a program more consistent with
progressive notions of justice and rehabilitation.
14. The development of policy on electronic monitoring should include significant
participation from those who have been on electronic monitors, their loved ones, and
those officials who have been involved in the actual implementation of monitoring
programs.

4

| EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

Introduction

In 2014 Dylan Matthews of Vox Media claimed to have found the solution to one of the
country’s leading social problems: mass incarceration. In his article “Prisons Are Horrible and
There’s Finally a Way to Get Rid of Them,” he recommended that authorities “move those
imprisoned for offenses short of homicide or sexual assault to GPS-supervised house arrest as
soon as is practicable.” 1
In the context of ever-increasing criticism of mass incarceration and excessive
corrections spending, Matthews’ call for mass monitorization typifies the search for a quick fix
to a complex problem. However, before placing hundreds of thousands of people on ankle
bracelets as an “alternative” to incarceration, we need a deeper understanding of this technology.
In particular, we need to examine how increased use of electronic monitoring (EM) would affect
prison population numbers, the
systems of parole and probation, the
rampant racism in the criminal
justice system, and how these
monitors fit into the realm of

. . . before placing hundreds of thousands of
people on ankle bracelets as an
“alternative” to incarceration, we need a
deeper understanding of this technology.

surveillance technology.
Although it has been used in criminal justice for more than three decades, researchers
have done little effective work on electronic monitoring. Most studies either focus on how use of
monitors influences recidivism rates of people with sex offense convictions or consider how to
make the devices operate more efficiently. Little effort has been made to examine how a monitor
affects the individual wearing the ankle bracelet, let alone their families and communities. The
“rights of monitored” and others directly impacted remain unstated and unexplored.
Moreover, since electronic monitors are increasingly using GPS tracking technology
which records every movement in real or near real time, EM is more than a criminal justice tool.

JAMES KILGORE 5
It is also part of the technology of surveillance. Each person on a GPS monitor generates masses
of data as they move around, data that potentially link to other modes of social control. Yet in the
US, activists and policy makers involved in criminal justice issues as well as those concerned
with surveillance and privacy have paid scant attention to this aspect of EM.

Google Speaks
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt: “Almost nothing, short of a biological virus, can scale
as quickly, efficiently or aggressively as these technology platforms and this makes the people
who build, control and use them powerful too.”2

This report aims to contribute to a critical understanding of electronic monitoring in both
criminal justice and surveillance. The report rests on five principles:
1.

For most people, being on a monitor is preferable to being in prison or jail.
However, this is not a sufficient reason to support the expanded use of EM. We
need to know much more.

2.

The use of tracking and location monitoring will expand in the future.

3.

No technology is neutral. Although EM is intrinsically controlling, the extent and
nature of that control depend on the mindset of those who implement EM as well
as the mindset of the monitored.

4.

Monitoring technology does not impact everyone equally. For the rich and
powerful, such as Martha Stewart and Lindsay Lohan, as well as for many
middle-class men with DUI convictions, an electronic monitor is a ticket to avoid
incarceration, a vehicle for maintaining class privilege. The experience of those at
the other end of the socioeconomic ladder is different. Poor people of color,
especially those who have been involved with the criminal justice system,
experience EM as a technology of control and humiliation which often comes
with serious financial penalties and the constant threat of re-incarceration.

6

| EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
5.

There is no technological quick fix to the problem of mass incarceration or the
growth of surveillance. The solution may include technology, but it must grow
from mobilizations and social movements that
fundamentally undermine the punitive mentality that
has dominated the US social policy landscape for
more than two decades. Expert-driven policies and
legislative changes formulated in isolation will not
lead to a genuine solution.
This report contains five sections. Section
One will present an historical profile of electronic
monitors in the criminal justice system. Section Two

Most EM devices are made up of an

will examine electronic monitoring as an alternative

ankle bracelet that communicates with

to incarceration. Section Three will look at the

some sort of electronic box linked to a

human rights aspect of electronic monitoring.

telephone line. They can be removed

Section Four will place electronic monitoring in the

with a pair of scissors as this one was

framework of the architecture of surveillance.

after the wearer completed his term.

Section Five will offer some general reflections on

(Photo: Gregory Koger)

what lies ahead for monitoring, and how social
movements might respond, and it concludes with
specific guiding principles for use of EM.

The Voice of the Monitored

Shawn Harris, who spent nearly a year on a monitor in
Michigan, summarized it like this: “all you did was switch from a
prison setting to a housing setting, which is now your new cell . . .
you’re not really free when you got the monitoring system.” 3

JAMES KILGORE 7

How Do Electronic Monitors Work?
Most EM systems consist of an ankle bracelet linked to an electronic box. The bracelet
must remain on the person’s ankle 24 hours a day. There are two main kinds of devices: radio
frequency (RF) and GPS. RF merely records whether a person is at home. GPS-based monitors
track location through a satellite connection, though some now make use of wi-fi. The devices
normally send information to the monitoring authority through either a land line telephone or a
cellphone connected to the box. Specialized devices have incorporated video monitors,
breathalyzers, blood alcohol measuring devices, and trackers or pagers that enable supervisors to
send text messages to those under supervision. Some also add voice recognition software linked
to robo-call programs that phone a person’s home at random intervals to verify their presence.
Most EM systems are battery powered. Like cellphones, they need to be recharged by being
connected to a wall plug. Battery life varies. Some devices require recharging as often as every 4
or 5 hours. Though it looks secure, an ankle bracelet can be removed with a pair of household
scissors. But removing it will trigger an alarm. In some jurisdictions, even tampering with the
device can result in a felony escape charge.
For most people on EM, the default position is house arrest. A person must remain at
home unless they have been granted a “move” by their supervising authority, usually a probation
or parole officer or other official of the court. If a person has employment, they may be allowed
regular movement to travel to and from work and remain there for the required hours. Computer
systems, usually located in a call center, can set up similar schedules for other events—school,
drug programs, therapy, etc. A person who leaves the house without permission or returns late can
be subject to sanction—normally either locked down at their house for a certain period or reincarcerated.

8

| EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

Section One
History of EM in the Criminal Justice System
Two Harvard academics, the Schwitzgebel brothers, first developed electronic
monitoring in the 1960s. They designed EM to provide networks of support for those on parole,
but their invention didn’t catch on. Only in 1983 did New Mexico judge Jack Love first apply an
ankle bracelet to someone in a criminal case. By 1987, 826 people were participating in
electronic monitoring programs nationally.4 By 1998, this number stood at just over 95,000.5
In the early days, electronic monitoring relied solely on RF. But in the mid-1990s GPS
added tracking as well as the option of incorporating “exclusion zones” into an individual’s
regime. These zones kept him or her away from areas known to present possible temptations to
re-offend. All this enhanced possibilities for higher levels of control.

