India, the largest democracy in the world unfortunately possesses a government that leaves a lot to be desired. Leaving no stone unturned to disappoint the very people it was elected to protect, the Indian government has time and again come up with laws and policies that make little or no sense. The latest in line is Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s Independence Day announcement that a list of sex offenders would be made publicly available on a national portal, to be launched soon, in order to keep the public alert.…
Read MoreMonth: August 2015
Sex Offenders Locked Up on a Hunch [Updated with Responses]
The essence of the American criminal justice system is reactive, not predictive: You are punished for the crime you committed. You can’t be punished simply because you might commit one someday. You certainly can’t be held indefinitely to prevent that possibility. And yet that is exactly what is happening to about 5,000 people convicted of sex crimes around the country. This population, which nearly doubled in the last decade, has completed prison sentences but remains held in what is deceptively called civil commitment — the practice of keeping someone locked…
Read MoreSB 448 scheduled for hearing August 24
The Senate Appropriations Committee will consider Senate Bill 448 (SB 448) during a hearing on August 24. If passed, the bill would require registered citizens to disclose internet identifiers to law enforcement officials. The Senate Public Safety Committee passed SB 448 unanimously based in part upon a promise by the bill’s author to amend the bill. According to committee staff, the bill must be amended to limit those who must disclose to an individual convicted of an offense that involved use of the internet. “Senate Bill 448 must be stopped,”…
Read MoreREGISTERED CITIZEN SUES CITY OF CYPRESS IN ORDER TO CONTINUE LIVING WITH FIANCEE [updated with media]
A lawsuit filed in Orange County Superior Court on August 13 challenges a new sex offender (“registrant”) ordinance in the City of Cypress that would force registrant Richard Linington to leave the home of his fiancée where he has been living since 2011. The ordinance, which is scheduled to become effective on August 26, 2015, prohibits registrants from living within 1,000 feet of any school, park, or day care center. The lawsuit seeks a temporary restraining order (TRO) that would maintain the status quo by preventing the ordinance from taking…
Read MoreOnline Petition: Justice for Zachery Anderson
When my son Zach met a girl through an online dating app, she said she was 17 years old and lived about twenty minutes away. The two decided to meet up and had consensual sex. Zach was a typical 19-year-old studying computer science at Community College — until he found out that the girl had lied about her age and was really 14. Though the girl admitted to lying about her age and even her parents agreed the encounter was completely consensual and that Zach didn’t do anything wrong, Zach…
Read MoreSex Offender Sues Arcadia Over Residency Restrictions
Despite revisions last year to an ordinance that severely limits housing options for potential residents convicted of sex crimes, a registered sex offender has filed a lawsuit against the city of Arcadia that seeks to repeal the law entirely. Recent state court decisions have challenged similar ordinances in other California municipalities, as advocates for sex offenders’ constitutional rights have over the last several years filed lawsuits aimed at rolling back what they claim are unfairly restrictive and discriminatory enforcement actions by Arcadia and a number of other locales statewide. Full…
Read MoreFolsom registered sex offenders live near elementary school
FOLSOM, Calif. (KCRA) —While researching nearby schools in Folsom for his 5-year-old daughter, Simon Varley also checked the Megan’s Law website to see where the nearest sex offenders live. Full Article
Read MoreMN: Federal judge demands swift action on reforming Minnesota’s sex offender program
Frustrated by legislative inaction, the federal judge who found Minnesota’s sex offender program unconstitutional has threatened a “more forceful solution” if state leaders fail to implement immediate reforms. In a harshly worded order issued Wednesday, Judge Donovan Frank of the U.S. District Court in St. Paul called on the state to correct systemic problems with the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP), which locks up about 720 sex offenders who have completed their prison terms but are deemed unsafe for public release. Frank gave the state until Sept. 21 to file…
Read MoreCA RSOL Meeting in San Diego – September 26
Please join us in San Diego for a monthly meeting on Saturday, September 26, 10 am. The meeting will take place at Cal Western Law School, 225 Cedar Street, San Diego. We will focus on current topics, including pending legislation and legal actions as well as offer an opportunity for networking with others. We welcome registrants, friends and family and other supporters to attend. The meeting is off-limits to media and government officials in order to ensure everyone’s privacy. There is no charge to attend. Show up, Stand Up, Speak…
