Two people have died and these state agents still have not taken the required course! Unbelievable..11-19-2014 California:
A half-day course could have helped federal probation officers monitor two men accused in Orange County serial killings. Officers have yet to take it.
A recent report from the California Office of the Inspector General raises new questions about a federal agency’s supervision of two Orange County sex offenders and hundreds of others in the state.
Although the two local offenders wore GPS bracelets while under the supervision of federal probation officers, a lack of training in the use of that technology effectively blocked officers from the data and the numerous red flags that data contained.
The two sex offenders, Steve Gordon and Franc Cano, have been accused in a string of serial killings involving four women from October 2013 to March of this year.
The report, issued last month, also indicates federal probation officers still haven’t taken a half-day course to get access to a state database of GPS data for sex offenders like Gordon and Cano.
Gordon and Cano were arrested in April. Before their arrests, as part of their probations, they were prohibited from associating with each other.
But as interviews later showed – and as GPS bracelet information would have shown at the time if it had been tracked – the men routinely flouted this rule without facing serious consequences.
They slept in proximity to each other in cars, bushes or tents. They ate meals together, mingled near an Anaheim auto body shop where Gordon worked and, according to Gordon, at one point attended a hockey game together.
Federal probation officers supervised Gordon and Cano during the year before their arrests, a period when the men also were wearing GPS bracelets.
That Gordon and Cano could associate so frequently while under the supervision of federal probation – and as they wore GPS devices designed to track their movements – has come under scrutiny following the murder charges against the men.
Though probation officers regularly had face-to-face meetings with Gordon and Cano and checked up on their compliance with terms of their probation, the federal agents did not look at the data generated by the state-owned GPS tracking devices.
Throughout much of their supervision by federal probation, Gordon and Cano were concurrently under the supervision of state parole agents. That’s why they wore state-owned GPS bracelets. Gordon switched to a federal device when his state parole ended in November 2013, and he was tracked by federal probation officers after that. Cano’s state-issued GPS device never was tracked by federal officials.
In a May report, federal probation officials cited the federal vs. state dynamic as one of the challenges in Gordon and Cano’s supervision. At times, the men wore bracelets monitored by different agencies operating different systems.
“The probation office did not explore cross referencing the GPS records from Gordon with those of Cano to see if the two men were associating,” the report said.
But federal probation didn’t mention another key detail. With relatively little training, the federal probation officers could have been monitoring the state GPS devices.
Parole “will provide any law enforcement agency access to our GPS data if they are interested and complete required training,” spokesman Luis Patino said recently via email.
“This would include federal probation.”
The Register learned that federal probation still doesn’t have access to state parole’s GPS database earlier this month following a report by the California Office of the Inspector General. An appendix in the report listed 87 law enforcement agencies with access to the database. Federal probation wasn’t among them.
It’s unknown why federal probation officers haven’t taken the training. Michelle Carey, head of federal probation in the Orange County region, didn’t return messages seeking comment.
Federal probation officers supervise more than 500 sex offenders throughout California, with about half residing in the Los Angeles area, according to internal statistics published by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.
Most large law enforcement agencies in Orange County and statewide currently have access to the state GPS database, according to the inspector general’s list and state parole officials. Local agencies include the Sheriff’s Department, the Santa Ana Police Department and the Irvine Police Department.
That database of paroled sex offenders led to Gordon and Cano’s arrest in April. A tech-savvy homicide detective at the Anaheim Police Department decided to compare data from parolees’ bracelets and crime scene evidence.
The analysis, according to Anaheim police, placed both Gordon and Cano near the scene of a woman’s murder and the last known locations of three missing women. The duo are now charged with kidnapping, raping and slaying all four women.
In May, when federal probation released an internal review of Gordon and Cano’s supervision, the agency recommended exploring changes in policy or in GPS technology so that officers could more easily detect illegal meetings between sex offenders.
It’s unclear, however, whether the agency has taken any steps in response to the recommendation.
David Sellers, a spokesman for the federal court system, which includes federal probation, said the system “continues to enhance its location monitoring program,” but he declined to elaborate. Publicly disclosing such information, he said, “could expose the community to potential harm from those who want to defeat (it).” ..Source.. by KEEGAN KYLE