Monitors in the U.S.:
The Numbers
Alcohol
Monitors
50000

about 160,000 devices were in use due
to a criminal justice encounter. About
half of these were GPS, and half radio

GPS
80000

Radio
Frequency
80000

Experts estimate that in 2014

frequency.6 Since most terms on EM
GPS

are less than a year, about 300,000

Radio Frequency

people experience electronic

Alcohol Monitors

monitoring annually.7 In addition, an
estimated 50,000 alcohol detection
ankle devices are in use, usually due
to a DUI conviction. All these

statistics are rough, based on data gathered through various uncoordinated sources. There is no
national database of monitoring usage or precise composite figures for those being monitored.8
In the last two decades, EM use has not expanded as rapidly as proponents predicted.
Several factors lie behind this. First, the industry is increasingly controlled by firms that earn the
bulk of their profits through investments in incarceration, such as The GEO Group and Securus
Technologies via subsidiaries (BI for GEO Group, STOP for Securus). The GEO Group is the
second-largest private prison operator in the US, and Securus’s holdings include a large share of

JAMES KILGORE 9
the $1.2 billion annual revenue from prison phones.9 Rather than promote an agenda of
decarceration, these companies direct most of their EM marketing efforts at mergers, takeovers,
and outbidding other competitors for existing contracts in order to monopolize the market.
Bad publicity has also hurt EM. Highly publicized crimes committed by people on
monitors have prompted negative images of monitors. Perhaps the most famous of these was the
case of Evan Ebel. In early 2014 he cut off his monitor and went to the house of former
Colorado Department of Corrections chief, Tom Clements, and shot him dead.10 David Renz in
New York and Bessman Okafor in Florida, both of whom committed murders while on monitors,
also contributed to a reduced willingness on the part of judges to use electronic monitoring.
Apart from crime stories, reports concerning the technological flaws in EM systems have
cast further doubts on the monitors’ viability. In 2014 Colorado reporters uncovered an incident
in which 90,000 device alerts went unanswered.11 In 2013 the Los Angeles Times revealed that
thousands of people with sex offense convictions had cut off their devices, and many of them
had apparently disappeared.12
Despite these limitations, electronic monitoring has experienced a process of “netwidening.” Policy makers and entrepreneurs have found new situations to apply an ankle
bracelet. Thus, electronic monitors appear not only as a condition of parole, probation, and pretrial release, but also in response to truancy violations, juvenile court involvement, and domestic
violence as well as during the waiting time before judgment in asylum or deportation cases.
However, with increasing pressure to reduce prison populations and corrections budgets,
the use of monitors is likely to expand, especially as part of a plan of decarceration.

“Electronic monitoring is seen as an alternative to detention, yet is often what leads our
clients to be detained.”
- Kate Weisbrud, Juvenile Lawyer13

10 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

Section Two
Electronic Monitoring as an Alternative to
Incarceration
Proponents of electronic monitoring frequently refer to EM as an “alternative” to
incarceration.
In this regard, they employ three main arguments for using EM.
1.

Cost. Monitors cost less than incarceration. Whereas average costs for state prison
incarceration can range from $60 to nearly $200 a day, EM contractors charge
corrections departments daily fees of between $3 and $15 for an ankle bracelet.
However, comparison of per-day charges overstates the savings from EM. Placing a
small number of people on a monitor instead of incarcerating them has little or no
effect on the major costs of prisons and jails: salaries, energy, bond repayments, etc.
These costs do not fall proportionately with a relatively small decline in prison
population. In addition, monitoring incurs extra administrative expenses. As a result,
experts estimate the real cost of monitoring at about $25 a day. Many jurisdictions
have addressed these cost issues by tacking on user fees, which can range from $5 to
$20 a day, but in exceptional cases go as high as $40.14

2.

Public safety. EM proponents contend that location monitoring contributes to public
safety by enhancing law enforcement’s control over those on the monitor.

3.

Benefits for those on the monitor. Advocates emphasize that people on a monitor
can work and spend time with their families in a way that is not possible if they are
incarcerated. As Ann Toyer of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections put it: “We
get them back into the community where they can work, they pay taxes, they have
access to community services . . . and they can pay for those services.”15
Although such arguments may initially appear convincing, they are based on a very

limited definition of an “alternative” to incarceration.

JAMES KILGORE 11

What Is an Alternative to Incarceration?
A genuine alternative to incarceration must fulfill at least two criteria:
1.

An alternative must take the place of incarceration in prison or jail. Even though

this may seem obvious, electronic monitors are frequently used as an add-on to a
condition of community control:
parole, probation, or pre-trial release.
Before monitors, those under
community control were generally free
to move about. When used in these
settings, particularly under the punitive
ethos of present-day criminal justice, monitors don’t substitute for incarceration but
simply increase the level of control over those trying to transition to the community.
Moreover, as an add-on, EM actually adds to corrections costs.
Even proponents and practitioners of electronic monitoring have complained of
inappropriate use of the device, especially as a condition of parole. Richard Stapleton, a
legal administrator who worked for more than three decades for the Michigan
Department of Corrections, including many years in EM policy, argues that adding
electronic monitoring as a condition of parole is “another burdensome condition of
extending . . . incarceration.” He maintains that people have “served their time” and
should not “be burdened with a whole stack of conditions.”16 Linda Connelly, the CEO of
a California-based EM provider, LCA, makes a similar argument. She believes that
monitors should be used only “in lieu of” incarceration. In essence, Stapleton and
Connelly are defining EM as a form of incarceration. For example, in a pre-trial situation
Connelly argues that “if they’re okay to be out, they should be out without it.” She
estimates that expansion of the use of electronic monitors in lieu of incarceration could
reduce the population behind bars by 50%, but sees at least 15% as realistic in the next
few years.
2.

A mindset change. An alternative to incarceration must embody an alternative

mindset. This means rejection of the punitive, racist mentality that has dominated US
criminal justice and social policy for more than three decades. An alternative to
incarceration must recognize the full humanity and rights of people with felony

12 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
convictions and their loved ones. In its current form, EM merely perpetuates the
punishment paradigm. Interviews for this report with dozens of people who have been on
monitors in various settings—as well as conversations with corrections officials, parole
officers, and CEOs of electronic monitoring companies—reveal a similar story:
electronic monitoring all too often operates under a punitive philosophy with little or no
acknowledgment of the “rights of the monitored.” Moreover, the legal framework that
applies to electronic monitoring is often unclear and contradictory.

Punitive EM Regimes: A High Stress Situation

Interviews reveal the punitive mindset that dominates most EM regimes. Former
Michigan Department of Corrections official Richard Stapleton confirmed this, saying that
people on EM were largely “at the whim of their agent.”17 That arbitrary authority makes EM a
high-stress situation for many people, with stress heightened by irrationally harsh rules. Some of
the rules and punitive measures that interviews for this report unearthed included:


Being allowed to shop in only three stores in town



Not being allowed to go shopping and attend a movie during the same outing



Being allowed out of the house only to do shopping or laundry if no one else in
the household can perform these activities



Being allowed out of the house for family activities only two days per year,
Thanksgiving and Christmas, and only for two hours on those occasions



Not being allowed to go to a hospital in an emergency without first obtaining
permission from the parole officer, regardless of the time of day or the seriousness
of the situation



Receiving a 10-day “flash” incarceration for going to a hospital in an emergency
and failing to have the doctor fill out the forms required by the Department of
Corrections before the police arrived at the hospital



Not being allowed to work overtime or change work schedule without permission
from the parole officer

JAMES KILGORE 13

Punitive EM Regimes (cont.)


