Thursday, April 19, 2007
Gang members tagged with GPS
San Bernardino county wants to start tagging gangbangers with GPS transponders. County commissioners have applied to the state to be part of a pilot program that would monitor all offenders who are released from jail after serving time for gang-related activities.
The program, which the county has started implementig on its own, is an innovative attempt to tackle the problem of gang violence, but it builds on similar California initiatives already underway. Last year, for instance, California voters enacted Jessica's Law, which forced all sex offenders to live more than 2,000 feet away from schools and parks. The law also require that all felony sex offenders submit to GPS-based electronic monitoring—for the rest of their lives. That's right, the bracelets need to stay on even after sentences are served and parole is over.
Technology is great for keeping track of criminals. Of course, there might be a problem with jailing the wrong people when idiots fail to account for daylight savings time.
A fifteen-year old boy in America was incarcerated for twelve days, wrongly accused of making a hoax bomb threat - because his school had forgotten that the clocks had gone forward.Read the whole thing for the whole stupidity.
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'They just started flipping out, saying I made a bomb threat to the school,' he told local television station KDKA. After he protested his innocence, Webb says that the principal said: 'Well, why should we believe you? You're a criminal. Criminals lie all the time.'
All charges against Webb have now been dropped.