FL prisons are using wristbands to track inmates, and punishing those who refuse, some say

DeSoto Correctional Institution, via the Florida Department of of Corrections. Inmates here are balking at being made to wear wristbands that can track their whereabouts.

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A Florida Department of Corrections requirement that inmates wear electronic bracelets to monitor their movements in one facility is raising concerns among some family members and advocates that refusal to wear the devices is resulting in punishment.

Denise Rock, with inmate advocacy group Florida Cares, said that “rampant conversations” are happening about the program among loved ones of inmates on social media because of the lack of information given out by the department.

One of the concerns expressed during the conversations is that the bracelets are being used to monitor inmates’ heartbeats to detect illegal drug use.

“We asked the department if that was going to be done and we were told that it is not, that it’s simply to assist with the count procedure,” Rock said. “Unfortunately, the department’s doing what it’s very often done, which is not providing people with information, so they get scared.”

Last year, the department began using artificial intelligence to surveil inmates’ outgoing phone calls using key words, although the system screens out calls with doctors, lawyers, and spiritual advisers, the Tampa Bay Times reported .

The wristband mandate comes after the agency amended its 2020 contract with Global Tel*Link Corp. (now doing business as ViaPath Technologies) to provide “real time location systems” at 71 prisons designated by the department. The contract provides for Bluetooth low-energy technology that enables “near-real time” tracking and location of inmates throughout designated areas in each prison.

“[Tracking] shall continuously provide the ‘near-real time’ or ‘last known’ position of inmates during active periods for coverage areas,” the contract reads.

Loss of privileges, gain time

Concerned family members told the Phoenix and through an invitation-only Facebook group to which the Phoenix was granted access that inmates rejecting the devices at DeSoto Correctional Institution are subjected to punishment including loss of privileges and “gain time,” plus transfer to other prisons. Gain-time is an inmate’s opportunity to earn a reduction in his or her criminal sentence, defined by the department as “used to encourage satisfactory inmate behavior and motivate program and work participation.”

The Corrections Department operates a system called the “DR Court,” a formal disciplinary hearing scheduled after an inmate receives such a written report of a rule violation.

State Rep. Dianne Hart, who has been active on criminal justice issues and advocated for improving conditions for inmates since her election in 2018, told the Phoenix she spoke to Department of Corrections Secretary Ricky Dixon recently, who confirmed to her that electronic bracelets are being used to monitor the movement of inmates.

“I think it’s a terrible thing,” said Hart, D-Tampa. “You’re already incarcerated and now you’re putting bracelets on me to keep up with me inside of the walls?”

The Florida Department of Corrections didn’t respond to multiple requests by the Phoenix for comment about the wristband program and the reaction of inmates.

Hart said that Dixon asked her last week why she thought the inmates were rebelling against wearing wristbands. “I told him, ‘Why should they be imprisoned again with a [wrist]band monitoring their every move?’

“It’s not making sense to me, other than there’s not enough officers and this is one way for you all to ensure that you know where everybody is, because you don’t have the proper security in these prisons, as opposed to trying to reduce the number [of inmates] so we can get it under some form of control,” she told the Phoenix.

Legislation stalled

Approximately 85,000 inmates are serving sentences in Florida’s correctional institutions, according to the FDC’s last annual report .

Hart has sought for years to craft legislation that would allow the Corrections Department to find safe methods to reduce the number of inmates in state prisons, to little success. Among the most notable was a measure to allow nonviolent offenders to reduce their mandatory time served from 85% to 65% through successful completion of academic and learning courses while incarcerated. It died in the Criminal Justice subcommittee last year.

ViaPath is slated to install fiber network equipment to aid with monitoring in 71 prisons by Dec. 31, 2024, according to the contract. The areas where the wristbands can be tracked include inmate housing units, day rooms, cafeterias, designated medical treatment rooms, and “other mutually agreed to building areas as part of individual site design planning.”

The contract includes an amendment signed on Aug. 10, 2023. The parties signed the original $24.375 million contract in December 2020 for inmate telephone services.

Advocacy groups that follow prison issues say they have not heard of similar programs being rolled out in other states.

Wanda Bertram, a communications strategist with the Prison Policy Initiative, said her organization didn’t have much information about the Florida program “because, as far as we know, it’s the first of its kind in any state prison system.”

The Fulton County Sheriff’s Office in Atlanta signed an agreement last year with a Georgia firm called Talitrix to track inmates with electronic wristbands, but Fulton County commissioners killed the deal in December after the company failed to provide a sufficient number of devices, as reported by 95.5 WSB in Atlanta.

The radio station reported that fewer than 50 inmates in two county jails were using those wristbands at that time, “instead of the 500 promised for $2.1 million in tax dollars.”

“We are not currently participating in any type of program,” Natalie L. Ammons, director of communications for the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office, told the Phoenix last month.

In Cobb County, Georgia, a spokesperson for the Sheriff’s Department says the office is “testing wristband technology” in its adult detention center.

“The current wristband monitors the heartrate of detainees housed in our infirmary and alerts medical staff when the heartrate falls below a set number,” said spokesperson Jeremy Blake.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported last year that such electronic wristbands were being implemented in jails in DeKalb County, Georgia, but a representative of that department told the Phoenix the jurisdiction has discontinued their use.

‘Not my answer’

Other prison systems use such monitoring devices, but for inmates who have been given “pre-release,” allowed to serve the remainder of their sentences in the community.

One expert said such tracking is becoming part of a national trend.

“This program is really striking and really concerning,” said Will Owen, communications director for the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project in New York City.

“We’ve seen electronic monitoring sold as a solution to mass incarceration across the U.S., and its use has really expanded tremendously in recent years. But in reality, electronic monitoring is only an expansion of mass incarceration and this use within prison is only an escalation of its use.”

Whether it’s people with relatively small infractions whose sentences are scheduled to end soon, or seniors unlikely to recidivate, Hart said, the Florida corrections system has to find a better way to deal with such a large prison population. “These wristbands are not my answer,” she said. “I don’t think it’s the appropriate answer.”

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