- Britain is considering a controversial scheme to implant
surgically electronic tags in convicted paedophiles amid fears that the
extent of the abuse of children has been massively underestimated.
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- Documents obtained by The Observer reveal the Government
could track paedophiles by satellite, with a system similar to that used
to locate stolen cars.
- The tags can be put beneath the skin under local anaesthetic
and would also be able to monitor the heart rate and blood pressure of
the abuser, alerting staff to the possibility that another attack was imminent.
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- A letter from Hilary Benn, the Minister responsible for
the supervision of sex offenders in the community, reveals the Home Office's
electronic monitoring team is already developing technology to track paedophiles
constantly. The team is now investigating the 'implant tag' after it was
alerted to its capabilities by a campaign group for victims of paedophiles.
- Tracker, the company which runs Britain's largest stolen
vehicle monitoring network, has already been approached about paedophile
monitoring and computer company Compaq has been asked to develop the software.
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- Compaq Software Solutions has developed similar technology
for Nasa to monitor remotely the bodily functions of astronauts. In the
case of paedophiles, the technology would not measure sexual excitement,
but would monitor the offender's state of nervousness and fear.
- Technology currently used can tell only whether an offender
is where he is supposed to be, which is usually a curfew address. New 'reverse
tags' can also monitor whether an offender is approaching a former victim's
house or a high-risk area such as a school, but it can not track every
movement.
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- In a letter to Labour MP Andrew Mackinley, Benn wrote:
'The Electronic Monitoring Team is... looking actively at the possibilities
for using tracking technology to monitor offenders' whereabouts as they
move from one place to another. To date... the team is unaware of any available
technology which uses bodily implants to track offenders' movements or
which can measure bodily functions to predict likely criminal activity.
Such future improvements are, however, worthy of consideration if it can
be demonstrated to be feasible and reliable in delivering improvements
in public protection.'
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- Ministers would need to pass new legislation to oblige
offenders to be surgically fitted with the tags.
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- Civil liberties groups expressed horror at the proposals
last night. 'Implanting tracking devices provides a very frightening vision
for the future. We already know that the rules protecting our privacy are
inadequate. Where would this stop?' said John Wadham, director of Liberty.
'This would be used initially for sex offenders, but we would soon find
that other marginalised groups, such as asylum seekers, would find they
were forced to have implants.'
- The implant tag has been proposed by Phoenix Survivors,
a group of child abuse victims who were traded as child prostitutes in
the north-west of England. Their name is taken from Operation Phoenix,
an investigation into the activities of 72-year-old Stanley Claridge.
- Claridge's stepdaughter and Phoenix Survivors' spokeswoman
Shy Keenan said: 'I am sick to death of it being acceptable that I am a
victim because these people have to have their human rights. These people
live outside the law and cannot be controlled, so you have to know what
they are doing all the time.'
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- The news of the implant tags comes after the first wave
of arrests from a list of 7,000 suspected British paedophiles was passed
to British police by investigators from the US Postal Inspection Service.
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- Credit card details had been traced to British customers
of a portal on the internet, which gave access to hundreds of child porn
sites. An investigation by Northumbria police as part of the nationwide
Operation Ore led to the seizure of hard drives from more than 100 computers.
Police in the North East had been given around 70 names from the list of
7,000 to arrest. In all, 56 men and four women were arrested. They were
not picked up by the usual vetting procedures because most had no previous
criminal record.
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- The computer files seized included the scenes of the
rape of children as young as two. One man had 12,000 images of child abuse
on his computer. As a result, Northumbria Police has estimated that the
numbers of people on the Sex Offenders' Register in the area will increase
by 10 per cent. If the hit-rate of the Northumbria investigation is replicated
across the country, it could lead to as many as 5,000 arrests.
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- Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited
- http://www.observer.co.uk
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