Paris Under House Arrest: How It Works
After just three days of hard time in the clink, Paris Hilton was released and placed under house arrest ... or, palace arrest, as is more likely the case. While it's possible she'll be back in the orange jumpsuit before too long, we thought we'd take this opportunity to see just how house arrest anklets actually work.
Standard Anklet
As TMZ has learned, Paris's newest fashion accessory is a clunky anklet rigged with a radio transmitter that communicates with a receiver installed in her house. The receiver is programmed with a distance range that Paris must stay within, and it uses phone lines to report her status (home or not home) back to a central monitoring hub. If Paris thought she could fool everyone by strapping the anklet around the neck of her pet monkey, she's out of luck: These babies are tamper-proof.
GPS-Equipped Anklet
Instead of radio frequencies, anklets can use GPS. If Paris were latched to this model, her watchers would know, not only if she's within her boundaries, but also exactly where inside those boundaries she is at any moment, and where exactly she'd been in the past. Law enforcement agencies can use this system to program "hot zones" that offenders are not allowed in. Victims can be provided with pagers that automatically notify them if the offender has crossed a boundary. But, when it comes to Paris Hilton's offenses, aren't we all the victims?
Alcoholic's Anklet
Given the fact that this all stems from a drunk driving incident, we're surprised the judge didn't tie a SCRAM unit around Paris's ankle. A SCRAM (Secure Continuous Remote Alcohol Monitoring) unit works like a standard anklet, only it's worn directly against the skin, where it reads the offender's blood alcohol level based on how much booze is mixed in with normal body sweat. Of course, that would require Paris actually break a sweat, which, as we all know, only happens under the warm green glow a night vision camera.
Information courtesy of HouseArrest.com, providers of house arrest equipment to law enforcement agencies.
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