There have recently been a spate of stories about housing for “civilly committed” sex offenders, people who’ve completed their sentences but been kept under supervision through civil proceedings, culminating in the resignation of the board chair at Texas’ Office of Violent Sex Offender Management.
But until yesterday’s Houston Chronicle article (“For sex offenders who’ve completed their sentences, ‘the only way out appears to be to die’,” April 26), the focus of discussion had been on demonizing the agency for housing too many such offenders in a handful of neighborhoods. The real problem, though, is the failed, underlying policy which fails to acknowledge that a) these folks must live somewhere and b) public safety is poorly served by ostracizing ex-offenders instead of promoting reintegration. Full Article
This is just another example. I feel that where registered citizens are concerned, their punishment is a crime worse than the original crime.
Both the American public, and the American legal system, seem to have a screw loose when it comes to the topic of sex.
A cruel farce doesn’t begin to describe what Texas is doing; in effect they are just moving people from one prison to another one after they have completed their sentence.