Editorial: Watching the watched today
The vexed question of whether or not it is wise for convicted criminals or people on bail for alleged crimes to be in the community has roared back into the public discourse at just the wrong time for any measured consideration of the issue.
The New Zealand Herald nailed a decent scoop over the weekend when it got hold of an internal police report which detailed how people subject to an electronic monitoring order are trying to circumvent the technology so that they can move around without detection, and possibly reoffend.
The report was drafted as an issues assessment for one police district, Canterbury, and was not written with the national situation in mind.
The authorities were quick to try to hose down any firestorm that the article might create, saying that the rate that electronic bail bracelets are tampered with is about 1.4%, a percentage which the Corrections Department said was as low as it has ever been.
That is as may be, but a relatively static rate of tampering fails to take into account that the actual number of people who are trying to rort the monitoring system is on the rise, given that the number of people subject to electronic surveillance continues to increase.
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For example, Corrections said yesterday that the number of people on monitored bail had increased from 495 as of June 2017 , to 2345 at June 30 this year — and 1.4% of the latter number represents several more people than 1.4% of the former.
And given that electronic monitoring can also be used for community detention and home detention sentences, as well as part of an extended supervision order, as a condition of parole, as part of a release-to-work programme or as part of intensive supervision, the number of people with a bracelet around their ankle is substantial.