With electronic monitoring bracelets strapped to their legs, 500 New York City inmates awaiting trial are to be released from jail next year in a new effort to reduce prison overcrowding, officials said yesterday.
In January, the city plans to release the first batch of inmates in a type of home-arrest supervision. In each case, a judge's approval would be required.
Officials in the Department of Correction, which operates the jails, said they had obtained authorization from state judicial officials after the Legislature refused last spring to give the department wider authority to release prisoners held on bail.
In campaigns to cut soaring prison costs, at least 40 states, including New Jersey, use electronic monitoring to release detainees or sentenced prisoners. New York State law-enforcement officials say there is no other formal program in the state for electronic monitoring of detainees. Tentative Contract
The City Correction Department said yesterday that it had tentatively awarded a contract to BI Monitoring of Boulder, Colo., to provide the electronic bracelets and a monitoring system to run the program for three years, with a maximum payment of $1.9 million.
Under state law, some inmates charged with nonviolent crimes can be released from jail and placed under supervised detention programs. Allan R. Sielaff, the city's Correction Commissioner, had said that only a handful of city prisoners could be released because the law banned him from freeing most defendants accused of felonies.
An aide to Mr. Sielaff, Thomas M. Antenen, said city officials had worked out an agreement with court officials permitting releases under a new standard called individualized monitoring. Only defendants being held for low-level, nonviolent felonies would be eligible for electronic monitoring, Mr. Antenen said.
John D. Maguire, the assistant chief of the department's criminal justice bureau, said other conditions would include that bail be $2,500 or less, that the inmate not be facing other charges and that the inmate have no record of violent behavior.
Mr. Antenen said that the BI company had been selected under a process known as requests for proposal, in which a vendor is chosen based on technical competence and price, not on a sealed low bid, as in most city contracts. BI submitted a bid that would cost the city $2.91 a day per inmate and would require the company to provide the bracelet and monitoring equipment.
The city now holds 22,000 inmates, 15,000 of whom are unable to make bail while awaiting trials. The Correction Department estimates that it cost $158 a day for the custody of each inmate and about $18 million a year would be saved by releasing 500 prisoners unable to raise bail.
Normally, each released inmate would be required to remain at home and an electronic signal would be set off if the prisoner left the surveillance area. Mr. Maguire said that inmates could also be electronically watched at jobs or school programs. Correction officers also would make surprise visits, Mr. Maguire said.
An inmate who broke the rules could be immediately returned to jail.
A departmental hearing on the awarding of the BI contract will be held Dec. 5 at 10 A.M. at City Hall.
