INDIANAPOLIS (WTHR) - There are more than 4,000 offenders in Marion County currently on electronic monitoring home detention.
Administrators are reaching out to other municipalities but believe they have one of the largest, if not the largest, program in the country.
“The statement that we have a very large program is true," said Marion County Community Corrections Director Tyler Bouma. "In fact, we are very large in comparison to the rest of the country. The fact that makes Indianapolis less safe I think is a misnomer.”
However, critics disagree, arguing the system is overloaded and is allowing violent criminals to walk the street.
Indianapolis Fraternal Order of Police President Rick Snyder has repeatedly voiced concern about the number of people with ankle bracelet monitors.
Bouma says home detention is used as alternative sentencing and to keep pre-trial individuals out of jail as they await trial. He says Marion County’s numbers are large because they use monitors as a tool to track offenders that in other communities would otherwise be on unmonitored probation.
“It’s a complicated number, but I don’t think that the large number is a failure. In fact, I think that it sets us aside as enhancing public safety because the communities that have smaller numbers than us does not mean that the people that are on our program in their community would be incarcerated,” said Bouma.
In tweets, Snyder said his concern is the repeat crimes committed by those in the program.
However, officials said they could not provide numbers on the amount of people who re-offend while on electronic monitoring.
“The reality is there are some people that are going to continue to commit offenses. There are going to be some people that re-offend or don’t show up to court, but our system reduces the likelihood,” said Bouma. “Our system has results that show we are more effective using our system, than by not.”