Tuesday, February 20, 2007

SCRAM: False or Not?

I have been looking for a realistic study on the tamper device. One report shows 733 confirmed tampers involving 158 offenders, I was 2 of those tampers and yet I did not tamper for delinquent purposes. This report failed to show how many involved a positive alcohol read as well, or how many were notified (by phone, police dispatch etc...) with reasonable certainty that the defendant could make there defense. In short, I'll bet that a vast majority of these confirmed tampers were false alarms but without more information, it appears that many defendants have lost their liberty for sleeping, wearing pants or socks or simply the tether falling down their legs which is quite comfortable after have 8 ounces pulling on your skin with every step for months! An interesting part of the study showed that the were 180 confirmed positives for 63 offenders. It does not take much logic to explain the dramatic increase in "confirmed tampers", for we can almost avoid contact with ethanol in most forms, most everyone wears socks, pants and or sleeps. Another factor not mentioned here is the abrasions. Could the dead skin from the scabbing wound create a tamper?
Today, I am still getting responses from concerned wearers, some charged with allegations that are "virtually" impossible to beat, and some just wearing it. One person claimed " My son was sent to jail for about forty days for two probation violations because his SCRAM unit showed what Jeff Hawthorn called drinking episodes. We went to court and prevailed thanks to a Judge who ordered two probation officers to wear SCRAM units and spend an hour in close proximity to my son and the oven that he works by in a bakery. All three units indicated alcohol consumption. AMS and Jeff Hawthorn need to be held accountable for the losses that people incur do to SCRAM's inability to distinguish consumed alcohol from invirnmental alcohol. Seems as though AMS is able to profit from a hastily marketed product." Remember, you can't fool the SCRAM bracelet, yet another possible way the device can fool the legal community, or are they?$?

Reference:
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:v0spCOum7jUJ:www.nlectc.org/training/commcorr2006/bock_commcorr2006_comparing.pps+scram+false-positives&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=13&gl=us