Put on an ankle bracelet, he's disappeared after 2 separate court appearances and no one knows where he is
For years the president of the Metropolitan Crime Commission has pushed for guidelines for the use of electronic monitoring.
Craig Howard's legal troubles are well-documented in New Orleans court records. Two prior convictions for domestic abuse battery, mental health and drug problems, and a gun arrest in February for allegedly firing a bullet through into a neighbor's apartment at the Blue Plate Artist Lofts apartments.
Following Howard’s Feb. 6 arrest, a magistrate commissioner attached conditions to Howard’s release on a $10,000 bail bond: professional treatment as well as monitoring with an electronic ankle bracelet. Howard, 26, is still awaiting trial on charges of aggravated criminal damage to property and negligent discharge of a firearm.
Howard’s case was routine until his court appearance on July 19. Late that morning, the electronic monitoring company – Assured Supervision Accountability Program, or ASAP – received an alert that Howard was tampering with his bracelet.
The computerized track of Howard’s ankle bracelet shows that he fled the courthouse after failing a drug test.
“We received a strap tamper,” said Jill Dennis of ASAP. “And it appeared he had just come from court.”
ASAP features real-time tracking alerts. As soon as the company realized Howard was fleeing and trying to remove his bracelet, the company sent agents to follow his trail. They tracked him to a nearby Home Depot. And that’s where the trail ended.
“He had used a tool at the Home Depot to cut the ankle monitor off and throw it in the bathroom,” Jill Dennis said.
While her agents were following Howard, Dennis was calling the authorities, starting with the New Orleans police. She then called Criminal Court Judge Ben Willard, the presiding judge, to get him to issue a warrant so officers could pick him up.
Dennis did not get the answer she expected.
“I was told that Judge Willard didn't order the ankle monitor, that I would have to call the magistrate judge that ordered the ankle monitor because he wasn't going to do anything,’’ she said.
Court records show the ankle monitor had been ordered previously by a magistrate commissioner before Howard's case was allotted to Willard.
Willard eventually issued an arrest warrant for Howard later on July 19 for failing to return to his courtroom. But by then, he was gone.
“This is frustrating in that this is not a failure of the electronic monitor. It's a failure of the judge,” said Rafael Goyeneche, president of the Metropolitan Crime Commission, a non-profit criminal justice watchdog group.
Monitoring Guidelines
For years Goyeneche has pushed for guidelines for the use of electronic monitoring, which has been hampered by an ad hoc patchwork of programs. While the technology is generally championed as a progressive criminal justice tool, the local version has been hampered by spotty monitoring, fly-by-night operators and loose regulation.
Sometimes the failures have been tragic, such as the 2014 fatal shooting of a pizza delivery worker by a juvenile wearing a bracelet that was not being monitored in real time.
In Howard’s case, Goyeneche said the technology worked just fine. He blames human error for the fact that Howard cut off his bracelet and escaped.
“This is something that is totally preventable. The electronic monitoring tool did its job,” he said. “Since that case was allotted to Judge Willard, it's on him that this happened.”
Matt Dennis, owner of ASAP, said one important feature of his company is that it provides instant notification of ankle bracelet violations, just as it did in Howard's case.
“The judge has the ability right now to know in real time,” he said, “and the judge chose to not care.”
There's an added twist in Howard's case. After ASAP reported Howard's violation, and notified police of the new crime – tampering with electronic monitoring equipment, a misdemeanor – Howard returned to Willard's court on his own on July 27, but suffered no consequences. He was ordered to return to court Aug. 8, which he did, but he failed another drug test, court records show.
And again, he fled the courthouse.
“We saw history repeat itself,” Goyeneche said. “He goes down for the drug test and then leaves the building. And this time there's no way to track him.”
Matt Dennis said, “It's shocking that you can cut an ankle monitor off in the city of New Orleans on a felony violence case and nothing happens. The judge says nothing.”
Willard was unavailable for an interview, but left a message late Wednesday reiterating that he did not order the ankle monitor for Howard. The judge has issued another no-bond capias for Howard’s arrest.
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