Having to submit a detailed description of all movements out of the house two
weeks in advance, including the departure and arrival details of all buses taken
along with the days and hours of work assignments for jobs like house cleaning,
construction, and gardening where schedules are not precise



Not being allowed to speak with anyone in the apartment complex where the
person lived



Not being allowed to sit on the front porch or be in the back yard of a house where
the person on the monitor lived



Having to request permission to go to the laundry room in an apartment complex



Not being able to shower because the shower was out of the range of the signal of
the ankle bracelet



Being ordered to do a drug test during working hours without the parole agent
making prior arrangement with the employer

For some the mere difficulty of obtaining a “move” was challenging. Gregory Koger, who
spent a year on a monitor in Illinois, reported that “there was literally a period of like three
straight months that I never left the house because of the hassle and bullshit of attempting to even
get movement.”18

Re-Thinking EM: An Alternative Legal Framework
In terms of assessing electronic monitoring as an alternative to incarceration, clarifying
its legal status is absolutely essential. If EM is to be implemented instead of incarceration, it
must be defined as the equivalent or partial equivalent of time spent in a jail or prison.
Otherwise, it is not an alternative at all but an additional constraint to a form of carceral control.
Court decisions are not uniform on this issue, but there is ample legal precedent to
support incarceration status for electronic monitoring. Federal statute designates a “pre-release”
status for those who are nearing the end of their sentence. Under pre-release, people can serve up

14 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
to the last six months of their time in a number of non-prison settings, including halfway houses
and “home confinement.” 19
Case law in Iowa, Florida, and California also provides precedents for crediting time on
an electronic monitor during a pre-trial release as the equivalent of incarceration.20
Internationally such practice has gained widespread use. For example, in Denmark up to 60% of
all sentences of 6 months or less are served on EM while up to the last 6 months of a prison
sentence can be served on a monitor.21
Accepting electronic monitoring as a form of incarceration has serious implications for its
use in other settings. In the case of pre-trial, this means that any time spent on an electronic
monitor should be applied toward any subsequent sentence imposed by the court. This could be
a day for day equivalent or some form of partial credit or “sentence discount.”22
EM and Emergencies

The story told by Kent Shultz, who was on an electronic monitor in Michigan after 28
years in prison, illustrates the punitive nature of the electronic monitoring regimes. In 2013,
Shultz told how one night the apartment building where he lived
caught fire. He ran outside and called his parole officer on his cell
phone. The parole officer told him he had to go back into the
burning apartment and retrieve the box apparatus that was part of
the EM system. Shultz, risking life and limb, ran back into the
house, successfully retrieved the box, and went to spend the night
at a local motel that the Red Cross had arranged as an emergency
contingency. The next morning Shultz reported to the local police
station, indicating that he was not at home where he was supposed
to be because his apartment had burned down. The police checked their records, found that an
absconding warrant had been generated for Shultz’s arrest, and locked him in a cell. Fortunately,
he had access to legal assistance and was freed after a few hours. Nonetheless, his situation
demonstrates the constant fear many people face while on a monitor—that their freedom hangs on
a thin thread and can be revoked due to an event completely beyond their control, like a fire or a
delayed bus. And not everyone in such situations can gain quick access to legal assistance.

JAMES KILGORE 15
Under this legal framing, the use of the monitor on a person who is on parole becomes, as
Richard Stapleton has argued, an unwarranted extension of their incarceration, hence an illegal
imposition.
Perhaps the most ambiguous situation is that of probation. In most instances, probation
applies to misdemeanors or relatively low-grade felonies. A monitor could be applied in three
ways: (1) instead of jail time, (2) as an add-on to a sentence of probation where no jail time is
imposed, or (3) as a condition of probation after a jail sentence has been completed. Hence, a
judge may elect to use a monitor as an alternative punishment to incarceration or may employ it
as a condition of a sentence to probation. However, if we define electronic monitoring with
house arrest as incarceration, then it should be imposed only as an equivalent to a jail sentence,
not as an additional condition to a term of community supervision.
Finally, categorizing electronic monitoring as a form of incarceration means that its
application in situations where a person has not even been criminally charged becomes totally
inappropriate. This would eliminate the now frequent use of EM in certain juvenile or school
truancy cases. Furthermore, since many immigration cases are civil rather than criminal matters,
incarceration of many immigrants awaiting adjudication lands beyond the boundary. Net
widening to “capture” other vulnerable cohorts beyond the criminal justice system, such as those
with histories of substance abuse, mental illness, or homelessness, would simply be out of
bounds.
Electronic Monitoring and Decarceration
With this alternative legal framework, electronic monitoring could become an important
tool of decarceration—a way to reduce prison and jail numbers. Any savings accrued from the
use of monitors could be directed to reinvestment in communities that have been decimated by
mass incarceration. Funding for programs such as job
training, public housing, daycare, substance abuse
treatment, and mental health centers would be some of the
logical targets for these redirected resources. Such accrued
savings should not be channeled back into more policing or
surveillance, as has often been done in some “justice
reinvestment” programs in the past.

16 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
However, redefining electronic monitoring as a form of incarceration represents only half
of what is necessary to constitute EM as an alternative. The other half consists of implementing
monitors in a way that embodies the notion of human rights—the “rights of the monitored.”

How do we define electronic monitoring?
Legal scholars and policy makers have generally avoided coming to grips with defining electronic
monitoring. So what is it: a disciplinary measure applied to those likely to “misbehave” while on
parole or probation? A form of “incarceration on the cheap” that saves taxpayers money while
keeping an eye on suspicious characters? Some might view it as merely a minor inconvenience for
someone who has done wrong. Yet another conception might compare EM to a dog leash, limiting
movement to a short perimeter but not as restrictive as being in a cage. Legal scholar Erin Murphy
has noted the lack of clear characterizations of EM:

Physical incapacitation of dangerous persons has always invoked . . . constitutional scrutiny, (but)
virtually no legal constraints circumscribe the use of its technological counterpart . . . courts
erroneously treat physical deprivations as the archetypal ‘paradigm of restraint’ and . . . largely
overlook the significant threat to liberty posed by technological measures. 23
Murphy’s observations imply that EM amounts to deprivation of liberty by a technological
measure. Following this train of thought, categorizing electronic monitoring as a form of “virtual”
or “low intensity” incarceration might be an accurate fit. Moreover, as the capacity of the
technology to monitor increases, the potential to ramp up the intensity of liberty deprivation under
EM also increases. With rising pressure to decarcerate and cut back on corrections expenditure,
the site and financial burden of incarceration can shift-from concrete and steel cell blocks to
households and communities. New York social justice activist Jazz Hayden argued that the stop
and frisk policy of New York police converted poor Black communities into “open air prisons.” 24
From this perspective, in over-policed communities, being on an electronic monitor could amount
to traveling from a virtual prison during house arrest time, to an open air prison once the person is
on the street. The use of exclusion zones further amplifies the deprivation of liberty of electronic
monitors. If electronic monitors are going to be more widely used, there is an urgent need to
expand and deepen the ways in which we think about electronic monitoring.

JAMES KILGORE 17

Section Three
Human Rights and Electronic Monitoring
Few efforts have been made in the United States to connect human rights with electronic
monitoring. 25 The minimal legal and regulatory documents that provide guidelines tend to be
statutes that may empower state or local authorities to use EM in certain cases, spell out the
details of equipment to be provided, or list the penalties for violations of EM rules.26 Many
contracts with users contain similar content, as well as providing a schedule of user fees.
In fact, most jurisdictions operate without any detailed guidelines or principles.
Surprisingly, this contrasts sharply with the majority of prisons and jails, where those
incarcerated normally have stipulated entitlements such as access to legal research materials and
medical treatment, specified hours for visiting and recreation, minimum daily calorie provision
for food, and some facility for purchasing consumer goods. These prison entitlements are
frequently ignored, but they do form grounds for legal appeals. No such entitlements apply in
virtually all EM programs.

