STRONG — Selectmen are facing a request from townspeople to prohibit registered sex offenders from living in specific areas of town.
The request was made after a group of people alerted town officials that a resident at Valley Brook housing on Main Street is a lifetime registrant on the Sex Offender Registry. The housing complex is next to Strong Elementary School.
“I had some members of the public with some concerns that there’s no sex offenders ordinance here in town,” Selectman Rodney Spiller said at a recent board meeting. Those same residents are uneasy about the man’s presence in the development, and are concerned about having children visit them with him living there.
The group asked selectmen if the town could develop an ordinance to restrict future lifetime registered sex offenders from such close proximity to children.
They “posted a photo at the Strong Post Office”? So now RCs get posted next to the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted in the post offices? Good thing it’s merely regulatory.
I found myself thinking yesterday that in law there is a concept of intent, Mens Rea. This is the enabling principle held by the state and courts; that there is no intent to punish with the registries so they are not onerous and do not constitute an undue burden.
A counter example is if one operates a vehicle in such a way and to cause harm or death, even unintentionally, the harm still exists and we see charges of involuntary manslaughter rising from the unintentional harms.
It seems that with the shear number of instances of provable harms, it might be possible to show the unintentional effects. These might be brushed aside.
But what if, as a part of this, an argument is made that nullification in this instance allows nullification of the same principal unintended harm… And show the arguments that could be used.
In my mind, these arguments would create a situation where a public “library” of methods would exist that can only be used if the courts uphold a nullification of intent on the part of the state.
i.e. Uphold that the state can avoid intent and he door to avoidance of intent by individuals is opened wide… And easily available.
Just a thought and I think it’s obvious I’m not a lawyer.