Filed
6:00 a.m. EDT
10.08.2025
Jails across the country are trying a high-tech solution to keep prisoners safe. Will it work?
Nurse Lynda Witkowski, who runs the wristband biometric monitoring program at the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility in Philadelphia, attaches the device to a reporter’s arm.
Every year, thousands of people die in prisons and jails across the country. In Philadelphia, the officials running the city’s jails have turned to wearable biometric bracelets — created by a company called 4Sight Labs — that are meant to identify when someone is experiencing a medical emergency so they can quickly receive care.
Philadelphia is just one of more than 60 jurisdictions across the country that have employed 4Sight Labs’ technologies to help make decisions about healthcare for incarcerated people. “Our goal is to not miss a health crisis,” said 4Sight Lab’s CEO David Sanders.
Journalists from Here & Now and The Marshall Project went inside a Philadelphia jail to learn about how these high-tech surveillance tools can reduce the number of preventable deaths behind bars–and where they may be falling short.