Unit 4
April 19, 2015
GPS monitoring of sex offenders for life? Supreme Court reverses N.C. case
Summary:
In recent a recent Supreme Court ruling, it was declared that the Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches apply to government actions in both the civil and criminal cases. In a five-page unsigned opinion, the justices reversed North Carolina's "judicial decision upholding a program that allows state official to us a GPS device to monitor the movements of repeat sex offenders 24 hours a day, seven days a week- for the rest of their lives'. The state appeals and the North Carolina Supreme Court ruled that since the program was created under civil law, rather than criminal law, the GPS monitoring did not amount to a search under the Fourth Amendment. The Supreme Court then remanded the case back to the lower courts to decide whether requiring an individual who has already served his/her entire criminal sentence to submit to GPS monitoring for the rest of his/her life in an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment.
Analysis:
This issue came about back in 1996 when, at the time, 17 year old Torrey Dale Grady was convicted twice of a sex offense. He was found guilty of a second degree sexual offense in 1996 and in 2006 he was convicted of "taking indecent liberties with a child". He received a 3 year sentence for the crime and his prison term was completed in 2009. Since Grady was considered a recidivist by the North Carolina Department of Correction, he was considered eligible for the state's satellite-based monitoring program. A judge then ordered him to enroll in the monitoring program "for the remainder of his natural life. The ankle bracelet was required to be wore at all times and a GPS monitoring station was to kept in his home. Since the ankle bracelet needed to be recharged, Grady had to spend 4-6 hours every day plugged into a wall socket. I believe that we should keep an eye on registered sex offenders and recidivist people but I think there should be a limit on how long each monitoring system is on each person based off of the crimes they have committed and if they have improved over the time they have been released. North Carolina is not the only state to issue the ankle bracelets to sex offenders. Since 2005, forty states have passed laws authorizing GPS monitoring for sex offenders. Eight of these states- including North Carolina-provide for such monitoring for the rest of one's life. The judge in North Carolina base his decision on the fact that Grady had been a recidivist (re-offended convicted criminal) of a sex crime. The judge did not look at whether Grady actually constituted a potential future danger to the society and community, but only the fact that he was a repeated offender. I think that the judges should examine all aspects of a person and a case before they make their final ruling decision. It is important to see all sides of a story and take into consideration who a person really is, while understanding the crime they may have committed.
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