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After 2 killings in Greenville County, free GPS ankle monitors come with a price

May 6, 2024

GREENVILLE — After two recent killings claimed three lives in Greenville County, the question remains as to why the suspects, strapped with GPS ankle monitors, were not stopped by authorities before it was too late.

In January, Gary Whitten visited the home of his former partner in the middle of the night, violating his bond on a domestic violence charge from a month before. The judge had set specific conditions for Whitten: no contact with his partner and GPS buffer zones surrounding her home so authorities would know if he came near.

When Whitten showed up, Sentinel called the woman to check if she was OK. However, deputies with the Greenville County Sheriff's Office weren't notified until the next morning.

By that time, authorities said Whitten had killed her and another woman, then broke off his ankle monitor to flee the scene.

Similarly, in late March, authorities said Robbie Fleming went to a house off Augusta Road, despite being in the Home Incarceration Program — more commonly called house arrest — with GPS monitoring. Fleming got into an argument with a man, pulled his gun and shot a bystander before fleeing the scene, the sheriff's office said at the time.

At some point that same day, Fleming broke off his ankle monitor. The sheriff's office said it never received a notification then, either.

It's unclear whether the private company that provides and tracks the ankle monitors, Sentinel Offender Services, failed to notify authorities or if the message simply got lost in the shuffle. 

How does the ankle monitor program work?

Unlike other counties in South Carolina, the Greenville County jail is not a part of the sheriff's office: it's a separate entity managed by county government. So for more than 10 years, California-based Sentinel has worked with Greenville County to monitor people out of jail on bond and perform drug tests for people on probation.

Since renewing its contract with Greenville County in 2020, Sentinel has largely taken on all of the responsibility of running the Home Incarceration Program at no cost to the county.

Instead of charging taxpayers, Sentinel sends the bill to the suspected offenders for their ankle monitors and GPS tracking. A sliding scale based on income means offenders could pay as little as $6 per day for passive GPS tracking or, for the "riskiest participants," as much as $9 per day for active monitoring, according to a proposal document at the time.

Once a judge orders someone into HIP, a jail officer delivers an application to Sentinel with specific parameters for their monitoring: the type of equipment they need, how often the equipment should phone back home, among other details.

At that point, Sentinel takes over. What comes next is unclear.

In a several-hundred-page proposal obtained by The Post and Courier through a public records request, Sentinel showed no doubts in the capabilities of its technology. The ankle monitors are "state of the art" with "24/7/365" monitoring, Sentinel said in the proposal.

People in Greenville County and across the country wearing its monitors can be tracked minute-by-minute. Authorities have real-time access.

The monitor itself has tamper-detection features that can send alerts to authorities "within seconds" of a tamper attempt.

There are dozens of alarm codes that jail officers can subscribe to, including when people go into GPS "exclusionary" zones where they should not be.

All of these features — and more — can be customized to each agency to fit their specific needs, Sentinel said in the proposal.

Neither officials with Greenville County nor executives at Sentinel were willing to provide more details to The Post and Courier.

Greenville County spokesman Bob Mihalic said that much of the protocol is exempt from public release for "safety reasons" so that offenders will not figure out how to circumvent monitoring.

One of Sentinel's chief executives, Mark Contestabile, did not respond to The Post and Courier's requests for comment.

Lack of clear communication channels pose risk

Part of the problem might lie in chain of communication.

Both the sheriff's office and Greenville County said that they do not monitor HIP participants: that's Sentinel's job. But what happens when someone breaks the rules of the program?

The sheriff's office has said that if it is called to do a welfare check, it will do so. In the January and March killings, it never received a call.

The jail officer who signed off on a warrant accusing Fleming of breaking off his ankle monitor did so the day after the killing, writing that he had received a notification from Sentinel the day before, according to the warrant.

When asked for more details, Mihalic refused to comment on the ongoing case. The sheriff's office directed The Post and Courier to the jail for more information about the warrant, and the jail officer did not respond to a request for more information.

Mihalic also refused to confirm the general expectation for when Sentinel is supposed to contact law enforcement.

"Responses to participant violations vary depending on the type of violation that occurs," Mihalic said. "For example, a minor violation might result in corrective action by the assigned case manager. A major violation (like absconding from the program by removing the monitoring device) would result in immediate notification to the appropriate court and the issuance of a warrant for arrest." 

Federal lawsuit filed against Sentinel in Georgia

Last June, South Carolina lawmakers passed a bond reform that required private ankle monitoring companies to get certified by the State Law Enforcement Division and follow specific SLED standards.

Among other things, companies are required at all times to be able to verify someone's location and "immediately notify local law enforcement" if exclusionary zones are violated, standards show.

As of March 15, Sentinel is an approved monitoring company by SLED, according to a public records request by The Post and Courier.

Georgia has a similar law regulating the industry.

In a federal March lawsuit, the family of Damarion Byrd, a 10-year-old killed by a stray bullet in March 2023, argued that Sentinel failed to monitor the man who allegedly fired the shot. Byrd's family said he had been wearing one of Sentinel's ankle monitors at the time of the shooting.

Responding to the suit in a filing, Sentinel agreed that Byrd's death was tragic but did not acknowledge whether its technology was faulty, only that the Georgia law has a provision making it immune from liability.