Overview
- The force named Victoria Hale, 50, and Barry Farthing, 41, as the first people fitted with location‑monitoring tags, each ordered to wear them for 12 months under court orders.
- Hale was tagged on September 19 at Brighton Magistrates’ Court after guilty pleas to 12 shoplifting charges and received a two‑year Criminal Behaviour Order with a 30‑metre exclusion around a Co‑Op in Eastbourne for 12 months.
- Farthing pleaded guilty to 46 counts following a six‑week spree, was jailed for eight months, and will wear a tag for 12 months on release with bans covering a 40‑metre radius around a Hastings Co‑Op and all Co‑Op and Tesco stores in East Sussex.
- Tags provide real‑time GPS monitoring, trigger alerts if offenders enter banned areas, can prompt police to warn nearby retailers within 300 metres, and may support prosecutions by matching movements to theft locations.
- Sussex Police describe the pilot as the first in the country, with the rollout framed against reported record shoplifting levels and Ministry of Justice plans to expand electronic monitoring by up to 22,000 additional tags annually.