Rules for EM—Two Exceptions: Michigan and Ohio

Michigan and Ohio are among the few states that make some effort to spell out what a
person on a monitor can do. Though not referring to “rights,” the Michigan Department of
Corrections specifies that the following “shall be permitted”: seeking or attending work,
participating in education or treatment, accessing medical services, attending religious services,
and participating in “required” community service.27 By contrast, in a highly restrictive 50-page set
of policy guidelines the Corrections Center of Northwest Ohio specifies that a person may attend
family gatherings outside the home only on Thanksgiving and Christmas and even then not for
more than two hours. This document also grants permission for a person to shop or do laundry only
if there is no one else in the household able to carry out these tasks.28

18 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

To find any serious discussion of the rights of the monitored, we need to look to the
United Nations and, more recently, the European Union (EU).29 As far back as 1990, the United
Nations addressed some of the human rights concerns in regard to noncustodial measures such as
EM. The resolutions adopted are known collectively as the Tokyo Rules. The Tokyo Rules,
which refer to the “needs and rights of the offender,” state that the conditions imposed should
never go “beyond those resulting from the decision of the judicial authority.”30
Complicating Cases: Domestic Violence

Some jurisdictions use electronic monitors in domestic violence cases. The device is
generally deployed to enforce a “no contact” order—keeping a person convicted of domestic
violence away from survivors of previous incidents. In these cases, the person with the history of
violence wears a monitor which triggers an alarm if the wearer comes within a certain distance of
the survivor or their place of residence. This is largely intended as a short-term preventive measure.
Unlike most applications of electronic monitoring, in domestic violence cases EM typically targets
situations where there is evidence that a person poses a clear and present danger to another. In such
situations, the use of EM may provide vital immediate protection to survivors and their families.
Still EM alone is not enough. In the long run, the underlying causes of domestic violence need to
be addressed, including the mindset that trivializes violence against women and transgender
people. Researcher Vikki Law suggests in some instances that EM is a way of “shuffling around
responsibility for addressing the issues and the conditions that allow domestic violence to flourish,
issues like poverty, racism, and gender inequality”31 while touting a technological solution.

Despite the fact that EU countries use monitors far less than the US (largely because of
the human rights implications), their debate over EM is extensive and rich. In particular, analysts
such as Mike Nellis have not only produced a vast literature32 but have also played important
roles in establishing an EU-wide working group on EM. Drawing extensively on the Tokyo
Rules, the working group in 2014 produced a set of recommendations that applied specifically to
electronic monitoring.33 The document spelled out not only the rights of the monitored but also
the rights of those who live with someone on a monitor. The EU as a whole adopted the
recommendations. They include the following:

JAMES KILGORE 19


The terms of a person’s monitoring regime should not impose unnecessary
burdens on third parties, especially those who share a household with the person
on the monitor.



EM is not a replacement for the required set of support services that a person
transitioning from prison to the community needs.



Staff should be trained to communicate “sensitively” with those on the monitor.



If exclusion zones are imposed, the conditions should not be “so restrictive as to
prevent a reasonable quality of everyday life in the community.”

While focusing primarily on the daily regimes associated with electronic monitoring, the
EU group has also devoted considerable attention to human rights and the privacy issues that
emerge from the collection of data via GPS location tracking.

Mike Nellis of the EU Working Group on EM

I do believe EM—in all its different technological forms—is inherently, essentially
controlling, and it can be used for either rehabilitative or punitive purposes, depending on the
legal and policy frameworks in which it is embedded, the measures it is integrated with, and the
attention given to what forms of control offenders regard as legitimate.34

Tracking Data from GPS Monitors
In the US little attention is paid to how to handle the massive location-tracking data
compiled through GPS monitors. In fact, rather than considering privacy issues, EM providers
often boast of how much data they collect and how long it is stored. For example, Satellite
Tracking of People (STOP), which claims to be the largest EM company in the US, assures
potential clients it keeps data for a “minimum” of seven years.35 The right to privacy of the
“convicted” (or even those on pre-trial release) appears not to be a concern.

20 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

EM and Our Technological Society

The problems that emerge with the present use of electronic monitoring raise many
broader questions about the technology. The fundamental issue is whether the technology itself
or the way it is used is the problem. For example, are there ways it could be applied along with
support services that would make it a cheaper, more effective criminal justice tool than it is
under present conditions? In a society where many people already voluntarily track themselves
through cellphones and apps that measure their heart rate and blood sugar, how much worse is
electronic monitoring? In terms of policy, should social justice advocates oppose EM as
excessively punitive on principle or try to limit the situations in which it is used and humanize
the rules that govern monitoring regimes? The future of EM will hinge on the answers to these
questions.

The Financial Cost of Being Monitored

A joint survey by National Public Radio and the Brennan Center found user fees for
electronic monitoring in every state but Hawaii.36 In many jurisdictions, individuals pay a setup
fee and a daily charge as well. Setup fees can be up to $200, and daily tariffs range from $5 to
$40. Some states offer relief for low-income users or ad hoc arrangements to do community
service in lieu of payment.37 In the event of a damaged or lost device, the penalty may reach up
to $1200. In addition, the financial aspect of monitoring may present complications when parole
agents are tasked with collecting fees from their clients. One former EM supervisor employed by
BI reported being given a bonus if he collected a certain percentage of fees from clients. He said
the normal policy was to confine a person to their house if they fell too far behind in payments.38

The European perspective on this differs dramatically. In many countries, GPS monitors
are used in a very limited capacity or not used at all precisely because of privacy concerns. In
Germany, all data collected via GPS monitors must be destroyed after two months. Moreover,
German regulations also address questions of who can access the data. For example, German

JAMES KILGORE 21
criminal investigators are not permitted to scour the ranks of people on a monitor who were in
the vicinity of a crime scene at a certain time. They can access that information only if other
evidence indicates that one of the people on a monitor might have been involved (e.g., an
eyewitness statement or the crime’s m.o.)

EM As Punishment: Interviewing People on Parole and Probation

What It Feels Like to Be on a Monitor
The effectiveness of electronic monitoring depends to a considerable extent on how the
person wearing the device interprets their experience. Yet the overwhelming majority of research
on electronic monitoring contains no voice of people who have been on a monitor, their loved
ones, or the employees directly responsible for implementing EM programs. Those who have
been interviewed for this report largely viewed EM as yet another form

of

punishment and state intervention in their lives, often with racial
overtones.
Jean-Pierre Shackelford, (pictured at right) who spent almost
three years on a monitor in Ohio, referred to EM as “21st-century
slavery, electronic style.”39
Ernest Shephard (pictured below),who spent 45 years in prison then was placed on a
monitor for a parole violation, was more blunt than Shackelford. Looking at his ankle bracelet,
he said: “I could imagine how slaves would be on a ship and they
would be gaffled to the ship and their feet would be anchored to
some steel. [That black plastic strap] always inspired me to want to
get a sense of relief, to escape, or to break it off. My life was
miserable. How could I be expected to sit day and night and
accommodate myself to a volunteer misery and I’m trying to do something to rehabilitate, to
make a life . . . and I got this nagging misery. I feel like a chattel slave and I say ‘if I don’t rebel,
what kinda dude am I?’”40
Terry Rodriguez, who spent several months on a monitor as part of probation,
complained about wearing the monitor in social and work settings: “I felt judged by people . . .

