GA: New Legislation Would Allow Lifelong GPS Monitoring of Sex Offenders
When the Georgia Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a law allowing convicted sex offenders to be ordered to wear GPS ankle monitors for the rest of their lives after release from prison, several justices offered a concurring opinion saying the Legislature could write a law requiring such monitoring that would pass constitutional muster.
New legislation dropped on the first day of the General Assembly aims to do just that.
House Bill 720Â stipulates that a judge may order probation for life and that it may include electronic monitoring.
The bill notes that it is intended to “provide a response to Park v. State,” the March 2019 opinion deeming statutory lifetime monitoring after an offender has served his court-ordered sentence constituted a “lifelong search” in violation of the Fourth Amendment.
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might as well 1900s be black and have chains attached to us
NO LIVE FREE OR DIE
Some Random Thoughts:
This should only affect those convicted after the date the bill becomes law. I don’t believe you can make probation retroactive.
This will also be challenged in court. Sentencing for a crime is punishment and this will be easily proven as excess punishment as they will not be able to help themselves in applying it to every SOR statute.
If they were to limit it to only those who re-offend (not including reporting violations) they would probably have an easier time getting it to stand.
The stupid part is, the State of Georgia is going to waste even more money on something that provides little to no benefit instead of using it where it might do some good. You are placing GPS tracking on a group of people who already only re-offend at very low rates. In addition, as we all know, the majority of crimes are first time offenders.
I wonder how many people on the registry would be willing to trade GPS monitoring for a Law Enforcement Eyes Only registry. What if you could make that choice, one or the other.
Isn’t it wonderful that some legislators, after swearing to defend the constitution, feel perfectly fine about trying to find a way AROUND that constitution. When you subvert the rights of any group,a constitution becomes useless.
Can’t read past paywall.
Gist appears to be, mandatory life GPS is unconstitutional, UNLESS judge had discretion in the individual’s case.
If the bill passes, defense attorneys will need to be prepared to argue why life GPS is unnecessarily.
Just where is this ever going to end. Murderers, drug dealers that are killing our children, drunk drivers, where is their monitoring. They are the real menaces to society and the repeat offenders.
Soon, everyone on probation will have a GPS! Other felons are next in line for this. Why do you think 5G is being set up? Once it is decided that YOU are the one to be found guilty, your whereabouts will be matched to locations of crimes. If any crime was committed nearby anywhere you were, then YOU must have committed the crime!
This will never happen and I tell you why. The technology of GPS tracking of humans wearing the latest monitors is full of faults and extremely costly to do. You cannot fully automate this process. You need live human surveillance. And once violations are found you need cops to find the offender. Nobody talks about how the system of GPS monitoring works and current flaws in the system. Presently it works about 40% of the time. So if a hundred thousand Sex Offenders in Georgia are wearing monitoring devices, Law Enforcement will need thousands of civilian and law enforcement officers to work surveillance outside and inside of automatic computer monitoring. To be clear its much too costly for most county and city police department’s to budget and support such a proposition and most of the time doesn’t work.
JEV True Confessions
It has already happened in Michigan for offenders who were convicted of 1st degree CSC, or whose victim was under 13. Cost is not a factor. The technology records everything, leaving authorities the opportunity to arrest you for alleged violations at any time that they choose. The fees charged to those who wear them are ridiculous. And the sad truth is that State government accounting treats the assessed fees as revenue whether those fees are paid or not.
All costs of monitoring are the responsibility of the offender, Jev. , so LE could care less of the costs involved.
The infrastructure is already in place for virtually endless amounts of GPS monitors. They are already putting them on more and more offenders, even misdemeanors, and illegal aliens are required to wear them now until their hearing.
I would also like to remind everyone that private companies are profiting greatly off this GPS scam. I’m sure that they are also pushing the phony propaganda that it keeps the public safe. Just another step in the direction of monitoring ALL citizens electronically.
This has already happened in Missouri also. However, there is NO way a T3 Registrant can ever get off of it. The one they use here is NOT water proof. You can’t go swimming or take bathes.
Day #1 I would drive my car off a bridge and gps would be ruined.
Day # 2, They chew me out and replace the unit. On the way home, I accidentally trip and fall into the community pool.
Day #3, I am threatened with jail if I ruin another gps. After getting a replacement, a pipe burst and ……. well you get the picture.
@ JEV: No, It will not be too expensive …. because they will require the offenders (as part of their lifetime probation) to pay an exorbitant monthly fee for the pleasure of being GPS-monitored. But that’s not punishment, right?? 🙄