6 ms·

Correct me if I'm off base here, but this seems to be absolute nonsense: > Like many on EM, Ross was never granted movement outside his home even once, not eve

by oooyay 3y ago

Correct me if I'm off base here, but this seems to be absolute nonsense: > Like many on EM, Ross was never granted movement outside his home even once, not even to buy food. His sister, a manager at Securitas, helped when she could, but work got in the way sometimes, he said. So, they replaced the box you sit in with a box that you pay for and provide no additional services with all the same restrictions. What the fuck is the point of these programs? I can understand wanting to use EM to ensure someone shows up to a trial, but this geofencing stuff is absolute madness. It just reintroduces the problem that made prisons and jails problematic in the first place. If someone is a non-threat enough to let them live in society with a bracelet then let them live.

qingcharles 3y ago
I wasn't allowed to leave for food. The judge told me he would not grant my request to leave for food. "Have you heard of Amazon? Order it online." he said. Then when I ordered it online he gave me five months in jail saying he never gave me permission to use the Internet :D
- oooyay 3y ago
  > "Have you heard of Amazon? Order it online." That's textbook entrapment given that collecting an Amazon order, much less the occasionally misplaced one, would require stepping outside of your apartment.
  - qingcharles 3y ago
    Yes. I once stepped onto my front step to let my dog out and the police saw me and went bat-shit crazy about it. They told me I needed to hire someone to come to my house each day and open my front door to let my dog out.
    - treebeard901 3y ago
      People in general do not seem to understand that the Govt more and more is not sending people to prison. They are bringing the prison to everyone instead. That ankle bracelet works the same way as the smartphones as far as location data. We all have ankle bracelets. Our cities are concrete surveillance prisons... It goes on and on and is another failure of the Justice system. I am dealing with a corrupt Judge as well so I know frustrating it can be.
- incahoots 3y ago
  I've gone through the system in a similar fashion, but with no where near the same outcome as you did. If I hadn't gone through a similar situation I would almost believe that you were making it up, that's how ridiculous this is. For context I got stopped in a car with a friend who had weed (unknown to me at the time), had a really old warrant for something like a missed child support payment (also didn't know), and we were both removed from the car. Mind you, I was not driving, and the car did not belong to me, I was simply a passenger. Cops claim they have cause to search the car, I can't argue otherwise, car gets searched, weed was found, we both get hit with the charge. I was expected to pay $6000 for possession, spent a week in jail, lost my job, and had to travel 3 hours to the court house to "appear" in front of a judge with no means of getting there because every waking moment needed me to find a job and save any money I had to pay upcoming rent and needs, in addition to paying child support and not missing a payment otherwise I would end up in jail. That's how quickly this shit escalates, had I not found a ride to get to the court house at least twice, I would've been arrested for bail jumping, and lost my new job, and my apartment. Apologizes if I'm taking away from your experience, not my intention. I feel like that if others don't come to share similar stories, people are quick to dispel your situation as a one off, and accuse of not being responsible.
  - pc86 3y ago
    Unfortunately, the common refrain in scenarios like this is that it's your fault. Even ignoring the weed, which I think a lot of people would have sympathy for, you owed child support that wasn't paid and had a [bench, presumably] warrant out for your arrest. The simple fact of the matter is that most people don't owe court-mandated child support at any point in their lives, most people that do owe it pay it, and most people don't ever have warrants out for their arrest. I don't say this as any sort of moral or character judgment, but simply to point out that part of the reason this thing is allowed to happen is because the people it's happening to are very rarely sympathetic individuals. They're viewed as bad people and "others" by the majority of the population. So what's the fix for this? I wish I had an answer, but I don't. Maybe teaching empathy so that the court system starts feeling pressure from the citizens that this isn't ok. Maybe legislation against charge stacking just to elicit plea deals. There's also the very real possibility of the pendulum swinging too far in the other direction where DAs don't charge petty crime and people charged with violent crimes are released on signature bonds.
- Ekaros 3y ago
  And this why there should be mechanism to throw judges and prosecutors for this sort of misconduct in prisons, for sufficiently lengthy sentences. With inmates being the peers they prosecuted.
- u32480932048 3y ago
  Most of these people aren't very bright.
chaps 3y ago
It's very much a political issue over a practical issue. The EM program has been around since the 80s, but the pandemic caused its use to explode -- largely to reduce the spread of COVID in/out of jails.
- qingcharles 3y ago
  This. And now with States finally trying to produce a fairer bond system (e.g. elimination of cash bail in Illinois and other jurisdictions), the system is expanding enormously.

