Presley Center of Crime & Justice Studies

Dr. Martinez-Aranda’s talk focused on the impact of ICE surveillance – electronic ankle monitor (EM) – on immigrants, and their communities. She shared insights on how EM operates as a surveillance tool that influences the immigrant’s relationship with the state, community, and self. Release from detention could conceivably provide an immigrant with the benefits of reintegra- tion into a co-ethnic community. However, under surveillance, the immigrant loses access to co-ethnic social capital, as the state fractures their safety net. Thus, EM operates as a tool of legal violence, creating a new axis of stratification and producing the unequal distribution of autonomy and resources. EM generates a condition of ‘extended punishment’ that consists of material and social harms that affect immigrants, families, and communities.