Germany is poised to enhance protections for victims of domestic violence through a proposed legislative change focusing on the electronic monitoring of perpetrators.
Justice Minister Stefanie Hubig has drafted a bill that would empower family courts to mandate the use of electronic tagging for individuals convicted of domestic abuse. The system would alert victims via a receiver when a perpetrator approaches within a pre-defined perimeter. Simultaneously, the police would be automatically notified of any such breach.
Currently, victims are required to independently inform law enforcement of a violation of a protection order. The new proposal aims to provide a proactive early warning system, as the perpetrator may already be in close proximity to the victim when a report is made. Electronic monitoring would establish precisely how near the perpetrator has come, enabling quicker intervention.
The initiative would create a unified national framework, building upon existing regulations already in place in several German states. According to the Federal Ministry of Justice, approximately 250,000 cases of domestic violence are officially recorded each year, though the true figure is believed to be substantially higher. The majority of victims are women, with statistics indicating a rate of approximately three women killed by their current or former partners every three days.
Beyond electronic monitoring, the proposed legislation also grants family courts the authority to require perpetrators to attend anti-violence training programs. Judges would also be authorized to access information from the national firearms registry to better assess the level of threat. Furthermore, the bill seeks to increase penalties for violations of protection orders, raising the maximum prison sentence from two to three years. The Ministry anticipates the new regulations could come into effect by the end of 2026.
The model for this change is largely based on a system implemented in Spain in 2009, where perpetrators of domestic violence can be subjected to electronic monitoring and victims can choose to receive an alert device. According to Hubig’s draft legislation, there have been no reported fatalities among victims monitored under this system.
Hubig intends to limit the application of electronic monitoring to “high-risk” cases. Initially, judges would be permitted to order the use of electronic tags for a period of six months, with the possibility of extensions of three months each, if deemed necessary based on ongoing risk assessments.