The New Orleans City Council in 2022 handed nearly $4.5 million in federal funding to the city's Office of Criminal Justice, aiming to reimplement a formal juvenile ankle monitoring program that had gone dormant four years earlier. Almost two years later, none of that money has been spent, council members recently learned. Mayor LaToya Cantrell's administration this week didn't dispute that the money has sat dormant, the Times-Picayune reports. In a statement, however, it suggested that the city's criminal justice team was caught flat-footed by the influx of funds, and that juvenile justice leaders haven't helped much to forward a plan to spend it. Questions about the court's ankle-monitoring program, or lack of it, took center stage after the June killing of French Quarter tour guide Kristie Thibodeaux. New Orleans police say Thibodeaux was shot dead by a 15-year-old assailant who was wearing a court-mandated ankle monitor that was deactivated.
The $4.5 million issued for the program was part of the 2021 American Rescue Plan, a federal stimulus for American cities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Without appropriate supervision, critics say people wearing GPS monitors often go on to commit crime, and the companies responsible often face no repercussions. New Louisiana legislation passed in May made ankle monitoring companies legally responsible for the offenders they monitor by establishing state oversight of private companies. New Orleans District Attorney Jason Williams argued that the industry has a long way to go, and that judges should be focused on the defendants they mandate to monitoring and be able to rely on trustworthy technology. "As it stands right now, ankle monitors are being thought of as a solution to jail overcrowding," Williams said, "and I think that's a very dangerous perspective."
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