Electronic ankle bracelets

BERMUDA – Offenders to start wearing electronic ankle bracelets

Posted by on Aug 30th, 2010 // No Comment

HAMILTON, Bermuda, CMC – The Bermuda government says it will implement a programme next month that will allow offenders to be fitted with electronic ankle bracelets.

Attorney General and Justice Minister Kim Wilson told a news conference Monday that the devices would cut the cost of keeping defendants awaiting trial on remand in prison and would also be used to monitor those on parole or subject to probation orders.

“This initiative has been introduced to find alternatives to incarceration within Bermuda without compromising the safety of society and to keep track of offenders,” Wilson said.

“Technological innovation to monitor offenders electronically has been devised since the 1960s and has since been introduced for correctional use in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and in other nations worldwide in an effort to reduce the prison populations.”

She said a judicial video-conferencing system was also being installed “with a view to early implementation”.

It will be used in some Supreme Court and Magistrates’ Court trials involving vulnerable witnesses, such as children, as well as for prisoners’ remand hearings.