It is somewhat up in the air, but home detention may soon be coming to Scottsdale. In April, the Scottsdale City Council passed the necessary ordinance to allow the presiding judge of the Scottsdale City Court to institute a home detention program; an alternative to serving time to jail. This would mean that people convicted of a DUI in Scottsdale may be able to serve some of their sentence in home detention. The reason for the institution of a home detention program in Scottsdale was that the City of Scottsdale was being forced to pay millions in jail costs to our Sheriff. This is as a result of the ridiculous DUIsentencing requirements being passed. Even though Scottsdale has taken the unusual position of never waiving any of the jail costs, even in cases of extreme hardship, it was still losing millions of dollars a year.
We have been waiting with baited breath to see when the home detention program will be rolled out, and we may not have to wait much longer. The question now is how they will determine who is eligible for the home detention program.
That may be a much more difficult question to answer. The rumor was that anyone who was arrested before May, 27, 2010 would be ineligible for the home detention program. This date seems made up and arbitrary, and the rumor may have been false. I recently heard that the court would be using the date of passage by the Scottsdale City Counsel, which in fact wasApril 27, 2010, to determine eligibility.
As more becomes known, you’ll find the answers to Scottsdale DUI home detention right here on my blog.
