This was a recent headline in the Daily Democrat in Yolo, California, recently: ” ‘OperationVigilance’ targets Yolo County sex offenders.”
http://www.dailydemocrat.com/article/NI/20171216/NEWS/171219907
“Yolo County law enforcement conducted surprise compliance checks on over 300 sex offenders earlier this week…”
“While many of the sex offenders investigated were in compliance, two sex offenders contacted were arrested for a variety of weapons, pornography and other violations. An additional 18 of these offenders are the subject of further investigation to determine whether or not they are in compliance.”
“Over 60 law enforcement personnel from seven local, state, and federal agencies participated in this joint operation from 15 agencies…”
I suggest we look at this from a slightly different perspective.
An unknown number of law enforcement man hours and an unknown amount of taxpayer dollars were expended in Yolo County recently when more than 60 law enforcement officers from 15 local, state, and federal agencies visited over 300 persons on California’s sex offender registry who were all living exactly where they were registered as living. Two of the 300 + persons were arrested. One or both of the two were in possession of weapons, illegal for all felons, and one or both were in possession of pornography. Whether or not the pornography consisted of legal or illegal images is not stated, but if they were on parole or probation, viewing even legal pornography is forbidden.
Lmao! This information is Nothing New.
Like a dog chasing its tail.
Enjoy the show…..? Idk (shrug)
“Targets…..” But it’s not punishment; just monitoring……Right? The entire registry is dripping with unconstitutional violations. Every single thing about the registry is unconstitutional. All of it. The whole thing. Entirely. Every time somebody who works for the government talks about the registry and the laws surrounding it, they get a little more complacent and say things like: Targets, punishes, etc……The registry is illegal. Any suggestion that amending or changing an unconstitutional law to make it more acceptable for some of the people that punished by it, while punishing others who are also on it a little bit less, is starting from a false premise. For example: Letting the 288’s off the registry, but doubling down on 311’s, to hammer on those “serious offenders” as hard as possible, is a ridiculous, absurd, and unacceptable argument. Until we join together to stop the entire ball of crap in its entirety, this is all an exercise in futility. The Nazi’s (And yes I can call them that thanks to the IML passport ID kill-shot) will continue to try to kill, imprison, and hurt every registrant, over and over again. Because it’s easy money for law enforcement, and it’s easy votes on election day. It’s all about money and power. Registrants are easy money. The cops LOVE easy money. But as long as we allow ourselves to be “targets”, this will continue. And the second part of the great two-part kill-shot of 2017, the famous “tiered registry” will continue to target, and hurt, and kill registrants. To say nothing of the fact that all of this nonsense does absolutely, positively, nothing, to protect society. It’s been a heck of a year. I just can’t wait to see what they have in store for us in 2018 and beyond. And the majority of us allowed ourselves to be led to slaughter. It’s time to fight back.
More like Operation Enduring Stupidity!
Seriously.. All this over-reactionary, all hands on deck, protect children at all costs, proactive hyper-vigilance will never, EVER do one ounce of good in thwarting, combating or curtailing ANYTHING. Also, these so-called “compliance checks” do not hold registrants responsible or accountable!
It’s just a matter of time before someone snaps and sends a message. Maybe then we can have a national discussion about how ineffectual, inept, senseless and feckless Megan’s law is?
@*Matt* “The entire registry is dripping with unconstitutional violations.” It sure is.
BTW, I Think This May Be Why Laura Ahearn essentially “Bailed Out.”
I’m pretty sure unwarranted surprise searches aren’t legal. It says they searched their homes and electronic devices. Doesnt that violate all kinds of rights as it stated that they checked 100% of the offenders living in the area and not just the ones who were on probation or parole. This is an unreasonable search and seizure
‘Operation Vigilance’ targets Yolo County sex offenders
http://www.dailydemocrat.com/article/NI/20171216/NEWS/171219907
Over 60 law enforcement personnel from seven local, state, and federal agencies participated in this joint operation from 15 agencies including: Yolo County District Attorney Investigations Bureau, Yolo County Probation, Yolo County Sheriff’s Office, Sacramento County Sheriff, West Sacramento Police Department, Davis Police Department, UC Davis Police Department, Woodland Police Department, Winters Police Department, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation Parole Team, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation K-9 Teams, the FBI, Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office, Sacramento Police Department and the California Highway Patrol.
So, in Yolo “You only live once” County, CA, how many of these folks actually were needed as part of this exercise and how many were there to be trained? Someone needs to be doing a FOIA request on this exercise and all of its details since it is public info and public funds expended to complete it. How many of these folks are on/off paper? What is the break down?
The idea of constant compliance check of registrants is crap and unconstitutional.
The article said they checked 300 people and 60 devices. So I expect that they were only checking the devices of people on probation or parole.
But of course, like nearly every media article about the “SEX offender” witch hunt, it is extremely poorly written and designed to make Nanny Big Government look less like the idiots that they are.
Even though most of the people who support this idiocy are Nazis, I don’t think they would blatantly do something illegal, especially when they intend to brag about it in the media.
Guessing the two that were arrested for porn and/or weapon possession were on paper. Weapons, OK. Felons generally aren’t allowed to have weapons unless their sentence is complete and they have had their weapons rights restored. Never been through that, but guessing it’s a years-long process, depending on the state. But porn possession? That’s a common PO violation based on the THEORY that viewing porn increases the likelihood of sexual re-offense. But once again, there is absolutely nothing to support it.
When I asked the question in my court-ordered group, the provider couldn’t come up with any examples and challenged me to find one. I took her up and searched everything I could access, mainly Google searches. I’m sure it’s fairly accurate, as registrants being arrested for anything generally makes local news. In the relatively few cases of registered SOs being arrested for new crime (sexual or not) – as opposed to PO or registry violations – I have yet to find a single case where viewing pornography is even mentioned, let alone a factor in re-offense. If there is one, I’d like to see it.
Also noteworthy is that in the few cases I have found of new RSO crime, the status of the accused as an RSO was never revealed until after he was arrested in yet another showing of how useless the registry is. I can say with certainty that the only crimes the registry has a role in are those created by the registry itself.
I would also add the unfortunate reality that those arrested will be presumed guilty simply because they are registered, regardless of any other fact in their respective cases. It sucks, because while previous offenses or accusations may be a sentencing issue, they almost always have nothing to do with the case at hand and more often than not swing the innocent-or-guilty question to guilty. That’s why past convictions and acquitted accusations are among a prosecutor’s favorite evidence, particularly when the case is a pretty weak one.
Election time is coming and someone needs to make as much brownie points as they can.
Notice how, once again, the pseudo-journalist fails to make distinctions (or to even mention) if all of the subjects of these home-invasions were on probation or parole, on the one hand or no longer under any kind of supervision, on the other. The only clue is that they mention the participation of probation and parole agents in this multi-agency effort. Instead, they simply use the term “sex offender” to describe the subjects of this scrutiny. Readers invariably confuse the two states of being and believe that all sex offenders must be subject to official home invasions and consider that “their” own rights are being violated when they learn that there are legal distinctions that must be made and rights which are restored when an “offender” is off-paper. Still, could it be that these task forces do sometimes target off-paper individuals for these searches/compliance interviews? And how many individuals would willingly cooperate with them? I would love to know.
So thrilled! Police have transferred my registry from a dirty bad neighborhood police station to a remodeled (no other sex offender was registering there) high tech with soft couches okay!!!