by oooyay 3y ago

qingcharles 3y ago

I wasn't allowed to leave for food. The judge told me he would not grant my request to leave for food. "Have you heard of Amazon? Order it online." he said. Then when I ordered it online he gave me five months in jail saying he never gave me permission to use the Internet :D

oooyay 3y ago
> "Have you heard of Amazon? Order it online." That's textbook entrapment given that collecting an Amazon order, much less the occasionally misplaced one, would require stepping outside of your apartment.
- qingcharles 3y ago
  Yes. I once stepped onto my front step to let my dog out and the police saw me and went bat-shit crazy about it. They told me I needed to hire someone to come to my house each day and open my front door to let my dog out.
  - treebeard901 3y ago
    People in general do not seem to understand that the Govt more and more is not sending people to prison. They are bringing the prison to everyone instead. That ankle bracelet works the same way as the smartphones as far as location data. We all have ankle bracelets. Our cities are concrete surveillance prisons... It goes on and on and is another failure of the Justice system. I am dealing with a corrupt Judge as well so I know frustrating it can be.
incahoots 3y ago
I've gone through the system in a similar fashion, but with no where near the same outcome as you did. If I hadn't gone through a similar situation I would almost believe that you were making it up, that's how ridiculous this is. For context I got stopped in a car with a friend who had weed (unknown to me at the time), had a really old warrant for something like a missed child support payment (also didn't know), and we were both removed from the car. Mind you, I was not driving, and the car did not belong to me, I was simply a passenger. Cops claim they have cause to search the car, I can't argue otherwise, car gets searched, weed was found, we both get hit with the charge. I was expected to pay $6000 for possession, spent a week in jail, lost my job, and had to travel 3 hours to the court house to "appear" in front of a judge with no means of getting there because every waking moment needed me to find a job and save any money I had to pay upcoming rent and needs, in addition to paying child support and not missing a payment otherwise I would end up in jail. That's how quickly this shit escalates, had I not found a ride to get to the court house at least twice, I would've been arrested for bail jumping, and lost my new job, and my apartment. Apologizes if I'm taking away from your experience, not my intention. I feel like that if others don't come to share similar stories, people are quick to dispel your situation as a one off, and accuse of not being responsible.
- pc86 3y ago
  Unfortunately, the common refrain in scenarios like this is that it's your fault. Even ignoring the weed, which I think a lot of people would have sympathy for, you owed child support that wasn't paid and had a [bench, presumably] warrant out for your arrest. The simple fact of the matter is that most people don't owe court-mandated child support at any point in their lives, most people that do owe it pay it, and most people don't ever have warrants out for their arrest. I don't say this as any sort of moral or character judgment, but simply to point out that part of the reason this thing is allowed to happen is because the people it's happening to are very rarely sympathetic individuals. They're viewed as bad people and "others" by the majority of the population. So what's the fix for this? I wish I had an answer, but I don't. Maybe teaching empathy so that the court system starts feeling pressure from the citizens that this isn't ok. Maybe legislation against charge stacking just to elicit plea deals. There's also the very real possibility of the pendulum swinging too far in the other direction where DAs don't charge petty crime and people charged with violent crimes are released on signature bonds.
Ekaros 3y ago
And this why there should be mechanism to throw judges and prosecutors for this sort of misconduct in prisons, for sufficiently lengthy sentences. With inmates being the peers they prosecuted.
u32480932048 3y ago
Most of these people aren't very bright.

chaps 3y ago

It's very much a political issue over a practical issue. The EM program has been around since the 80s, but the pandemic caused its use to explode -- largely to reduce the spread of COVID in/out of jails.

qingcharles 3y ago
This. And now with States finally trying to produce a fairer bond system (e.g. elimination of cash bail in Illinois and other jurisdictions), the system is expanding enormously.