Year: 2012

It would be difficult today to find a person who had no idea what the sex offender registry is. It would be equally difficult to find someone with only a passing interest who didn’t feel that it is a good thing to have. It started in most states as a law enforcement tool identifying repeat, sexually violent child predators. It now has an estimated 700,000 names on it and encompasses acts as varied as consensual teen sex, taking and sending a photo of one’s own breasts, and rape. And even…

Despite the obvious disconnect between teens’ online behaviors and parents’ knowledge of them, parents continue to exude a sense of confidence and control. Most parents insist they’re in control when it comes to mentoring their teen’s online behaviors. Yet, many teens believe their parents are in the dark. More than three in four parents express confidence they know how to find out what their teen is doing online, and half of parents live under the assumption that their teen tells them everything he/she does online. In reality, over two in…

We might feel at ease knowing that, if a sex offender moved into our neighborhood, we’d have to be informed. But does that really protect our children? In Tom Perrotta’s novel, Little Children, a convicted sex offender moves back to the town where he grew up to live with his mother. Isolated and ostracized, he nonetheless ventures to the town swimming pool one steamy summer afternoon to cool off. When the crowd begins to realize he’s snorkeling in the pool, it quickly empties as screaming mothers grab their toddlers and…

On June 12,  the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued Notice H 2012-11 State Registered Lifetime Sex Offenders in Federally Assisted Housing, which reiterates statutory- and regulatory-based responsibilities to prohibit admission to federally assisted housing for individuals subject to a lifetime registration requirement under a state sex offender registration program, and supersedes Notice H 2009-11. The new policies stem, in part, from a 2009 OIG audit, which estimated that 2,094 to 3,046 assisted households included a lifetime registered sex offender. Full Article

Dear Child Advocate: Mr. Sandusky is not a Monster as the public and media are labeling him! He is a human being who had/has many good qualities and has become a SICK Opportunist who has been allowed to repeat his behavior because of current laws and Society has once again turned their back on a man who needed treatment fourteen years ago. There are Opportunists and there are Predators who sexually abuse children. Congress supplied the weapon to allow Mr. Sandusky (and many others) to commit these crimes; “If you…

A Seattle attorney is asking for a review of Washington’s sex offender registration and notification system following the murders of two sex offenders this week in Clallam County. At least one of the two men killed was a husband and a father. The crime that put him into the state sex offender registry happened ten years ago. He was categorized a level II offender, one being lowest risk, three being the highest. Seattle attorney Brad Meryhew devotes his entire practice to defending accused and convicted sex offenders. He says it’s…