22 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

EM As Punishment: Interviewing People on Parole and Probation (cont.)

everybody pretty much knowing your business without you even telling them. [The monitor was
also] a barrier in terms of getting employment, [when] I had to mention to my employer that I
was on house arrest.”41
Family members also talked about how they experienced the stress of the monitor.
Marissa Garcia, whose husband spent several months in southern California on a monitor, said,
“It was like I had one too, [I] always panicked to be home by ten to get him to charge it and not
have the gang task force at our doors.”
Alex Berliner, whose partner was on a monitor in Oakland, California, noted that his
confinement created lots of extra work for her in terms of shopping, buying medicine, and
having to handle virtually all the basics of managing his life.42
Lois DeMott, whose 17-year-old son had mental health issues but was put on a monitor
in Michigan, reported: “I have to plan my whole life around his schedule. It affects whatever
support system the person has.” When her son was locked down in the house for the entire
weekend, she asked: “How do you help this person stay sane if he has to stay in the house from
Friday night to Sunday? Families need to be taken into consideration.”43

JAMES KILGORE 23

Section Four
EM and the Architecture of Surveillance
The Edward Snowden revelations have escalated awareness of state and corporate
surveillance, often simply called Big Data. In his book Data and Goliath, author Bruce Schneier
notes that “for the first time in history governments and corporations have the ability to conduct
mass surveillance on entire populations.”44 Much of the processing of this data is based on
mathematically derived formulas known as algorithms. Industries use these algorithms in risk
assessment tools. As researchers Danielle Keats Citron and Frank Pasquale put it: “Big Data is
increasingly mined to rank
and rate individuals.
Predictive algorithms
assess whether we are good
credit risks, desirable
employees, reliable tenants,
valuable customers—or
deadbeats, shirkers,
menaces, and ‘wastes of
time.’ Crucial opportunities
are on the line, including
the ability to obtain loans,
work, housing, and insurance.”45
Although the formulas behind these algorithms have an enormous impact on people’s
lives, they are generally not available to the public, nor are they subject to appeal.
But, as the Snowden disclosures revealed, data collection and surveillance extend far
beyond the needs of business enterprises. Surveillance technology captures enormous amounts of
data on the principle of “save everything you can and someday you’ll be able to figure out some
use for it all.”46

24 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
People experience this onslaught of Big Data in different ways. For mainstream America,
primary concerns relate to privacy. This swath of the population is often not exactly certain what
they specifically fear from surveillance, but there is considerable resentment at being targeted. A
big part of this resentment emerges from their self-image as innocent, law-abiding citizens who
don’t deserve to have their privacy invaded. It may not be that
they oppose surveillance but that they want it targeted at those
who “deserve” to be targeted. This cohort objects strongly to
justifications of surveillance like that of former Google CEO
Eric Schmidt: “if you have something that you don’t want
anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first
place.”47
Some media activists have noted the limitations of the
focus on privacy, arguing that such a framing of the issue is
“something for people who don’t have anything more urgent to care about.” They have labeled
excessive concerns with privacy as “white privileged anxiety” that “hides the harm to
communities of color.”48
In fact, for poor people of color, intrusions into daily life by the state and corporate
America have become normalized. There is little room for self-perception of innocence or
entitlement to privacy. In most cases, databases have already captured them many times over—
for criminal convictions, for failing to pay a traffic fine, for applying for public assistance, for
periods of residence in mental health institutions, drug treatment programs, and homeless
shelters, for visiting incarcerated loved ones, for school discipline, for taking part in political
activity deemed subversive, or for merely associating with family, neighbors, or friends who are
targeted for surveillance. Nonetheless, with electronic monitoring, new dimensions of intrusion
emerge. House arrest with an ankle bracelet is perhaps the most intense form of carceral-like
control beyond the walls of an institution—the prison beyond the prison.
These controls ultimately restrict where people can go, whom they associate with, where
they live, and what type of jobs or recreation they engage in. In addition, the burdens EM places
on household members are effectively punishing people who in most cases are already underresourced, overstressed, and limited in living space. While perhaps appearing unobtrusive, EM
is, in fact, an intensive form of surveillance and control.

JAMES KILGORE 25

Spying: An Analytical Framework
The Stop LAPD Spying Coalition’s
framework for categorizing surveillance in Los
Angeles highlights four dimensions: data
collection, profiling, policing tactics, and
corporate profits. This represents how what
Bruce Schneier calls the “public-private
surveillance partnership”49 uses an expanding
range of technology. This may include data
recorded at an individual level through license
plate readers, face-recognition technology,
This graphic from Stop LA Police Spying Coalition
illustrates the components of surveillance.

drones, and cellphone-tracking devices known
as Stingrays, as well as compilation through

joint ventures such as Fusion Centers. The profiling aspect comes in as the data collection targets
specific demographic and geographical sectors of the population through the use of risk
assessment tools based on algorithms. Private service providers such as AT&T and Google are
often partners in facilitating the generation of data. 50
In practice the most frequent targets of such activity are poor people of color. However,
certain events may shine extra light on other groups—Muslims, immigrants, and transgender
folks as well as those with criminal histories. Likely the most extreme use of this targeting has
taken place outside the US, through assassinations in places like Yemen or Pakistan. As former
NSA official Michael Hayden noted in regard to drone attacks, “we kill people based on
metadata.”51 These data collection processes also flow directly into “crime fighting” strategies
known as “predictive policing.” Resources and personnel focus on particular geographical
“hotspots” where statistics predict crime is likely to occur. Police then profile individuals who
are in that area according to criteria determined by algorithms. These targeted areas will be
disproportionately communities of poor people of color. As Malkia Cyril has pointed out:
“Without oversight, accountability, transparency, or rights, predictive policing is just high-tech
racial profiling—indiscriminate data collection that drives discriminatory policing practices.”52

26 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

The 21st-Century Mining Industry: Data Is the New Gold

Designing collection systems and processing data for law enforcement, corrections, and
surveillance is big business. While these systems contribute to ever more complex methods of
control for the vulnerable, this 21st-century mining generates huge profits for major players in
the industry. Law enforcement, corrections, and surveillance continue to grab an increasing share
of the $18 billion Big Data industry.53 This market has attracted such traditional information
technology giants as IBM, which has developed a Smarter Cities package that features crime
prediction and video analytics to identify potential crimes and “criminals.” But a new generation
of techies has also entered this market. University-spawned products like Rutgers University’s
Risk Terrain Management (RTM) as well as LexisNexis’s Risk Solutions Social Media Monitor
are heavily involved in predictive analytics. Such new developments have enhanced the capacity
of national law enforcement databases such as N-Dex to monitor the vulnerable population.

