About a month ago we identified three cases for which we had not yet received an answer. As of today, we have answers to those questions, however, some of those answers have resulted in more questions.
First, a federal district court in Missouri has issued its decision regarding Halloween signs. That decision was strong and clear: Halloween signs are unconstitutional. The court even granted a permanent statewide injunction that in essence prohibits law enforcement in the state of Missouri from enforcing the state law that required the Halloween signs.
While the district court has issued its decision, the Attorney General has filed a notice of appeal in this case. Fortunately, the district court’s decision will be the law of the land this Halloween. And it’s possible the Attorney General will abandon its decision to appeal after his election in November. Only time will tell.
Second, the California Department of Corrections issued regulations regarding treatment for registrants on parole. The regulations clarify that every registrant on parole must be evaluated every year in order to determine whether additional treatment is required. The regulations also clarify that if a decision is made that additional treatment is required, then a copy of that written decision must be provided to the registrant.
After these regulations were issued, a few treatment providers have told registrants that they will not change their practices. For example, it has been reported that one treatment provider stated that they have always had a three-year treatment plan and that all registrants under their care must complete all three years regardless of the registrant’s circumstances. It has also been reported that another treatment provider boasted that his company makes a lot of money providing treatment to registrants and that there is no way they are going to agree that a registrant no longer needs treatment. If these statements are correct, additional litigation will be required in the future.
Third, the California Department of Justice has stated that they have created a process by which it will reduce tier assignments for hundreds of registrants convicted of an attempted offense. That process includes the mailing of letters to those registrants. Despite this statement, no one has yet reported that they have received such a letter. That is why a Public Records Act request has been sent to the department asking if any such letters have been sent. If the answer is no, then additional litigation will be required in the future.
Answers to last month’s questions have arrived, however, those answers are far from complete. Instead, they are stop gap measures at best. Please stay tuned for the final answers.
Wait a minute here! I’m still waiting for information about an offramp for tier 3. Is this a forgotten concept and why are we not talking about this? Let’s bring this to the front of the priorities. You can’t really have a real tiered system without an offramp. What is being done about this?
THANK YOU, Janice, for all you do! You are a saint who’s middle name is “Justice”!
Thank you, Janice, for providing the updates on these three legal matters.
And, of course, many, many thanks for all of your efforts on the behalf of Registrants and their families! 🙏🏻
The issue of creating an off-ramp for those assigned to Tier 3 will be addressed in legislation, not litigation. We have not forgotten. The focus of this column is only litigation, specifically three successful cases in which important decisions were made but have not yet been fully implemented or we are waiting to see if an appeal will be filed (Missouri case only).
I’ve been on treatment for 7 years. With 1 year and a half in maintenance. Wouldn’t that be recognized as completion? I moved to antelope valley and went from sharper future treatment to open door. Open door wanna start all over. Making my risk factors high as if I’m just starting therapy. They don’t care for my progress of 7 years of treatment. So will they make me go this year as if I’d my first year in the agreement???
Hi Janice,
I think with regard to the treatment program, I have asked my program office when they will start to run the regulations that CDCR has put out and they have stated numerous times that they are waiting for direction from CDCR before they can continue with any changes. They have stated this numerous times. I believe that it would be beneficial to ask CDCR to CC the Court/ACSOL with what they will draft and send to the treatment programs as to what direction they will give to them so that everybody is on the same page. I think that across the board, the treatment programs are not going to move forward with anything until they get direct verbiage from CDCR. With that being said, I think it will benefit all of us to know when/what will be said.
Thanks for all you do!!!! 🙂
There should be relief from registration for those of us charged with sexual offenses that occurred many many years before conviction. Since there is no statute of limitations for sex crimes involving a minor, the DA can bring charges 10, 20, or 30 years later. It’s not only very difficult to defend yourself against these accusations, but you then have to wait 20 years to get off the registry for a single offense that is decades old. Essentially, that means a tier 2 offense can keep someone on the registry 30, 40, or 50 years after the offense. If someone has multiple victims I could understand the need to wait but a single offense should not keep someone tied up in registration hell forever.
Regarding the Halloween signs, I think I might start a betting pool on which state will try it again next year. I’m glad Janice is willing, but still frustrated that she has to waste time and effort beating the same dead horse.
Regarding the “treatment” thing, most programs are simply cash cows for the providers and extra eyes for parole/probation officers and have very little (if anything) to do with mental health. I don’t see what good it does to provide the registrants a written evaluation of why more “treatment” is needed – said evaluation will likely be nothing but a form letter without any individualized assessment (which most providers are grossly under qualified to make anyway) and filled with vagaries that say nothing about the person or circumstance. Personally, I would take those so-called assessments to the licensing board, especially if others in the same group get the exact same letter or form.
Frankly, I would have fought the “treatment” requirement with existing statutes. In Georgia (and other states I’m sure) the law presumes a person is perfectly sane when committing a crime absent proof to the contrary (ditto at trial or plea hearing) and that the commission of a crime cannot be the sole indication of a mental health condition to warrant involuntary mental health treatment. Further, to authorize a court to mandate such treatment, the defendant must be competently diagnosed by a licensed psychiatrist or physician.
Nor can it be said that the person voluntarily accepted such treatment, at least as a probation condition. It’s not incentivized like in substance abuse programs where probation ends up on completion of “treatment”, assuming one can complete such programs (very often not the case) and probation is immediately revoked if one is unwilling or unable to complete or participate to the satisfaction of the providers. Also important, most providers are mere substance abuse counselors whose assessments are more driven by a calendar than the behavior of the client and possess absolutely no qualifications whatsoever to diagnose mental health. The substance abuse programs on which “treatment” is based also show ineffectiveness, as the same people who complete these programs still run in and out of the drug courts every year.
As far as tiering, I still consider it wasted effort. While some have benefitted from the tiering system (as long as they don’t leave the state, at least), it only makes the registry as a whole more of the overly complicated, useless, financially draining, unconstitutional, bureaucratic waste it was to begin with. Moreso when significant time and resources are spent to make the tiered system work or be more fair.
There is an argument on another story here at ACSOL saying that the protection of children is not a magic mantra to run roughshod over the rights of adults. Should that prevail (and I for one am optimistic it will), I would think it a very effective argument to use to challenge the whole registry scheme.
Those 290.5 treatment facilities are out of control, If you’re a person forced to register and forced to attend these classes be careful with you say to those people because they’re documenting everything especially if you are Tier 1 or 2.
There is an off ramp for Tier 3 if their charge was attempted or if their CP case was a misdemeanor. People can’t expect ACSOL to do everything everyone needs to write the DOJ and send letters or maybe organize a few people and go down to the DOJ office and find out what’s going on.
I just hope that some day those who received a 1203.4 will be moved down to Tier 1 or removed from the registry all together. My fiance is not even on the National Megan’s Law website and his offense, under Federal law, is not even registrable. Yet, he was moved from being non disclosed to Tier 3 with full address disclosure after the new law went into effect. And all that with expunged offenses. His Static-99R score was the same with the old law (hence the word “static”). How can they justify putting him in the highest tier when with the old law, the score had no bearing at all. CA is still an offense based State, and now they are considering the Static-99R also?