The Wisconsin legislature budget committee is recommending lifetime global positioning tracking of criminals on supervised release for first-degree sexual assault of children, at a cost of more than $10,100 per year for each offender, says the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Lawmakers said the high cost, which the Department of Corrections said could total $477 million over the next 20 years, is justified. “There are no bigger sleazebags than these types of child molesters,” said Rep. Dean Kaufert. “When they know they’re being tracked, their behavior is going to change.”
The necessary follow-up by probation and parole agents would mean that an average of 17 state workers would need to be hired each year to keep pace with the number of offenders added to the program. Officials estimated that the monitoring requirement would track 285 criminals in the first year at an estimated cost of $2.9 million, about $10,100 per offender. Within 20 years, as many as 5,700 offenders statewide might have to be tracked.