BOULDER — After Colorado prison records proved Evan Ebel tampered with his ankle monitoring bracelet, the company who made the device is offering a behind the scenes look at the technology used on inmates across the country.
The records show that a Boulder-based monitoring company contacted the Colorado Department of Corrections to inform them Ebel had tampered with his bracelet.
That bracelet, identified in paperwork, is the B-I HomeGuard 206.
On the company’s website, the device is marketed as an affordable solution for corrections agencies looking to keep track of offenders.
“With HomeGuard 206, officers can reliably monitor individuals for compliance to curfews and schedules.
The offender wears a durable transmitter, which communicates with the HomeGuard 206 cellular receiver.
This information is relayed to the monitoring center via cellular communication to compare against pre-determined schedules.” said a release on the company’s website.
The company, which cited confidentiality agreements and the ongoing Colorado investigation, would not discuss Ebel’s case specifically but offered FOX31 Denver a behind-the-scenes look at the technology that is used on 60,000 offenders in the United States.
“There’s a lot more to it…more than just a transmitter on someone’s ankle,” said Jock Waldo, Vice President of B-I Incorporated.
The HomeGuard 206, which company officials charge $2-3 a day to agencies to operate, is not a GPS tracking device. The bracelet instead is used to monitor when an offender is going to and from their home.
On Tuesday, company officials stressed that an offender’s device and monitoring requirements are determined by a government agency and not the private company.
The company monitors an estimated 40,000 offenders every day from a state of the art facility in Indiana.