TX14: No REP in electronic monitoring while on pretrial release

Defendant on electronic monitoring as a bond condition has no reasonable expectation of privacy in the GPS information. Hawkins v. State, 2025 Tex. App. LEXIS 5601 (Tex. App. – Houston (14th Dist.) July 31, 2025):

The record does not show that the retrieval of the GPS monitoring data intruded upon an objectively reasonable expectation of privacy. Appellant was on notice that his physical movements were subject to GPS monitoring to ensure his compliance with the conditions of his pretrial release, and he was also on notice that his pretrial release could be revoked if he engaged in criminal activity. We cannot conclude that the HPD’s request for a single-day of appellant’s movements in the course of his pretrial release period (that could ordinarily last between several months to over a year), revealed the quantity or quality of information that intruded upon an objective expectation of privacy in “the whole of their physical movements.” Carpenter v. United States, 585 U.S. 296, 310, 138 S. Ct. 2206, 2217, 201 L. Ed. 2d 507 (2018) (holding request for seven days of historical cell site location data to determine if cell phone owner was involved in criminal activity constituted an unreasonable search). Though we have found no other court in our state to confront the precise issue, others across the country have determined the sharing of location data between law enforcement agencies of a person required to wear an ankle monitor as a bond condition is not contrary to one’s reasonable expectation of privacy. See United States v. Jackson, 214 A.3d 464, 484 (D.C. 2019) (holding defendant “had no objectively reasonable expectation that [probation authorities] would withhold the GPS tracking data from the police”); see also Commonwealth v. Govan, 496 Mass. 124, 142 (2025) (holding a twenty-minute inquiry into whether the defendant, wearing an ankle monitor during a pretrial release, was in the immediate vicinity of the crime scene followed by a subsequent warrantless inquiry into the defendant’s precise whereabouts for an hour (after receiving an affirmative answer to the first inquiry) did not constitute a unreasonable search).

Accordingly, because appellant did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy that the data collected by one law enforcement agency to continuously track his movements might be shared in part with another law enforcement agency for the purpose of investigating his movements on the day of a crime, appellant did not have standing to assert a Fourth Amendment violation, and thus the trial court’s denial of appellant’s motion was not erroneous.