The Real Cost of Prisons Weblog

Billings (MT) Gazette

8/21/07

Electronic anklet has potential for prison system, Mangold says.
By RUFFIN PREVOST Gazette Wyoming Bureau

CODY - Elected officials can sometimes be hard to find, but Powell Mayor Scott Mangold could be located with a few keystrokes on a computer over the weekend, as a network of satellites tracked his every move.

Mangold strapped on an electronic monitoring anklet Thursday and wore it until Sunday morning to test a system being marketed by Freedom Fighters, a Wyoming company seeking to sell the gear to law enforcement.

Powell Police Chief Tim Feathers wrote in a memo to Mangold that he sees potential advantages in using the device as a possible alternative to incarceration for certain nonviolent, first-time offenders.

Mangold said he thinks it could save taxpayers money at a time when hundreds of the state's prisoners are housed out of state, and finding qualified jailers can be difficult when competing with high oil and gas wages.

"Prison is a place for repeat, violent offenders, but this offers an alternative," said Boone Tidwell of Freedom Fighters, who will be pitching the device to Wyoming sheriffs and prison managers.

Tidwell, a retired sheriff's detective and former bail bondsman, is marketing the device in Wyoming for manufacturer SecureAlert, a Utah company that also monitors offenders wearing the anklets.

Equipped with a global positioning unit and a cell phone, the TrackerPal is a little larger than a pack of cigarettes, uses detachable, rechargeable battery packs, and is attached with a custom tool.

Police can use the TrackerPal's cell phone to speak with offenders.

Tidwell said the device differs from older electronic monitoring anklets, which allowed offenders to stay within a few yards of a fixed base station, typically located in their homes.

With the latest generation of equipment, probation or parole officers can set up an exclusion zone where the wearer is not allowed, such as a school or park, in the case of a registered sex offender.

Or, they may be allowed only at home, work and the road between the two places, he said.

Future versions of the device available by early next year will be able to take readings from the wearer's skin and detect drug or alcohol use, Tidwell said.

"This would help a lot of the 'meth moms' that we're giving those massive jail sentences of 10 or 15 years to," Mangold said.

"You could attach one of these to them after they've completed a treatment program and get them back to their families and into the work force. If it detects meth, they go back to jail," he said.

Because offenders would wear the anklets instead of being locked up, they would be volunteering for the program, and could be required to help pay for some or all of its costs, he said.

Tidwell figured the anklets would cost around $15 to $25 per day, including monitoring, which could be done by local law enforcement or through SecureAlert.

"When you consider we're shipping hundreds of prisoners out of the state to be housed at a cost of $60 per day, this could mean a savings of several millions of dollars a year," he said.

Mangold said the device was set up to alert if he traveled more than about three miles from Powell, and it vibrated and issued a recorded warning as he drove to the Powell Municipal Airport Saturday, about nine miles away.

A dispatcher from the monitoring company called the anklet's cell phone to warn Mangold that he was outside his allowed area, he said.

"It's a little startling when your ankle starts to vibrate," he said. "It's even weirder talking to your ankle and hearing someone talk back."

Mangold said the anklet took a little getting used to at first, including while he was sleeping.

He decided to take it off before going waterskiing on Bighorn Lake, where a reporter coincidentally spotted Mangold without the anklet.

Tidwell said the device is waterproof and can be worn in the shower and briefly immersed in up to about 9 feet of water.

Mangold said the data collected during his weekend test will help show state legislators what the device can do.

He expects to travel with Tidwell to Cheyenne to discuss what changes to state law might need to be made to allow for its use.

Mangold said the device may be a way to help ease prison crowding, address a shortage of jailers and save the state money on working with low-risk offenders, all while helping get parolees back to work.

"We need to try something else," he said. "Building new prisons doesn't work."
http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles/2007/08/21/news/wyoming/18-anklet.tx
t