Bahamas Moves Toward Electronic Monitoring
Legislators began debate Monday on the Government’s Bill to amend the Bahamian Penal Code to allow for electronic monitoring of convicts and persons on bail awaiting trial.
In moving debate on the Bill, Education Minister the Hon. Carl Bethel said, “It is foreshadowed that electronic monitoring will be an additional and effective weapon in the fight against crime, a tool which balances appropriately the liberty or freedom of the individual with the need for society to be protected to the extent possible from persons who might be tempted to abuse their freedom to commit further criminal offences.”
Where a person is convicted of an offence punishable by imprisonment of three years and upwards, the Bill gives the court the power to order that a convict be subject to electronic monitoring for a further period of up to five years after his release from prison on the expiration of his prison sentence. Where a person is convicted of an offence punishable with imprisonment for a period of three years or less the court, through the Bill, may if it thinks fit in place of any term of imprisonment or a part of such term, order that the person be released and subjected to electronic monitoring. And where a person is granted bail in respect of a charge of commission of a serious criminal offence punishable by imprisonment for three years or more, the court may, through the Bill, order that a condition of bail is that the person be subjected to electronic monitoring…
Touting the modern technological usefulness of electronic monitoring, the Minister pointed out that, “All movements of the person who is monitored can be tracked, in the same way that the radio signal of a cell phone can be tracked … The added GPS features greatly contribute to the possibility of providing a real disincentive for the monitored person to commit any further crimes, since the electronic signal recorded on the GPS system could place him at the scene of any other crime that he might have been tempted to commit.”
More information on this move at IBLS.