Hence, while people in the upper income brackets are having their consumer or phone
activity mined, targeted groups have the direct eye of the state on their daily physical movements
and patterns of association. Big Brother watches them in an entirely different way. Kade
Crockford, director of the ACLU’s Technology for Liberty Project, describes predictive policing
as a “tech-washing of racially discriminatory law-enforcement practices.”54 One organization
involved in opposing expansion of surveillance labeled it a “feedback loop of injustice.”55

EM: Virtual Gentrification and Urban Futures
Electronic monitoring adds the capacity not only to track people but to set up systems to
limit their movement, to keep certain people in and certain people out. This potential already is
in action in the case of electronic monitors with exclusion zones. Most frequently applied to
those with histories of sex offenses, an exclusion zone programmed into a monitor triggers an
alarm when a person enters forbidden territory.
The combination of exclusion zones and other databases opens the door to a form of
virtual gentrification of cities, where the poor, especially poor people of color, are excluded from

JAMES KILGORE 27
areas where they might encroach on the life style of the elites. In cities such as Seattle,
ordinances and on-the-ground policing have carried out this segregation.56 But the advent of new
technologies offers a range of ways to remotely reconfigure gated communities and racialized
skid row housing settlements through data collection, profiling, and spatial exclusion.

Are Chip Implants in Our Future?

Ten years ago few of us could have imagined the role smart phones now play in everyday
life. Although this technology brings many conveniences, every phone also functions as a
location monitor, the capacity of which can be enhanced through the addition of a number of
apps. Where will this go in the future? One possibility is computer chips imbedded beneath the
skin. Although efforts to implement such technology in the US have been blocked, in Sweden
some companies are injecting chips the size of a grain of rice into employees’ hands. A wave
of the hand will open doors, operate photocopiers, and initiate remote printing from a laptop.57

At the moment, surveillance technology appears to be moving ahead, driven by the joint
agendas of national security, carceral control, and profit making. The Snowden revelations have
enhanced public awareness of the scope of the surveillance state, but the concrete linkage of data
gathering to criminal justice, law enforcement, and grander social planning remains largely
obscured. However, if those who are opposing mass incarceration and the public-private
surveillance partnership are to respond effectively to the need for alternatives, they will need to
have a deep understanding of the implications of the expanding capacity of technology to
combine control with surveillance and be able to imagine how this technology could be regulated
and how it could be used in other ways.

28 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

People with Sex Offense Histories: The Canaries in the Mineshaft?

Reverend Richard Witherow helped found Miracle Village, a Florida community for
people with sex offense convictions who couldn’t find places to live in Miami because of
exclusion zones. He argues that these people have become “modern day lepers”—the folks
no one wants near them.58
The case of people with sex offense histories effectively demonstrates how technology
can combine with other sanctions to create a situation of hyper-control. Since the early 1990s,
a wide array of measures has been implemented against people with sex offense convictions:


Extension of the definition of sex offense. These may now include public urination,
streaking, exposure, and downloading pornography.



Establishment of sex offense registries in all 50 states. Though listing criteria vary, the
general approach is to post an individual’s name and address on a sex offender registry
website. In most instances, listing is for life. As of 2014, more than 700,000 people
nationally were on sex offense registries.59



Lifetime GPS monitors. At least nine states have imposed this for people with
convictions for certain categories of sex offenses.



Exclusion zones. Often implemented through the use of GPS, these zones restrict a
person with a sex offense conviction from going within a certain distance (typically
500 or 1,000 feet) of places where children are likely to be present (e.g., schools, parks,
daycare centers). In many cases these restrictions also apply to where a person may
live and are imposed even if their offense did not involve children.



Internet restrictions. Rules for online activity may include banning access to social
media sites, installing monitoring software that tracks all key strokes or websites
visited, especially targeting anything categorized as pornographic. In some cases,
accessing the Internet is outlawed altogether.60



Penile monitoring. For certain individuals with rape convictions, physiological
responses to pornographic videos are measured via usage of a penile plethysmograph, a
device that measures blood flow to the penis.61 Excessive blood flow may lead to
incarceration.

JAMES KILGORE 29

People with Sex Offense Histories: The Canaries in the Mineshaft? (cont.)


Use of civil commitments. With a civil commitment, a judge can sentence a person to
incarceration for an unlimited period of time on the grounds that the person is likely to
commit another crime. At least 18 states have given courts the power to execute civil
commitments. As of 2012, some 7,000 people were held in prisons under civil
commitment orders. Many of them are people with sex offense histories.62
All of these measures reflect a total rejection of two overwhelming pieces of evidence

about sex offenses: (1) the majority of sex offenses are committed by family members and
other people who are known to the victim, not as a result of “stranger danger”; and (2) the
recidivism rate for people with sex offense convictions is relatively low compared to other
crimes.
Instead of relying on evidence or therapy, the process for addressing sexual violence
has combined the promotion of irrational fear, the use of excessively repressive legislation,
and the deployment of technology in the form of databases, profiling, and GPS tracking to
limit the activity of people with sex offense histories. The targeting includes large numbers of
people whose offense was not a serious felony or was committed by an individual who has
been through extensive therapy and rehabilitation and has demonstrated the capacity to
become a constructive member of the community.
In regard to people with sex offenses, two key questions emerge:
1. Will the draconian measures used against this category of people be curtailed or
will other groups of vulnerable people, particularly those with criminal
convictions, be subjected to similar processes and invasions of their daily life
through the technology of surveillance and tracking?
2. Do people convicted of certain categories of sexual offenses, especially those
involving children, constitute a special category that should be subject to
electronic monitoring even if they have not been convicted of any new crimes?
And if there are categories of people who might be subject to EM under such
circumstances, what is the danger that the net of those categories will widen,
especially in response to high-profile crimes?

30 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

Section Five
Responding to Electronic Monitoring:
The Struggle for Alternatives and Rights

“We can change the story on surveillance to raise the voices of those who have been left out.”
-Malkia Cyril, Center for Media Justice63

In the present context, there is little evidence to support EM as a genuine alternative to
incarceration. At the same time, EM is not going to go away, especially with the constantly
expanding capacity of devices to track and gather other data. If decarceration gathers steam, EM
will become an important option. Before that happens, the debate around its use and implications
needs to sharpen. Any useful framing must open up a dialog around the rights of the monitored
and link EM to state and corporate surveillance. Otherwise, we run the risk of hundreds of
thousands of people being virtually incarcerated in their homes and of the net widening to track
many more who have not even had an encounter with law enforcement.
This section of the report consolidates the findings and analysis presented here into
fourteen guiding principles aimed to re-frame the debate around electronic monitoring, both as
an alternative to incarceration and as a form of surveillance.
These guiding principles are:
1. Electronic monitoring with house arrest is a form of incarceration. People who
spend time on a monitor should be given credit for time served.
2. Electronic monitoring should not be added onto a term of parole or probation
after a person has served their time. As a Richard Stapleton put it, ‘it is just
another burdensome condition of extending . . . incarceration.”
3. The net of who is placed on an electronic monitor must not be widened,
especially not to capture people who have not been convicted of any crime.

