Jennifer Pancake, program coordinator for Community Corrections Association of Youngstown, shows what the display looks like on a cellphone application CCA can provide a crime victim. The application alerts when an individual on GPS house arrest has traveled close to the victim’s location. A Mahoning County Area Court judge is an advocate for its use.

YOUNGSTOWN — Mahoning County Area Court Judge Molly Johnson has found a way to help victims of physical or sexual assault regain a sense of control.

For the two years she has been in office in the Canfield, Sebring, Austintown and Boardman courts, she has ordered about 10 defendants to pay for and have a type of GPS monitoring that provides an extra layer of protection for the victim.

Johnson has ordered defendants to have a monitoring system that includes a cellphone application on the victim’s phone called Empower, by Track Group Products, that alerts the person if the defendant comes within a specified distance.

“The feedback I’ve received from victims is that it gives them peace of mind and appears to be very effective,” she said.

Johnson’s primary court assignment is in Canfield, but she sometimes fills in at the other county courts.

HOW IT WORKS

Many times, defendants are entitled to bond out of jail — sometimes for a long time while their case is pending.

Community Corrections Association, which outfits defendants with GPS monitoring ankle bracelets and monitors them, provides the victim with the cell-phone app. The defendant pays an additional $2 per day for the app.

In addition to electronic monitoring, CCA offers many other programs as an alternative to the traditional corrections system while reducing costs to taxpayers, lowering re-arrest rates and helping people become productive community members, according to its website.

The Empower app has a simple display that someone can use to call 911, CCA or another number.

Meanwhile, back at CCA, personnel monitor the defendant just as they would any other person on electronically monitored house arrest — except that the Empower system allows CCA personnel to also see a GPS map showing how close the defendant and victim are from each other. CCA contacts the defendant and asks him or her to leave the area or travel in another direction if they get too close.

A GOOD IDEA

Jennifer McLaughlin, assistant Mahoning County prosecutor, said she did not know about the Empower app but she thinks it’s a good idea.

“I’ve spent the last six years prosecuting sexual assaults, child abuse cases, domestic violence cases, so we have a lot of victims who were abused by the defendant, maybe for a long period of time, maybe there have been prior attempts to report the abuse and for whatever reason it didn’t go forward.”

She added: “For some of these victims, it is a big leap of faith to come forward and make that disclosure to begin with. A lot of these victims over the years were potentially threatened by their abuser, that ‘if you tell, I am going to hurt you or hurt your mom or I have a gun.’

“So for many victims, when they come forward with this disclosure, those things are in the back of their mind and they have good reason to be afraid of the defendant.”

McLaughlin said most defendants are entitled to be free on “some bond,” and they can possibly be out on bond for a year or two years while their case is pending.

She mentioned the Robert Seman criminal case in which Seman was accused of raping a young girl for several years, then setting fire to the house where she lived with her grandparents in Youngstown just before his rape trial was set to begin in 2015.

The fire killed all three while Seman was on electronically monitored house arrest that apparently failed to detect all of his movements. Seman committed suicide in 2017 just before his murder trial was set to begin.

“I have victims who even after the defendant is convicted and sentenced to the penitentiary, they still express fear that maybe he could get out early and get to them,” she said.

VICTIM ALERTS

Jennifer Pancake, program coordinator for CCA, said in a typical GPS- monitoring situation, the equipment alerts CCA if a defendant travels to an area where he or she is not allowed, or travels out of an area where he or she is allowed.

The Empower app does not show the victim a map of the suspect, but it shows CCA that type of map and where the victim is in relation to the defendant. It does tell the victim what direction to head to avoid contact with the defendant, Pancake said.

The additional protection offered by Empower app is designed to ease the fears of the victim.

“Even though (the defendant) is being monitored, it’s peace of mind that (the victim) has that extra safety net, that I am warned and I can change my whereabouts,” Pancake said.

“They can take back some of that control where they are. They can control their safety with it,” Pancake said.

The reason for providing a simple way to call for help is that a dangerous situation can crop up without warning, Pancake said.

“You never know when something may happen. It can happen in a split second. So we need to make sure we are on top of that so they feel comfortable and safe.”

She said the defendant and victim can end up in the same store, for example.

“That’s going to alert the victim and let them know that they are in that vicinity, then they can leave if they feel threatened or get a security person and ask, ‘Can you walk me out?’ That kind of thing,” Pancake said.

“I think it is a very useful tool to have.”

THOUGHT PROCESS

Johnson said a person may be eligible for release on bond with electronically monitored house arrest in certain types of domestic violence cases, for example.

“Somebody like that, you might write an entry that says, ‘You can go to work and you can come home and maybe stop for gas along the way,'” Johnson said.

“So whether they are at home or on work privileges, sometimes you write an entry that says, ‘you can be anywhere in the county except these places,'” Johnson said.

“There’s a thought process that goes into that as to whether this offender was violent or did they have a serious history with this victim,” she said.

“Should they even be allowed to go to work? Should they be allowed to drive? It’s a whole assessment that you do as a judge to figure out the best way to put it in that entry.

“And you either carve out a ‘no’ zone or multiple ‘no’ zones or you give ‘positive’ zones, and the GPS-monitoring company puts that into their system.”

erunyan@tribtoday.com