E-tagging
convicts
Martin Bright
BRITAIN
is considering a controversial scheme to surgically implant
electronic tags in convicted paedophiles amid fears that the
extent of children abuse has been massively underestimated.
Documents
obtained by The Observer newspaper in London reveal the UK
Government could track paedophiles by satellite, with a system
similar to that used to locate stolen cars.
The tags can be
put beneath the skin under local anaesthesia and would also be
able to monitor the heart rate and blood pressure of the abuser,
alerting staff to the possibility that another attack is
imminent.
A letter from
Hilary Benn, the Minister responsible for the supervision of sex
offenders in the community, reveals the Home Office’s
electronic monitoring team is already developing technology to
track paedophiles constantly. The team is now investigating the
‘implant tag’ after it was alerted to its capabilities by a
campaign group for victims of paedophiles.
Tracker, the
company which runs Britain’s largest stolen vehicle monitoring
network, has already been approached about paedophile monitoring
and computer company Compaq has been asked to develop the
software.
Compaq Software
Solutions has developed similar technology for NASA to monitor
remotely the bodily functions of astronauts. In the case of
paedophiles, the technology would not measure sexual excitement,
but would monitor the offender’s state of nervousness and
fear.
Technology
currently used can tell only whether an offender is where he is
supposed to be, which is usually a curfew address. New
‘reverse tags’ can also monitor whether an offender is
approaching a former victim’s house or a high-risk area such
as a school, but it cannot track every movement.
In a letter to
Labour MP Andrew Mackinley, Benn wrote: ‘The Electronic
Monitoring Team is... looking actively at the possibilities for
using tracking technology to monitor offenders’ whereabouts as
they move from one place to another. To date... the team is
unaware of any available technology which uses bodily implants
to track offenders’ movements or which can measure bodily
functions to predict likely criminal activity. Such future
improvements are, however, worthy of consideration if it can be
demonstrated to be feasible and reliable in delivering
improvements in public protection.’
Ministers would
need to pass new legislation to oblige offenders to be
surgically fitted with the tags.
Civil liberties
groups expressed horror at the proposals last night.
‘Implanting tracking devices provides a frightening vision for
the future. We already know the rules protecting our privacy are
inadequate. Where would this stop?’ said John Wadham, director
of Liberty. ‘This would be used initially for sex offenders,
but we would soon find that other marginalised groups, such as
asylum seekers, would find they were forced to have implants.’
The implant tag
has been proposed by Phoenix Survivors, a group of child abuse
victims who were traded as child prostitutes in the North West
of England. Their name is taken from Operation Phoenix, an
investigation into the activities of 72-year-old Stanley
Claridge.
Claridge’s
stepdaughter and Phoenix Survivors spokeswoman Shy Keenan said:
‘I am sick to death of it being acceptable that I am a victim
because these people have to have their human rights. These
people live outside the law and cannot be controlled, so you
have to know what they are doing all time.’
The news of the
implant tags comes after the first wave of arrests from a list
of 7,000 suspected British paedophiles was passed to British
police by investigators from the US Postal Inspection Service.
Credit card
details had been traced to British customers of a portal on the
WWW, which gave access to hundreds of child porn sites. An
investigation by Northumbria police as part of the nationwide
Operation Ore led to the seizure of hard drives from more than
100 computers. The police in the northeast had been given around
70 names from the list of 7,000 to arrest. In all, 56 men and
four women were arrested. They were not picked up by the usual
vetting procedures because most had no previous criminal record.
The computer files
seized included the scenes of the rape of children as young as
two. One man had 12,000 images of child
abuse on his computer. As a result, Northumbria Police has
estimated that the numbers of persons on the Sex Offenders
Register in the area will increase by 10 per cent. If the hit
rate of the Northumbria investigation is replicated across the
country, it could lead to as many as 5,000 arrests.
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