JAMES KILGORE 31
4. Regulations regarding both the access to and archiving of data collected from
GPS-based electronic monitors must be put in place. These regulations must
respect the right of privacy and outline time frames for deleting such data from
official archives.
5. The treatment of people with sex offense histories or any other sub-category of
criminal convictions should conform to the same standards of privacy and human
rights accorded everyone else in the criminal justice system.
6. Exclusion zones should only be used in rare instances and applied on a case by
case basis. Present practice leads to restrictions that often make it unreasonably
difficult for a person on a monitor to find housing or employment. Moreover, the
zones create the potential for technological segregation of urban areas, the creation
of race- and class-based skid rows and gated communities, with the boundaries
policed by tracking devices and other forms of technological surveillance.
7. Lifetime GPS should be abolished. Whether it be incarceration or tracking via
electronic monitor, no carceral status should be beyond review.
8. Enhancing the surveillance power of electronic monitors should be opposed,
particularly any applications which monitor biometrics or brain activity, to record
audio or video, or to administer pharmaceuticals remotely. Any moves to initiate
chip implants should also be opposed.
9. Electronic monitors should not be technological mechanisms for reinforcing
economic and racial disparity. In the past, ankle bracelets have often been used as
a means of helping the well-to-do avoid incarceration for their transgressions. By
contrast, strict EM regimes have been disproportionately applied to poor people as
an add-on to an already burdensome condition of parole or probation. Such practice
must end.
10. The policies and regulations for EM should be transparent and informed by the
rights of the person on the monitor and their loved ones. EM policies and
regulations should facilitate the successful participation of the person on the monitor
in the economic and social life of the community.
11. User fees for people on electronic monitors as a result of involvement in the
criminal justice system should be banned. Such fees become yet another source of

32 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
criminal justice debt, which contributes to recidivism and the perpetuation of
poverty.
12. The companies that provide electronic monitoring services need to be strictly
regulated by government authorities and overseen by social justice movements.
The biggest players in the industry are two of the most unscrupulous prison
profiteering companies: The GEO Group, the second largest private prison
company in the US, and Securus Technologies, a firm which made $114 million in
2014 by overcharging people in prisons and jails for phone calls to their loved ones.
13. Practitioners and providers of electronic monitoring in the US have established
no best practice models which acknowledge the human rights of people on the
monitor. Therefore, those involved in electronic monitoring in this country must
look to the extensive experience of European countries, specifically the
Confederation of European Probation (CEP), for guidance and support in
transforming the present punitive, profiteering electronic monitoring system into a
program more consistent with progressive notions of justice and rehabilitation.
14. The development of policy on electronic monitoring should include significant
participation from those who have been on electronic monitors, their loved ones,
and those officials who have been involved in the actual implementation of
monitoring programs.

JAMES KILGORE 33

About the Author
James Kilgore is a writer, researcher, and activist based in Urbana, Illinois. He spent a year on an
electronic monitor as a condition of his parole. He has written widely on issues related to mass
incarceration, including his 2015 book, Understanding Mass Incarceration: A People’s Guide to
the Key Civil Rights Struggle of Our Time.

Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank a number of people who made this report possible. These include
the Media Democracy Fund, which supported part of the research, and the contributors to the
author’s Indiegogo project, whose donations enabled much of the work of this report, including
travel to complete interviews. Also, a number of people read and commented on the report:
Michelle Alexander, Brian Dolinar, Craig Gilmore, Emily Harris, Susan Levy Haskell, Ruth
Wilson Gilmore, Stuart Levy, and Shiva Shah. Similar thanks go to Malkia Cyril, both for her
comments on the text and for placing this work on the action agenda of the Center for Media
Justice. Danielle Chynoweth deserves a special acknowledgment for advocating for this project
as part of the activities of the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center. I also owe a debt
of gratitude to Al Davis for his editing and Amanda Hwu for her creative and high-spirited work
in the design. Photo credit for the cover goes to Elliot Hammer/Flickr. I am grateful for all those
who agreed to be interviewed for this work. In this regard, several people greatly assisted me in
connecting to people for interviews and helping frame the approach of the report. These included
Maria Alexander, Emily Harris, Monica Jahner, Aleks Kajstura, Hamid Khan, Barbara Levine,
Ida McCray, Laura Sager, Geri Silva, Whitney Richards-Calathes, Leah Sakala, Mary Sutton,
and Peter Wagner. Special kudos to Citizens Alliance on Prisons and Public Spending (CAPPS),
Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB), and the LA Youth Justice Coalition for
helping connect me with interviewees.

34 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER
Finally, two more thank you’s are in order. The first goes to Mike Nellis, the world’s
leading expert on electronic monitoring, who supported my every move, including organizing an
incredibly enlightening trip to Germany in 2014 to attend a conference on electronic monitoring
and human rights. And the second is to my family, including the greatest reader and supporter of
them all, Terri Barnes, who not only helped conceptualize the report and project and read various
drafts of the report, but also, along with my two sons, Lewis and Lonnie, lived through a year of
my being on the monitor without flinching. With all this support, I still accept credit for any
errors of fact or analysis.

1

http://www.vox.com/2014/6/27/5845484/prisons-are-terrible-and-there-is-finally-a-way-to-get-rid-of-them.
Bruce Schneier, Data and Goliath: The Hidden Battles to Collect Your Data and Control Your World (New York:
Norton, 2015), p. 86.
3
Personal interview with the author, Columbus, OH, August 20, 2012.
4
A. K. Schmidt, “Use of Electronic Monitoring by Criminal Justice Agencies” (Washington, DC: Report for
National Criminal Justice Research Service, 1988).
5
National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center, Online Bulletin, National Institute of Justice
(1999), http://www.justnet.org/Lists/JUSTNET%20Resources/Attachments/859/Elec-Monit.pdf.
6
Interview with George Drake, President of Correct Tech, LLC, September 3, 2014, and July 30, 2015.
7
This includes immigration detention–related uses, juvenile justice, and domestic violence cases that may not
involve a parole/probation component.
8
The only global statistics available are compiled by federal authorities who keep track of those on parole with GPS
monitors. In 2012, according to a Freedom of Information Act request from the author to the Department of Justice,
18,491 people were on parole with GPS. Of these, 12,627 were people with sex offense histories. These figures do
not give any racial or gender breakdowns.
9
Timothy Williams, “The High Cost of Calling the Imprisoned,” New York Times, March 30, 2015.
10
M. Zelinger, “Evan Ebel removed monitoring bracelet days before murders of Tom Clements and Nate Leon”
(2014), http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/local-news/ap-evan-ebel-removed-monitoring-bracelet-daysbefore-murders-of-tom-clements-and-nate-leon.
11
C. Osher, “Colorado parole officers saw 90,000 electronic monitoring alerts,” Denver Post, April 23, 2014,
http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_23091746/colorado-parole-officers-saw-90-000-electronicmonitoring.
12
P. St. John, “Probation officials concede failures in GPS tracking of felons,” Los Angeles Times, February 25,
2014.
13
Soraya Shockley, “Unlocked: From Probation to Incarceration,” Youth Radio, July 28, 2015,
https://youthradio.org/news/article/unlocked-from-probation-to-incarceration/.
14
Figures obtained from personal interviews with people on monitors, and with Linda Connelly of LCA Monitoring,
along with a survey of EM contracts and email correspondence with Gregory Roach of the Michigan Department of
Corrections electronic monitoring unit and conversations with EM consultant George Drake, op. cit.
15
Emma Anderson, The Evolution of Electronic Monitoring Devices, National Public Radio series, May 24, 2014,
http://www.npr.org/2014/05/22/314874232/the-history-of-electronic-monitoring-devices.
16
Personal interview with the author,
17
All quotes from Stapleton from telephone interview with the author, June 26, 2013.
18
Personal interview, June 5, 2011.
19
“Release of a Prisoner,” Title 18, U.S. Code, Part II, Chapter 229, Subchapter C, 3624.
20
See Anderson v. State of Iowa (2011) No. 09-0507; Administrative Order S-2005-154, 13th Judicial Circuit Court
for Hillsborough County, Florida (2005); California Penal Codes, Chapter 7, Article 1, Section 2900.5(k)(2).
2