Read MoreHuman Trafficking in America: Myths and Realities
Are politicians making the same mistakes with sex trafficking as they did with the war on drugs? What effects have stricter laws had on consenting sex workers? Is forced prostitution a growing problem? Video Discussion
Read More“Yes Means Yes” Date-Rape Consent Rule Unconstitutional – Judge
In what may foreshadow the end to a new “yes means yes” standard of consent for date rape, already been adopted in California and New York as well as on many other campuses, a judge has ruled – in a case in which both parties were so drunk they did not even know if sex had actually occurred – that the new standard violated the U.S. Constitution. Full Article
Read MoreA Grandma Reflects on Sex Offender Laws: “My Husband Would Have Gone to Jail”
Following up on the Zach Anderson case — the 19 year old on the Sex Offender Registry for 25 years for having consensual sex with a girl who said she was 17 (but was really 14) — comes this grandma’s letter. The Sex Offender Registry is a Free-Range issue because it grows out of the belief our kids are in constant danger and it perpetuates that belief, by making many non-threatening people like Zach into scary dots on the “maps of local sex offenders.” Full Article (FreeRangeKids)
Read MoreMany sex offenders denied entry into Mexico. But others live here.
Mexico has no national registry of sex offenders, but it’s been able to use an international database to bar entry to more than a thousand known abusers and would-be child sex tourists over the last 22 months. Full Article Related All Posts in International Travel International Travel (Main Post)
Read MoreCT: Sex Offender Registry Review A Tricky Task [Editorial]
Connecticut’s sex offender registry was created in 1998 to protect the public. Does it work? A committee of the Connecticut Sentencing Commission hopes to answer that question in the next 30 months as it reviews the state’s laws and policies relating to sex offenders. “This is not an easy topic,” said committee co-Chairman Robert Farr, former chairman of the Connecticut Board of Pardons and Paroles. Full Editorial
Read MoreIN: Indiana sex offender’s porn ban tossed out by appeals court
A federal appeals court panel has overturned a lower court’s order banning an Indiana sex offender from viewing adult pornography. The panel of judges from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit ruled Thursday that a probation requirement barring convicted sex offender Jeffrey P. Taylor of Logansport from accessing “legal adult pornography” was not supported by evidence in his criminal case. The decision, however, has little actual impact on Taylor. His probation period ended Friday — the day after the appeals court decision was issued. “Since the service…
Read MoreWhen the sex offender registry goes too far
You may have heard about questionable instances of people being put on a sex offender registry: teenagers having sex with other teenagers, overly curious children touching each other’s private parts, someone urinating in public. These are hardly the pedophiles and violent criminals who abduct and rape the innocent, but oftentimes they are subject to the same stringent restrictions on where to live and shop and the same stigma that makes finding a job very difficult. The case of Zachary Anderson helps to illustrate the failure of this one-size-fits-all punishment. ……
Read MoreGoogle, Facebook, Twitter join crackdown on child porn
Google, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft and Yahoo will be among the first technology companies to use the Internet Watch Foundation’s “hash list” to identify and remove child abuse images uploaded to their services, the British anti-abuse organization announced Monday. Not to be confused with a hashtag, a hash is a string of code that can serve as the digital fingerprint of an image. Sharing the list of fingerprints with Internet companies will allow victims’ images to be identified and removed more quickly, preventing them from being repeatedly shared. Full Article
Read MoreIL: Judge: Sex offender rule unconstitutional
BLOOMINGTON — A requirement that Illinois sex offenders report all Internet sites they use to police is unconstitutional because it violates the offenders’ free speech rights, according to a ruling by a McLean County judge. Judge Robert Freitag agreed with arguments from the defense lawyer for ____ ____, 22, of Normal, that state law is overly broad in its mandate that all email addresses and sites a sex offender uses or plans to use, including Facebook, must be registered with police. Full Article
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