MediaJustice

#NoDigitalPrisons

Law enforcement agencies are increasingly presenting high-tech tools like electronic monitoring and algorithms as solutions to mass incarceration. But these digital tools are false solutions and only amplify the racial bias that already exists in the criminal legal system.

"Mapping Pretrial Injustice" Launch Visit the "Mapping Pretrial Injustice" Site
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Challenging E-Carceration

Challenging E-Carceration

The prison rate is dropping but the use of electronic monitoring is growing. Electronic Monitoring threatens to become a form of technological mass incarceration, shifting the site and costs of imprisonment from state facilities to vulnerable communities and households.

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Mapping Pretrial Injustice

In thousands of communities across the United States, courts are embedding risk assessment tools into high-stakes pretrial incarceration, supervision, and release decisions. The way these tools are used and the biases they can embody are usually not obvious to the public.

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By the Numbers

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77%

A ProPublica study found that Black people were 77% more likely than others to be incorrectly flagged as likely to commit a future violent offense by algorithmic tools.

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140%

The percentage increase in the use of electronic monitoring in the past decade.

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41

According to research conducted by the Media Mobilizing Project, 41 states and Washington D.C. have at least one county using a pretrial risk assessment tool.

About the Campaign

PROBLEM

Law enforcement agencies are increasingly presenting high-tech tools and algorithms as solutions to mass incarceration. Yet even as the prison rate is dropping, the use of electronic monitoring is growing—shifting the site and costs of imprisonment from state facilities to vulnerable communities and households of color. And as governments move to end the cash bail system, many are turning to pretrial risk assessments, placing another technological barrier between people and their freedom. These digital tools are false solutions and do not truly address the racial bias that exists in the criminal legal system.

SOLUTIONS

In 2018, led by MediaJustice Fellow James Kilgore, the “Challenging E-carceration” project released a set of guidelines to support advocates and policymakers to protect the human rights of those who are monitored. Over 50 racial justice, criminal justice and civil rights organizations endorsed the guidelines. [Read the Guidelines]

In 2020, Media Mobilizing Project and MediaJustice launched “Mapping Pretrial Injustice”, a website on Pretrial Risk Assessments, intended to inform our allies, advocates, and organizers leading anti-mass incarceration work, as well as encourage a broader dialogue around the fairness of algorithmic decision-making tools, accountability, and transparency. [Learn more]

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