JAMES KILGORE 35

21

Mike Nellis, “Standards and Ethics in Electronic Monitoring: Handbook for Professionals Responsible for the
Establishment and the Use of Electronic Monitoring” (Brussels: Council of Europe, 2015).
22
This sentence discount is practiced in some European countries, including Estonia.
23
Erin Murphy, “Paradigms of Restraint”, 2008, Duke Law Journal, 57 Duke I.J. 1323-61
24
Quoted in Maya Schenwar, “Your Home Is Your Prison,” posted at Tom Dispatch.com, January 15, 2015
25
The major exceptions would be a somewhat cursory report produced by the John Howard Society of Alberta in
2000 entitled “Electronic Monitoring,” and my own work “Progress or More of the Same? Electronic Monitoring
and Parole in the Age of Mass Incarceration,” Critical Criminology, 21 (1), 123–39 (March 2013); “Toward a New
Paradigm for Electronic Monitoring: Voices of the Monitored,” Journal of Offender Monitoring; and “The Spread of
Electronic Monitoring: No Quick Fix for Mass Incarceration,” Truthout, July 30, 2014. Marc Renzema has also
produced several insightful pieces, including his book chapter “Evaluative Research in Electronic Monitoring,” in
Mike Nellis, Kristel Beyens, and Dan Kaminski, Electronically Monitored Punishment: International and Critical
Perspectives (London: Routledge, 2012).
26
The Illinois Detention Act, for example, merely lists the situations where a monitor can be applied. The Virginia
act dwells on the eligibility and conditions for revoking someone from EM and reincarcerating them. The Florida act
prioritizes explanation of the user fee structure for EM. Most other states and local jurisdictions fall into the same
pattern, with the exception of the cases of Michigan and Northwestern Ohio described on page 17.
27
Michigan Department of Corrections, “Policy Directive on EMS,” 2010, No 06.0d3.105.
28
Corrections Center of Northwest Ohio, “Policy and Procedures: Offender Services Section: Electronic Monitoring
Program,” 2011.
29
For a discussion that raises some of the human rights issues in the context of the UK, see the 2010 article by Liz
Campbell of Human Rights Watch in The Guardian, “Electronic Tagging of Offenders Raises Rights Concerns,”
http://www.theguardian.com/law/2010/aug/12/larry-murphy-electronic-tagging.
30
UN General Assembly, United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for Non-Custodial Measures (The Tokyo
Rules): resolution adopted by the General Assembly., 14 December 1990, A/RES/45/110.
31
Phone interview with the author, July 30, 2015.
32
By far the best collection of these writings is Mike Nellis et al. Electronically Monitored Punishment:
International and Critical Perspectives, op. cit.
33
Recommendation CM/Rec(2014)4 of the Committee of Ministers to member States on electronic monitoring,
adopted February 19, 2014.
34
Email communication with the author, August 5, 2015.
35
From slide presentation prepared by STOP for Stanford University,
http://scpnt.stanford.edu/pnt/PNT10/presentation_slides/6-PNT_Symposium_Logan.pdf.
36
Survey conducted by National Public Radio, the Brennan Center and National Center for State Courts, “State by
State Court Fees,” May 19, 2014, http://www.npr.org/2014/05/19/312455680/state-by-state-court-fees.
37
Email communication from Gregory Roach, Michigan Department of Corrections.
38
Personal interview with Carter Smith, op. cit.
39
Personal interview with the author, Columbus OH, August 20, 2012
40
Personal Interview with the author, Inglewood CA, August 18, 2014.
41
Personal Interview with the author, Van Nuys CA, August 19, 2014.
42
Personal conversation, Oakland CA, August 24, 2014.
43
Personal phone conversation with the author, July 7, 2014
44
Schneier, p. 28.
45
Daniel Keats Citron and Frank A. Pasquale, “The Scored Society: Due Process for Automated Predictions,”
Washington Law Review, 89(1), 2014, http://digitalcommons.law.umaryland.edu/fac_pubs/1431/.
46
Schneier, op. cit., p. 33
47
Quoted in Schneier, op. cit., p. 125.
48
Interviews cited in Center for Media Justice et al., “Digital CultureSHIFT: From Scale to Power,” (2015),
http://centerformediajustice.org/digital-culture-shift-from-scale-to-power/.
49
Schneier, op. cit., p. 78.
50
For information on the role of AT&T in assisting with government surveillance, see Julia Angwin et al., “NSA
Spying Relies on AT&T’s ‘Extreme Willingness to Help,’” Propublica Report, August 2015,
https://www.propublica.org/article/nsa-spying-relies-on-atts-extreme-willingness-to-help . On Google, see Frank
Pasquale, The Black Box Society: The Secret Algorithms That Control Money and Information (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 2015), especially Chapter Four.

36 | EM IS NOT THE ANSWER

51

David Cole, “We Kill People Based on Metadata,” New York Review of Books, May 10, 2014,
http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2014/may/10/we-kill-people-based-metadata/.
52
Malkia Cyril, “Black America’s State of Surveillance,” The Progressive, March 30, 2015.
53
Figures from Jeff Kelly, “Big Data Vendor Revenue and Market Forecast 2013-17,”
http://wikibon.org/wiki/v/Big_Data_Vendor_Revenue_and_Market_Forecast_2013-2017.
54
Quoted in Ingrid Burrington, “What Amazon Taught the Cops,” The Nation, June 15, 2015.
55
PrivacySOS.org, “What Is Predictive Policing,” http://www.privacysos.org/predictive.
56
For details on Seattle, see Katherine Beckett and Steven Herbert, Banished: The New Social Control in Urban
America, (New York: Oxford, 2011).
57
CBC News, “Swedish Office Building Tests Implanted RFID Microchips in Workers,” February 27, 2015,
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/swedish-office-building-tests-implanted-rfid-microchips-in-workers-1.2975360.
58
Greg Allen, “Pastor Offers Sex Offenders A ‘Miracle’: A New Start,” National Public Radio, December 4, 2009,
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121089157.
59
Puck Lo, “Sex-Offender Laws Are Ineffective and Unfair, Critics Say,” Aljazeera America, October 17, 2014,
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/10/17/challenges-to-sexoffenderregistries.html.
60
Andrew Extein, “Digital Darkness and Silence for Sex Offenders in the Information Age,” Truthout, February 14,
2015, http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/29077-digital-darkness-and-silence-for-sex-offenders-in-the-informationage#.
61
Though this technology has been used many times, the most famous case is that of former pro football player
Darren Sharper. See Ken Daley, “Darren Sharper's 9 Years in Prison Followed by Lifelong Monitoring As Sexual
Predator, Document Reveals,” Times-Picayune, April 9, 2015.
62
Deirdre D’Orazio et al., “SOCCPN Annual Survey of Sex Offender Civil Commitment Programs 2013,” October
28, 2013, http://www.soccpn.org/images/SOCCPN_survey_presentation_2013_in_pdf.pdf
63
“Black America’s State of Surveillance,” The Progressive, April 2015.