“This is the most extreme type of monitoring that I’ve seen,” says Pilar Weiss, founder of the National Bail Fund Network, a network of over 90 community bail and bond funds across the United States. “It’s part of a disturbing trend where deep surveillance and social control applications are used pretrial with little oversight.”
Hard to believe they unlocked and gave their phone to these weirdos. If you truly have a reason to see this data you can send a court order their isp.
The legal system is so detached from reality when it comes to technology that it leads to this kind of horseshit where someone, before any court proceedings proving guilt are even started, is subject to extreme and unjust punishment.
Privacy on the internet is a lifeline at this point and they might as well be cutting off his water or electricity, which would be only slightly more egregious. But the people who create legislation and operate the judicial system are comprised largely of crusty old boomers who need a secretary just to send an email or open a fucking PDF. They are information troglodytes who are simply incompatible with the modern world.
And here I worry about eliminating ads, trackers and Google Play services on my phone. There’s no way I would agree to that shit.
Prosecutors and judges really need a reminder of the concept of innocent until proven guilty.
The day her husband was released on bond, Hannah sat down with their kids and tried to explain how all of their devices were going to be monitored: The probation department would see anything they looked at on their phones and assume it was their father using the device. The constant surveillance had an immediate impact on the family, Hannah says.
And:
In near real time, probation officers are being fed screenshots of everything Hannah’s family views on their devices. From images of YouTube videos watched by her 14-year-old daughter to online underwear purchases made by her 80-year-old mother-in-law, the family’s entire digital life is scrutinized by county authorities. “I’m afraid to even communicate with our lawyer,” Hannah says. “If I mention anything about our case, I’m worried they are going to see it and use it against us.”
Any reasonable person would describe that as not just a punishment, but a pretty severe one.
And one that affects children. Having a teenager know that a person she never met, who she has no way to contact, is looking at her activity every minute isn’t just punishment in fact. It’s victimization.
Thus, I think we can conclude from this that the Monroe County, Indiana prosecutors office is victimizing children. Full stop. Time to make some arrests.
Doesn’t this also violate right to privacy of everyone else in the home? I smell a civil rights issue.
The very idea that they can forcibly monitor the entire families devices in order for him to be granted bail is insane. Personally, I think the idea of not being allowed any electronic device shouldn’t be allowed anymore, but using that as a pretext to affect the entire family is absurd.
Absolutely.
In 1950, if you were told as a pretrial release condition, you weren’t allowed to use paper because your alleged crime involved a book, no one would have thought that reasonable. Today, devices are the equivalent of paper.
I agree that this is cruel and unusual punishment, however, I strongly dislike the paper == computer metaphor. The two are hardly comparable.
Compared to paper, it is easy to comit serious crimes from the comfort of your own home with a computer. Computers facilitate Lightspeed communication, and can be used for instantaneous financial transaction. They can be used to collect information anonymously, and deseminate information publically.
Very very different risk levels.
That said, subjecting an entire family to 24/7 electronic surveillance (and making them pay for it!?!) Is fucked up. I think we need a different paradigm for dealing with “e-criminals” like perhaps the state provides state-administered devices to those charges with electronic crimes? Idrk, but this ain’t it cheif.
Computers are remarkably efficient but at the dawn of the Gutenberg press, you could have made similar observations. For the first time with paper, it was possible to commit crimes in the privacy of your own home merely by writing things down and sending them to a publisher.
Except for the “instantaneous” and “Lightspeed” observations, which I think are the real key here. Also, commiting a book crime would require conscious cooperation and coordination with another person/people (the publisher), whereas internet crimes can be done completely solo.
I think a more sensible comparison could be made between computers and telephones or telegraphs
It’s more efficient, certainly. But telling someone pretrial in 2023 they can’t use a computer isn’t realistic.
Jayzuz. If the app’s EULA specifically states it’s NOT to be used as a judicial tool, why in the f*ck are cops using it anyway???
Murica is so far down the Big Brother rabbit hole rn I fear for its survival.
The app is clearly done by religious nutjobs that get off on societal voyeurism, they don’t mind the cops, they are just covering their legal asses.
Laws and rules only apply to people, not cops.
