“You’ll never stand-alone”: Electronic monitoring in Germany
| Author | Judith Treig,Frieder Dünkel,Christoph Thiele |
| DOI | 10.1177/2066220317697657 |
| Published date | 01 April 2017 |
| Date | 01 April 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/2066220317697657
European Journal of Probation
2017, Vol. 9(1) 28 –45
© The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/2066220317697657
journals.sagepub.com/home/ejp
“You’ll never stand-alone”:
Electronic monitoring in
Germany
Frieder Dünkel
University of Greifswald, Germany
Christoph Thiele
University of Greifswald, Germany
Judith Treig
University of Greifswald, Germany
Abstract
Electronic monitoring (EM) in Germany is used only exceptionally in cases of high-
risk offenders released from prison after fully having served a prison sentence or after
release from the preventive detention measure (added to a prison sentence in cases
of “dangerous” violent or sex offenders). About 70 cases on a daily total of more than
36,000 supervision of conduct cases are under global positioning system (GPS)-EM. Only
in one federal state (Hesse) EM on radio frequency technology is also used to avoid pre-
trial detention or in regular probation/parole cases. Numbers remain very low also in
this context. EM is always combined with a probation or supervision of conduct order,
which means that it is embedded in the rehabilitative work of the probation services.
The German judiciary and crime policy are very reluctant to expand EM, as there is
no pressure from the prison system (no overcrowding) and the “ordinary” probation
service (without EM) works quite efficiently.
Keywords
Crime policy, electronic monitoring, high-risk offenders, principle of proportionality,
probationary supervision, supervision of conduct
Corresponding author:
Frieder Dünkel, Department of Criminology, University of Greifswald, 17487 Greifswald/Germany.
Email: duenkel@uni-greifswald.de
697657EJP0010.1177/2066220317697657European Journal of ProbationDuenkel et al.
2017
Article
Düenkel et al. 29
Introduction: History of EM in Germany
Electronic monitoring (EM) has never been an important issue in crime policy in
Germany. Discussions at the end of the 1990s led to a pilot project in the federal state of
Hesse, where EM is primarily used as a judicial directive in combination with a sus-
pended sentence or as a directive for an accused to avoid pre-trial detention, both forms
together count for about 80 cases per year. But, besides this pilot project in one out of 16
federal states – contrary to other countries (see Haverkamp [2014] for an overall view)
– a nationwide and broader introduction was never intended in Germany as it was not
realised as a promising option to replace imprisonment either in the pre-trial stage nor as
a court disposal at the sentencing stage.
There were occasional discussions and attempts to introduce EM during the execution
of prison sentences for preparing release from prison by so-called relaxations of the
prison regime (“Vollzugslockerungen”, prison leaves), but again only three federal states
(Hesse, Baden-Württemberg and Saxony-Anhalt) introduced the possibility in their
prison legislation.1Within the Hessian pilot project, EM prison leaves are restricted to
just a handful of cases, in Saxony-Anhalt the legal possibility to use EM is not applied so
far and EM thus remains only a theoretical option, and in Baden-Württemberg the
attempt to implement EM in combination with prison leaves or as an alternative form of
the execution of prison sentences for fine defaulters was abolished.2
While prison overcrowding was a driver for the implementation of EM in some
European countries, prison overcrowding both in the past and currently is not an
issue at all in Germany. Instead, the need for EM became “urgent” with the decision
of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) (M. vs. Germany, no. 19359/04),
which stated that the instrument of preventive detention was a violation of the
European Convention on Human Rights, with the consequence that several “danger-
ous” offenders had to be released from preventive detention. The legislator reacted
in 2010 by introducing EM as an element attached to the measure of “supervision of
conduct” (Führungsaufsicht), which is a special intensive supervision by the proba-
tion service and the supervision of conduct agency (Führungsaufsichtsstelle) for so-
called high-risk offenders. Main target groups are offenders released from psychiatric
hospitals or from preventive detention (Sicherungsverwahrung)3, and offenders
released from prison after having served the full sentence and if their prognosis for
reoffending is high.
The so-called electronic location monitoring (Elektronische Aufenthaltsüberwachung,
EAÜ) is the only form of EM that is accepted in all German federal states. EAÜ uses
GPS-technology and thus theoretically allows the location of the person under EM to be
continuously monitored. Nevertheless, EAÜ-EM is not practiced as a 24/7 live surveil-
lance of the offenders’ movement. Instead, the involved authorities only gain access to
the “geo-data” in cases when deviating events are reported via the global positioning
system (GPS)-technic – that is, mainly when the offender (potentially) has left an inclu-
sion zone or illicitly sets foot in an exclusion zone (e.g. playgrounds, schools, kindergar-
tens or the place of residence of a former victim). The purpose of EAÜ is to minimise the
risk that offenders, who have committed serious sexual or violent offences (dangerous
offenders), reoffend after their release from prison or from a forensic institution.
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