Vera Institute of Justice Issues Report on the Growth of Electronic Monitoring in the United States

Date:  02-03-2024 The number of people on electronic monitoring grew almost tenfold between 2005 and 2022 despite the costs and harms that surround it

From Vera Institute of Justice: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Nico MacDonald | nmacdonald@vera.org New York, NY (Jan 30, 2024)—Today, the Vera Institute of Justice issued a report, People on Electronic Monitoring, on the prevalence of electronic monitoring (EM) in the criminal legal and immigration systems in the United States. This comprehensive analysis reveals a steep increase in EM use over the past 15 years. It is the most comprehensive count to date on electronic monitoring in the U.S. The graphs below show Vera’s estimates of the rapid growth of EM in both the criminal legal and immigration systems in this time. EM is a form of digital surveillance that tracks people’s physical location, movement, or other markers of behavior (such as blood alcohol level). It is commonly used in the criminal legal system as a condition of pretrial release or post-conviction supervision and for people in civil immigration proceedings who are facing deportation. Read the report here.