4th Circuit Approves Imprisonment of Sex Offender Convicted of a Nonexistent Crime

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William Welsh has been imprisoned for seven years even though he was convicted of a crime that everyone agrees he did not commit. That’s OK, according to a federal appeals court, because Welsh is not really a prisoner; he’s a patient, lawfully committed under a federal statute that allows indefinite detention of “sexually dangerous persons.” Full Article

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Wow. If it stands, this is a very, very troubling and scary precedent…not just for RCs in particular, but the citizenry in general. Of course, this is the same Circuit that said Packingham was just fine. Hopefully SCOTUS takes it, reverses, then severely beats the 4th about the head with it. If SCOTUS allows it to stand or affirms, this country is on a very dangerous path. Truly, there would be nothing preventing like treatment of someone who rails against the government, or is a neo-Nazi, etc. Whatever happened to the “imminent threat” aspect of preventive action?

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I also hope this gets to SCOTUS. My “tiering is useless” argument aside, one major point is that Welsh was designated a predator not because of an assessment of him by a therapist or of anything he may have done since his conviction, but by the SORNA system that designates tiers based solely on crime(s) of conviction.

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After writing my comments over and over again, the only thing I can truly say is that the courts are just screwed up when it comes to sex offense laws.

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This quote from Packingham is extremely relevant…
The Internet’s forces and directions are so new, so protean, and so far reaching that courts must be conscious that what they say today may be obsolete tomorrow.

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