GPS Technology Boosts Enforcement of Restraining Orders
The digital age is catching up with enforcement of
court-ordered restraining orders. By
now, GPS is an acronym that most Americans need no introduction to. Global Positioning Satellites are becoming
more and more a part of daily life.
These systems
lead hikers out of the woods and motorists out of traffic, providing
navigational data and easy-to-follow directions. A growing number of states also are
taking full advantage of GPS technology and its ability to find anything.
Currently, 13 states have passed laws that allow judges to
order domestic violence offenders to wear bracelets containing a GPS
transponder. This technology lets law
enforcement officials make sure that the boundaries courts put in place around
a victim’s home or the children’s school are protected, 24 hours a day.
Historically, the effectiveness of a restraining order has
depended on the offender’s willingness to obey it. The most angry and/or violent abusers were
often the very same individuals who disregarded a court’s order.
With a GPS bracelet, an offender who violates
the boundary of a restraining order prompts two calls: one to the person
protected by the order, and another to the police, who can respond to the
violator’s exact location. Alexis Moore,
the head of Survivors in Action, a victims' advocacy group, sums up the
feeling of many in her profession:
"Why it’s not available in all 50 states,
I’ll never know."
She is leading the
push for a GPS law in California.
Unfortunately, the reason the technology has yet to catch on
everywhere is simple dollars and cents. According
to the Colorado Electronic Monitoring Resource Center, some 5,000 GPS devices
are tracking offenders across the country. Some jurisdictions have declined to take up the cost of monitoring
persons under a restraining order, while others have decided to order the
offender himself to foot the expense.
While this technology seems like a slam-dunk to many
victims-advocacy groups, not everyone is convinced. Deborah Epstein, a member of the Domestic
Violence Clinic at Georgetown University, worries that GPS technology might
provide victims with more peace of mind than real security.
While the 5,000 offenders currently monitored
seems like a very manageable number, a full count of all persons under
restraining orders would be significantly higher.
"If we hand them out in every case, law enforcement isn’t
going to be able to deliver the kind of protection that victims need," Epstein
says, "and we run the risk of lulling victims into a false sense of security,
they think, my abusive partner has a monitoring bracelet on, I’m safe."
For victims trying to divorce from their abusive
spouses or seeking legal action against them, those concerns ring somewhat
hollow. Many feel that the extra warning
offered by GPS monitoring technology provides a window of time that could mean
the difference between life and death.
In other words, the technology ensures that the protection of the court
will be more than just a piece of paper.
Source: ABC News
