SACRAMENTO – A state hearing officer is recommending a convicted sex offender be paid $215,200 for the nearly seven years he spent in California prisons for failing to register after he moved from his native Rhode Island. ____ ____ ____, 50, doesn’t deny sexually assaulting a 7-year-old girl in Providence in 1991, but claims the Rhode Island conviction for second-degree child molestation did not require him to register as a sex offender when he moved to California. Full Article
Read MoreMonth: May 2014
Finding sex offenders via Facebook app
A new Facebook app helps you find out who your “friends” really are. It scans your list of “friends” and notifies you if any of them are on the national sex offender register. In a world where more friends and more views helps you get your name out there, there’s always the potential for danger. Full Article Related: This app told me my uncle, roommate, and partner are potential sex offenders
Read MoreOK: Removes 2,400 Registered Sex Offenders After Supreme Court Ruling
Oklahoma has removed 2,400 sex offenders from its registry since a state Supreme Court decision six months ago. The legislature passed a law in 2007 increasing the number of years sex offenders have to register and it was applied to people already convicted, but the Oklahoma Supreme Court said the law could only apply to people going forward. Full Article
Read MoreLiving with 290: 1st Annual Registration
As every registrant knows visiting local law enforcement for annual registration can be a pain in the butt. The law says registration updates must occur within five days before or after a person’s birth day each year. For me this meant calling the local police station and setting up an appointment. I figured calling five days prior to my birthday should have automatically provided ample opportunities for the records department at the police station to setup an appointment within the time frame allotted by law. Turns out I was wrong…
Read MoreOH: Ex-Sex Offender Comes in Solid Third Place in Cuyahoga County Executive Race
Tim Russo ran one hell of a race. A race worthy of a vote. I am not afraid to say that, yes, I voted for a sex offender to run Cuyahoga County. There were many more people out there who punched a ballot with Russo’s name on it. He gathered 9,171 votes in the race, well behind Armond Budish, who was pretty much anointed the new king of the Democratic Party at the county level before a ballot was even cast, and Shirley Smith who currently serves as a state…
Read MoreTX: Burned body, missing sex offender linked
The investigation into the death of a man found in a burning storage building behind a home on County Road 495 continued today as detectives try to determine how he died. Smith County Sheriff Larry Smith said he had not received official word as to the man’s identity, but the Tyler Morning Telegraph has learned the person listed at the residence is a 36-year-old registered sex offender, whom authorities have not been able to locate since the fire. Full Article
Read MoreNH: Sex offender registry law is unconstitutional (Editorial)
Today, New Hampshire’s Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case that will turn on the basic constitutional principle that criminal laws cannot be retroactive, thus punishing someone for an act that was legal at the time. Nor can the punishment for a crime be changed after the fact. Full Article
Read MoreMO: My Son, the Sex Offender: One Mother’s Mission to Fight the Law
In the run up to Halloween one year, Sharie Keil saw something that really made her jump: Missouri governor Jay Nixon, then the attorney general. He was on television to announce that registered sex offenders were hereby banned from participating in her favorite holiday. On threat of a year in jail, they had to stay inside and display a sign saying they had no candy. The goal was “to protect our children,” as Nixon put it, but Keil heard only a peal of political hysteria. Full Article
Read MoreCO: Reasonable residency rules for sex offenders in Commerce City
Commerce City’s solution to deciding where sex offenders can live is a model for how communities can reasonably handle residency requirements. Commerce City on Monday passed an amendment to its residency requirements, allowing registered sex offenders who aren’t sexually violent to seek exceptions to rules that ban them from living within 1,000 feet of a school, park, playground or day care center. Full Op-Ed Piece
Read MoreSanta Ana Ordinance Challenged in Federal District Court
The City of Santa Ana was sued today in federal district court challenging a city ordinance that prohibits some registered citizens from being on or within 300 feet of city libraries, learning centers, schools, parks and museums. Santa Ana is the 7th city or county to be sued in a period of seven weeks. “The City of Santa Ana ordinance violates both the federal and state constitutions,” stated CA RSOL president Janice Bellucci. “California RSOL warned the city about its ordinance both in writing and through testimony prior to its passage,…
Read MoreSC: Sex offender’s killers kiss after verdict, would have ‘killed more’
UNION, S.C. —A man and his wife pleaded guilty to shooting and killing a registered sex offender and his wife and kissed in court after they were sentenced Tuesday. Full Article
Read MoreFullerton Council to Revise Sex Offender Ban in Parks
Fullerton’s ban on convicted sex offenders in city parks will likely be revised in the wake of court rulings and a potential lawsuit. Since the 1940s, California has wrestled with laws that deal with convicted sex offenders and what they can and cannot do after they are released from prison and complete parole. In the past four years, about half of Orange County cities adopted laws that banned adults convicted of sexually abusing children from living near or going into city parks. Full Article
Read MoreMO: Area Counties to Charge for Sex Offender Registration
(ST. JOSEPH, Mo.) Sheriff’s departments from nine counties across northwest Missouri will be taking advantage of a law allowing them to charge sex offenders for maintaining the Sex Offender Registry program. Representatives from four of those counties met at the Buchanan County Sheriff’s office Monday to talk about the charges. Full Article
Read MoreCO: Sex offender residency restrictions being scaled back
Less than 10 years after many cities rushed to draw restrictions and boundaries on where registered sex offenders could live, the trend is now reversing after a court case ruled one city’s restrictions in conflict of state interests. Full Article
Read MoreTX: Mom fighting sex offender label in kidnapping
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A Texas woman’s case is raising questions about whether parents who are convicted of kidnapping their own children in custody disputes should be automatically registered as sex offenders. ____ ____ was convicted of aggravated kidnapping and sentenced to five years in prison after fleeing with her son to Mexico in 2002. She was freed from prison in 2010 but must register as a sex offender until 2020 even though she has never been accused or convicted of a sex-related crime. Full Article
Read MorePA: Juvenile sex-offender registries are challenged
Though tried in juvenile court, with its focus on privacy and rehabilitation, he was later required by a 2012 Pennsylvania law to register as a sex offender — branded a long-term danger to society, with no way off the list for at least 25 years. Juvenile law advocates campaigning against such automatic registries argue that they undermine the rehabilitative purpose of juvenile law and wrongly force judges to treat offenders the same, no matter their circumstances. In Pennsylvania, local judges increasingly agree with them. Late last year, a central Pennsylvania…
Read MoreNH: New Hampshire sex offender fights registry rules
CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — The New Hampshire Supreme Court will hear a challenge to the constitutionality of sex offender registry requirements for convicts whose crimes were committed before the legislature imposed more stringent rules. Lawyers for “John Doe” contend the registry requirements — which have been overhauled numerous times since 1998 — amount to new layers of punishment that weren’t in place when he was convicted in 1987 of sexually assaulting his 14-year-old stepdaughter. Lawyers for the state acknowledge the information required from sex offenders and frequency of their reports…
Read MoreKids, Cops, and Sex Offenders: Pushing the Limits of the Interest-Convergence Thesis
Abstract: Sex offenders are today’s pariahs – despised by all, embraced by none. During the past twenty years, society’s dislike and fear of sex offenders has resulted in a flood of legislation designed to protect communities from them. These laws include residency restrictions, which bar convicted sex offenders from living near places where children are expected to be found. Given this climate, do lawyers who for sex offenders have any hope of winning justice for their clients? In 2005, the Ohio Justice & Policy Center (“OJPC”) began a three year-advocacy campaign against Ohio’s residency restrictions. At first…
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