ALT (logo) Harvard Kennedy School MALCOLM WIENER CENTER for Social Policy Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management (centered, green color scheme - block quote image - green text on white background) "These findings have major implications for debates about pretrial EM's net widening effects but also the inherent stickiness of the criminal legal system." SANDRA SUSAN SMITH [footer] (black text, bottom left) Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Social Costs of Pretrial Electronic Monitoring in San Francisco

ALT Qualitative Findings: The Difficulties Pretrial EM Program Participants Face 1) Prior life challenges, especially housing insecurity + co-occurring substance use & mental health disorders, made it much more difficult to meet pretrial conditions with an EM device. 2) EM devices made it more difficult to secure or keep a job and maintain vital social connections because of the stigma of criminal system involvement, even when just awaiting trial. 3) Technical problems with EM devices themselves — including inaccuracy, unreliability, and inconsistency — made compliance more difficult, as did restrictive general conditions. [footer] (black text, bottom left) Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Social Costs of Pretrial Electronic Monitoring in San Francisco

ALT CONCLUSIONS The Difficulties Pretrial EM Program Participants Face The system did not do enough to address the life challenges that “high needs” EM participants faced, and too often the supports it did offer were weak, very temporary, and often punitive, not therapeutic. The result is that participants who struggled with problems like housing insecurity and co-occurring disorders felt as if they were set up to fail. Pretrial EM conditions created many struggles, making it even more difficult than it usually is in the Bay Area for participants to find safe, affordable, and stable housing; to protect their health and well-being; to secure employment and keep their jobs; and to maintain their physical, emotional, and psychological connections to loved ones. (footer) (black text) Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Social Costs of Pretrial Electronic Monitoring in San Francisco

ALT (left column) [gps location graphic] Reforms like pretrial EM, while presumably meant as a move toward decarceration, end up trapping participants in cycles of interaction with the criminal legal system even before they have been convicted of the crime(s) for which they are being monitored but remain merely accused. (right column) [green background] (logo in white) Harvard Kennedy School MALCOLM WIENER CENTER for Social Policy Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management (image of window or prison cell bars) read the working paper Sept. 2022 by Sandra Susan Smith & Cierra Robson (footer) (black text, bottom left) Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Social Costs of Pretrial Electronic Monitoring in San Francisco

ALT (logo) Harvard Kennedy School MALCOLM WIENER CENTER for Social Policy Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management (centered, green color scheme - block quote image - green text on white background) "These findings have major implications for debates about pretrial EM's net widening effects but also the inherent stickiness of the criminal legal system." SANDRA SUSAN SMITH [footer] (black text, bottom left) Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Social Costs of Pretrial Electronic Monitoring in San Francisco